W$M

YALE
UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

THE
WORKS OF CHARLES KINGSLEY.
VOLUME XXI.
VILLAGE SERMONS,
AND
TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.

THE WORKS OK
CHARLES KINGSLEY.

VOLUME XXI.

VILLAGE SERMONS,
AND
TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.

MACMILLAN AND CO.
x886.

VILLAGE SERMONS,

AND

TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.

VILLAGE SERMONS,

TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.

BY
CHARLES KINGSLEY.

'- /

MACMILLAN AND CO.
1886.

gleuicateii to
MY MOST KIND AND FAITHFUL FRIEND,
THE HONOURABLE AND VERY REVEREND
GERALD WELLESLEY,
DEAN OF WINDSOR.

CONTENTS.

VILLAGE SERMONS.

I. God's World, .
II. Religion not Godliness,
III. Life and Death,
IV. The Work of God's Spirit,
V. Faith,
VI. The Spirit and the Flesh,
VII. Retribution,
VIII. Self-Destruction, .
IX. Hell on Earth,
X. Noah's Justice, .
XI. The Noachic Covenant.
XII. Abraham's Faith,
XIII. Abraham's Obedience,
XIV. Our Father in Heaven,
XV. The Transfiguration,
¦XVI. The Crucifixion,
XVII. The Resurrection, .

io>iS
2S 34-
43 5259.
65 74
828999"
106.
114123128.

CONTENTS.

SERMON
XVIII. Improvement,
XIX. Man's Working Day,
XX. Association,
XXI. Heaven on Earth,
XXII. National Privileges,
XXIII. Lenten Thoughts,
XXIV. On Books, .
XXV. The Courage of the Saviour,

PAGE 136r42
149155
161
169
1761S4

TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.

I.

How to Keep Passion Week, .

193

II.

The Divine Hunger and Thirst, .

201

III.

The Transfiguration,

207

IV.

A Soldier's Training,

213

V.

Christ's Shhep, .

219

VI.

The Hearing Ear and the Seeing Eyi

, . 224

VII.

The Victory of Faith, .

231

VIII.

Turning- Points,

IX.

Obadiah, ... . .

243

X.

Religious Dangers, .

XI.

Blessing and Cursing,

XII.

Work,

XIII.
False Prophets,
XIV.
The Rock of Ages, .
XV.
Antipathies, ... . .
290
CONTENTS.

ix

SERMON

PAGfi

XVI.

St. Paul, 

296

XVII.

The Broken and Contrite Heari,

303

XVIII.

St. Peter, 

3°9

XIX.

Elijah, 

3i7

XX.

The Loftiness of Humility, .

323

XXI.

The Knowledge of God, .

331

XXII.

The Torment of Fear,

34i

XXIII.

The Flesh and the Spirit,

345

XXIV.

The Unrighteous Mammon,

35c

XXV.

The Sighs of Christ,

¦ 358

XXVI.

The Woman of Samaria, .

362

XXVII.

The Invasion of the Assyrians,

370

XXVIII.

The Ten Lepers,

375

XXIX.

Pardon and Peace, .

38c

XXX.

The Central Sun,

388

XXXI.

Christmas Peace, ....

394

XXXII.

The Life of the Spirit, .

¦ 398

XXXIII.

The Unchangeable One,

4°3

XXXIV.

EN TOYTQ N1KA 

408

XXXV.

The Eternal Manhood,

4'4

XXXVI.

The Battle Within, .

422

XXXVII.

Hypocrisy, 

42c

XXXVIII.

A People Prepared for the Lord.,

43^

XXXIX.

The Wrath of Love,

44«

VILLAGE SERMONS.

SERMON I.
GOD'S WORLD.

Psalm civ. 24,
O Lord, how manifold are Thy works ! in wisdom hast Thou made them
all : the earth is full of Thy riches.
"\ li 7"HEN we read such psalms as the one from which this
verse is taken, we cannot help seeing, if we consider,
a great difference between them and any hymns or religious
poetry which are commonly written or read in these days.
The hymns which are most liked now, and the psalms which
people most willingly choose out of the Bible, are those which
speak, or seem to speak, about God's dealings with people's
own souls, while such psalms as this are overlooked. People
do not care really about psalms of this kind when they find
them in the Bible, and they do not expect or wish now-a-days
anyone to write poetry like them. For these psalms of which
I speak praise and honour God, not for what He has done to
our souls, but for what He has done and is doing in the world
around us. This very 104th Psalm, for instance, speaks
entirely about things which we hardly care, or even think
proper, to mention in church now. It speaks of this earth
entirely, and the things on it; of the light, the clouds, and
wind — of hills and valleys, and the springs on the hill-sides —
of wild beasts and birds — of grass and corn, and wine and oil —
S A

2 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
of the sun and moon, night and day — the great sea, the ships,
and the fishes, and all the wonderful and nameless creatures
which people the waters — the very birds' nests in the high trees,
and the rabbits burrowing among the rocks, nothing on the
earth but this psalm thinks it worth mentioning. And all this,
which one would expect to find only in a book of natural
history, is in the Bible, in one of the psalms, written to be sung
in the temple at Jerusalem, before the throne of the living God
and His glory which used to be seen in that temple, — inspired,
as we all believe, by God's Spirit, — God's own word, in short :
that is worth thinking of. Surely the man who wrote this must
have thought very differently about this world, with its fields
and woods, and beasts and birds, from what we think. Sup
pose, now, that we had been old Jews in the temple, standing
before the Holy House, and that we believed, as the Jews
believed, that there was only one thin wall and one curtain of
linen between us and the glory of the living God, that unspeak
able brightness and majesty which no one could look at for
fear of instant death, except the high priest in fear and
trembling once a year — that inside that small Holy House, He,
God Almighty, appeared visibly, — God who made heaven
and earth. Suppose we had been there in the temple, and
known all this, -should we have liked to be singing about
beasts and birds, with God Himself close to us ? We should
not have liked it — we should have been terrified, thinking
perhaps about our own sinfulness, perhaps about that wonder
ful majesty which dwelt inside. We should have wished to say
or sing something spiritual, as we call it ; at all events, some
thing very different from the 104th Psalm, about woods, and
rivers, and dumb beasts. We do not like the thought of such
a thing : it seems almost irreverent, almost impertinent to God
to be talking of such things in His presence. Now, does this
show us that we think about this earth, and the things in it, in
a very different way from those old Jews ? They thought it a
fit and proper thing to talk about corn and wine and oil, and

i.J GOD'S WORLD.

cattle and fishes, in the presence of the Almighty God, and we
do not think it fit and proper. We read this psalm when it
comes in the Church service as a matter of course, mainly
because we do not believe that God is here among us. We
should not be so ready to read it if we thought that Almighty
God was so near us.
That is a great difference between us and the old Jews.
Whether it shows that we are better or not than they were in
the main, I cannot tell; perhaps some of them had such
thoughts too, and said, ' It is not respectful to God to talk
about such common-place earthly things in His presence;'
perhaps some of them thought themselves spiritual and pure-
minded for looking down on this psalm, and on David for
writing it. Very likely, for men have had such thoughts in all
ages, and will have them. But the man who wrote this psalm
had no such thoughts. He said himself, in this same psalm,
that his words would please God. Nay, he is not speaking
and preaching about God in this psalm, as I am now in my
sermon, but he is doing more ; he is speaking to God — a much
more solemn thing, if you will think of it. He says, ' O Lord
my God, Thou art become exceedingly glorious. Thou deckest
Thyself with light as with a garment. All the beasts wait on
Thee; when Thou givest them meat they gather it. Thou
renewest the face of the earth.' When he turns and speaks of
God as ' He,' saying, ' He appointed the moon,' and so
On, he cannot help going back to God, and pouring out his
wonder, and delight, and awe, to God Himself, as we would
sooner speak to anyone we love and honour than merely speak
about them. He cannot take his mind off God. And just at
the last, when he does turn and speak to himself, it is to say,
'Praise thou the Lord, O my soul, praise the Lord,' as if
rebuking and stirring up himself for being too cold-hearted
and slow, for not admiring and honouring enough the infinite
wisdom, and power, and love, and glorious majesty of God,
which to him shines out in every hedge-side bird and every

4 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
blade of grass. Truly I said that man had a very different
way of looking at God's earth from what we have !
Now, in what did that difference lie ? What was it ? We
need not look far to see. It was this, — David looked on the
earth as God's earth ; we look on it as man's earth, or nobody's
earth. We know that we are here, with trees and grass, and
beasts and birds round us. And we know that we did not put
them here ; and that, after we are dead and gone, they will go
on just as they went on before we were born, — each tree,
and flower, and animal, after its kind : but we know nothing
more. The earth is here, and we on it ; but who put it there,
and why it is there, and why we are on it, instead of being any
where else, few ever think. But to David the earth looked
very different ; it had quite another meaning ; it spoke to him
of God who made it. By seeing what this earth is like, he saw
what God who made it is like ; and we see no such thing.
The earth ? — we can eat the corn and cattle on it, we can earn
money by farming it, and ploughing and digging it ; and that
is all most men know about it. But David knew something
more — something which made him feel himself very weak, and
yet very safe ; very ignorant and stupid, and yet honoured
with glorious knowledge from God, — something which made
him feel that he belonged to this world, and must not forget it
or neglect it ; namely, that this earth was his lesson-book —
this earth was his work-field; and yet those same thoughts
which showed him how he was made for the land round him,
and the land round him was made for him, showed him also
that he belonged to another world — a spirit-world; showed
him that when this world passed away, he should live for ever ;
showed him that while he had a mortal body, he had an im
mortal sou] too; showed him that though his home and
business were here on earth, yet that, for that very reason, his
home and business were in heaven, with God who made the
earth, with that blessed One of whom he said, ' Thou, Lord,
in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth, and the

I.] GOD'S WORLD. 5
heavens are the work of Thy hands. They shall perish, but
Thou shalt endure ; they all shall fade as a garment, and like
a vesture shalt Thou change them, and they shall be changed ;
but Thou art the same, and Thy years shall not fail. The
children of Thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall
stand fast in Thy sight.' 'As a garment shalt thou change
them,' — ay, there was David's secret ! He saw that this earth
and skies are God's garment — the garment by which we see
God ; and that is what our forefathers saw too, and just what
we have forgotten ; but David had not forgotten it. Look at
this very 104th Psalm again, how he refers everything to God.
We say, ' The light shines :' David says something more ; he
says, ' Thou, O God, adornest Thyself with light, as with a
curtain.' Light is a picture of God. ' God,' says St. John,
' is light, and in Him is no darkness at all.' We say, ' The
clouds fly, and the wind blows,' as if they went of themselves ;
David says, ' God makes the clouds His chariot, and walks
upon the wings of the wind.' We talk of the rich airs of
spring, of the flashing lightning of summer, as dead things ;
and men who call themselves wise say, that lightning is only
matter, — ' We can grind the like of it out of glass and silk, and
make lightning for ourselves in a small way;' and so they can
in a small way, and in a very small one : David does not deny
that, but he puts us in mind of something in that lightning and
those breezes which we cannot make. He says God makes
the winds His angels, and flaming fire His ministers ; and St.
Paul takes the same text, and turns it round to suit his purpose,
when he is talking of the blessed angels, saying, ' That text in
the 104th Psalm means something more; it means that God
makes His angels spirits (that is, winds), and His ministers a
flaming fire.' So showing us that in those breezes there are
living spirits, that God's angels guide those thunder-clouds;
that the roaring thunderclap is a shock in the air truly, but that
it is something more — that it is the voice of God, which shakes
the cedar trees of Lebanon, and tears down the thick bushes,

6 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
and makes the wild deer slip her young. So we read in the
psalms in church; that is David's account of the thunder. I
take it for a true account ; you may or not, as you like. See
again. Those springs in the hill-sides, how do they come
there ? ' Rain-water soaking and flowing out,' we say. True,
but David says something more ; he says God sends the
springs, and He sends them into the rivers too. You may say,
' Why, water must run down-hill, what need of God ? ' But
suppose God had chosen that water should run up hill, and not
down, how would it have been then ? — Very different I think.
No, He sends them ; He sends all things. Wherever there is
anything useful, His spirit has settled it. The help that is
done on earth, He doeth it all Himself. — Loving and merciful,
— caring for the poor dumb beasts ! He sends the springs,
and David says, ' All the beasts of the fields drink thereof.'
The wild animals in the night, He cares for them too — He,
the Almighty God. We hear the foxes bark by night, and we
think the fox is hungry, and there it ends with us ; but not with
David : he says, ' The lions roaring after their prey do seek
their meat from God' — God, who feedeth the young ravens
who call upon Him. He is a God ! ' He did not make the
world,' says a wise man, ' and then let it spin round His finger,'
as we wind up a watch, and then leave it to go of itself. No ¦
' His mercy is over all His works.' Loving and merciful, the
God of nature is the God of grace. The same love which
chose us and our forefathers for His people while we were yet
dead in trespasses and sins ; the same only-begotten Son,
who came down on earth to die for us poor wretches on the
cross, — that same love, that same power, that same Word of
God, who made heaven and earth, looks after the poor gnats
m the winter time, that they may have a chance of coming out
of the ground when the day stirs the little life in them, and
dance in the sunbeam for a short hour of gay life, before they
return to the dust whence they were made, to feed creatures
nobler and more precious than themselves. That is all God's

I.j GOD'S WORLD.

doing, all the doing of Christ, the King of the earth. ' They
wait on Him,' says David. The beasts, and birds, and insects,
the strange fish, and shells, and the nameless corals too, in the
deep, deep sea, who build and build below the water for years
and thousands of years, every little, tiny creature bringing his
atom of lime to add to the great heap, till their heap stands
out of the water and becomes dry land ; and seeds float
thither over the wide waste sea, and trees grow up, and birds
are driven thither by storms : and men come by accident in
stray ships, and build, and sow, and multiply, and raise
churches, and worship the God of heaven, and Christ, the
blessed One, on that new land which the little coral-worms
have built up from the deep. Consider that. Who sent them
there ? Who contrived that those particular men should light
on that new island at that especial time? Who guided
thither those seeds, those birds ? Who gave those insects that
strange longing and power to build and build on continually ?
— Christ, by whom all things are made, to whom all power is
given in heaven and earth ; Pie and His Spirit, and none else.
It is when He opens His hands, they are filled with good. It
is when He takes away their breath, they die, and turn again
to their dust. He lets His breath, His spirit, go forth, and out
of that dead dust grow plants and herbs afresh for man and
beast, and He renews the face of the earth. ' For,' says the
wise man, ' all things are God's garment ' — outward and visible
signs of His unseen and unapproachable glory ; and when they
are worn out, He changes them, says the Psalmist, as a gar
ment, and they shall be changed.
The old order changes, giving place to the new,
And God fulfils Himself in many ways.
But He is the same. He is there all the time. All things are
His work. In all things we may see Him, if our souls have
eyes. All things, be they what they may, which live and grow
on this earth, or happen on land or in the sky, will tell us a

8 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
tale of God, — show forth some one feature, at least, of our
blessed Saviour's countenance and character, — either His fore
sight, or His wisdom, or His order, or His power, or His love,
or His condescension, or His long-suffering, or His slow, sure
vengeance on those who break His laws. It is all written
there outside in the great green book, which God has given to
labouring men, and which neither man nor fiend can take from
them. The man who is no scholar in letters may read of God
as he follows the plough, for the earth he ploughs is his
Father's : there is God's mark and seal on it — His name,
which, though it is written on the dust, yet neither man nor
fiend can wipe it out !
The poor, solitary, untaught boy, who keeps the sheep, or
minds the birds, long lonely days, far from his mother and his
playmates, may keep alive in him all purifying thoughts, if he
will but open his eyes and look at the green earth around him.
Think now, my boys, when you are at your work, how all
things may put you in mind of God, if you do but choose.
The trees which shelter you from the wind, God planted them
there for your sakes, in His love. There is a lesson about
God. The birds which you drive off the corn — who gave them
the sense to keep together and profit by each other's wit and
keen eyesight? *Who but God, who feeds the young birds
when they call on Him ? There is another lesson about God.
The sheep whom you follow — who ordered the warm wool to
grow on them, from which your clothes are made ? Who but
the Spirit of God above, who clothes the grass of the field, and
the silly sheep, and who clothes you too, and thinks of you
when you do not think of yourselves? There is another
lesson about God. The feeble lambs in spring, they ought to
remind you surely of your blessed Saviour, the Lamb of God,
who died for you upon the cruel cross, who was led as a lamb
to the slaughter ; and like a sheep that lies dumb and patient
under the shearer's hand, so He opened not His mouth. Are
not these lambs, then, a lesson from God ? And these are but

1.] GOD'S WORLD.

one or two examples out of thousands and thousands. Oh,
that I could make you, young and old, all feel these things !
Oh, that I could make you see God in everything, and every
thing in God ! Oh, that I could make you look on this earth,
not as a mere dull, dreary prison and workhouse for your
mortal bodies, but as a living book, to speak to you at every
time of the living God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost ! Sure I
am that that would be a heavenly life for you, — sure I am that
it would keep you from many a sin, and stir you up to many a
holy thought and deed, if you could learn to find in everything
around you, however small or mean, the work of God's hand,
the likeness of God's countenance, the shadow of God's glory. „

SERMON II.
RELIGION NOT GODLINESS.

Psalm civ. 13 — 15!
He watereth the hills from his chambers : the earth is satisfied with the
fruit of thy works. He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle, and
herb for the service of man : that he may bring forth food out of the
earth ; and wine that maketh glad the heart of man, and oil to make his
face to shine, and bread which strengthened man's heart.
T^ID you every remark, my friends, that the Bible says
hardly anything about religion — that it never praises
religious people? This is very curious. Would to God
we would all remember it ! The Bible speaks of a religious
man only once? and of religion only twice, except where it
speaks of the Jews' religion to condemn it, and shows what an
empty, blind, useless thing it was.
What does this Bible talk of, then ? It talks of God ; not
of religion, but of God. It tells us not to be religious, but to
be godly. You may think there is no difference, or that it is
but a difference of words. I tell you that a difference in words
is a very awful, important difference. A difference in words is
a difference in things. Words are very awful and wonderful
things, for they come from the most awful and wonderful of all
beings, Jesus Christ, the Word. He puts words into men's
minds. He made all things, and He makes all words to
express those things with. And woe to those who use the

RELIGION NOT GODLINESS. n
wrong words about things ! For if a man calls anything by
its wrong name, it is a sure sign that he understands that
thing wrongly, or feels about it wrongly ; and therefore a man's
words are often honesler than he thinks ; for as a man's words
are, so is a man's heart ; out of the abundance of our hearts
our mouths speak ; and, therefore, by right words, by the right
names which we call things, we shall be justified, and by our
words, by the wrong names we call things, we shall be con
demned. Therefore a difference in words is a difference in the things
which those words mean, and there is a difference between
religion and godliness ; and we show it by our words. Now
these are religious times, but they are very ungodly times ; and
we show that also by our words. Because we think that people
ought to be religious, we talk a great deal about religion;
because we hardly think at all that a man ought to be godly,
we talk very little about God, and that good old Bible word
' godliness ' does not pass our lips once a month. For a man
may be very religious, my friends, and yet very ungodly. The
heathens were very religious at the very time that, as St. Paul
tells us, they would not keep God in their knowledge. The
Jews were the most religious people on the earth, they hardly
talked or thought about anything but religion, at the veiy time
that they knew so little of God that they crucified Him when
He came down among them. St. Paul says that he was living
after the strictest sect of the Jews' religion, at the very time
that he was fighting against God, persecuting God's people and
God's Son, and dead in trespasses and sins. These are ugly
facts, my friends, but they are true, and well worth our laying to
heart in these religious, ungodly days. I am afraid if Jesus
Christ came down into England this day as a carpenter's son,
He would get— a better hearing, perhaps, than the Jews gave
Him, but still a very bad hearing — one dare hardly think of it.
And yet I believe we ought to think of it, and, by God's
help, I will one day preach you a sermon, asking you all round

12 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
this fair question : — If Jesus Christ came to you in the shape
of a poor man, whom nobody knew, should you know Him ;
should you admire Him, fall at His feet, and give yourself up
to Him body and soul ? I am afraid that I, for one, should
not — I am afraid that too many of us here would not. That
comes of thinking more of religion, than we do of godliness —
in plain words, more of our own souls than we do of Jesus
Christ. But you will want to know what is, after all, the
difference between religion and godliness ? Just the difference,
my friends, that there is between always thinking of self and
always forgetting self — between the terror of a slave and the
affection of a child — between the fear of hell and the love of
God. For, tell me what you mean by being religious ? Do
you not mean thinking a great deal about your own souls, and
praying and reading about your own souls, and trying by all
possible means to get your own souls saved ? Is not that the
meaning of religion ? And yet I have never mentioned God's '
name in describing it ! This sort of religion must have very
little to do with God. You may be surprised at my words, and
say in your hearts, almost angrily, ' Why, who saves our souls
but God? Therefore religion must have to do with God.'
But, my friends, for your souls' sake, and for God's sake, ask
yourselves this Question on your' knees this day : — If you could
get your souls saved without God's help, would it make much
difference to you ? Suppose an angel from heaven, as they say,
was to come down and prove to you clearly that there was no
God, no blessed Jesus in heaven, that the world made itself,
and went on of itself, and that the Bible was all a mistake,
but that you need not mind, for that your gardens and crops
would grow just as well, and your souls be saved just as well
when you died.
To how many of you would it make any difference? To
some of you, thank God, I believe it would make a difference.
There are some here, I believe, who would feel that news the
worst news they ever heard — worse than if they were told that

u.] RELIGION NOT GODLINESS. 13
their souls were lost for ever ; there are some here, I do believe,
who, at that news, would cry aloud in agony, like little children
who had lost their father, and say, ' No Father in heaven to
love? No blessed Jesus in heaven to work for, and die for,
and glory and delight in ? No God to rule and manage this
poor, miserable, quarrelsome world, bringing good out of evil,
blessing and guiding all things and people on earth ? What do
I care what becomes of my soul if there is no God for my soul
to glory in ? What is heaven worth without God ? God is
heaven !'
Yes, indeed, what would heaven be worth without God ?
But how many people feel that the curse of this day is, that
most people have forgotten that 1 They are selfishly anxious
enough about their own souls, but they have forgotten God.
They are religious, for fear of hell ; but they are not godly, for
they do not love God, or see God's hand in everything. They
forget that they have a Father in heaven ; that He sends rain,
and sunshine, and fruitful seasons ; that He gives them all
things richly to enjoy in spite of all their sins. His mercies
are far above, out of their sight, and therefore His judgments
are far away out of their sight too ; and so they talk of ' the
visitation of God,' as if it was something that was very extraor
dinary, and happened very seldom ; and when it came, only
brought evil, harm, and sorrow. If a man lives on in health,
they say he lives by the strength of his own constitution ; if he
drops down dead, they say he died by ' the visitation of God.'
If the corn-crops go on all right and safe, they think that quite
natural — the effect of the soil, and the weather, and their own
skill in fanning and gardening. But if there comes a hail
storm or a blight, and spoils it all, and brings on a famine,
they call it at once ' a visitation of God.' My friends, do you
think God ' visits ' the earth or you only to harm you ? I tell
you that every blade of grass grows by ' the visitation of Gpd.'
I tell you that every healthy breath you ever drew, every cheer
ful hour vou ever spent, every good crop you ever housed

14 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
safely, came to you by ' the visitation of God.' I tell you that
every sensible thought or plan that ever came into your heads,
every loving, honest, manly, womanly feeling that ever rose in
your hearts, God ' visited ' you to put it there. If God's
Spirit had not given it you, you would never have got it of
yourselves. But people forget this, and therefore they have so little real
love to God — so little real, loyal, childlike trust in God.
They do not think much about God, because they find
no pleasure in thinking about Him ; they look on God
as a taskmaster, gathering where He has not strewed,
reaping where He has not sown ; a taskmaster who has put
them, very miserable, sinful creatures, to struggle on in a
very miserable, sinful world, and, though He tells them in
His Bible that they cannot keep His commandments, expects
them to keep them just the same, and will at the last send
them all into everlasting fire, unless they take a great deal of
care, and give up a great many natural and pleasant things, and
beseech and entreat Him very hard to excuse them after all.
This is the thought which most people have of God, even
religious people; they look on God as a stern tyrant, who,
when man sinned and fell, could not satisfy His own justice —
His own vengeaifce, in plain words — without killing some one,
and who would have certainly killed all mankind, if Jesus
Christ had not interfered, and said, ' If Thou must slay some
one, slay me, though I am innocent !'
Oh, my friends, does not this all sound horrible and
irreverent? And yet, if you will but look into your own
hearts, will you not find some such thoughts there ? I am sure
you will. I believe every man finds such thoughts in his
heart now and then. I find them in my own heart : I know
that they must be in the hearts of others, because I see them pro
ducing their natural fruits in people's actions, — a selfish, slavish
view of religion, with little or no real love to God, or real
trust in Him ; but a great deal of uneasy dread of Him : for

"¦ ] RELIGION NOT GODLINESS.

15

this is just the dark, false view of God, and of the good news
of salvation and the kingdom of heaven, which the devil is
always trying to make men take. The Evil One tries to make
us forget that God is love ; he tries to make us forget that
God gives us all things richly to enjoy ; he tries to make us
forget that God gives at all, and to make us think that we take,
not that He gives ; to make us look at God as a taskmaster,
not as a Father ; in one word, to make us mistake the devil for
God, and God for the devil.
And therefore it is that we ought to bless God for such
Scriptures as this 104th Psalm, which He seems to have pre
served in the Bible just to contradict these dark, slavish notions,
— just to testify that God is a giver, and knows our necessities
before we ask, and gives us all things, even as He gave us His
blessed Son — freely, long before we wanted them, — from the
foundation of all things, before ever the earth and the world
was made — from all eternity, perpetual Love and perpetual
Bounty. What does this text teach us ? To look at God as Him
who gives to all freely, and upbraideth not. It says to us, Do
not suppose that your crops grow of themselves. God waters
the hills from above. He causes the grass to grow for the cattle,
and the green herb for the service of man. Do not suppose
that He cares nothing about seeing you comfortable and
happy. It is He, He only, who sends all which strengthens
man's body, and makes glad his heart, and makes him of a
cheerful countenance. His will is that you should be
cheerful. Ah, my friends, if we would but believe all
this ! We are too apt to say to ourselves, ' Our earthly
comforts here have nothing to do with godliness or God ; God
must save our souls, but our bodies we must save ourselves.
God gives us spiritual blessings, but earthly blessings, the good
things of this life, for them we must scramble and drudge our-
selves,and get as much of them as we can without offending God;'
— as if God grudged us our comforts ! as if godliness had not the

1-6 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
promise of this life as well as the life to come ! If we would
but believe that God knows our necessities before we ask —
that He gives us daily more than we can ever get by working
for it ! — if we would but seek first the kingdom of God and His
righteousness, all other things would be added to us ; and we
should find that he who loses his life should save it. And
this way of looking at God's earth would not make us idle ; it
would not tempt us to sit with folded hands for God's blessings
to drop into our mouths. No ; I believe it would make men
far more industrious than ever mere self-interest can make
them ; they would say, ' God is our Father ; He gave us His
only Son, He gives us all things freely; we owe Him not
slavish service, but a boundless debt of cheerful gratitude.
Therefore we must do His will, and we are sure His will must
be our happiness and comfort ; therefore we must do His will,
and His will is that we should work, and therefore we must
work. He has bidden us labour on this earth — He has bidden
us dress it and keep it, conquer it and fill it for Him. We are
His stewards here on earth, and therefore it is a glory and an
honour to be allowed to work here in God's own land — in
our loving Father's own garden. We do not know why He
wishes us to labour and till the ground, for He could have fed
us with manna*from heaven if He liked, as He fed the Jews of
old, without our working at all. But His will is that we should
work ; and work we will, not for our own sakes merely, but for
His sake, because we know He likes it, and for the sake of our
brothers, our countrymen, for whom Christ died.'
Oh, my friends, why is it that so many till the ground
industriously, and yet grow poorer and poorer for all their
drudging and working ? It is their own fault. They till the
ground for their own sakes, and not for God's sake and for
their countrymen's sake ; and so, as the Prophet says, they
sow much and bring in little ; and he who earns wages earns
them to put in a bag full of holes. Suppose you try the
opposite plan : suppose you say to yourself, ' I will work

n.] RELIGION NOT GODLINESS. 17
henceforward because God wishes me to work. I will work
henceforward for my country's sake, because I feel that God
has given me a noble and a holy calling when He set me to
grow food for His children, the people of England. As for my
wages and my profit, God will take care of them if they are just ;
and if they are unjust, He will take care of them too. He, at all
events, makes the garden and the field grow, and ndt I. My
land is filled, not with the fruit of my work, but with the fruit
of His work. He will see that I lose nothing by my labour.
If I till the soil for God and for God's children, I may trust God
to pay me my wages.' Oh, my friends, He who feeds the young
birds when they call upon Him ; and far, far more, He who
gave you His only-begotten Son, will He not with Him freely
give you all things ? For, after all done, He must give to you,
or you will not get. You may fret and stint, and scrape and
puzzle ; one man may sow, and another man may water ; but,
after all, who can give the increase but God ? Can you make
a load of hay, unless He has first grown it for you, and then
dried it for you ? If you would but think a little more about
Him, if you would believe that your crops were His gifts, and
in your hearts offer them up to Him as thank-offerings, see if
He would not help you to sell your crops as well as to house
them. He would put you in the way of an honest profit for
your labour just as surely as He only put you in the way of
labouring at all. 'Trust in the Lord, and be doing good;
dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed ;' for ' without
me,' says our Lord, ' you can do nothing.' No : these are His
own words — nothing. To Him all power is given in heaven
and earth ; He knows every root and every leaf, and feeds it.
Will He not much more feed you, oh ye of little faith ? Do
you think that He has made His world so ill that a man cannot
get on in it unless he is -a knave ? No. Cast all your care on
Him, and see if you do not find out ere long that He cares for
you, and has cared for you from all eternity.

SERMON III.
LIFE AND DEATH.

Psalm civ. 24, 28 — 30.
O Lord, how manifold are Thy works ! in wisdom hast Thou made them
all : the earth is full of Thy riches. That Thou gavest them they
gather : Thou openest Thine hand, they are filled with good. Thou
hidest Thy face, they are troubled : Thou takest away their breath, they
die, and return to their dust. Thou sendest forth Thy spirit, they are
created : and Thou renewest the face of the earth.
T HAD intended to go through this psalm with you in
regular order ; but things have happened in this parish,
awful and sad, during the last week, which I was bound not to
let slip withouftrying to bring them home to your hearts, if by
any means I could persuade the thoughtless ones among you
to be wise and consider your latter end : — I mean the sad
deaths of various of our acquaintances. The death-bell has
been tolled in this parish three times, I believe, in one day — a
thing which has seldom happened before, and which, God
grant, may never happen again. Within two miles of this
church there are now five lying dead. Five human beings,
young as well as old, to whom the awful words of the text have
been fulfilled : ' Thou takest away their breath, they die, and
return to their dust.' And the very day on which three of these
deaths happened was Ascension-day — the day on which Jesus,
the Lord of life, the conqueror of death, ascended up on high,

LIFE AND DEATH.

19

having led captivity captive, and became the first-fruits of the
grave, to send down from the heaven of eternal life the Spirit
who is the Giver of life. That was a strange mixture, death
seemingly triumphant over Christ's people on the very day on
which life triumphed in Jesus Christ Himself. Let us see,
though, whether death has not something to do with Ascension-
day. Let us see whether a sermon about death is not a fit
sermon for the Sunday after Ascension-day. Let us see
whether the text has not a message about life and death too —
a message which may make us feel that in the midst of life we
are in death, and that yet in the midst of death we are in life ;
that however things may seem, yet death has not conquered
life, but life has conquered and will conquer death, and con
quer it most completely at the very moment that we die, and
our bodies return to their dust.
Do I speak riddles ? I think the text will explain my riddles,
for it tells us how life comes, how death comes. Life comes
from God : He sends forth His Spirit, and things are made,
and He renews the face of the earth. We read in the very
first two verses of the book of Genesis how the Spirit of God
moved upon the face of the waters at the creation, and woke
all things into life. Therefore the Creed well calls the Holy
Ghost, the Spirit of God — that is, the Lord and Giver of
Life. And the text tells us that He gives life, not only to us
who have immortal souls, but to everything on the face of the
earth ; for the psalm has been talking all through, not only of
men, but of beasts, fishes, trees, and rivers, and recks, sun and
moon. Now all these things have a life in them. Not a life
like ours ; but still you speak rightly and wisely when you say,
'That tree is alive, and That tree is dead. That running
water is live water — it is sweet and fresh; but if it is kept
standing it begins to putrefy, its life is gone from it, and a sort
of death comes over it, and makes it foul, and unwholesome, and
unfit to drink.' This is a deep matter, this ; how there is a sort
of life in everything, even to the stones under our feet. I do

20 VILLAGE SERMONS. [_SERM.
not mean, of course, that stones can think as our life makes
us do, or feel as the beasts' life makes them do, or even grow
as the trees' life makes them do ; but I mean that their life
keep them as they are, without changing or decaying. You
hear miners and quarrymen talk very truly of the live rock.
That stone, they say, was cut out of the live rock, meaning the
rock as it is under ground, sound and hard — as it would be,
for aught we know, to the end of time, unless it was taken out
of the ground, out of the place where God's Spirit meant it to
be, and brought up to the open air and the rain, in which it is
not its nature to be. And then you will see that the life of the
stone begins to pass from it bit by bit, that it crumbles and
peels away, and, in short, decays and is turned again to its
dust. Its organization, as it is called, or life, ends, and then —
what ? does the stone lie for ever useless ? No ! And there
is the great blessed mystery of how God's Spirit is always bring
ing life out of death. When the stone is decayed and crumbled
down to dust and clay, it makes soil — this very soil here,
which you plough, is the decayed ruins of ancient hills ; the
clay which you dig up in the fields was once part of some
slate or granite mountains, which were worn away by weather
and water, that they might become fruitful earth. Wonderful !
but anyone wfto has studied these things can tell you they are
true. Anyone who has ever lived in mountainous countries
ought to have seen the thing happen, ought to know that the
land in the mountain valleys is made at first, and kept rich year
by year, by the washings from the hills above ; and this is the
reason why land left dry by rivers and by the sea is generally
so rich. Then what becomes of the soil ? It begins a new
life. The roots of the plants take it up ; the salts which they
find in it — the staple, as we call them — go to make leaves and
seed ; the very sand has its use, it feeds the stalks of corn and
grass, and makes them stiff. The corn-stalks would never
stand upright if they could not get sand from the soil. So
what a thousand years ago made part of a mountain, now makes

m.] LIFE AND DEATH.

21

part of a wheat plant ; and in a year more the wheat grain will
have been eaten, and the wheat straw perhaps eaten too, and
they will have died — decayed in the bodies of the animals who
have eaten them, and then they will begin a third new life —
they will be turned into parts of the animal's body — of a man's
body. So that what is now your bone and flesh, may have
been once a rock on some hill-side a hundred miles away.
Strange, but true ! all learned men know that it is true.
You, if you think over my words, may see that they are at
least reasonable. But still most wonderful ! This world
works right well surely. It obeys God's spirit. Oh, my
friends, if we fulfilled our life and our duty as well as the clay
which we tread on does — if we obeyed God's Spirit as
surely as the flint does, we should have many a heartache
spared us, and many a headache too ! To be what God
wants us ! — to be men, to be women, and therefore to live as
children of God, members of Christ, fulfilling our duty in that
state to which God has called us — that would be our bliss and
glory. Nothing can live in a state in which God did not
intend it to live. Suppose a tree could move itself about like
an animal, and chose to do so, the tree would wither and die ;
it would be trying to act contrary to the law which God has
given it. Suppose the ox chose to eat meat like the lion, it
would fall sick and die ; for it would be acting contrary to the
law which God's Spirit had made for it — going out of the
calling to which God's word has called it, to eat grass and not
flesh, and live thereby. And so with us; if we will do
wickedly, when the will of God, as the Scripture tells us, is our
sanctification, our holiness ; if we will speak lies, when God's
law for us is that we should speak truth ; if we will bear hatred
and ill-will, when God's law for us is, Love as brothers — you
all sprang from one father, Adam — you were all redeemed by
one brother, Jesus Christ ; if we will try to live as if there was
no God, when God's law for us is, that a man can live like a
man only by faith and trust in God ; — then we shall die, if we

22 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
break God's laws according to which he intended man to live.
Thus it was with Adam ; God intended him to obey God, to
learn everything from God. He chose to disobey God, to try
and know something of himself, by getting the knowledge of
good and evil ; and so death passed on him. He became an
unnatural man, a bad man, more or less, and so he became a
dead man ; and death came into the world, that time at least,
by sin, by breaking the law by which man was meant to be a
man. As the beasts will die if you give them unnatural food,
or in any way prevent their following the laws which God has
made for them, so man dies of necessity. All the world can
not help his dying, because he breaks the laws which God has
made for him.
And how does he die ? The text tells us, God takes away
his breath, and turns His face from him. In His presence, it
is written, is life. The moment He withdraws His Spirit, the
Spirit of life, from anything, body or soul, then it dies. It was
by sin came death — by man's becoming unfit for the Spirit of
God. Therefore the body is dead because of sin, says St. Paul,
doomed to die, carrying about in it the seeds of death, from the
very moment it is born. Death has truly passed upon all men !
Most sad ; and yet there is hope, and more than hope, there
is certain assurance, for us, that though we die, yet shall we
live ! I have shown you, in the beginning of my sermon, how
nothing that dies perishes to nothing, but begins a new and a
higher life. How the stone becomes a plant — something better
and more useful than it was before ; the plant passes into an
animal — a step higher still. And therefore we may be sure that
the same rule will hold good about us men and women, that
when we die, we shall begin a new and a nobler life, that is, if
we have been true men ; if we have lived fulfilling the law of
our kind. St. Paul tells us so positively. He says that nothing
conies to life except it first die, then God gives it a new body.
He says that even so is the resurrection of the dead, — that we

III.] LIFE AND DEATH. 23
gain a step by dying ; that we are sown in corruption, and are
raised in incorruption ; we are sown in dishonour, and are
"raised in glory ; we are sown in weakness, and are raised in
power ; we are sown a natural body, and are raised a spiritual
body ; that as we now are of the earth earthy, after death and
the resurrection our new and nobler body will be of the heavens
heavenly ; so that ' when this corruptible shall have put on in
corruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then
death shall be swallowed up in victory.' Therefore I say,
Sorrow not for those who sleep as if you had no hope for the
dead ; for ' Christ is risen from the dead, and become the first-
fruits of them that slept. For as in Adam all die, even so in
Christ shall all be made alive.'
And I say that this has to do with the text — it has to do with
Ascension-day. For if we claim our share in Christ, — if we
claim our share of our heavenly Father's promise, ' to give the
Holy Spirit to those who ask Him,' then we may certainly hope
for our share in Christ's resurrection, our share in Christ's
ascension. For, says St. Paul (Rom. viii. 10, n), 'If Christ
be in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life
because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him who raised
up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ
from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies, by His
Spirit that dwelleth in you ! ' There is a blessed promise ! that
in that, as in everything, we shall be made like Christ our
Master, the new Adam, who is a life-giving Spirit, that as He
was brought to life again by the Spirit of God, so we shall be.
And so will be fulfilled in us the glorious rule which the text
lays down, ' Thou, O God, sendest forth Thy Spirit, and they
are created, and Thou dost renew the face of the earth.'' Ful
filled ? — yes, but far more gloriously than ever the old Psalmist
expected. Read the Revelation of St. John, chapters xxi. and
xxii., for the glory of the renewed earth ; read the First Epistle
of Paul to the Thessalonians, chap. iv. 16 — 18, for the glcrious
resurrection and ascension of those who have died trusting in

24 VILLAGE SERMONS.
the blessed Lord, who died for them ; and then see what a
glorious future lies before us — see how death is but the gate of
life — see how what holds true of everything on this earth, down'
to the flint beneath our feet, holds true ten thousand times of
men — that to die and to decay is only to pass into a nobler
state of life. But remember, that just as we are better than the
stone, we may be also worse than the stone. It cannot disobey
God's laws, therefore it can enjoy no reward, any more than
suffer any punishment. We can disobey — we can fall from our
calling — we can cast God's law behind us — we can refuse to do
His will, to work out our own salvation ; and just because our
reward in the life to come will be so glorious, if we fulfil our
life and law, the life of faith and the law of love, therefore will
our punishment be so horrible, if we neglect the life of faith and
trample under foot the law of love. Oh, my friends, choose !
Death is before you all. Shall it be the gate of everlasting life
and glory, or the gate of everlasting death and misery ? Will
you claim your glorious inheritance, and be for ever equal to
the angels, doing God's will on earth as they in heaven ; or will
you fall lower than the stones, who, at all events, must do their
duty as stones, and not do God's will at all, but only suffer it in
eternal woe ? You must do one or the other. You cannot be
like the stone*— without feeling, without joy or sorrow — just
because you are immortal spirits, every one of you. You must
be either happy or miserable, blessed or disgraced, for ever. I
know of no middle path ; — do you ? Choose before the night
comes, in which no man can work. Our life is but a vapour
which appears for a little time, then vanishes away. ' O Lord,
how manifold are Thy works ! in wisdom hast Thou made them
all : the earth is full of Thy riches. That Thou givest them
they gather : Thou openest Thine hand, they are filled with
good. Thou hidest Thy face, they are troubled : Thou takest
away their breath, they die, and return to their dust. Thou
sendest forth Thy Spirit, they are created : and Thou renewest
the face of the earth.'

SERMON IV.
THE WORK OF GOD'S SPIRIT.

James i. 16, 17.
Do not err, my beloved brethren ; every good gift and every perfect gift is
from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights.
'""THIS text, I believe more and more every day, is one of
the most important ones in the whole Bible ; and just at
this time it is more important for us than ever, because people
have forgotten it more than ever.
And, according as, you firmly believe this text, according
as you firmly believe that every good gift you have in body and
soul comes down from above, from God the Father of Lights —
according, I say, as you believe this, and live upon that belief,
just so far will you be able to do your duty to God and man,
worthily of your blessed Saviour's calling and redemption, and
of the high honour which He has given you of being free and
christened men, redeemed by His most precious blood, and
led by His most noble Spirit.
Now, just because this text is so important, the devil is
particularly busy in trying to make people forget it. For what
is his plan ? Is it not to make us forget God, to put God out
of all our thoughts, to make us acknowledge God in none of
our ways, to make us look at ourselves and not at God, so that
we may become first earthly and sensual, and then devilish,
like Satan himself? Therefore he tries to make us disbelieve

26 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
this text. He puts into our hearts such thoughts as these : —
"Ay, all good gifts may come from God; but that only means
all spiritual gifts. All those fine, deep doctrines and wonder
ful feelings that some very religious people talk of, about con
version, and regeneration, and sanctification, and assurance,
and the witness of the indwelling Spirit, — all those gifts come
from God, no doubt, but they are quite above us. We are
straightforward, simple people, who cannot feel fine fancies;
if we can be honest, and industrious, and good-natured, and
sober, and strong, and healthy, that is enough for us, — and all
that has nothing to do with religion. Those are not gifts
which come from God. A man is strong and healthy by birth,
and honest and good-natured by nature. Those are very good
things ; but they are not gifts — they are not graces — they are
not spiritual blessings— they have nothing to do with the state
of a man's soul. Ungodly people are honest, and good-
tempered, and industrious, and healthy, as well as your saints
and your methodists ; so what is the use of praying for spiritual
gifts to God, when we can have all we want by nature ? "
Did such thoughts never come into your heads, my friends ?
Are they not often in your heads, more or less ? Perhaps not
in these very words, but something like them.
I do not sdy it to blame you, for I believe that every man,
each according to his station, is tempted to such thoughts ;' I
believe that such thoughts are not yours or any man's ; I
believe they are the devil's, who tempts all men, who tempted
even the Son of God Himself with thoughts like these at. their
root. Such thoughts are not yours or mine, though they may
come into our heads. They are part of the evil which besets
us— which is not us — which has no right or share in us — which
we pray God drive away from us when we say, " Deliver us
from evil." Have you not all had such thoughts ? But have
you not all had very different thoughts ? have you not, every
one of you, at times, felt in the bottom of your hearts, after all,
"This strength and industry, this courage, and honesty, and

IV.] THE WORK OF GOD'S SPIRIT. 27

good-nature of mine, must come from God ; I did not get them
myself. If I was born honest, and strong, and gentle, and
brave, some one must have made me so when I was born, or
before. The devil certainly did not make me so, therefore
God must. These, too, are His gifts ? "
Did you ever think such thoughts as these ? If you did not,
not much matter, for you have all acted, more or less, in your
better moments, as if you had them. There are more things
in a man's heart, thank God, than ever come into his head.
Many a man does a noble thing by instinct, as we say, without
ever thinking whether it is a noble thing or not — without think
ing about it at all. Many a man, thank God, is led at times,
by God's Spirit, without ever knowing whose Spirit it is that
leads him.
But he ought to know it, for it is willing, reasonable service
which God wants of us. He does not care to use us like tools
and puppets. And why ? He is not merely our Maker, He is
our Father, and He wishes us to know and feel that we are
His children — to know and feel that we all have come from
Him ; to acknowledge Him in all our ways, to thank Him for
all, to look up lovingly and confidently to Him for more, as His
reasonable children, day by day, and hour by hour. Every
good gift we have comes from Him ; but He will have us know
where they all come from.
Let us go through now a few of these good gifts, which we
call natural, and see what the Bible says of them, and from
whom they come.
First, now, that common gift of strength and courage. Who
gives you that ? — who gave it David ? For He that gives it to
one is most likely to be He that gives it to another. David
says to God, ' Thou teachest my hands to war, and my fingers
to fight ; by the help of God I can leap over a wall : He makes
me strong, that my arms can break even a bow of steel.' That
is plain-spoken enough, I think. Who gave Samson his
strength, again ? What says the Bible ? How Samson met a

28 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
young lion which roared against him, and he had nothing in his
hand, and the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him, and
he tore the lion as he would have torn a kid. And, again, how,
when traitors had bound him with two new cords, the Spirit of
the Lord came mightily upon him, and the cords which were on
his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire, and fell from off
his hands. And, for God's sake, do not give in to that miserable
fancy that because these stories are what you call miraculous,
therefore they have nothing to do with you — that Samson's
strength came to him miraculously by God's Spirit, and yet
yours comes to you a different way. The Bible is written to
tell you how all that happens really happens — what all things
really are. God is working among us always, but we do not
see Him ; and the Bible just lifts up, once and for all, the veil
which hides Him from us, and lets us see, in one instance, who
it is that does all the wonderful things which go on round us to
this day, that when we see anything like it happen we may
know whom to thank for it.
The Great Physician healed the blind and the lame in
Judea; and why? — to show us who heals the blind and the
lame now — to show us that the good gift of medicine and
surgery, and the physician's art, comes down from Him who
cured the paralytic and cleansed the lepers in Judea — to whom
all power is given in heaven and earth.
So, again, with skill in farming and agriculture. From whom
does that come ? The very heathens can tell us that ; for it is
curious, that among the heathen, in all ages and countries,
those men who have found out great improvements in tilling
the ground have been honoured and often worshipped as
divine men — as gods; thereby showing that the heathen,
among all their idolatries, had a true and just notion about
man's practical skill and knowledge — that it could only come
from heaven ; that it was by the inspiration and guidance of
God above that skill in agriculture arose. What says Isaiah of
that to the very same purpose ? ' Doth the plowman plow

iv.] THE WORK OF GOD'S SPIRIT. 29
all day to sow ? doth he open and break the clods of his
ground ? When he hath made plain the face thereof, doth he
not cast abroad the vetches, and cast in the principal wheat
and the appointed barley and the rye in their place ? For his
God doth instruct him to discretion, and doth teach him.
This also,' says Isaiah, ' cometh from the Lord of Hosts, who
is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working.' Would to
God you would all believe it !
Again : wisdom and prudence, and a clear, powerful mind,
— are not they parts of God's likeness ? How is God's Spirit
described in Scripture ? It is called the Spirit of wisdom and
understanding, the Spirit of prudence and might. Therefore,
surely, all wisdom and understanding, all prudence and strength
of mind, are, like that Spirit, part of God's image ? And where
did we get God's image ? Can we make ourselves like God ?
If we are like Him, He must have formed that likeness, and He
alone. The Spirit of God, says the Scripture, giveth us under
standing. Or, again : good-natured and affection, love, generosity,
pity, — whose likeness are they ? What is God's name but love?
God is love. Has not He revealed Himself as the God of
mercy, full of long-suffering, compassion, and free forgiveness ;
and must not, then, all love and affection, all compassion and
generosity, be His gift ? Yes. As the rays come from the
sun, and yet are not the sun, even so our love and pity, though
they are not God, but merely a poor, weak image and reflec
tion of Him, yet from Him alone they come. If there is
mercy in our hearts, it comes from the fountain of mercy. If
there is the light of love in us, it is a ray from the full sun of
His love.
Or honesty, again, and justice, — whose image are they but
God's ? Is He not The Just One — the righteous God ? Is
not what is just for man just for God ? Are not the laws of
justice and honesty by which man deals fairly with man, His
laws — the laws by which God deals with us ? Does not every

50 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
book — I had almost said every page — in the Bible show us
that all our justice is but the pattern and copy of God's justice,
— the working out of those six latter commandments of His,
which are summed up in that one command, ' Thou shalt love
Thy neighbour as thyself?'
Now, here, again, I ask : If justice and honesty be God's
likeness, who made us like God in this — who put into us this
sense of j ustice which all have, though so few obey it ? Can
man make himself like God ? Can a worm ape his Maker ?
No. From God's Spirit, the Spirit of Right, came this inborn
feeling of justice, this knowledge of right and wrong, to us —
part of the image of God in which He created man — part of
the breath or spirit of life which He breathed into Adam. Do
not mistake me. I do not say that the sense, and honesty,
and love in us, are God's Spirit — they are the spirit of man ;
but that they are like God's Spirit, and therefore they must be
given us by God's Spirit, to be used as God's Spirit Himself
uses them. How a man shall have his share of God's Spirit,
and live in, and by God's Spirit, is another question,
and a higher and more blessed one; but we must master
this question first — we must believe that our spirits come
from God, then, perhaps, we shall begin to see that our
spirits never cSn work well unless they are joined to the
Spirit of God, from whom they came. From whom else, I ask
again, can they come ? Can they come from our bodies ?
Our bodies ! What are they ? — Flesh and bones, made up of
air and water and earth, — out of the dead bodies of the
animals, the dead roots and fruits of plants which we eat.
They are earth — matter. Can matter be courageous? Did
you ever hear of a good-natured plant, or an honest stone?
Then this good-nature, and honesty, and courage of ours, must
belong to our souls— our spirits. Who put them there ? Did
we ? Does a child make its own character ? Does its body
make its character first ? Can its father and mother make its
character ? No. Our characters must come from some spirit

IV.] THE WORK OF GOD'S SPIRIT. 31
above us — either from God or from the devil. And is the
devil likely to make us honest, or brave, or kindly? I leave
you to. answer that. God — God alone, my friends, is the
author of good — the help that is done on earth, He doeth it
all Himself: every good gift and every perfect gift cometh
from Him.
Now, some of you may think this a strange sort of sermon,
because I have said little or nothing about Jesus Christ and
His redemption in it ; but I say — No.
You must believe this much about yourselves before you can
believe more. You must fairly and really believe that God
made you one thing before you can believe that you have made
yourselves another thing. You must really believe that you
are not mere machines and animals, but immortal souls, before
you can really believe that you have sinned ; for animals can
not sin — only reasonable souls can sin. We must really
believe that God made us at bottom in His likeness, before we
can begin to find out that there is another likeness in us
besides God's — a selfish, brutish, too often a devilish likeness,
which must be repented of, and fought against, and cast out,
that God's likeness in us may get the upper hand, and we may
be what God expects us to be. We must know our dignity
before we can feel our shame. We must see how high we have a
right to stand, that we may see how low, alas ! we have fallen.
Now you — I know many such here, thank God — to whom
God has given clear, powerful heads for business, and honest,
kindly hearts, I do beseech you consider my words, Who has
given you these but God? They are talents which He has
committed to your charge ; and will He not require an account
of them ? He only, and His free mercy, have made you to
differ from others ; if you are better than the fools and pro
fligates round you, He, and not yourselves, has made you
better. What have you that you have not received ? By the
grace of God alone you are what you are. If good comes
easier to you than to others, He alone has made it easier to

32 VILLAGE SERMONS. [sERM.
you ; and if you have done wrong, — if you have fallen short of
your duty, as all fall short, is not your sin greater than others' ?
for unto whom much is given, of them shall much be required.
Consider that, for God's sake, and see if you, too, have not
something to be ashamed of, between yourselves and God.
See if you, too, have not need of Jesus Christ and His precious
blood, and God's free forgiveness, who have had so much light
and power given you, and still have fallen short of what you
might have been, and what by God's grace, you still may be,
and, as I hope and earnestly pray, still will be.
And you, young men and women — consider ; — if God has
given you manly courage and high spirits, and strength and
beauty — think — God, your Father, has given them to you, and
of them He will surely require an account; therefore, 'Rejoice,
young people,' says Solomon, ' in your youth, and let your
hearts cheer you in the- days of your youth, and walk in the
ways of your heart and in the sight of your eyes. But remem
ber,' continues the wisest of men — ' remember, that for all these
things God shall bring you into judgment.' Now, do not mis
understand that. It does not mean that there is a sin in being
happy. It does not mean that if God has given to a young
man a bold spirit and powerful limbs, or to a young woman a
handsome fade1, and a merry, loving heart, that He will punish
them for these, — God forbid ! what He gives He means to
be used ; but this it means, that according as you use those
blessings so will you be judged at the last day ; that for them,
too, you will be brought to judgment, and tried at the bar of
God. As you have used them for industry, and innocent
happiness, and holy married love, or for riot and quarrelling,
and idleness, and vanity, and filthy lusts, so shall you be
judged. And if any of you have sinned in any of these ways,
— God forbid that you should have sinned in all these ways ;
but surely, surely, some of you have been idle — some of you have
been riotous — some of you have been vain — some of you have
been quarrelsome — some of you, alas ! have been that which I

lV.j THE WORK OF GOD'S SPIRIT. 5i
shall not name here — Think, if you have sinned in any one of
these ways, how can you answer it to God ? Have you no
need of forgiveness ? Have you no need of the blessed
Saviour's blood to wash you clean ? Young people ! God has
given you much. As a young man, I speak to you Youth is
an inestimable blessing or an inestimable curse, according as
you use it ; and if you have abused your spring-time of youth,
as all, I am afraid, have — as I have — as almost all do, alas ! in
this fallen world, where can you get forgiveness but from Him
that died on the cross to take awav the sins of the world ?

SERMON V.
FAITH.

Habakkuk ii. 4.
The just shall live by faith.
'T'HIS is one of those texts of which there are so many in
¦*¦ the Bible, which, though they were spoken originally to
one particular man, yet are meant for every man. These
words were spoken to Habakkuk, a Jewish prophet, to check
him for his impatience under God's hand ; but they are just as
true for every man that ever was and ever will be as they were
for him. They are world-wide and world-old ; they are the law
by which all goodness, and strength, and safety, stand either in
men or angels, for it always was true, and always must be true
that if reasonable beings are to live at all, it is by faith.
And why? Because everything that is, heaven and earth,
men and angels, are all the work of God — of one God, infinite,
almighty, all-wise, all-loving, unutterably glorious. My friends,'
we do not think enough of this, — not that all the thinking in
the world can ever make us comprehend the majesty of our
Heavenly Father ; but we do not remember enough what we do
know of God. We think of God, watching the world and all
things in it, and keeping them in order as a shepherd does his
sheep, and so far so good ; but we forget that God does more
than this, — we forget that this earth, sun and moon, and all the

FAITH.

35

thousand thousand stars which cover the midnight sky, — many
of them suns larger than the sun we see, and worlds larger than
the world on which we stand, that all these, stretching away
millions of millions of miles into boundless space, — all are lying
like one little grain of dust, in the hollow of God's hand, and
that if He were to shut His hand upon them, He could crush
them into nothing, and God would be alone in the universe
again as He was before heaven and earth were made. Think
of that ! — that if God was but to will it, we, and this earth on
which we stand, and the heaven above us, and the sun that
shines on us, should vanish away, and be nowhere and nothing.
Think of the infinite power of God, and then think how is it
possible to live, except by faith in Him, by trusting to Him,
utterly? If you accustom yourselves to think in the same way
of the infinite wisdom of God, and the infinite love of God, they
will both teach you the same lesson ; they will show you that if
you were the greatest, the wisest, the holiest man that ever lived,
you would still be such a speck by the side of the Almighty and
Everlasting God, that it would be madness to depend upon
yourselves for anything while you lived in God's world. For,
after all, what can we do without God ? In Him we live, and
move, and have our being. He made us, He gave us our
bodies, He gave us our life ; what we do He lets us do, what we
say He lets us say; we all live on sufferance. What is it but
God's infinite mercy that ever brought us here, or keeps us here
an instant ? We may pretend to act without God's leave or
help, but it is impossible for us to do so ; the strength we put
forth, the wit we use, are all His gifts. We cannot draw a
breath of air without His leave, and yet men fancy they can do
without God in the world ! My friends, these are but few
words, and poor words, about the glorious majesty of God and
our littleness when compared with Him ; but I have said quite
enough, at least, to show you all how absurd it is to depend
upon ourselves for anything. If we are mere creatures of God, if
God alone has every blessing both of this world and the next,

36 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
and the will to give them away, whom are we to go to but to
Him for all we want ? It is so in the life of our bodies, and it
is so in the life of our spirits. If we wish for God's blessings,
from God we must ask them. That is our duty, even though
God in His mercy and long-suffering does pour down many a
blessing upon men who never trust in Him for them. To us all,
indeed, God gives blessings before we are old enough to trust
in Him for them, and to many He continues those blessings in
after-life in spite of their blindness and want of faith. 'He
maketh His sun to shine on the evil and on the good, and
sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust' He gives — gives
— it is His glory to give. Yet strange ! that men will go on
year after year, using the limbs, and eating the food, which God
gives them, without ever believing so much as that God has
given them — without so much as looking up to heaven once,
and saying, ' God, I thank Thee ! ' But we must remember
that those blessings will not last for ever. Unless a man has
lived by faith in God with regard to his earthly comforts, death
will come and put an end to them at once ; and then it is only
those who have trusted in God for all good things, and thanked
Him accordingly in this life, who shall have their part in the
new heavens and the new earth, which will so immeasurably
surpass all thOT this earth can give.
And it is the same with the life of our spirits ; in it, too, we
must live by faith. The life of our spirits is a gift from God,
the Father of spirits, and He has chosen to declare that unless
we trust to Him for life, and ask Him for life, He will not
bestow it upon us. The life of our bodies He in His mercy
keeps up, although we forget Him ; the life of our souls He
will not keep up ; therefore, for the sake of our spirits, even
more than of our bodies, we must live by faith. If we wish to
be loving, pure, wise, manly, noble, we must ask those excellent
gifts of God, who is Himself infinite love and purity, wisdom
and nobleness. If we wish for everlasting life, from whom can
-we obtain it but from God who is the boundless, eternal life

v.] FAITH.

37

itself? If we wish for forgiveness for our faults and failings,
where are we to get it but from God, who is boundless love
and pity, and who has revealed to us His boundless love and
pity in the form of a man, Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the
world ? And to go a step further ; it is by faith in Christ we
must live — in Christ, a man like ourselves, yet God blessed for
ever. For it is a certain truth, that men cannot believe in God
or trust in Him unless they can think of him as a man. This
was the reason why the poor heathen made themselves idols in
the form of men, that they might have something like them
selves to worship ; and those among them who would not
worship idols almost always ended in fancying that God was
either a mere notion, or else a mere part of this world, or else
that He sat up in heaven neither knowing nor caring what
happened upon earth. But we, to whom God has given the
glorious news of His Gospel, have the. very Person to worship
whom all the heathen were searching after and could not find,
— one who is very ' God,' infinite in love, wisdom, and strength,
and yet 'very man,' made in all points like ourselves, but
without sin ; so that we have not a High Priest who cannot be
touched .with the feeling of our infirmities, but one who is able
to help those who are tempted, because He was tempted
Himself like us, and overcame by the strength of His own
perfect will, of His own perfect faith. By trusting in Him, and
acknowledging Him in every thought and action of our lives,
we shall be safe ; for it is written, ' The just shall live by faith.'
These things are true, and always were true. All that men
ever did well, or nobly, or lovingly, in this world, was done by
faith — by faith in God of some sort or other ; even in the man
who thinks least about religion, it is so. Every time a man
means to do, and really does, a just or generous action, he does
it because he believes, more or less clearly, that there is a just
and loving God above him, and that justice and love are the
right thing for a man — the law by which God intended him to
walk : so that this small, dim faith still shows itself in practice :

$8 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
and the more faith a man has in God and in God's laws, the
more it will show itself in every action of his daily life ; and the
more this faith works in his life and conduct,' the better man
he is ; — the more he is like God's image, in which man was
originally made ; — and the more he is like Christ, the new
pattern of God's image, whom all men must copy.
So that the sum of the matter is this : without Christ we can
do nothing — by trusting in Christ we can do everything. See,
then, how true the verse before my text must be, that he whose
soul is lifted up in him is not upright ; for if a man fancies that
his body and soul are his own, to do what he pleases with
them, when all the time they are God's gift ; — if a man fancies
that he can take perfect care of himself, while all the time it is
God that is keeping him out of a thousand sins and dangers; —
if a man fancies that he can do right of himself, when all the
time the little good that he does is the work of God's Spirit,
which has not yet left him ; — if a man fancies, in short, that he
can do without God, when all the time it is in God that he
lives, and moves, and has his being, how can such a man be
called upright ? Upright ! he is utterly wrong ; he is believing
a lie, and walking accordingly; and therefore, instead of
keeping upright, he is going where all lies lead, into all kinds
of low and crooked ways, mistakes, absurdities, and at last to
ruin of body and soul. Nothing but truth can keep a man
upright and straight, can keep a man where God has put him,
and where he ought to be ; and the man whose heart is puffed
up by pride and self-conceit, who is looking at himself and not
at God, that man has begun upon a falsehood, and will soon
get out of tune with heaven and earth. For consider, my
friends : suppose some rich and mighty prince went out and
collected a number of children, and of sick and infirm people,
and said to them, ' You cannot work now, but I will give you
food, medicine, everything that you require, and then you must
help me to work ; and I, though you have no right to expect it
of me, will pay you for the little work you can do on the

v.] FAITH. 39
strength of my food and medicine,' — is it not plain that all
those persons could only live by faith in their prince, by trust
ing in him for food and medicine, and by acknowledging that
that food and medicine came from him, and thanking him
accordingly? If they wished to be true men, if they wished
him to continue his bounty, they would confess that all the
health and strength they had belonged to him of right, because
his generosity had given it to them. Just in this position we
stand with Christ the Lord. When the whole world lay in
wickedness, He came and chose us, of His free grace and
mercy, to be one of his peculiar nations, to work for Him and
with Him ; and from the time He came, all that we and our
forefathers have done well has been done by the strength and
wisdom which Christ has given us. Now, suppose, again, that
one of the persons of whom I spoke was seized with a fit of
pride — suppose he said to himself, ' My health and strength do
not come from the food and medicine which the prince gave
me; they come from the goodness of my own constitution; the
wages which I am paid are my just due ; I am a free man, and
may choose what master I like.' Suppose any one of your
servants treated you so, would you not be inclined to answer,
'You are a faithless, ungrateful fellow; go your ways, then, and
see how little you can do without my bounty?' But the
blessed King in heaven, though He is provoked every day, is
more long-suffering than man. All He does is to withdraw His
bounty for a moment, to take this world's blessings from a man,
and let him find out how impossible it is for him to keep him
self out of affliction— to take away His Holy Spirit for a
moment from a man, and let him see how straight he rushes
astray, and every way but the right ; and then, if the man is
humbled by ' his fall or his affliction, and comes back to his
Lord, confessing how weak he is, and promising to trust in
Christ and thank Christ only for the future, then our Lord will
restore His blessings to him, and there will be joy among the
angels of God over one sinner that repents. This was the way

+0 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.

in which God treated Job when, in spite of all his excellence,
his heart was lifted up. And then, when he saw his own folly,
and abhorred himself, and repented in dust and ashes, God
restored to him sevenfold what He had taken from him —
honour, wisdom, riches, home, and children. This is the way,
too, in which God treated David. ' In my prosperity,' he tells
us, ' I said, I shall never be moved; Thou, Lord, of Thy good
ness hast made my hill so strong'— forgetting that he must be
kept safe every moment of his life, as well as made safe once
for all. 'Thou didst turn Thy face from me, and I was
troubled. Then cried I unto Thee, O Lord, and gat me to my
Lord right humbly. And then,' he adds, 'God turned my
heaviness into joy, and girded me with gladness' (Psalm xxx.).
And again, he says, 'Before I was troubled I went wrong, but
now I have kept Thy word' (Psalm cxix.). And this is the way
in which Christ the Lord treated St. Peter and St. Paul, and
treats, in His great mercy, every Christian man when He sees
him puffed up, to bring him to his senses, and make him live
by faith in God. If he takes the warning, well; if he does not,
he remains in a lie, and must go where all lies lead. So
perfectly does it hold throughout a man's whole life, that he
whose soul is lifted up within him is not upright ; but that the
just must live by faith.
Now, there is one objection apt to rise in men's minds when
they hear such words as these, which is, that they take such a
' low view of human nature : ' it is so galling to our pride to be
told that we can do nothing for ourselves ; but if we think of
the matter more closely, and, above all, if we try to put it into
practice and live by faith, we shall find that there is no real
reason for thus objecting. This is not a doctrine which ought
to make us despise men; any doctrine that does, does not come
of God. Men are not contemptible creatures — they are
glorious creatures — they were created in the image of God ;
God has put such honour upon them that He has given them
dominion over the whole earth, and made them partakers of

v.] FAITH. 4I
His eternal reason; and His Spirit gives them understanding to
enable them to conquer this earth, and make the beasts, ay,
and the very winds and seas, and fire and steam, their obedient
servants ; and human nature, too, when it is what God made it,
and what it ought to be, is not a contemptible thing : it was
noble enough for the Son of God to take it upon Himself — to
become man, without sinning or defiling Himself; and what
was good enough for Him is surely good enough for us.
Wickedness consists in unmanliness, in being unlike a man, in
becoming like an evil spirit or a beast. Holiness consists in
becoming a true man, in becoming more and more like the
likeness of Jesus Christ. And when the Bible tells us that we
can do nothing of ourselves, but can live only by faith, the
Bible puts the highest honour upon us which any created thing
can have. What are the things which cannot live by faith?
The trees and plants, the beasts and birds, which, though they
live and grow by God's providence, yet do not know it, do not
thank Him, cannot ask Him for more strength and life as we
can, are mere dead tools in God's hands, instead of living,
reasonable beings as we are. It is only reasonable beings, like
men and angels, with immortal spirits in them, who can live by
faith; and it is the greatest glory and honour to us, I say again,
that we can do so — that the glorious, infinite God, Maker of
heaven and earth, should condescend to ask us to be loyal to
Him, to love Him, should encourage us to pray to Him boldly,
and then should condescend to hear our prayers — we, who in
comparison of Him are smaller than the gnats in the sunbeam
in comparison of men ! And then, when we remember that He
has sent His only Son into the world to take our nature upon
Him, and join us all together in one great and everlasting
family, the body of Christ the Lord, and that He has actually
given us a share in His own Almighty Holy Spirit, that we may
be able to love Him, and to serve Him, and to be joined to
Him, the Almighty Father, do we not see that all this is
infinitely more honourable to us than if we were each to go on

42 VILLAGE SERMONS.
his own way here without God — without knowing anything of
the everlasting world of spirits to which we now belong? My
friends, instead of being ashamed of being able to do nothing
for ourselves, we ought to rejoice at having God for our Father
and our Friend, to enable us to ' do all things through Him
who strengthens us ' — to do whatever is noble, and loving, and
worthy of true men. Instead, then, of dreaming conceitedly
that God will accept us for our own sakes, let us just be
content to be accepted for the sake of Jesus Christ our King.
Instead of trying to walk through this world without God's
help, let us ask God to help and guide us in every action of
our lives, and then go manfully forward, doing with all our
might whatsoever our hands or our hearts see right to do,
trusting to God to put us in the right path, and to fill our heads
with right thoughts and our hearts with right feeling ; and so
our faith will show itself in our worits, and we shall be justified
at the last day, as all good men have ever been, by trusting to
our Heavenly Father and to the Lord Jesus Christ, and the
guidance of His Holy Spirit

SERMON VI.
THE SPIRIT AND THE FLESH.

Galatians v. 16.
I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh.
For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the
flesh, and these are contrary the one to the other.
HP HE more we think seriously, my friends, the more we shall
see what wonderful and awful things words are — how they
mean much more than we fancy, — how we do not make words,
but words are given to us by one higher than ourselves. Wise
men say that you can tell the character of any nation by its lan
guage, by watching the words they use, the names they give to
things, for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks,
and by our words, our Lord tells us, we shall be justified and
condemned. It is God, and Christ, the Word of God, who gives words to
men, who puts it into the hearts of men to call certain things
by certain names ; and, according to a nation's godliness, and
wisdom, and purity of heart, will be its power of using words
discreetly and reverently. That miracle of the gift of tongues,
of which we read in the New Testament, would have been still
most precious and full of meaning if it had had no other use
than this — to teach men from whom words come. When men
found themselves all of a sudden inspired to talk in foreign,
languages which they had never learnt, to utter words of which

44

VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.

they themselves did not know the meaning, do you not see how
it must have made them feel that all language is God's making
and God's giving ? Do you not see how it must have made
them feel what awful, mysterious things words were, like those
cloven tongues of fire which fell on the apostles ? The tongues
of fire signified the difficult foreign languages which they
suddenly began to speak as the Spirit gave them utterance.
And where did the tongues of fire come from? Not out of
themselves, not out of the earth beneath, but down from the
heaven above, to signify that it is not from man, from man's
flesh or brain, or the earthly.part of him, that words are. bred,
but that they come down from Christ the Word of God, and
are breathed into the minds of men by the Spirit of God.
Why do I speak of all this ? To make you feel what awful,
wonderful things words are ; how, when you want to understand
the meaning of a word, you must set to work with reverence and
godly fear — not in self-conceit and prejudice, taking the word
to mean just what suits your own notions of things, but trying
humbly to find out what the word really does mean of itself,
what God meant it to mean when He put it into the hearts of
wise men to use that word and bring it into our English
language. A man ought to read a newspaper or a story-book
in that spirit ; now much more, when he takes up the Bible !
How reverently he ought to examine every word in the New
Testament — this very text, for instance. We ought to be sure
that St. Paul, just because he was an inspired apostle, used the
very best possible words to express what he meant on so
important a matter ; and what are the best words ? The clearest
and the simplest words are the best words ; else how is the
Bible to be the poor man's book ? How, unless the wayfaring
man, though simple, shall not err therein ? Therefore we may
be sure the words in Scripture are certain to be used in their
simplest, most natural, most every-day meaning, such as the
' simplest man can understand. And therefore we may be sure
that these two words, ' flesh ' and ' spirit,' in my text, are used

vi.] THE SPIRIT AND THE FLESH.

45

in their very simplest, straightforward sense ; and that St. Paul
meant by them what working-men mean by them in the affairs
of daily life. No doubt St. Peter says that there are many
things in St Paul's writings difficult to be understood, which
those who are unlearned and unstable wrest to. their own
destruction ; and, most true it is, so they do daily. But what
does ' wresting ' a thing mean ? It means twisting it, bending
it, turning it out of its original straightforward, natural meaning,
into some new crooked meaning of their own. This is the way
we are all of us too apt, I am afraid, to come to St. Paul's
Epistles. We find him difficult because we won't take him at
his word, because we tear a text out of its right place in the
chapter — the place where St. Paul put it, and make it stand by
itself, instead of letting the rest of the chapter explain its mean
ing. And then, again, people use the words in the text as un
fairly and unreasonably as they use the text itself; they won't
let the words have their common-sense English meaning — they
must stick a new meaning of their own on .them. ' Oh,' they
say, ' that text must not be taken literally ; that word has a
spiritual signification here. Flesh does not mean flesh, it
means men's corrupt nature;' little thinking, all the while, that
perhaps they understand those words, spiritual, and corrupt,
and nature, just as ill as they do the rest of the text.
How much better, my friends, to let the Bible tell its own
story ; not to be so exceeding wise above what is written ; just
to believe that St. Paul knew better how to use words than we
are likely to do, — just to believe that when he says flesh he
means flesh. Everybody agrees that when he says spirit he
means spirit ; why, in the name of common sense, when he says
flesh should he not mean flesh ? For my own part, I believe
that when St. Paul talks of man's flesh, he means by it man's
body, man's heart and brain, and all his bodily appetites and
powers — what we call a man's constitution ; in a word, the
animal part of man, just what a man has in common with the
beasts who perish.

46 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
To understand what I mean, consider any animal — a dog,
for instance — how much every animal has in it what men have,
— a body, and brain, and heart ; it hungers and thirsts as we do ;
it can feel pleasure and pain, anger and loneliness, and fear and
madness ; it likes freedom, company, and exercise, praise and
petting, play and ease ; it uses a great deal of cunning, and
thought, and courage, to get itself food and shelter, just as
human beings do : in short, it has a fleshy nature, just as we
have, and yet, after all, it is but an animal, and so, in one
sense, we are all animals, only more delicately made than the
other animals ; but we are something more — we have a spirit as
well as a flesh, an immortal soul. If any one asks, what is a
man ? the true answer is, an animal with an immortal spirit in
it ; and this spirit can feel more than pleasure and pain, which
are mere carnal, that is, fleshly things ; it can feel trust, and
hope, and peace, and love, and purity, and nobleness, and
independence, and, above all, it can feel right and wrong.
There is the infinite difference between an animal and a man,
between our flesh and our spirit ; an animal has no sense of
right and wrong ; a dog who has done wrong is often terrified,
tut not because he feels it wrong and wicked, but because he
knows from experience that he will be punished for doing it •
just so with a man's fleshly nature ; — a carnal, fleshly man, a
man whose spirit is dead within him, whose spiritual sense of
right and wrong, and honour and purity, is gone, when he has
done a wrong thing is often enough afraid ; but why ? Not for
any spiritual reason, not because he feels it a wicked and
abominable thing, a sin, but because he is afraid of being
punished for it, because he is afraid that his body, his flesh, will
be punished by the laws of the land, or by public opinion, or
because he has some dim belief that this same body and flesh
of his will be burnt in hell-fire ; and fire, he knows by experi
ence, is a painful thing — and so he is afraid of it ; there is
nothing spiritual in all that, — that is all fleshly, carnal ; the
heathens in all ages have been afraid of hell-fire ; but a man's

vi.] THE SPIRIT AND THE FLESH. 47
spirit, on the ether hand, if it be in hell, is in a very different
hell from mere fire, — a spiritual hell, such as torments the evil
spirits at this very moment, although they are going to and fro
on this very earth. This earth is hell to them ; they carry about
hell in them, — they are their own hell. Everlasting shame,
discontent, doubt, despair, rage, disgust at themselves, feeling
that they are out of favour with God, out of tune with heaven
and earth, loving nothing, believing nothing, ever hating, hating
each other, hating themselves most of all — there is their hell !
There is the hell in which the soul of every wicked man is, — ay,
is now while he is in this life, though he will only awake to the
perfect misery of it after death, when his body and fleshly nature
have mouldered away in the grave, and can no longer pamper
and stupify him, and make him forget his own misery. Ay,
there has been many a man in this life who had every fleshly
enjoyment which this world can give — riches and pleasure, ban
quets and palaces, every sense and every appetite pampered, —
his pride and his vanity flattered ; who never knew what want,
or trouble, or contradiction was on the smallest point ; a man,
I say, who had every carnal enjoyment which this earth can
give to a man's selfish flesh, and yet whose spirit was in hell all
the while, and who knew it ; hating and despising himself for a
mean selfish villain, while all the world round was bowing down
to him and envying him as the luckiest of men. I am trying to
make you understand the infinite difference between a man's
flesh and his spirit ; how a man's flesh can take no pleasure in
spiritual things, while man's spirit of itself can take no pleasure
in fleshly things. Now, the spirit and the flesh, body and soul,
in every man, are at war with each other, — they have quarrelled :
that is part of the corruption of our nature, the fruit of Adam's
fall. And as the Article says, and as every man who has ever
tried to live godly well knows from experience, ' that infection
of nature does remain to the last, even in those who are re
generate.' So that, as St. Paul says, the spirit lusteth against
the flesh, and the flesh against the spirit: and it continually

4S VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.

happens that a man cannot do the things which he would ; he
cannot do what he knows to be right ; thus, as St. Paul says
again, a man may delight in the law of God in his inward man,
that is, in his spirit, and yet all the while he shall find another
law in his members, i.e. in his body, in his flesh, in his brain
which thinks, and his heart which feels, and his senses which
are fond of pleasure ; and this law of the flesh, these appetites
and passions which he has, like other animals, fight against the
law of his mind, and when he wishes to do good, make him do
evil. Now, how is this ? The flesh is not evil ; a man's body
can be no more wicked than a dumb beast can be wicked. St.
Paul calls man's flesh sinful flesh ; not because our flesh can sin
of itself, but because our sinful souls make our flesh do sinful
things ; for, he says, Christ came in the likeness of sinful flesh,
and yet in him was no sin. The pure and spotless Saviour
could not have taken man's flesh upon him if there was any sin
fulness in it. The body knows nothing of right and wrong ; it
is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be, says
St. Paul. And why? Because God's law is spiritual; deals
with right and wrong. Wickedness, like righteousness, is a
spiritual thing. If a man sins, his body is not in fault ; it is his
spirit, his weak, perverse will, which will sooner listen to what
his flesh tells* him is pleasant than to what God tells him is
right ; for this, my friends, is the secret of the battle of life. We
stand between heaven and earth. Above is God's Spirit striv
ing with our spirits, speaking to them in the depths of our soul,
showing us what is right, putting into our hearts good desires.
making us long to be honest and just, pure and manful, loving
and charitable ; for who is there who has not at times longed
after these things, and felt that it would be a blessed thing for
him if he were such a man as Jesus Christ was and is ? — Above
us, I say, is God's Spirit speaking to our spirits ; below us is this
world speaking to our flesh, as it spoke to Eve's, saying to us,
' This thing is pleasant to the eyes — this thing is good for food
— that thing is to be desired to make you wise, and to flatter

vi.] THE SPIRIT AND THE FLESH.

49

your vanity and self-conceit' Below us, I say, is this world,
tempting us to ease, and pleasure, and vanity; and in the
middle, betwixt the two, stands up the third part of man — his
soul and will, set to choose between the voice of God's Spirit
and the temptations of this world — to choose between what is
right and what is pleasant — to choose whether he will obey the
desires of the spirit, or obey the desires of the flesh. He must
choose. If he lets his flesh conquer his spirit, he falls ; if he
lets his spirit conquer his flesh, he rises ; if he lets his flesh con
quer his spirit, he becomes what he was not meant to be — a
slave to fleshly lust ; and then he will find his flesh set up for
itself, and work for itself. And where man's flesh gets the
upper hand, and takes possession of him, it can do nothing but
evil — not that it is evil in itself, but that it has no rule, no law
to go by ; it does not know right from wrong ; and therefore it
does simply what it likes, as a dumb beast or an idiot might ;
and therefore the works of the flesh are — adulteries, drunken
ness, murders, fornications, envyings, backbitings, strife. When
a man's body, which God intended to be the servant of his
spirit, has become the tyrant of his spirit, it is like an idiot on a
king's throne, doing all manner of harm and folly without know
ing that it is harm and folly. This is not its fault. Whose
fault is it, then ? Our fault — the fault of our wills and our
souls. Our souls were intended to be the masters of our flesh,
to conquer all the weaknesses, defilements of our constitution —
our tempers, our cowardice, our laziness, our hastiness, our
nervousness, our vanity, our love of pleasure — to listen to our
spirits, because our spirits learn from God's Spirit what is right
and noble. But if we let our flesh master us, and obey its own
blind lusts, we sin against God ; and we sin against God doubly ;
for we not only sin against God's commandments, but against
ourselves, who are the image and glory of God.
Believe this, my friends ; believe that, because you are all
fallen human creatures, there must go on in you this sore life
long battle between your spirit and your flesh — your spirit

50 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
trying to be master and guide, as it ought to be, and your
flesh rebelling, and trying to conquer your spirit and make you
a mere animal, like a fox in cunning, a peacock in vanity, or a
hog in greedy sloth. But believe, too, that it is your sin and
your shame if your spirit does not conquer your flesh — for God
has promised to help your spirits. Ask Him, and His Spirit
will teach them — fill them with pure, noble hopes, with calm,
clear thoughts, and with deep, unselfish love to God and
man. He will strengthen your wills, that they may be able to
refuse the evil and choose the good. Ask Him, and He will
join them to His own Spirit — to the Spirit of Christ, your
Master; for he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit with
Him. Ask Him, and He will give you the mind of Christ —
teach you to see and feel all matters as Christ sees and feels
them. Ask Him, and He will give you wisdom to listen to
His Spirit when it teaches your spirit, and then you will be able
to walk after the spirit, and not obey the lusts of the flesh ; and
you will be able to crucify the flesh with its passions and lusts,
that is, to make it, what it ought to be, a dead thing — a dead
tool for your spirit to work with manfully and godly, and not a
live tyrant to lead you into brutishness and folly ; and then you
will find that the fruit of the spirit, of your spirit led by God's
Spirit, is really, as St. Paul says, 'love, joy, peace, long-
suffering, gentleness, honesty' — 'whatsoever things are true,
whatsoever things are honourable and of good report;' and
instead of being the miserable slaves of your own passions, and
of the opinions of your neighbours, you will find that where
the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty, true freedom, not only
from your neighbour's sins, but, what is far better, freedom
from your own.
These are large words, my friends, and promise mighty
things. But I dare speak them to you, for God has spoken to
you. These promises God made you at your baptism ; these
promises I, on the warrant of your baptism, dare make to you
again. At your baptism God gave you the right to call Him

VI.] THE SPIRIT AND THE FLESH. 51
your loving Father, to call His Son your Saviour, His Spirit
your Sanctifier. And He is not a man, that He should lie ;
nor the son of man, that He should repent ! Try Him, and
see whether He will not fulfil His word. Claim His promise,
and though you have fallen lower than the brutes, He will
make men and women of you. He will be faithful and just
to forgive you your sins, and to cleanse you from all un
righteousness.

SERMON VII.
RETRIBUTION.

Numbers xxxii. 23.
Be sure your sin will find you out.
'THE full meaning of this text is, that every sin which a man
¦*• commits is certain, sooner or later, to come home to him
with fearful interest.
Moses gave this warning to two tribes of the Israelites, — to
the Reubenites and Gadites, who had promised to go over
Jordan and help their countrymen in war against the heathen,
on condition of being allowed to return and settle on the east
bank of Jordan, where they then were ; but if they broke their
promise, and returned before the end of the war, they were to
be certain that their sin would find them out ; that God would
avenge their falsehood on them in some way in their lifetime :
in their lifetime, I say, for there is no mention made in this
chapter, or in any part of the story, of heaven or hell, or any
world to come. And the text has been always taken as a fair
warning to all generations of men, that their sin also, even in
their lifetimes, will be visited upon them.
Now, it is strange, at first sight, that these texts, which warn
men that their sins will be punished in this life, are just the
most unpleasant texts in the whole Bible ; that men shrink
from them more, and shut their eyes to them more than they

RETRIBUTION.

53

do to those texts which threaten them with hell-fire and ever
lasting death. Strange ! — that men should be more afraid of
being punished in this life for a few years than in the life to ¦
come for ever and ever ; — and yet not strange if we consider ;
for to worldly and sinful souls, that life after death and the
flames of hell seem quite distant and dim — things of which they
know little and believe less, while this world they do know,
they are quite certain that its good things are pleasant and its
bad things unpleasant, and they are thoroughly afraid of losing
them. Their hearts are where their treasure is, in this world ;
and a punishment which deprives them of this world's good
things hits them home : but their treasure is not in heaven, and
therefore about losing heaven they are by no means so much
concerned. And thus they can face the dreadful news, that
' the wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the people that
forget God ; ' while, as for the news that the wicked shall be
recompensed on the earth, that their sins will surely find them
out in this life, they cannot face that, — they shut their ears to
it, — they try to persuade themselves that sin will pay them hei-e,
at all events ; and as for hereafter, they shall get off somehow,
— they neither know nor care much how. .
Yet God's truth remains, and God's truth must be heard;
and those who love this world so well must be told, whether
they like or not, that every sin which they commit, every mean,
every selfish, every foul deed, loses them so much enjoyment
in this very present world of which they are so mighty fond.
That is God's truth ; and I will prove it true from common
sense, from Holy Scripture, and fi'om the witness of men's
own hearts.
Take common sense. Does not common sense tell us, that
if God made this world, and governs it by righteous and God
like laws, this must be a world in which evil doing cannot
thrive ? God made the world better than that, surely ! He
would be a bad law-giver who made such laws, that it was as
well to break them as to keep them. You would call them bad

54 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
laws, surely ! No, God made the world, and not the devil ;
and the world works by God's laws, and not the devil's ; and it
inclines towards good, and not towards evil ; and he who sins,
even the least, breaks God's laws, acts contrary to the rule and
constitution of the world, and will surely find that God's laws
will go on in spite of him, and grind him to powder, if he by
sinning gets in the way of them. God has no need to go out
of His way to punish our evil deeds. Let them alone, and they
will punish themselves. Is it not so in every thing? If a
tradesman trades badly, or a farmer farms badly, there is no
need of lawyers to punish him ; he will punish himself. Every
mistake he makes will take money out of his pocket; every
time he offends against the established rules of trade or
agriculture, which are God's laws, he injures himself; and so,
be sure, it is in the world at large, — in the world in which men
and the souls of men live, and move, and have their being.
Next, to speak of Scripture. I might quote texts innumer
able to prove that what I say Scripture says also. Consider
but this one thing — that there is a whole book in the Bible
written to prove this one thing, — that our good and bad deeds
are repaid us with interest in this life ; I mean the Proverbs
of Solomon, in which there is little or no mention of heaven or
hell, or any world to come. It is all one noble, and awful, and
yet cheering sermon on that one text, ' The righteous shall be
recompensed in the earth, much more the wicked and the sin
ner.' Put in a thousand different lights, brought home to us
a thousand different roads, comes the same everlasting doom —
' Vain man, who thinkest that thou canst live in God's world and
yet despise His will, know that, in every smiling, comfortable
sin, thou art hatching an adder to sting thee in the days of old
age, to poison thy cup of sinful joy, even when it is at thy lips ;
to haunt thy restless thoughts, and dog thee day and night ; to
rise up before thee, in the silent, sleepless hours of night, like
an angry ghost, an awful foretaste of the doom that is to come ;
and yet a merciful foretaste, if thou wilt be but taught by the

vii.] RETRIBUTION. 55
disappointment, the unsatisfied craving, the gnawing shame of
a guilty conscience, to see the heinousness of sin, and would
turn before it be too late.'
What, my friends, — what will you make of such texts as this,
'That he who soweth to the flesh shall of the flesh reap corrup
tion ? Do you not see that comes true far too often ? Can it help
always coming true, seeing that God's apostle spoke it? What
will you make of this, too, ' That the wicked is snared by the
working of his own hands' — 'That evil' — the evil which we do
— 'of its own self shall slay the wicked ? ' What says the whole
noble 37th Psalm of David, but that same awful truth of God,
that sin is its own punishment ?
Why should I go on quoting texts? Look for yourselves,
you who fancy that it is only on the other side of the grave
that God will trouble Himself about you and your meanness,
your profligacy, your falsehood. Look for yourselves in the
Book of God, and see if there be any writer there,— lawgiver,
prophet, psalmist, apostle, up to Christ the Lord Himself,—
who does not warn men again and again, that here, on earth,
their sins will find them out. Our Saviour indeed, when on
earth, said less about this subject than any of the prophets be
fore Him, or the apostles after Him, and for the best of reasons.
The Jews had got rooted in their minds a superstitious notion,
that all disease, all sorrow, was the punishment in each case of
some particular sin ; and thus, instead of looking with pity and
loving awe upon the sick and the afflicted, they were ac
customed too often to turn from them as sinners, smitten of
God, bearing in their distress the token of His anger. The
Blessed One, — He who came to heal the sick and save the
lost, — reproved that error more than once. When the dis
ciples fancied a certain poor man's blindness to be a judg
ment from God, ' Neither did he sin, ' said the Lord, ' nor his
parents, but that the glory of God might be made manifest in
him.' And yet, on the other hand, when He healed a certain
man of an old infirmity at the pool of Bethesda, what were His

56 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
words to him ? ' Go thy way, sin no more, lest a worse thing
come unto thee;' — a clear and weighty warning that all his
long misery of eight-and-thirty years had been the punishment
of some sin of his, and that the sin repeated would bring on
him a still severer judgment.
What again does the apostle mean, in the Epistle to the
Hebrews, when he tells us how God scourges every son whom
he receives, and talks of his chastisements, whereof all are
partakers. Why do we need chastising if we have nothing
which needs mending ? And though the innocent may some
times be afflicted to make them strong as well as innocent, and
the holy chastened to make them humble as well as holy, yet if
the good cannot avoid their share of affliction, how will the bad
escape? 'If the righteous scarcely be saved, where will the
ungodly and the sinner appear?' But what use in arguing when
you know that my words are true ? You know that your sins
will find you out. Look boldly and honestly into your own
hearts. Look through the history of your past lives, and
confess to God, at least, that the far greater number of your
sorrows have been your own fault ; that there is hardly a day's
misery which you ever endured in your life of which you might
not say, 'If I had listened to the voice of God in my con
science — if I had earnestly considered what my duty was — if I
had prayed to God to determine my judgment right, I should
have been spared this sorrow now !' Am I not right? ' Those
who know most of God and their own souls will agree most
with me ; those who know little about God and their own souls
will agree but hardly with me, for they provoke God's chastise
ments, and writhe under them for the time, and then go and do
the same wrong again, as the wild beast will turn and bite the
stone thrown at him, without having the sense to see why it was
thrown. Think again of your past lives, and answer in God's sight,
how many wrong things have you ever done which have
succeeded — that is, how many sins which you would not be right

vii.] RETRIBUTION. 57

glad were undone if you could but put back the wheels of time?
They may have succeeded outwardly ; meanness will succeed
so lies — oppression — theft — adultery — drunkenness — godless-
ness — they are all pleasant enough while they last, I suppose:
and a man may reap what he calls substantial benefits from them
in money, and such-like, and keep that safe enough; but has his
sin succeeded? Has it not found him out? — found him out
never to lose him again? Is he the happier for it? Does he
feel freer for it ? Does he respect himself the more for it ? —
No. And, even though he may prosper now, yet does there not
run through all his selfish pleasure a certain fearful looking
forward to a fiery judgment to which he would gladly shut his
eyes, but cannot ?
Cunning, fair-spoken oppressor of the poor, has not thy sin
found thee out? Then be sure it will. In the shame of thine
own heart it will find thee out ; — in the curses of the poor it
will find thee out; — in a friendless, restless, hopeless death-bed,
thy covetousness and thy cruelty will glare before thee in their
true colours, and thy sin will find thee out !
Profligate woman, who art now casting away thy honest
name, thy self-respect, thy womanhood, thy baptism-vows, that
thou mayest enjoy the foul pleasures cf sin for a season, has not
thy sin found thee out ? Then be sure it will hereafter, when
thou hast become disgusted at thyself and thine own infamy, —
and youth, and health, and friends are gone, and a shameful
and despised old age creeps over thee, and death stalks nearer
and nearer, and God vanishes further and further off, then thy
sin will find thee out !
Foolish, improvident young man, who art wasting the noble
strength of youth and manly spirits which God has given thee
on sin and folly, throwing away thine honest earnings in cards
and drunkenness, instead of laying them by against a time
of need — has not thy sin found thee out ? Then be sure it will
some day, when thou hast to bring home thy bride to a cheer
less, unfurnished house, and there to live from hand to mouth,

58

VILLAGE SERMONS.

— without money to provide for her sickness, — without money
to give her the means of keeping things neat and comfortable
when she is well, — without a farthing laid by against distress,
and illness, and old age: — then your sin will find you out: then
perhaps my text and my words may come across you, as you sigh
in vain in your comfortless home, in your impoverished old age,
for the money which you wasted in your youth ! My friends,
my friends, for your own sakes consider, and mend ere that day
come, as else it surely will.
And lastly, you who, without running into any especial sins, as
those which the world calls sins, still live careless about religion,
without loyalty to Christ the Lord, without any honest attempt,
or even wish, to serve the God above you, or to rejoice in
remembering that you are His children, working for Him, and
under Him, — be sure your sin will find you out. When afflic
tion, or sickness, or disappointment come, as come they will if
God has not cast you off; — when the dark day dawns, and your
fool's paradise of worldly prosperity is cut away from under
your feet, then you will find out your folly; you will find that you
have insulted the only friend who can bring you out of affliction
— cast off the only comfort which can strengthen you to bear
affliction — forgotten the only knowledge which will enable you
to be wiser for affliction. Then, I say, the sin of your godless-
ness will find you out; if you do not intend to fall, soured and
sickened merely by God's chastisements, either into stupid despair
or peevish discontent, you will have to go back, to go back to
God and cry, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before
Thee, and am no more worthy to be called Thy son.'
Go back at once, before it be too late. Find out your sins
and mend them — before they find you out, and break your
hearts.

SERMON VIII.
SELF-DESTRUCTION.

i Kings xxii. 23.
The Lord hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these thy prophets.
'"PHE chapter from which my text is taken, which is the first
lesson for this evening's service, is a very awful chapter,
for it gives us an insight into the meaning of that most awful
and terrible word, — temptation. And yet it is a most com
forting chapter, for it shows us how God is long-suffering and
merciful, even to the most hardened sinner; how to the last He
puts before him good and evil, to choose between them, and
warns him to the last of his path, and the ruin to which it
leads. We read of Ahab in the first lesson this morning as a
thoroughly wicked man, — mean and weak, cruel and ungodly,
governed by his wife Jezebel, a heathen woman, in marrying
whom he had broken God's law, — a woman so famous for
cruelty and fierceness, vanity and wickedness, that her name is
a by-word even here in England now — ' as bad as Jezebel,' we
say to this day. We heard of Ahab in this morning's lesson
letting Jezebel murder the righteous Naboth, by perjury and
slander, to get possession of his vineyard ; and then, instead of
shrinking with abhorrence from his wife's iniquity, going down
and . taking possession of the land which he had gained by her

60 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
sin. We read of God's curse on him, and yet of God's long-
suffering and pardon to him on his repentance. Yet neither
God's curse nor God's mercy seem to have moved him. But
he had been always the same. ' He did evil,' the Bible tells
us, ' in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him.'
He deserted the true God for his wife's idols and false gods ;
and in spite of Elijah's miracle at Carmel — of which you heard
last Sunday — by which he proved by fire which was the true
God, and in spite of the wonderful victory which God had given
him, by means of one of God's prophets, over the Syrians, he
still remained an idolater. He, would not be taught, nor
understand; neither God's threats nor mercies could move
him; he went on sinning against light and knowledge; and now
his cup was full — his days were numbered, and God's ven
geance was ready at the door.
He consulted all his false prophets as to whether or not he
should go to attack the Syrians at Ramoth-Gilead. They knew
what to say — they knew that their business was to prophesy
what would pay them — what would be pleasant to him. They
did not care whether what they said was true or not — they lied
for the sake of gain, for the Lord had put a lying spirit into
their mouths. , They were rogues and villains from the first.
They had turned prophets, not to speak God's truth, but to
make money, to flatter King Ahab, to get themselves a reputa
tion. We do not hear that they were all heathens. Many of
them may have believed in the true God. But they were cheats
and liars, and so they had given place to the devil, the father
of lies : and now he had taken possession of them in spite of
themselves, and they lied to Ahab, and told him that he would
prosper in the battle at Ramoth-Gilead. It was a dangerous
thing for them to say; for if he had been defeated, and returned
disappointed, his rage would have most probably fallen on
them for deceiving him. And as in those Eastern countries
kings do whatever they like without laws or parliaments, Ahab
would have most likely put them all to a miserable death on

vm.] SELF-DESTRUCTION. 6l
the spot. But however dangerous it might be for them to lie,
they could not help lying. A spirit of lies had seized them,
and they who began by lying because it paid them, now could
not help doing so whether it paid them or not.
But the good king of Judah, Jehoshaphat, had no faith in
these flattering villains. He asked whether there was not
another prophet of the Lord to inquire of? Ahab told him
that there was one, Micaiah the son of Imlah, but that he
hated him, because he only prophesied evil of him. What a
thorough picture of a hardened sinner — a man who has become
a slave to his own lusts, till he cares nothing for a thing being
true, provided only it is pleasant ! Thus the wilful sinner, like
Ahab, becomes both fool and coward, afraid to look at things
as they are ; and when God's judgments stare him in the face,
the wretched man shuts his eyes tight, and swears that the evil
is not there, just because he does not chose to see it.
But the evil was there, ready for Ahab, and it found him.
When he forced Micaiah to speak, Micaiah- told him the whole
truth. He told him a vision, or dream, which he had seen.
' Hear thou therefore the word of the Lord : I saw the Lord
sitting on His throne, and all the host of heaven standing by
Him. And the Lord said, Who shall persuade Ahab, that he
may go up and fall at Ramoth-Gilead? And there came forth
a spirit, and said, I will go forth, and be a lying spirit in the
mouth of all his prophets. And the Lord said, Thou shalt
persuade him, and prevail also: go forth, and do so. Now
therefore, behold, the Lord hath put a lying spirit in the mouth
of all these thy prophets, and the Lord hath spoken evil
concerning thee.'
'What warning could be more awful, and yet more plain?
Ahab was told that he was listening to a lie. He had free
choice to follow that lie or not, and he did follow it. After
having put Micaiah into prison for speaking the truth to him,
he went up to Ramoth-Gilead ; and yet he felt he was not safe
He had his doubts and his fears. He would not go openly

¦62 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
into the battle, and disguised himself, hoping that by this
means he should keep himself safe from evil. Fool ! God's
vengeance could not be stopped by his paltry cunning. In
spite of all his disguise, a chance shot struck him down between
the joints of his armour. His chariot-driver carried him out of
the battle, and ' he was stayed up in his chariot against the
Syrians, and died at even : and the blood ran out of his wound
into the midst of the chariot. And one washed the chariot in
the pool of Samaria ; and the dogs licked up his blood there,'
according to the word of the Lord, which He spoke by the
mouth of His prophet Elijah, saying, ' In the place where dogs
licked the blood of Naboth, whom thou slewest, shall dogs lick
thy blood, even thine.'
And do not fancy, my friends, that because this is a miracu
lous story of ancient times, it has nothing to do with us. All
these things were written for our example. This chapter tells
us not merely how Ahab was tempted, but it tells us how we
are tempted, every one of us, here in England, in these very
¦days. As it was with Ahab, so it is with us. Every wilful sin
that we commit, we give room to the devil. Every wrong step
that we take knowingly, we give a handle to some evil spirit to
lead us seven steps further wrong. And yet in every temptation
God gives us a fair chance. He is no cruel tyrant who will
deliver us over to the devil, to be led helpless and blindfold to
•our ruin. He did not give Ahab over to him so. He sent a
lying spirit to deceive Ahab's prophets, that Ahab might go up
and fall at Ramoth-Gilead ; but at the very same time, see, He
sends a holy and a true man, a man whom Ahab could trust,
and did trust at the bottom of his heart, to tell him that the lie
was a lie, to warn him of his ruin, so that he might have
no excuse for listening to those false prophets — no excuse for
following his own pride, his own ambition, to his destruction.
So you see, ' let no man say, when he is tempted, I am tempted
of God, for God tempteth no man, but every one is tempted
when he is led away by his own lusts and enticed.' Ahab was

vm.] SELF-DESTRUCTION. 63
led away by his own lusts; his cowardly love of hearing what
was pleasant and flattering to him, rather than what Was true —
rather than what he knew he deserved; that was what enticed
him to listen to Zedekiah and the false prophets, rather than to
Micaiah the son of Imlah. That is what entices us to sin — the
lust of believing what is pleasant to us, what suits our own self-
will — what is pleasant to our bodies — pleasant to our purses —
pleasant to our pride and self-conceit. Then, when the lying
spirit comes and whispers to us, by bad thoughts, by bad
books, by bad men, that we shall prosper in our wickedness,
does God leave us alone to listen to those evil voices without
warning? No! He sends His prophets to us, as He sent
Micaiah to Ahab, to tell us that the wages of sin is death— to
tell us that those who sow the wind shall reap the whirlwind —
to set before us at every turn good or evil, that we may choose
between them, and live or die according to our choice. For
do not fancy that there are no prophets in our days, unless the
gift of the Holy Spirit, which is promised to all who believe, be
a dream and a lie. There are prophets now-a-days — yea, I
say unto you, and more than prophets. Is not the Bible a
prophet ? Is not every page in it a prophecy to us, foretelling
God's mercies and God's punishments towards men ? Is not
every holy and wise book, every holy and wise preacher and
writer, a prophet, expounding to us God's laws, foretelling to
us God's opinions of our deeds, both good and evil? Ay, is
not every man a prophet to himself? That ' still small voice '
in a man's heart, which warns him of what is evil — that feeling
which makes him cheerful and free when he has done
right, sad and ashamed when he has done wrong — is not that a
prophecy in a man's own heart ? Truly it is. It is the voice
of God within us — it is the Spirit of God striving with our
spirits, whether we will hear, or whether we will forbear —
setting before us what is righteous, and noble, and pure, and
what is manly and God-like — to see whether we will obey that
voice, or whether we will obey our own selfish lusts, which

64 VILLAGE SERMONS.
tempt us to please ourselves — to pamper ourselves, our greedi
ness, covetousness, ambition, or self-conceit. And again, I say,
we have our prophets. Every preacher of righteousness is a
prophet. Every good tract is a prophet That Prayer-book,
those Psalms, those Creeds, those Collects, which you take into
your mouths every Sunday, what are they but written pro
phecies, crying unto us with the words of holy men of old,
greater than Micaiah, or David, or Elijah, 'Hear thou the word
of the Lord ?' The spirits of those who wrote that Prayer-book
— the spirits of just men made perfect, filled with the spirit of
the Lord — they call to us to learn the wisdom which they
knew, to avoid the temptations which they conquered, that we
may share in the glory in which they share round the throne of
Christ for evermore.
And if you ask me how to try the spirits, how to know
whether your own thoughts, whether the sermons which you
hear, the books which you read, are speaking to you God's
truth, or some lying spirit's falsehood, I can only answer you,
'To the law and to the testimony' — to the Bible; if they speak
not according to that word, there is no truth in them. But how
to understand the Bible ? for the fleshly man understands not
the things of God. The fleshly man, he who cares only about
pleasing himself, he who goes to the Bible full of self-conceit
and selfishness, wanting the Bible to tell him only just what he
likes to hear, will only find it a sealed book to him, and will
very likely wrest the Scriptures to his own destruction. Take
up your Bible humbly, praying to God to show you its meaning,
whether it be pleasant to you or not, and then you will find that
God will show you a blessed meaning in it ; He will open your
eyes, that you may understand the wondrous things of His law;
He will show you how to try the spirit of all you are taught, and
to find out whether it comes from God.

SERMON IX.
PIELL ON EARTH.

Matthew viii. 29.
And, behold, the evil spirits cried out, saying, What have we to do with
Thee, Jesus, Thou Son of God ? Art Thou come hither to torment us
before the time ?
HPHIS account of the man possessed with devils, and of his
language to our Lord, of our Lord's casting the devils
out of the poor sufferer, and His allowing them to enter into a
herd of swine, is one that is well worth serious thought ; and I
think a few words on it will follow fitly after my last Sunday's
sermon on Ahab and his temptations by evil spirits. In that
sermon I showed you what temper of mind it was which laid a
man open to the cunning of evil spirits : I wish now to show
you something of what those evil spirits are. It is very little
that we can know about them. We were intended to know
very little ; just as much as would enable us to guard against
them, and no more. The accounts of them in the Scriptures
are for our use, not to satisfy our curiosity. But we may find
out a great deal about them from this very chapter, from
this very story, which is repeated almost word for word in
three different Gospels, as if to make us more certain of so
curious and important a matter, by having three distinct and
independent writers to witness for its truth. I advise all those

65 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
who have Bibles to look for this story in the 8th chapter of St
Matthew, and follow me as I explain it.1
Now, first, we may learn from this account, that evil spirits
are real persons. There is a notion got abroad that it is only
a figure of speech to talk of evil spirits — that all the Bible means
by them are certain bad habits, or bad qualities, or diseases.
There are many who will say, when they read this story, This
poor man was only a madman. It was the fashion of the old
Jews when a man was mad to say that he was possessed by evil
spirits. All they meant was that the man's own spirit was in an
evil diseased state, or that his brain and mind were out of order.
When I hear such language — and it is very common — I can
not help thinking how pleased the devil must be to hear people .
talk in such a way. How can people help him better than by
saying that there is no devil ? A thief would be very glad to
hear you say, ' There are no such things as thieves ; it is all an
old superstition, so I may leave my house open at night with
out danger ;' and I believe, my friends, from the very bottom
of my heart, that this new-fangled disbelief in evil spirits is put
into men's hearts by the evil spirits themselves. As it was once
said, ' The devil has tried every plan to catch men's souls, and
now, as the last and most cunning trick of all, he is shamming
dead.' These may seem homely words, but the homeliest words
are very often the deepest. I advise yon all to think seriously
on them.
1 ' And when He was come to the other side, into the country of the
Gergesenes, there met Him two possessed with devils, coming out of the
tombs, exceeding fierce, so that no man might pass by that way. And,
behold, they cried out, saying, What have we to do with Thee, Jesus, Thou
Son of God ? Art Thou come hither to torment us before the time ? And
there was a good way off from them an herd of many swine feeding. So the
devils besought Him, saying, If Thou cast us out, suffer us to go away into
the herd of swine. And he said unto them, Go. And when they were
come out, they went into the herd of swine ; and, behold, the whole herd
of swine ran violently down a steep place into the sea, and perished in the
waters.'

IX.] HELL ON EARTH. 67
But it is impossible, surely, to read this story without seeing
that the Bible considers evil spirits as distinct persons just as
much as each one of us is a person, and that our Lord spoke to
them and treated them as persons. ' What have we to do with
Thee, Jesus, Thou Son of God ? Art Thou come hither to tor
ment us before the time?' And again, 'If Thou cast us out,
suffer us to go into the herd of swine.' What can show more
plainly that there were some persons in that poor man, besides
himself, his own spirit, his own person ? and that he knew it,
and Jesus knew it too ? and that He spoke to these spirits,
these persons who possessed that man, and not to the man
himself? No doubt there was a terrible confusion in the poor
madman's mind about these evil spirits, who were tormenting
him, making him miserable, foul, and savage, in mind and body
— a terrible confusion ! We find, when Jesus asked him his
name, he answers ' Legion,' that is, an army, a multitude, ' for
we are many,' he says. Again, one Gospel tells us that he says,
' What have / to do with Thee, Jesus, Thou Son of God ? '
While in another Gospel we are told that he said, ' What have
we to do with Thee ? ' He seems not to have been able to
distinguish between his own spirit and these spirits who pos
sessed him. They put the furious and despairing thoughts into
his heart ; they spoke through his mouth ; they made a slave
and a puppet of him. But though he could riot distinguish
between his own soul and the devils who wefe in it, Christ
could and Christ did.
The man says to Him, or rather the devils make the man say
to Him, ' If Thou cast us out, suffer us to go into the herd of
swine, and drive us not out into the deep.' What did Christ
answer him ? Christ did not answer him as our so-called
wise men in these days would, ' My good man, this is all
a delusion and a fancy of your own, about your having evil
spirits in you — more persons than one in you — for you are
wrong in saying we of yourself. You ought to say ' I,' as
every one else does; and as for spirits going out of you,

68 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
or going into a herd of swine, or anything else, that is all a
superstition and a fancy. There is nothing to come out of you ;
there is nothing in you except yourself. All the evil in you is
your own, the disease of your own brain, and the violent pas
sions of your own heart. Your brain must be cured by medi
cine, and your violent passions tamed down by care and kind
ness, and then you will get rid of this foolish notion that you
have evil spirits in you, and calling yourself a multitude as if
you had other persons in you besides yourself.'
Anyone who spoke in this manner now-a-days would be
thought very reasonable and very kind. Why did not our Lord
speak so to this man ? for there was no outward difference be
tween this man's conduct and that of many violent mad people
whom we see continually in England. We read, that this man
possessed with devils would wear no clothes ; that he had extra
ordinary strength ; that he would not keep company with other
men, but abode day and night in the tombs, exceeding fierce,
crying, and cutting himself with stones, trying in blind rage,
which he could not explain to himself, to hurt himself and all who
came near him. And, above all, he had this notion, that evil
spirits had got possession of him. Now, every one of these habits
and fancies you may see in many raging maniacs at this day.
But did our Lord treat this man as we treat such maniacs
in these days ? He took the man at his word, and more ; the
man could not distinguish clearly between himself and the evil
spirits, but our Lord did. When the devils besought him say
ing, 'If Thou cast us out, suffer us to go into the herd of swine,'
our Lord answers, 'Go,' and 'when they were cast out they
went into the herd of swine ; and, behold, the whole herd of
swine ran violently down a steep place into the sea, and
perished in the waters.'
It was as if our Lord had meant to say to the bystanders,—
ay, and to us, and to all people in all times and in all countries,
' This poor possessed maniac's notion was a true one. There
were other persons in him besides himself, tormenting him,

IX.] HELL ON EARTH. 69
body and soul ; and, behold, I can drive these out of him and
send them into something else, and leave the man uninjured
himself, and only himself, again in an instant, without any need
of long education to cure him of his bad habits.' It will be
but reasonable, then, for us to take this story of the man
possessed by devils, as written for our example, as an instance
of what might, and perhaps would, happen to any one of us,
were it not for God's mercy.
St. Peter tells us to be sober and watchful, because ' the
devil goes about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may
devour;' and when we look at the world around, we may
surely see that that stands as true now as it did in St. Peter's
time. Why, again, did St. James tell us to resist the devil, if
the devil be not near us to resist ? Why did St. Paul take for
granted, as he did, that Christian men were, of course, not
ignorant of Satan's devices, if it be quite a proof of enlighten
ment and superior knowledge to be ignorant of his devices, —
if any dread, any thought even, about evil spirits, be beneath
the attention of reasonable men ? My friends, I say fairly,
once for all, that that common notion, that there are no men
now possessed by evil spirits, and that all those stories of the
devil's power over men are only old, worn-out superstitions,
has come from this, that men do not like to retain God in their
knowledge, and therefore, as a necessary consequence, do not
like to retain the devil in their knowledge ; because they
would be very glad to believe in nothing but what they
can see, and taste, and handle; and, therefore, the thought
of unseen evil spirits, or good spirits either, is a painful
thing to them. First, they really do not believe in angels —
ministering spirits sent out to minister to the heirs of salva
tion ; then they begin not to believe in evil spirits. The
Bible plainly describes their vast numbers ; but these people
are wiser than the Bible, and only talk of one — of the devil,
as if there were not, as the text tells us, legions and armies
of devils. Then they get rid of that one devil in their real

70 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
desire to believe in as few spirits as possible. I am afraid
many of them have gone on to the next step, and got rid of the
one God out of their thoughts and their belief. I said I am
afraid, I ought to have said I know, that they have done so,
and that thousands in this day who began by saying evil spirits
only mean certain diseases and bad habits in men, have ended
by saying, ' God only means certain good habits in man. God
is no more a person than the evil spirits are persons.'
I warn you of all this, my friends, because if you go to live
in large towns, as many of you will, you will hear talk enough
of this sort before your hairs are grey, put cleverly and
eloquently enough ; for, as a wise man said, ' The devil does
not send fools on his errands.' I pray God, that if you ever
do hear doctrines of that kind, some of my words may
rise in your mind and help to show to you the evil path down
which they lead.
We may believe, then, from the plain words of Scripture, that
there are vast numbers of evil spirits continually tempting men,
each of them to some particular sin; to worldliness, for instance,
for we read of the spirit of the evil world ; to filthiness, for we
read of unclean spirits ; to falsehood, for we read of lying
spirits, and a spirit of lies ; to pride, for we read of a spirit of
pride ; — in short, to all sins which a man can commit, to all evil
passions to which a man can give way. We have a right to
believe, from the plain words of Scripture, that these spirits are
continually wandering up and down tempting men to sin. That
wonderful story of Job's temptation, which you may all read for
yourselves in the first chapter of the book of Job, is, I think,
proof enough for anyone.
• But next, and I wish you to pay special attention to this
point : We have no right to believe — we have every right not to
believe — that these evil spirits can make us sin in the smallest
matter against our own wills. The devil cannot put a single sin
into us ; he can only flatter the sinfulness which is already in us.
For, see; this pride, lust, covetousness, falsehood, and so on,

ix.] HELL ON EARTH. 7l

to which the Bible tells us they tempt us, have roots already in
our nature. Our fallen nature of itself is inclined to pride,
to worldliness, and so on. These devils tempt us by putting in
our way the occasion of sin, by suggesting to us tempting
thoughts and arguments which lead to sin; so the serpent
tempted Eve, not by making her ambitious and self-willed, but
by using arguments to her which stirred up the ambition and
self-will in her : ' Ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil,'
the devil said to her.
So Satan, the prince of the evil spirits, tempted our Lord.
And as the prince of the devils tempted Christ, so do his ser
vants tempt us, Christ's servants. Our tempers, our longings,
our fancies, are not evil spirits ; they are, as old divines well
describe them, like greedy and foolish fish, who rise at the baits
which evil spirits hold out to us. If we resist those baits — if we
put ourselves under God's protection — if we claim strength from
Him who conquered the devil and all his temptations, then we
shall be able to turn our wills away from those tempting baits,
and to resign our wills into our Father's hand, and He will take
care of them, and strengthen them with His will ; and we shall
find out that if we resist the devil, he will flee from us. But if
we yield to temptations whenever they come in our way, we
shall find ourselves less and less able to resist them, for we shall
learn to hate the evil spirits less and less ; I mean, we shall
shrink less from the evil thought they hold out to us. We shall
give place to the devil, as the Scripture tells us we shall ; for
instance, by indulging in habitual passionate tempers, or rooted
spite and malice, letting the sun go down upon our wrath : and
so a man may become more and more the slave of his own
nature, of his own lusts and passions, and therefore of the
devils who are continually pampering and maddening those lusts
and passions, till a man may end in complete possession ; not
in common madness, which may be mere disease, but as a
savage and a raging maniac, such as, thank God, are rare in
Christian countries, though they were common among our own

72 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
forefathers before they were converted to Christianity, — men like
the demoniac of whom the text speaks, tormented by devils,
given up to blind rage and malice against himself and all around,
to lust and blasphemy, to confusion of mind and misery of body,
God's image gone, and the image of the devil, the destroyer and
the corrupter, arisen in its place. Few men can arrive at this
pitch of wretchedness in a civilised country. It would not
answer the evil spirit's purpose to let them do so. It suits
his spirits best in such a land as this to walk about dressed up
as angels of light. Few men in England would be fools enough
to indulge the gross and fierce part of their nature till they
became mere savages, like the demoniac whom Christ cured ;
so it is to respectable vices that the devil mostly tempts us —
to covetousness, to party spirit, to a hard heart, and a narrow
mind ; to cruelty, that shall clothe itself under the name of law ;
to filthiness, which excuses itself by saying, 'It is a man's
nature, he cannot help it ; ' to idleness, which excuses itself on
the score of wealth ; to meanness and unfairness in trade, and
in political and religious disputes — these are the devils which
haunt us Englishmen — sleek, prim, respectable fiends enough ;
and, truly, their name is Legion ! And the man who gives
himself up to them, though he may not become a raving savage,
is just as truly possessed by devils, to his own misery and ruin,
that he may sow the wind and reap the whirlwind ; that though
men may speak well of him, and posterity praise his saying, and
speak good of the covetous whom God abhorreth, yet he may
go for ever unto his own, to the evil spirits to whom his own
wicked will gave him up for a prey. I beseech you, my friends,
consider my words ; they are not mine, but the Bible's. Think
of them with fear ; — and yet with confidence, for we are bap
tized into the name of Him who conquered all devils ; you may
claim a share in that Spirit which is opposite to all evil spirits,
— whose presence makes the agony and misery of evil spirits,
and drives them out as water drives out fire. If He is on your
side, why should you be afraid of any spirit ? Greater is He

XI.] HELL ON EARTH. 73
that is in you than he that is against you ; and He, Christ Him
self, is with every man, every child, who struggles, however
blindly and weakly, against temptation. When temptation
comes, when evil looks pleasant, and arguments rise up in
your mind, that seem to make it look right and reasonable,
as well as pleasant, then, out of the very depths of your hearts,
cry after Him who died for you. Say to yourselves, ' How
can I do this thing, and offend against Him who bought
me with His blood?' Say to Him, ' I am weak, I am confused;
I do not see right from wrong ; I cannot find my way ; I cannot
inswer the devil ; I cannot conquer these cunning thoughts ; I
know in the bottom of my heart that they are wrong, mere temp
tations, and yet they look so reasonable. Blessed Saviour, Thou
must show me where they are wrong. Thou didst answer the
devil Thyself out of God's Word, put into my mind some
answer out of God's Word to these temptations ; or, at least,
give me spirit to toss them off — strength of will to thrust the
whole temptation out of my head, and say, I will parley no
longer with the devil; I will put the whole matter out of my head
for a time. I don't know whether it is right or wrong for me to do
this particular thing, but there are twenty other things which I do
know are right. I will go and do them, and let this wait awhile.'
Believe me, my friends, you can do this — you can resist these
evil spirits which tempt us all ; else why did our Lord bid us
pray, ' Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil ? '
Why ? Because our Father in heaven, if we ask Him, will not
lead us into temptation, but through it safe. Tempted we must
be, else we should not be men ; but here is our comfort and
our strength — that we have a King in heaven who has fought
out and conquered all temptations, and a Father in heaven who
has promised that He will not suffer us to be tempted above
that we are able, but will, with the temptation, make a way to
escape, that we may be able to bear it. Again, I say, draw
near to God, and He will draw near to you. Resist the devil,
and he will flee from you.

SERMON X.
NOAH'S JUSTICE.

Genesis vi. 9.
Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and '
Noah walked with God.
T INTEND, my friends, according as God shall help me,
to preach to you, between this time and Christmas, a few
sermons on some of the saints and worthies of the Old Testa
ment : and I will begin this day with Noah. Now, you must
bear in mind that the histories of these ancient men were, as
St. Paul says, written for our example. If these men in old
times had been different from us, they would not be examples
to us ; but they were like us — men of like passions, says St.
James, as ourselves ; they had each of them in them a corrupt
nature, which was continually ready to drag them down, and
make beasts of them, and make them slaves to their own lusts
— slaves to eating and drinking, and covetousness, and cowar
dice, and laziness, and love for the things which they could see
and handle — just such a nature, in short, as we have. And
they had also a spirit in each of them which was longing to be
free, and strong, and holy, and wise — such a spirit as we have.
And to them, just as to us, God was revealing Himself; God
was saying to their consciences, as He does to ours, 'This is
right, that is wrong ; do this, and be free and clear-hearted ; do

NOAH'S JUSTICE. 75
that, and be dark and discontented, and afraid of thy own
thoughts. ' And they too, like us, had to live by faith, by con
tinual belief that they owed a duty to the great God whom
they could not see, by continual belief that He loved them, and
was guiding and leading them through everything which hap
pened, good or ill.
This is faith in God, by which alone we, or any man, can live
worthily, — by which these old heroes lived. We read, in the
twelfth chapter of Hebrews, that it was by faith these elders
obtained a good report : and the whole history of the Old
Testament saints is the history of God speaking to the hearts
of one man after another, teaching them each more and more
about Himself, and the history also of these men listening to
the voice of God in their hearts, and believing that voice, and
acting faithfully upon it, into whatever strange circumstances or
deeds it might lead them. ' By faith,' we read in the same
chapter — 'by faith Noah, being warned of God, prepared an
ark to the saving of his house, and became heir of the righte
ousness which is by faith.'
Now, to understand this last sentence, you must remember
that Noah was not under the law of Moses. St. Paul has a
whole chapter (the third chapter of Galatians) to show that
these old saints had nothing to do with Moses' law any more
than we have; that it was given to the Jews many hundred
years afterwards. So these histories of the Old Testament
saints are, in fact, histories of men who conquered by faith —
histories of the power which faith in God has to conquer
temptation, and doubt, and false appearances, and fear and
danger, and all which besets and keeps us down from being
free and holy, and children of the day, walking cheerfully
forward on our heavenward road in the light of our Father's
loving smile.
Noah, we read, ' was a just man and perfect in his genera
tions ; ' and why ? Because he was a faithful man — faithful to
God, as it is written, 'The just shall live by his faith;' not by

jQ VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
trusting in what he does himself, in his own works or deserv-
ings, but trusting in God who made him ; believing that God is
perfectly righteous, perfectly wise, perfectly loving ; and that,
because He is perfectly loving, He will accept and save sinful
man when He sees in sinful man the earnest wish to be His
faithful, obedient servant, and to give himself up to the rule
and guidance of God. This, then, was Noah's justice in God's
sight, as it was Abraham's. They believed God, and so
became heirs of the righteousness which is by faith ; not their
own righteousness, not growing out of their own character, but
given them by God, who puts His righteous Spirit into those
who trust in Him.
But, moreover, we read that Noah ' was perfect in his
generations;' that is, he was perfect in all the relations and
duties of life, — a good son, a good husband, a good father;
these were the fruits of his faith. He believed that the unseen
God had given him these ties, had given him his parents, his
children, and that to love them was to love God, to do his
duty to them was to do his duty to God. This was part of his
walking with God, continually under his great Taskmaster's
eye,— walking about his daily business with the belief that a<
great loving Father was above him, whatever he did ; ready to
strengthen, and guide, and bless him if he did well, ready to
avenge Himself on him if he did ill. These were the fruits of
Noah's faith.
But you may think this nothing very wonderful. Many a
man in England does this every day, and yet no one ever hears
of him ; he attends to all his family ties, doing justly, loving
mercy, and walking humbly with God, like one who knows he
is redeemed by Christ's blood ; he lives, he dies, he is buried,
and out of his own parish his name is never known ; while Noah
has earned for himself a world-wide fame ; for four thousand
years his name has been spreading over the whole earth as one
of the greatest men who ever lived. Mighty nations have
worshipped Noah as a God ; many heathen nations worship him

x.] NOAH'S JUSTICE. yj
under strange and confused names and traditions to this day ;
and the wisest and holiest men among Christians now reverence
Noah, write of him, preach on him, thank God for him, look
up to him as, next to Abraham, their greatest example in the
Old Testament.
Well, my friends, to understand what made Noah so great,
we must understand in what times Noah lived. ' The wicked
ness of men was great in the earth in those days, and every
imagination of the thoughts of their heart was only evil con
tinually, and the earth was filled with violence through them.'
And we must remember that the wickedness of men before the
flood was not outwardly like wickedness now ; it was not petty,
mean, contemptible wickedness of silly and stupid men, such as
could be despised and laughed down ; it was like the wicked
ness of fallen angels. Men were then strong and beautiful,
cunning and active, to a degree of which we can form no con
ception. Their enormous length of life (six, seven, and eight
hundred years commonly) must have given them an experience
and daring far beyond any man in these days. Their bodily
size and strength were in many cases enormous. We read
that ' there were giants in the earth in those days ; and also after
that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men,
and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men
which were of old, men of renown.' Their powers of invention
seem to have been proportionably great. We read, in the fourth
chapter of Genesis, how, within a few years after Adam was
driven out of Paradise, they had learned to build cities, to tame
the wild beasts, and live upon their milk and flesh ; that they
had invented all sorts of music and musical instruments ; that
they had discovered the art of working in metals. We read
among them of Tubal Cain, an instructor of every workman
in brass and iron; and the old traditions in the East, where
these men dwelt, are full of strange and awful tales of their
power. Again, we must remember that there was no law in Noah's

78 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
days before the flood, no Bible to guide them, no constitutions
and acts of parliament to bind men in the beaten track by the
awful majesty of law, whether they will or no, as^we have.
This is the picture which the Bible gives us of the old world
before the flood — a world of men mighty in body and mind,
fierce and busy, conquering the world round them, in continual
war and turmoil ; with all the wild passions of youth, and yet
all the cunning and experience of enormous old age ; with the
strength and the courage of young men to carry out the
iniquity of old ones ; every one guided only by self-will, having
cast off God and conscience, and doing every man that which
was right in the sight of his own eyes. And amidst all this,
while men as wise, as old, as strong, as great as himself, whirled
away round him in this raging sea of sin, Noah was steadfast ;
he, at least, knew his way, — 'he walked with God, a just man
and perfect in his generations.'
To Noah, living in such a world as this, among temptation,
and violence, and insult, no doubt there came this command
from God : ' The end of all flesh is come before me, for the
earth is filled with violence through them, and I will destroy
them with the earth. And behold I, even I, do bring a flood
of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the
breath of life ; but with thee will I establish my covenant, and
thou shalt make thee an ark of wood after the fashion which I
tell thee ; and thou shalt come into the ark, thou and thy family,
and of every living thing, two of every sort, male and female,
shalt thou bring into the ark, and keep them alive with thee ;
and take thou of all food that is eaten into the ark, for thee,
and for them.' What a message, my friends ! If we wish to
see a little of the greatness of Noah's faith, conceive such a
message coming from God to one of us ! Should we believe it
— much less act upon it ? But Noah believed God, says the
Scripture ; and ' according as God commanded him, so did he.'
Now, in whatever way this command came from God to Noah,
it is equally wonderful. Some of you, perhaps, will say in your

x.] NOAH'S JUSTICE. 79
hearts, ' No ! when God spoke to him, how could he help obey
ing Him ? ' But, my friends, ask yourselves seriously — for,
believe me, it is a most important question for the soul and
inner life of you and me, and every man — how did Noah know
that it was God who spoke to him ? It is easy to say God
appeared to him ; but no man hath seen God at. any time. It
is easy, again, to say that an angel appeared to him, or that
God appeared to him in the form of a man ; but still the same
question is left to be answered, how did he know that this
appearance came from God, and that its words were true ?
Why should not Noah have said, ' This was an evil spirit which
appeared to me, trying to frighten and ruin me, and stir up all
my neighbours to mock me, perhaps to murder me ? ' Or
again ; suppose that you or I saw some glorious apparition this
day, which told us on such and such a day such and such a
town will be destroyed, what should we think of it ? Should
we not say, I have been dreaming — I must have been ill, and
so my brain and eyes must have been disordered ? and treat
the whole thing as a mere fancy of ill-health : now, why did not
Noah do the same ?
Why do I say this ? To show you, my friends, that it is not
apparitions and visions which can make a man believe. As it
is written, " If they believe not Moses and the prophets, neither
will they believe though one rose from the dead.' No; a man
must have faith in his heart already. A man must first be
accustomed to discern right from wrong— to listen to and to
obey the voice of God within him ; that word of God of which
it is said ' the word is nigh thee, in thy heart and in thy mind,'
before he can hear God's word from without ; else he will only
explain away miracles, and call visions and apparitions sick
men's dreams.
But there was something yet more wonderful and divine in
Noah's faith, — -I mean his patience. He knew that a flood was
to come — he set to work in faith to build his ark — and that ark
was in building for one hundred and twenty years. One

So VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
hundred and twenty years ! It seems at first past all belief.
For all that time he built ; and all the while the world went on
just as usual ; and, before he had finished, old men had died,
and children grown into years ; and great cities had sprung up
perhaps where there was not a cottage before ; and trees which
were but a yard high when that ark was begun had grown into
mighty forest-timber : and men had multiplied and spread, and
yet Noah built and built on steadfastly, believing that what God
had said would surely one day or other come to pass. For one
hundred and twenty years he saw the world go on as usual, and
yet he never forgot that it was a doomed world. He endured
the laughter and mockery of all his neighbours ; and every fresh
child who was born grew up to laugh at the foolish old man
who had been toiling for a hundred years past on his mad
scheme, as they thought it ; and yet Noah never lost faith, and
he never lost love either — for all those years, we read, he
preached righteousness to the very men who mocked him, and
preached in vain. One hundred and twenty years he warned
those sinners of God's wrath, of righteousness and judgment to
come, and no man listened to him ! That, I believe, must
have been, after all, the hardest of all his trials.
And, doubtless, Noah had his inward temptation many a
time ; no doubl he was ready now and then to believe God's
message all a dream — to laugh at himself for his fears of a flood
which seemed never coming, but in his heart was the ' still
small voice ' of God, warning him that God was not a man that
He should lie, or repent, or deceive those who walked faith
fully with Him ; and around him he saw men growing and grow
ing in iniquity, filling up the cup of their own damnation : and
he said to himself, 'Verily there is a God who judgeth the
earth — for all this a reckoning day will surely come ; and he
worked steadfastly on, and the ark was finished. And then at
last there came a second call from God, ' Come thou and all
thy house into the ark, for thee have I seen righteous before me
in this generation. Yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain

x.] NOAH'S JUSTICE. 8 1
upon the earth, and every living substance that I have made
will I destroy from off the earth.' And Noah entered into the
ark, and seven days he waited ; and louder than ever laughed
the scoffers round him, at the old man and his family shut into
his ark safe on dry land, while day and night went on as quietly
as ever, and the world ran its usual round ; for seven days more
their mad game lasted — they ate, they drank, they married,
they gave in marriage, they planted, they builded ; and on the
seventh day it came ; the rain fell day after day, and week after
week, and the windows of heaven were opened, and the foun
tains of the great deep were broken up, and the flood arose, and
swept them all away !

SERMON XI.
THE NOACHIC COVENANT.

Gen. ix. 8, 9.
And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him, saying, And I,
behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you.
TN my last sermon on Noah I spoke of the flood and of
Noah's faith before the flood ; I now go on to speak of the
covenant which God made with Noah after the flood. Now,
Noah stood on that newly-dried earth as the head of mankind ;
he and his family, in all eight souls, saved by God's mercy
from the general ruin, were the only human beings left alive,
and had laid on them the wonderful and glorious duty of re
newing the race of man, and replenishing the vast world around
them. From that little knot of human beings were to spring all
the nations of the earth.
And because this calling and destiny of theirs was a great
and all-important one — because so much of the happiness or
misery of the new race of mankind depended on the teaching
which they would get from their forefathers, the sons of Noah,
therefore God thought fit to make with Noah and his sons a
solemn covenant, as soon as they came out of the ark.
Let us solemnly consider this covenant, for it stands good
now as much as ever. God made it ' with Noah, and his seed
after him,' for perpetual generations. And we are the seed of

THE NOACHIC COVENANT. 83
Noah ; every man, woman, and child of us here were in the loins
of Noah when the great absolute God gave him that pledge and
promise. We must earnestly consider that covenant, for in it
lies the very ground and meaning of man's life and business on
this earth.
' And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them,
Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth. And the
fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every living
creature. Into your hand are they delivered. Every moving
thing that liveth shall be meat for you ; even as the green herb
have I given you all things. But flesh with the life thereof,
which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat. And surely your
blood of your lives will I require ; at the hand of every beast
will I require it, and at the hand of man ; at the hand of every
man's brother will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth
man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed ; for in the image
of God made He man.'
Now, to understand this covenant, consider what thoughts
would have been likely to grow up in the mind of Noah's
children after the flood ? Would they not have been something
of this kind : ' God does not love men ; He has drowned all but
us, and we are men of like passions with the world who
perished : may we not expect the like ruin at any moment ?
Then what use to plough and sow, and build and plant, and
work for those who shall come after us ? " Let us eat and
drink, for to-morrow we die." '
And again, they would have been ready to say, ' This God,
whom our forefather Noah said sent floods, we cannot see
Him ; but the floods themselves we can see. All these clouds
and tempests, lightning, sun, and stars, — are we stronger than
they ? No ! They may crush us, drown us, strike us dead at
any moment. They seem too to go by certain wonderful rules
and laws ; perhaps they have a will and understanding in them.
Instead of praying to a God whom we never saw, why not pray
to the thunderclouds not to strike us dead, and to the seas and

84 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
rivers not to sweep us away ? For this great, wonderful, awful
world in which we are, however beautiful may be its flowers,
and its fruits, and its sunshine, there is no trusting it ; we are
sitting upon a painted sepulchre, a beautiful monster, a gulf of
flood and fire, which may burst up any moment, and sweep us
away, as it did our forefathers.'
Again, Noah's children would have begun to say, 'These
beasts here round us, they are so many of them larger than us,
stronger than us, able to tear us to atoms, eat us up as they
would eat a lamb. They are self-sufficient, too ; they want no
clothes, nor houses, nor fire, like us poor, weak, naked, soft
human creatures. They can run faster than we, see further than
we ; their scent, too, what a wonderful, mysterious power that
is, like a miracle to us ! And, besides all their cunning way of
getting food and building nests, they never do wrong; they
never do horrible things contrary to their nature; they all abide
as God has made them, obeying the law of their kind. Are not
these beasts, then, much wiser and better than we ? We will
honour them, and pray to them not to devour us — to make us
cunning and powerful as they are themselves. And if they are
no better than us, surely they are no worse than us. After all,
what difference is there between a man and a beast? The
flood which dtowned the beasts drowned the men too. A beast
is flesh and blood ; what more is a man ? If you kill him, he
dies, just as a beast dies ; and why should not a man's carcase
be just as good to eat as a beast's, and better?' And so there
would have been a free opening at once into all the horrors of
cannibalism !
Again, Noah's descendants would have said, ' Our forefathers
offered sacrifices to the unseen God, as a sign that all they had
belonged to Him, and that they had forfeited their own souls
by sin, and were therefore ready to give up the most precious
things they had — their cattle — as a sign that they owed all to
that very God whom they had offended. But are not human
creatures much more precious than cattle? Will it not be a much

Xi.] THE NOACHIC COVENANT. 85
greater sign of repentance and willingness to give up all to God,
if we offer Him the best things which we have — human crea
tures ? — if we kill and sacrifice to Him our most beautiful and
innocent things —little children — noble young men — beautiful
young girls?'
My friends, these are very strange and shocking thoughts, but
they have been in the hearts and minds of all nations. The
heathens do such things now. Our own forefathers used to do
such things once ; they were tempted to worship the sun and
the moon, and rivers, and the thunder, and to look with super
stitious terror at the bears, and the wolves, and the snakes round
them, and to kill their young children and maidens, and offer
them up as sacrifices to the dark powers of this world, which
they thought were ready to swallow them up. And God is my
witness, my friends, when one goes through some parts of Eng
land now, and sees the mine-children and factory-children, and
all the sin and misery, and the people wearying themselves in
the fire for very vanity, we seem' not to be so very far from the
same dark superstition now, though we may call it by a differ
ent name. England has been sacrificing her sons and her
daughters to the devil of covetousness of late years, just as
much as our forefathers offered theirs to the devil of selfish and
cowardly superstition.
But see, now, how this covenant which God made with Noah
was intended just to remedy every one of those temptations which
I just mentioned, into which Noah's children's children would
have been certain to fall, and into which so many of them did fall.
They might have become reckless, I said, from fear of a flood
at any moment. God promises them — and confirms it with the
sign of the rainbow — never again to destroy the earth by water.
They would have been likely to take to praying to the rain and
the thunder, the sun and the stars ; God declares in this cove
nant that it is He alone who sends the rain and thunder, that
He brings the clouds over the earth, that He rules the great
awful world ; that men are to look up and believe in God as a

S6 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
loving and thinking person, who has a will of His own, and that
a faithful, and true, and loving, and merciful will ; that their
lives and safety depend not on blind chance, or the stern neces
sity of certain laws of nature, but on the covenant of an almighty
and all-loving person.
Again, I said that Noah's sons would have been ready to fear,
and, at last, to worship the dumb beasts ; God's covenant says,
' No ; these beasts are not your equals — they are your slaves —
you may freely kill them for your food; the fear. of you shall be
upon them. The huge elephant and the swift horse shall be
come your servants ; the lion and the tiger shall tremble and
flee before you. Only claim your rights as men ; believe that
the invisible God who made the earth is your strength and your
protector, and that He to whom the earth belongs has made
you lords of the earth and all that therein is. But,' said God's
covenant to Noah's sons, ' you did not make these beasts — you
did not give them life ; therefore I forbid you to eat their blood
wherein their life lies, that you may never forget that all th.e
power you have over these beasts was given you by God, who
made and preserves that wonderful, mysterious, holy thing called
life, which you can never imitate.' Again, I said that Noah's
children, having been accustomed to the violence and blood
shed on the earth before the flood, might hold man's life
cheap; that having seen in the flood men perish just like the
beasts around them, they might have begun to think that man's
life was not more precious than the beasts'. They might have
all gone on at last, as some of them did, to those horrors of can
nibalism and human sacrifice of which I just now spoke. Now,
here again comes in God's covenant, ' Surely the blood of your
lives will I require. At the hand of every beast will I require
it, and at the hand of every man's brother will I require it.
Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed ;
for in the image of God made He man.' This, then, is the
covenant which God made with Noah for perpetual generations,
and therefore with us, the children of Noah. In this covenant

XI.] THE NOACHIC COVENANT. 87
you see certain truths come out into light ; some, of which you
read nothing before in the Bible, and other truths which, though
they were given to Adam, yet had been utterly lost sight of
before the flood. This has been God's method, we find from
the Bible, ever since the creation, — to lead man step by step
up into more and more light, up to this very day, and to make
each sin and each madness of men an occasion for revealing to
him more and more of truth and of the living God. And so
each and every chapter in the Bible is built upon all that has
gone before it ; and he that neglects to understand what has
gone before will never come to the understanding of wha.t fol
lows after. Why do I say this ? Because men are continually
picking out those scraps of the Bible which suit their own fancy,
and pinning their own faith on them, and trying to make them
serve to explain everything in heaven and earth; whereas no
man can understand the Epistles unless he first understands the
Gospels. No man will understand the New Testament unless
he first understands the pith and marrow of the Old. No man
will understand the Psalms and the Prophets unless he first un
derstands the first ten chapters of Genesis ; and lastly, no one
will ever understand anything about the Bible at all, who,
instead of taking it simply as it is written, is always trying to
twist it into proofs of his own favourite doctrines, and make
Abraham a high Calvinist, or Noah a member of the Church of
England. Why do I say this ? To make you all think seri
ously that this covenant on which I have been preaching is
your covenant; that as sure as the rainbow stands in heaven, as
sure as you and I are sprung out of the loins of Noah, so surely
this covenant which binds us is part of our Christian covenant,
and woe to us if we break it !
This covenant tells us that we are made in God's likeness,
and therefore that all sin is unworthy of us, and unnatural to
us. It tells that God means us bravely and industriously to
subdue the earth and the living things upon it ; that we are to
be the. masters of the pleasant things about us, and not their

88 VILLAGE SERMONS.
slaves, as sots and idlers are ; that we are stewards and tenants
of this world for the great God who made it, to whom we are to
look up in confidence for help and protection. It tells us that
our family relationships, the blessed duties of a husband and a
father, are sacred things ; that God has created them, that the
great God of heaven Himself respects them, that the covenant
which He makes with the father He makes with the children ;
that He commands marriage, and that He blesses it with fruit-
fulness ; that it is He who has told us, ' Be fruitful and multiply,
and replenish the earth ;' that the tie of brotherhood is His
making also ; that He will require the blood of the murdered
man at his brothers hand ; that a man's brothers, his nearest
relations, are bound to protect and right him if he is injured ;
so that we are all to be, in the deepest sense of the word, what
Cain refused to be, our brother's keepers, and each member of a
family is more or less answerable for the welfare and safety of
all his relations. Herein lies the ground of all religion and of
all society — in the covenant which God made with Noah ; and
just as.it is in vain for a man to pretend to be a scholar when
he does not even know his letters, so it is mockery for a man to
pretend to be a converted Christian man who knows not even
so much as was commanded to Noah and his sons. He who
has not learnt to love, honour, and succour his own family — he
who has not learnt to work in honest and manful industry — he
who has not learnt to look beyond this earth, and its chance,
and its customs, and its glittering outside, and see and trust in
a great, wise, loving God, by whose will every tree grows and
every shower falls, what is Christianity to him? He has to
learn the first principles which were delivered to Noah', and
which not even the heathen and the savage have utterly for
gotten.

SERMON XII.
ABRAHAM'S FAITH.

Hebrews xi. 9, 10.
By faith Abraham sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange
country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with
him of the same promise : for he looked for a city which hath founda
tions, whose builder and maker is God.
T N the last sermon which I preached in this church, I said
that the Bible is the history of God's ways with mankind ;
how He has schooled and brought them up until the coming
of Christ ; that if we read the Bible histories, one after another,
in the same order in which God has put them in the Bible,
we shall see that they are all regular steps in a line ; that each
fresh story depends on the story which went before it ; and
yet, in each fresh history we shall find God telling men some
thing new— something which they did not know before. And
that so the whole Bible, from beginning to end, is one glorious,
methodic, and organic tree of life, every part growing out of
the others, and depending on the others, from the root — that
foundation, other than which no man can lay, which is Christ,
revealing Himself, though not by name, in that wonderful first
chapter of Genesis, — up to the fruit, which is the kingdom of
Christ, and Gospel of Christ, and the salvation in which we
here now stand. I told you that the lesson which God has

90 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
been teaching men in all ages, is faith in God— that the saints
of old were just the men who learned this lesson of faith.
Now this, as we all know, was the secret of Abraham's great
ness, that he had faith in God to leave his own country at
God's bidding, and become a stranger and a pilgrim on the
earth, wandering on in full trust that God would give him
another country instead of that which he had left — a ' city
which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.'
This was what Abraham looked for. Something of what it
means we shall see presently.
You remember the story of the tower of Babel ? how certain
of Noah's family forgot the covenant which God had made
with Noah ; forgot that God had commanded them to go forth
in every direction and fill the earth with human beings,
solemnly promising to protect and bless them, and took on
themselves to do the very opposite — set up a kingdom of their
own fashion, and herded together for selfish safety, instead of
going forth to all the quarters of the world in a natural way,
according to their families, in their tribes, after their nations,
as the eleventh chapter of Genesis says they ought to have done.
' Let us build us a city and a tower, and make us a name, lest,'
they said, ' we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole
world.' Here'was one act of disobedience to God's order.
But, besides this, they had fallen into a slavish dread of the
powers of nature — they were afraid of another flood. They set
to, to build a tower, on which they might worship the sun and
stars, and the host of heaven, and pray to them to send no
more floods and tempests. They thus fell into a slavish fear
of the powers of nature, as well as into a selfish and artificial
civilization. In short, they utterly broke the covenant which
God had made with Noah. But by miraculously confounding
their language, God drove them forth over the face of the whole
earth, and so forced them to do that which they ought to have
done willingly at first.
Now, we must remember that all this happened in the very

XII.] ABRAHAM'S FAITH. gj
country in which Abraham lived. He must have heard of it
all — for aught we know, he had seen the tower of Babel. So
that, for good or for evil, the whole Babel event must have
produced a strong effect on the mind of a thoughtful man like
Abraham, and raised many strange questionings in his heart,
which God alone could answer for him, or for us. Now, what
did God mean to teach Abraham, by calling him out of his
country, and telling him, ' I will make of thee a great nation ? '
I think He meant to show him, for one thing, that that Babel
plan of society was utterly absurd and accursed, certain to
come to nought, and so to lead him on to hope for a city which
had foundations, and to see that its builder and maker must be,
not the selfishness or the ambition of men, but the will, and
the wisdom, and providence of God.
Let us see how God led Abraham on to understand this —
to look for a city which had foundations ; in short, to under
stand what a state and a nation means and ought to be.
First, God taught him that he was not to cling, coward-like, to
the place where he was born, but to go out boldly to colonise
and subdue the earth, for the great God of heaven would pro
tect and guide him. ' Get thee out of thy country, and from
thy father's house, unto a land which I will show thee. And I
will bless them that bless thee, and curse them that curse thee.'
Again : God taught him what a nation was : ' / will make of
thee a great nation.' As much as to say, ' Never fancy, as
those fools at Babel did, that a nation only means a great
crowd of people — never fancy that men can make themselves
into a nation just by feeding altogether, and breeding alto
gether, and fighting altogether, as the herds of wild cattle and
sheep do, while there is no real union between them.' For
what brought those Babel men together ? Just what keeps a
herd of cattle together — selfishness and fear. Each man
thought he would be safer forsooth in company. Each man
thought that if lie was in company, he could use his neighbour's
wits, as well as his own, and have the benefit of his neigh-

92 VILLAGE SERMONS. [ser.m.
hour's strength as well as his own. And that is all true enough ;
but that does not make a nation. Selfishness can join nothing ;
it may join a set of men for a time, each for his own ends.
just as a joint-stock company is made up ; but it will soon s pi it
them up again. Each man, in a merely selfish community.
will begin, after a time, to play on his own account, as well as
work on his own account — to oppress and overreach for his
own ends, as well as to be honest and benevolent for his own
ends, for he will find ill-doing far easier, and more natural, in
one sense, and a plan that brings in quicker profits, than well
doing ; and so this godless, loveless, every-man-for-himself
nation, or sham nation rather, this joint-stock company, in
which fools expect that universal selfishness will do the work
of universal benevolence, will quarrel and break up, crumble
to dust again, as Babel did. ' But,' says God to Abraham, ' I
will make of thee a great nation. I make nations, and not
they themselves.' So it is, my friends : this is the lesson which
God taught Abraham, the lesson which we English must learn
now-a-days over again, or smart for it bitterly — that God makes
nations. He is King of kings ; ' by Him kings reign and
princes decree judgment' He judges all nations : He nur-
tureth the nations. This is throughout the teaching of the
Psalms. ' It is*He that hath made us, and not we ourselves ;
we are His people, and the sheep of His pasture ;' — for this I
take to be the true bearing of that glorious national hymn, the
iooth Psalm, and not merely the old truism that men did not
create themselves, when it exhorts all nations to praise God
because it is He that hath made them nations, and not they
themselves. The Psalms set forth the Son of God as the King
of all nations. In Him, my friends — in Him all the nations of
the earth are truly blessed.
He the Saviour of a few individual souls only ? God forbid !
To Him all power is given in heaven and earth ; by Him were
all things created, whether in heaven or earth, visible and in
visible, whether they be thrones or dominions, or principalities

xii.] ABRAHAM'S FAITH. 93
or powers ; all national life, all forms of government, whether
hero-despotisms, republics, or monarchies, aristocracies of
birth, or of wealth, or of talent, — all were created by Him,
and for Him, and He is before all things, and by Him all
things consist and hold together. Every thing or institution on
earth, which has systematic and organic life in it — by Him it con
sists — by Him, the Life and the Light who lighteneth every man
that cometh into the world. From Him come law, and order,
and spiritual energy, and loving fellow-feeling, and patriotism,
the spirit of wisdom, and understanding, and prudence — all, in
short, by which a nation consists and holds together. It is not
constitutions, and acts of parliament, and social contracts, and
rights of the people, and rights of kings, and so on, which
make us a nation. These are but the effects, and not the con
sequences of the national life. That is the one spirit which
is shed abroad upon a country whose builder and maker is God,
and which comes down from above — comes down from Christ,
the King of kings, who has given each nation its peculiar work
on this earth, its peculiar circumstances and history to mould
and educate it for its work, and its peculiar spirit and national
character, wherewith to fulfil the destiny which Christ has
appointed for it.
Believe me, my friends, it takes long years, too, and much
training from God and from Christ, the King of kings, to make
a nation. Everything which is most precious and great is also
most slow in growing, and so is a nation. The Scripture com
pares it everywhere to a tree ; and as the tree grows, a people
must grow, from small beginnings, perhaps from a single family,
increasing on, according to the fixed laws of God's world, for
years and hundreds of years, till it becomes a mighty nation,
with one Lord, one faith, one work, one Spirit.
But again ; God said to Abraham, when He had led him into
this far country, ' Unto thy seed will / give this land.' This
was a great and a new lesson for Abraham, that the earth
belonged to that same great invisible God who had promised

94 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
to guide and protect him, and make him into a nation — that
this same God gave the earth to whomsoever He would, and
allotted to each people their proper portion of it. ' He (said
St. Paul on the Areopagus) hath determined the times before
appointed for all nations, and the bounds of their habitation,
that they may seek after the Lord and find Him.' Ah ! this
must have been a strange and a new feeling to Abraham ; but,
stranger still, though God had given him this land, he was not
to take possession of a single foot of it ; the land was already
in the hands of a different nation, the people of Canaan ; and
Abraham was to go wandering about a sojourner, as the text
says, in this very land of promise, which God had given him,
without ever taking possession of his own, simply because it
belonged to others already. How this must have taught
Abraham that the rights of property were sacred things — things
appointed by God ; that it was an awful and heinous sin to
make wanton war on other people, to drive them out and take
possession of their land ; that it was not mere force or mere
fancy which' gave men a right to a country, but the providence
of Almighty God ! Now, Abraham needed this warning, for
the men of Babel seem from the first to have gone on the plan
of driving out and conquering the tribes round them. They
seem to have set up their city partly from ambition. ' Let us
make us a name,' they said, meaning, ' Let us make ourselves
famous and terrible to all the people around us, that we may
subdue them.' And we read of Nimrod, who was their first
king and the founder of Babel, that he was a mighty hunter
before the Lord, that is, as most learned men explain it, a
mighty conqueror and tyrant in defiance of God and His laws ;
as the poet says of him,
A mighty hunter, and his game was man.
The Jews, indeed, have an old tradition that Nimrod cast
Abraham into a fiery furnace for refusing to worship the host
of heaven with him. The story is very likely untrue, but still

xu.] ABRAHAM'S FAITH. 95
it is of use in showing what sort of reputation Nimrod left
behind him in his own part of the world. We may thus see
that Abraham would need warning against these habits of
violence, tyranny, and plunder, into which the men of Babel
and other tribes were falling. And this was what God meant
to teach him by keeping him a stranger and a pilgrim in the
very land which God had promised to him for his own. Thus
Abraham learnt respect for the rights and properties of his
neighbours ; thus he learnt to look up in faith to God, not only
as his patron and protector, but as the lord and absolute owner
of the soil on which he stood.
Now, in the 14th chapter of Genesis there is an account of
Abraham's being called on to put in practice what he had
learnt, and, by doing so, learning a fresh lesson. We read of
four kings making war against five kings, against Chedorlaomer,
king of Elam or Persia, who had been following the ways of
Nimrod and the men of Babel, and conquering these foreign
kings and making them serve him. We read of Chedorlaomer
and four other kings coming down and wantonly ravaging and
•destroying other countries, besides the five kings who had
rebelled against them, and at last carrying off captive the
people of Sodom and Gomorrah, and Lot, Abraham's nephew.
We read then how Abraham armed his trained servants, born
in his own house, three hundred and eighteen men, and pursued
after these tyrants and plunderers, and with his small force
completely overthrew that great army. Now, that was a sign
and a lesson to Abraham, as much as to say, ' See the fruits of
having the great God of heaven and earth for your protector
and your guide, —see the fruits of having men round you, not
hirelings, keeping in your company just to see what they can
get by it, but born in your own house, who love and trust you,
whom you can love and trust, — see how the favour of God,
and reverence for those family ties and duties which He has
appointed, make you and your little band of faithful men
superior to those great mobs of selfish, godless, unjust robbers,

96 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
— see how hundreds of these slaves ran away before one man,
who feels that he is a member of a family, and has a just cause
for fighting, and that God and his brethren are with him.'
Here, you see, was another hint to Abraham of what it was
and who it was that made a great nation.
And now some of you may say, ' This is a strange sermon.
You have as yet said nothing of Christ, nothing of the Holy
Spirit, nothing of grace, redemption, sanctification. What kind
of sermon is this?'
My friends, do not be too sure that I have not been preach
ing Christ to you, and Christ's Spirit to you, and Christ's
redemption too, most truly in this sermon, although I have
mentioned none of them by name. There are times for orna
menting the house, there are times for repairing the wall, there
are times too for thoroughly examining the foundation, because,
if that be not sound, it is little matter what fine work is built
up upon it; and there are times when, as David says, the
foundations of the earth are out of course, when men have
forgotten sadly the very first principles of society and religion.
And, surely, men are doing so in these days ; men are for
getting that other foundation can no man lay save that which
is laid, which is Christ ; they laugh at the thought of a city, that
is, a state and form of government, ' not made with hands, eternal
in the heavens ;' they have forgotten that St. Paul tells them in
the Hebrews that we have ' a city which hath foundations, whose
builder and maker is God,' a kingdom which cannot be moved.
Yes, men who call themselves learned and worldly wise, and
good men too, alas ! who fancy that they are preaching God's
gospel, go about and tell men, ' The men of Babel were right,
after all. What have nations to do with God and religion?
Nations are merely earthly, carnal things, that were only
invented by sinful men themselves, to preserve their bodies and
goods, and make trading easy. Religion has only to do with a
man's private opinions, his single soul; the government has
nothing to do with the Church : a Christian has nothing to do

xii.] ABRAHAM'S FAITH.

97

with politics.' And so these men most unwittingly open a door
to all sorts of covetousness and meanness in the nation, and all
sorts of trickery and cowardice in the government. Tell a man
that his business has nothing to do with God, and you cannot
wonder if he acts without thinking of God. If you tell a nation
that it is selfishness which makes it prosperous, of course you
must expect it to be selfish. If you tell us Englishmen that
the duties of a citizen are not duties to God, but only duties
to the constable and the tax-gatherer, what wonder if men be
lieve you and become undutiful to God in their citizenship ?
No, my friends, once for all, as sure as God made Abraham
a great nation, so if we English are a great nation, God has made
us so — as sure as God gave Abraham the land of Canaan for
his possession, so did He give us this land of England, when
He brought our Saxon forefathers out of the wild barren north,
and drove out before them nations greater and mightier
than they, and gave them great and goodly cities which they
builded not, and wells digged which they digged not, farms
and gardens which they planted not, that we too might fear the
Lord our God, and serve Him, and swear by His name ; — as
sure as He commanded Abraham to respect the property of
his neighbours, so as He commanded us ; as sure as God taught
Abraham that the nation which was to grow from him owed a
duty to God, and could be only strong by faith in God, so it is
with us : we English people owe a duty to God, and are to deal
among ourselves, and with foreign countries, by faith in God,
and in the fear of God, ' seeking first the kingdom of God and
His righteousness,' sure that then all other things — victory,
health, commerce, art, and science — will be added to us, as the
first lesson says. For this is your wisdom and understanding
in the sight of the nations, which shall say, Surely this great
nation is a wise and understanding people ! For what nation
is grown so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous
as these laws, this gospel, which God sets before us day by
day ? — us, Englishmen !

98 VILLAGE SERMONS.
And I say that these are proper thoughts for this place.
This is not a mere preaching-house, where you may learn every
man to save his own soul ; this is a far nobler place ; this
building belongs to the National Church of England, and we
worship here, not merely as men, but as men of England,
citizens of a Christian country, come here to learn not merely
how to save ourselves, but how to help towards the saving of
our families, our parish, and our nation ; and therefore we must
know what a country and a nation mean, and what is the
meaning of that glorious and divine word, ' a citizen ;' that by
learning what it is to be a citizen of England, we may go on to
learn fully what it is to be a citizen of the kingdom of God.
For this is part of the whole counsel of God, which He re
veals in His Holy Bible ; and this also we must not, and dare
not, shun declaring in these days.

SERMON XIII.
ABRAHAM'S OBEDIENCE.

Hebrews xi. 17 — 19.
By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac : and he that had
received the promises offered up his only-begotten son, of whom it
was said, That in Isaac shall thy seed be called: accounting that God
was able to raise him up, even from the dead ; from whence also he
received him in a figure.
T N this chapter we come to the crowning point of Abraham's
history, the highest step and perfection of his faith ; beyond
which it seems as if man's trust in God could no further go.
You know, most of you, doubtless, that Isaac, Abraham's son,
was come to him out of the common course of nature — when
he and his wife Sarah were of an age which seemed to make
all chance of a family utterly hopeless. You remember how
God promised Abraham that this boy should be born to him at
a certain time, when He appeared to him on the plains of
Mamre, in that most solemn and deep-meaning vision of which
I spoke to you, last Sunday. You remember, too, no doubt,
most of you, how God had promised Abraham again and again,
that in his seed, his children, all the nations of the earth should
be blessed ; so that all Abraham's hopes were wrapped up in this
boy Isaac; he was his only, son, whom he loved; he was the
child of his old age, his glory and his joy ; he was the child of
God's promises. Every time Abraham looked at him he felt

IOO VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
that Isaac was a wonderful child : that God had a great work
for him to do ; that from that single boy a great nation was to
spring, as many in multitude as the stars in the sky, or the sand
on the sea-shore, for the great Almighty God had said it. And
he knew, too, that from that boy, who was growing up by him
in his tent, all the nations in the earth should be blessed : so
that Isaac, his son, was to Abraham a daily sacrament, as I
may say, a sign and pledge that God was with him, and would
be true to him ; that as surely as God had wonderfully and be
yond all hope given him that son, so wonderfully and beyond
all hope He would fulfil all His other promises. Conceive then,
if you can, what Abraham's astonishment, and doubt, and terror,
and misery must have been at such a message as this from the
very God who had given Isaac to him : ' And it came to pass
after these things, that God did tempt Abraham, and said unto
him, Abraham ; and he said, Behold, here I am. And He said,
Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest,
and get thee into the land of Moriah ; and offer him there
for a burnt-offering upon one of the mountains which I will
tell thee of.'
What a storm of doubt it must have raised in Abraham's
mind ! How unable he must have been to say whether that
message came from a good or bad spirit, or commanded him
to do a good action or a bad one ; that the same God who had
.said, ' Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be
shed ;' who had forbidden murder as the very highest of crimes,
should command him to shed the blood of his own son ; that
the same God who had promised him that in Isaac all the nations
of the earth should be blessed, should command him to put
him to death that very son upon whom all his hopes depended !
Fearful indeed must have been the struggle in Abraham's
mind, but the good and the right thought conquered at last.
His feeling was, no doubt, ' This God who has blessed me so
long, who has guided me so long, whom I have obeyed so long,
shall I not trust Him a little further yet ? How can I believe

XIII.] ABRAHAM'S OBEDIENCE. 101
that He will do wrong ? How can I believe that He will lead
me wrong ? If it is really wrong that I should kill my son, He
will not let me do it : if it really is His will that I should kill
my son, / will do it. Whatever He says must be right ; it is
agony and misery to me, but what of that ? Do I not owe
Him a thousand daily and hourly blessings ? Has He not led
me hither, preserved me, guided me, taught me the knowledge
of Himself, — chosen me to be the father of a great nation ?
Do I not owe Him everything ? and shall I not bear this sharp
sorrow for His sake ? I know, too, that if Isaac dies, all my
hope, all my joy, will die with him : that I shall have nothing
left to look for, nothing left to work for in this world. Nothing !
shall I not have God left to me ? When Isaac is dead will the
Lord die ? will the Lord change ? will He grow weak ? — Never !
Years ago did He declare to me that He was the Almighty God ;
I will believe that He will be always Almighty ; I will believe
that though I kill my son, my son will be still in God's hands,
and I shall be still in God's hands, and that God is able to
raise him again, even from the dead. God can give him back
to me, and if He will not give him back to me, He can fulfil
His promises in a thousand other ways. Ay, and He will fulfil
His promises, for in Him is neither deceit, nor fickleness, nor
weakness, nor unrighteousness of any kind ; and, come what
will, I will believe His promise and I will obey His will.'
Some such thoughts as these, I suppose, passed through
Abraham's mind. He could not have had a man's heart in
him indeed, if not only those thoughts, but ten thousand more,
sadder, and stranger, and more pitiful than my weak brain can
imagine, did not sweep like a storm through his soul at that
last and terrible temptation ; but the Bible tells us nothing of
them : why should the Bible tell us anything of them ? the
Bible sets forth Abraham as the faithful man, and therefore it
simply tells us of his faith, without telling us of his doubts and
struggles before he settled down into faith. It tells us, as it
were, not how often the wind shifted and twisted about during

102 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
the tempest, but in what quarter the wind settled when the tem
pest was over, and it began to blow steadily, and fixedly, and
gently, and all was bright, and mild, and still in Abraham's
bosom again, just as a man's mind will be bright, and gentle,
and calm, even at the moment he is going to certain death or
fearful misery, if he does but know that his suffering is his duty,
and that his trial is his heavenly Father's will : and so all we
read in the Old Testament account is simply, ' And Abraham
rose up early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two
of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and clave the
wood for the burnt-offering, and rose up, and went into the place
of which God had told him. Then on the third day Abraham
lifted up his eyes, and saw the place afar off. And Abraham
said unto his young men, Abide ye here with the ass ; and I
and the lad will go yonder and worship, and come again to you.
And Abraham took the wood of the burnt-offering, and" laid it
upon Isaac his son : and he took the fire in his hand, and a
knife : and they went both of them together. And Isaac spake
unto Abraham his father, and said, My father : and he said,
Here am I, my son. And he said, Behold the fire and the
wood : but where is the lamb for the burnt-offering ? And
Abraham said. My son, God will provide Himself a lamb for a
burnt-offering. So they went both of them together. And
they came to the place which God had told him of; and
Abraham built an altar there, and laid the wood in order, and
bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar upon the wood.
And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to
slay his son.'
Really, if one is to consider the whole circumstances of
Abraham's trials, they seem to have been infinite, more than
mortal man could bear; more than he could have borne, no
doubt, if the same God who tried had not rewarded his strength
of mind by strengthening him still more, and rewarded his faith
by increasing his faith ; when we consider the struggle he must
have had to keep the dreadful secret from the young man's

xiii.] ABRAHAM'S OBEDIENCE. 103
mother, the tremendous effort of controlling himself, the long
and frightful journey, the necessity, and yet the difficulty he
seems to have felt of keeping the truth from his son, and yet of
telling him the truth, which he did in those wonderful words,
'God shall provide Himself a lamb for a burnt-offering' (on
which I shall have occasion to speak presently) ; and, last and
worst of all, the perfect obedience and submission of his son ;
for Isaac was not a child then — he was a young man of nearly
thirty years of age ; strong and able enough, no doubt, to have
resisted his aged father, if he had chosen. But the very ex
cellence of Isaac seems to have been, that he did not resist,
that he showed the same perfect trust and obedience to
Abraham that Abraham did towards God ; for he was led ' as a
lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is
dumb, so he opened not his mouth ;' as we read, ' Abraham
bound Isaac his son and laid him on the wood.' Surely that
was the bitterest pang of all, to see the excellence of his son
shine forth just when it was too late for him to enjoy him — to
find out what a perfect child he had, in simple trust and utter
obedience, just at the very moment when he was going to lose
him: 'And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the
knife to slay his son.'
At that point Abraham's trial finished. He had shown the
completeness of his faith by the completeness of his works,
that is, by the completeness of his obedience. He had utterly
given up all for God. He had submitted his will completely to
God's will. He had said in heart, as our Blessed Lord said,
' Father, if it be possible, let this woe pass from me ; neverthe
less, not as I will, but as Thou wilt ; ' and thus, I say, he was
justified by his works, by his actions ; that is, by this faithful
action he proved the faithfulness of his heart, as the Angel said
to him, ' Now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast
riot withheld thy son, thine only son, from me : ' for as St. James
says, ' Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he
had offered Isaac his son upon the altar ? Seest thou,' says he,

104 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
' how his faith wrought with his works ! ' how his works were the
tool or instrument which his faith used ; and by his works his
faith was brought to perfection, as a tree is brought to perfection
when it bears fruit. ' And so,' St. James continues, ' the scrip
ture was fulfilled, which says Abraham believed God, and it was
imputed to him for righteousness ; and he was called the friend
of God. Ye see then,' he says, ' how that by works a man is
justified,' or shown to be righteous and faithful, ' and not by
faith only ; ' that is, not by the mere feeling of faith, for, as he
says, ' as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without
works is dead also.' For what is the sign of a body's being
dead ? It is its not being able to do anything, not being able
to work; because there is no living and moving spirit in it.
And what is the sign of a man's faith being dead ? his faith not
being able to work, because there is no living spirit in it, but it
is a mere dead, empty shell and form of words, — a mere notion
and thought about believing, in a man's head, but not a living
trust and loyalty to God in his heart. Therefore, says St.
James, ' show me thy faith without thy works,' if thou canst,
' and I will show thee my faith by my works,' as Abraham did
by offering up Isaac his son.
Oh ! my friends, when people are talking about faith and
works, and trying to reconcile St. Paul and St. James, as they
call it, because St. Paul says Abraham was justified by faith, and
St. James says Abraham was justified by works, if they would
but pray for the simple, childlike heart, and the head of common
sense, and look at their own children, who, every time they go
on a message for them, settle, without knowing it, this mighty
difference of man's making between faith and works. You tell
a little child daily to do many things the meaning and use of
which it cannot understand ; and the child has faith in what
you tell it ; and therefore it does what you tell it, and so it
shows its faith in you by obedience in working for you.
But to go on with the verses : ' And the angel of the Lord
called unto Abraham out of heaven the second time, and said,

Xiu.] ABRAHAM'S OBEDIENCE. 105
By myself have I sworn, said the Lord, for because thou hast
done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son:
that in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will
multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand
which is upon the seashore; and thy seed shall possess the gate
of his enemies ; and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth
be blessed ; because thou hast obeyed my voice.'
Now, here remark two things : first, that it was Abraham's
obedience in giving up all to God, which called forth from God
this confirmation of God's promises to him ; and next, that God
here promised him nothing new ; God did not say to him,
' Because thou hast obeyed me in this great matter, I will give
thee some great reward over and above what I promised thee.'
No ; God merely promises him over again, but more solemnly
than ever, what He had promised him many years before.
And so it will be with us, my friends ; we must not expect to
buy God's favour by obeying Him, — we must not expect that
the more we do for God, the more God will be bound to do for
us, as the Papists do. No ; God has done for us all that He will
do. He has promised us all that He will promise. He has
provided us, as He provided Abraham, a lamb for the burnt-
offering, the Lamb without blemish and without spot, which
taketh away the sins of the world. We are His redeemed people
— we have a share in His promises — He bids us believe that,
and show that we believe it by living as redeemed men, not our
own, but bought with a price, and created anew in Christ Jesus
to do good works ; not that we may buy forgiveness by them,
but that we may show by them that we believe that God has
forgiven us already, and that when we have done all that is
commanded us, we are still unprofitable servants ; for though we
should give up at God's bidding our children, our wives, and
our own limbs and lives, and show as utter faith in God, and
complete obedience to God, as Abraham did, we should only
have done just what it was already our duty to do.

SERMON XIV.
OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN.

i John ii. 13.
I write unto you, little children, because ye have known the
Father.
T PREACHED some time ago a sermon on the whole of
these most deep and blessed verses of St. John.
I now wish to speak to those who are of age to be confirmed
three separate sermons on three separate parts of these verses.
First, to those whom St. John calls little children; next, to
those whom he calls grown men. To the first I will speak to
day ; to the latter, by God's help, next Sunday. And may the
Blessed One bring home my weak words to all your hearts !
Now for the meaning of ' little children.' There are those
who will tell you that those words mean merely ' weak believers,'
' babes in grace,' and so on. They mean that, no doubt ; but
they mean much more. They mean, first of all, be sure, what
they say. St. John would not have said ' little children,' if he
had not meant little children. Surely, God's apostle did not
throw about his words at random, so as to leave them open to
mistakes, and to want some one to step in and tell us that they
do not mean their plain, common-sense meaning, but something
else. Holy Scripture is too wisely written, and too awful a
matter, to be trifled with in that way, and cut and squared to

OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN. 107
suit our own fancies, and explained away till its blessed promises
are made to mean anything or nothing.
No ! By little children, St. John means here children in age
— of course Christian children and young people, for he was
writing only to Christians. He speaks to those who have been
christened, and brought up, more or less, as christened children
should be. But, no doubt, when he says little children, he
means also all Christian people, whether they be young or old,
whose souls are still young, and weak, and unlearned. All,
however old they may be, who have not been confirmed — I do
not merely mean confirmed by the bishop, but confirmed by
God's grace,— all those who have not yet come to a full know
ledge of their own sins, — all who have not yet been converted,
and turned to God with their whole hearts and wills, who have
not yet made their full choice between God and sin, — all who
have not yet fought for themselves the battle which no man or
angel can fight for them — I mean the battle between their sel
fishness and their duty — the battle between their love of pleasure
and their fear of sin — the battle, in short, between the devil and.
his temptations to darkness and shame, and God and his pro
mises of light, and strength, and glory, — all who have not been
converted to God, to them St. John speaks as little children —
people who are not yet strong enough to stand alone, and do
their duty on God's side against sin, the world, and the devil.
And all of you here who have not yet made up your minds,
who have not yet been confirmed in soul, — whether you were
confirmed by the bishop or not, — to you I speak this day.
Now, first of all, consider this, — that though St. John calls you
'little children,' because you are still weak, and your souls have
not grown to manhood, yet he does not speak to you as if you
were heathens and knew nothing about God : he says, ' I have
written unto you, little children, because ye have known the
Father.' Consider that; that was his reason for all that he had
written to them before; that they had known the Father, the
God who made heaven and earth — the Father of our Lord

I08 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
Jesus Christ — the Father of little children — my Father and
your Father, my friends, little as we may behave like what we
are, sons of the Almighty God. That was St. John's reason for
speaking to little children, because they had already known the
Father. So he does not speak to them as if they were heathens;
and I dare not speak to you, young people, as if you were
heathens, however foolish and sinful some of you may be; I
dare not do it, whatever many preachers may do now-a-days;
not because I should be unfair and hard upon you merely, but
because I should lie, and deny the great grace and mercy which
God has shown you, and count the blood of the covenant, with
which you were sprinkled at baptism, an unholy thing; and do
despite to the spirit of grace which has been struggling in your
hearts, trying to lead you out of sin into good, out of darkness
into light, ever since you were born. Therefore, as St. John said,
I say, I preach this day to you, young people, because you
have known your Father in heaven !
But some of you may say to me, 'You put a great honour on
us ; but we do not see that we have any right to it. You tell
us that we have a very noble and awful knowledge — that we
know the Father. We are afraid we do not know Him; we do
not even rightly understand of whom or what you preach.'
Well, my young friends, these are very awful words of St.
John ; such blessed and wonderful words, that if we did not find
them in the Bible, it would be madness and insolence to God
of us to say such a thing, not merely of little children, but even
of the greatest, and wisest, and holiest man who ever lived; but
there they are in the Bible — the blessed Lord Himself has told
us all,' When ye pray, say, Our Father in heaven;' — and I dare
not keep them back because they sound strange. They may
sound strange, but they are not strange. Any one who has ever
watched a young child's heart, and seen how naturally and at
once the little innocent takes in the thought of his Father which
is in heaven, knows that it is not a strange thought — that it
comes to a little child almost by instinct — that his Father in

xiv.] OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN. 109
heaven seems often to be just the thought which fills his heart
most completely, has most power over him, — the thought which
has been lying ready in his heart all the time, only waiting for
some one to awaken it, and put it into words for him; that he
will do right when you put him in mind of his Father above the
skies sooner than he will for a hundred punishments. For
truly says the poet —
Heaven lies about us in our infancy,
Not in complete forgetfulness,
Nor yet in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come,
From God who is our home !
And yet more truly said the Blessed One Himself, that ' chil
dren's angels always behold the face of our Father which is in
heaven ;' and that 'of such is the kingdom of heaven.' But
you may say, some of you, perhaps, ' Whatever knowledge of
our Father in heaven we had, or ought to have had, when we
were young, we have lost it now. We have forgotten what we
learnt at school. We have been what you would call sinful ; at
all events we have been thinking all our time about a great
many things beside religion, and they have quite put out of our
head the thought that God is our Father. So how have we
known our Father in heaven?'
Well, then, to answer that, — consider the case of your earthly
fathers, the men who begot you and brought you up. Now,
there might be one of you who had never seen his father since
he was born, but all he knows of him is, that his name is so
and so, and that he is such and such a sort of man, as the case
might be ; and that he lives in such and such a place, far away,
and that now and then he hears talk of his father, or receives
letters or presents from him. Suppose I asked that young
man, Do you know your father ? would he not answer — would
he not have a right to answer, ' Yes, I know him. I never saw
him, or was acquainted with him, but I know him well enough ;

HO VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
I know who he is, and where to find him, and what sort of a
man he is.' That young man might not know his father's face,
or love him, or care for him at all. He might have been dis
obedient to his father ; he might have forgotten for years that
he had a father at all, and might have lived on his own way,
just as if he had no father. But when he was put in mind of it
all, would he not say at once, 'Yes, I know my father well
enough ; his name is so and so, and he lives at such and such
a place ? I know my father.'
Well, my young friends, and if this would be true of your
fathers on earth, it is just as true of your Father in heaven.
You have never seen Him — you may have forgotten Him — you
may have disobeyed Him — you may have lived on your own
way, as if you had no Father in heaven ; still you know that
you have a Father in heaven. You -pray, surely, sometimes.
What do you say? ' Our Father which art in heaven.' So you
have a Father in heaven, else what right have you to use those
words, — what right have you to say to God, ' Our Father in
heaven,' if you believe that you have no Father there ? That
would be only blasphemy and mockery. I can well understand
that you have often said those words without thinking of them
— without thinking what a blessed, glorious, soul-saving mean
ing there was in them ; but I will not believe that you never
once in your whole lives said, ' Our Father which art in heaven,'
without believing them to be true words. What I want is, for
you always to believe them true. Oh, young men and young
women, boys and girls — believe those words, believe that when
you say, ' Our Father which art in heaven,' you speak God's
truth about yourselves ; that the evil devil rages when he hears
you speak those words, because they are the words which prove
that you do not belong to him and to hell, but to God and the
kingdom of heaven. Oh, believe those words — behave as if
you believed those words, and you shall see what will come of
them, through all eternity for ever.
Well, but you will ask, What has all this to do with confir-

xiv.] OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN. m
mation. It has everything to do with confirmation. Because
you are God's children, and know that you are God's children,
you are to go and confirm before the bishop your right to be
called God's children. You are to go and claim your share
in God's kingdom. If you were heir to an estate, you would
go and claim your estate from those who held it. You
are heirs to an estate — you are heirs to the kingdom
of heaven; go to confirmation, and claim that kingdom;
say, ' I am a citizen of God's kingdom. Before the bishop and
the congregation, here I proclaim the honour which God has
put upon me.' If you have a father, you will surely not be
ashamed to own him ! How much more when the Almighty
God of heaven is your Father ! You will not be ashamed to
own Him ? Then go to confirmation; for by doing so you own
God for your Father. If you have an earthly father, you will
not be ashamed to say, ' I know I ought to honour him and
obey him;' how much more when your father is the Almighty
God of heaven, who sent His own Son into the world to die for
you, who is daily heaping you with blessings body and soul !
You will not be ashamed to confess that you ought to honour
and obey Him? Then go to confirmation and say, ' I here take
upon myself the vow and promise made for me at my baptism.
I am God's child, and therefore I- will honour, love, and obey
Him. It is my duty ; and it shall be my delight henceforward
to work for God, to do all the good I can to my life's end,
because my Father in heaven loves the good, and has com
manded me, poor, weak countryman though I be, to work for
Him in well-doing.' So I say, if God is your Father, go and
own Him at confirmation. If God is your Father, go and
promise to love and obey Him at confirmation; and see if He
does not, like a strong and loving Father as He is, confirm you
in return, — see if He does- not give you strength of heart and
peace of mind, and clear, quiet, pure thoughts, such as a man
or woman ought to have who considers that the great God, whp
made the sky and stars above their heads, is their .Father. But

112 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
perhaps there are some of you, young people, who do not wish
to be confirmed. And why? Now, look honestly into your
own hearts and see the reason. Is it not, after all, because you
don't like the trouble ? Because you are afraid that being con
firmed will force you to think seriously and be religious; and
you had rather not take all that trouble yet ? Is it not because
you do not like to look your own selves in the face, and see
how foolishly you have been living, and how many bad habits
you will have to give up, and what a thorough conversion and
change you must make, if you are to be confirmed in earnest ?
Is not this why you do not wish to be confirmed ? And what
does that all come to ? That though you know that you are
God's children, you do not like to tell people publicly that you
are God's children, lest they should expect you to behave like
God's children — that is it. Now, young men and young
women, think seriously once for all ; if you have any common
sense — I do not say grace— left in you, think! Are you not
playing a fearful game? You would riot dare to deny your
fathers on earth — to refuse to obey them; because you know
well enough that they would punish you — that if you were too
old for punishment, your- neighbours, at least, would despise
you for mean, ungrateful, and rebellious children ! But because
you cannot see God your Father, because you have not some
sign or wonder hanging in the sky to frighten you into good be-
havour, therefore you are not afraid to turn your backs on Him.
My friends, it is ill mocking the living God. Mark my words !
If a man will not turn, He will whet his sword, and make us
feel it. You who can be confirmed, and know in your hearts
that you ought to be confirmed, and ought to be really conver
ted and confirmed in soul, and make no mockery of it, — mark
my words ! If you will not be converted and confirmed of your
own good will, God, if He has any love left for you, will convert
and confirm you against your will. He will let you go your
own ways till you find out your own folly. He will bring you
low with affliction perhaps with sickness, with misfortune, with

Xiv.] OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN. 113
shame. Some way or other, He will chastise you, again and
again, till you are forced to come back to Him, and take His
service on you. If He loves you, He will drive you home to
your Father's house. You may laugh at my words now — see if
you laugh at them when your hairs are grey. Oh, young people,
if you wish in after-life to save yourselves shame and sorrow,
and perhaps, in the world to come, eternal death, come to con
firmation, acknowledge God for your Father, promise to come
and serve Him faithfully, make those blessed words of the
Lord's Prayer, 'Our Father in heaven,' your glory and your
honour, your guide and guard through life, your title-deeds to
heaven. You who know that the Great God is your Father,
will you be ashamed to own yourselves His sons ?

SERMON XV.
THE TRANSFIGURATION.

Mark ix. 2.

Jesus taketh Peter, and James, and John, and leadeth them up into a high
mountain apart, and was transfigured before them.
'THE second lesson for this morning's service brings us to one
•*- of the most wonderful passages in our blessed Saviour's
whole stay on earth, namely, His transfiguration. The story,
as told by the different Evangelists, is this — That our Lord took
Peter, and John, and James his brother, and led them up into
a high mountain apart, which mountain may be seen to this
very day. It is a high peaked hill, standing apart from all the
hills around it, with a small smooth space of ground upon the
top, very fit, from its height and its loneliness, for a transaction
like the transfiguration, which our Lord wished no one but these
three to behold. There the apostles fell asleep; while our
blessed Lord, who had deeper thoughts in His heart than they
had, knelt down and prayed to His Father and our Father,
which is in heaven. And as He prayed, the form of his coun
tenance was changed, and His raiment became shining, white as
the light ; and there appeared Moses and Elijah talking with
Him. They talked of matters which the angels desire to look
into, of the greatest matters that ever happened in this earth
since it was made; of the redemption of the world, and of the

THE TRANSFIGURATION. 115

death which Christ was to undergo at Jerusalem. And as they
were talking, the apostles awoke, and found into what glorious
company they had fallen while they slept. What they felt no
mortal man can tell — that moment was worth to them all the
years they had lived before. When they had gone up with
Jesus into the mount, He was but the poor carpenter's son,
wonderful enough to them, no doubt, with His wise, searching
words, and His gentle, loving looks, that drew to Him all men
who had hearts left in them, and wonderful enough, too, from
all the mighty miracles which they had seen Him do; but still
He was merely a man like themselves, poor and young, and
homeless, who felt the heat, and the cold, and the rough roads,
as much as they did. They could feel that He spake as never
man spake — they could see that God's spirit and power was on
Him as it had never been on any man in their time. _ God had
even enlightened their reason by His spirit, to know that He
was the Christ, the Son of the living God. But still it does seem
they did not fully understand who and what He was; they
could not understand how the Son of God should come in the
form of a despised and humble man ; they did not understand
that His glory was to be a spiritual glory. They expected His
kingdom to be a kingdom of this world— they expected His
glory to consist in palaces, and armies, and riches, and jewels,
and all the magnificence with which Solomon and the old
Jewish kings were adorned; they thought that He was to
conquer back again from the Roman emperor all the inestimable
treasures of which the Romans had robbed the Jews, and that
He was to make the Jewish nation, like the Roman, the
conquerers and masters of all the nations of the earth. So
that it was a puzzling thing to their minds why He should be
King of the Jews at the very time that He was reputed to be
but a poor man's son, living on charity. It was to show them
that His kingdom was the kingdom of heaven that He was
transfigured before them.
They saw His glory — the glory as of the only-begotten of the

U6 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
Father, full of grace and truth. The form of His countenance
was changed ; all the majesty, and courage, and wisdom, and
love, and resignation, and pity, that lay in His noble heart,
shone out through His face, while He spoke of His death
which He should accomplish at Jerusalem — the Holy Ghost
that was upon Him, the spirit of wisdom, and love, and beauty
— the spirit which produces everything that is lovely in heaven
and earth, in soul and body, blazed out through his eyes, and
all His glorious countenance, and made Him look like what
He was — a God. My friends, what a sight! Would it not
be worth while to journey thousands of miles — to go through
all difficulties, dangers, that man ever heard of, for one sight of
that glorious face, that we might fall down upon our knees
before it, and, if it were but for a moment, give way to the
delight of finding something that we could utterly love and
utterly adore? I say, the delight of finding something to
worship ; for if there is a noble, if there is a holy, if there is a
spiritual feeling in man, it is the feeling which bows him down
before those who are greater, and wiser, and holier than himself.
I say, that feeling of respect for what is noble is a heavenly
feeling. The man who has lost it — the man who feels no re
spect for those who are above him in age, above him in know
ledge, above ffim in wisdom, above him in goodness, that man
shall in nowise enter into the kingdom of heaven. It is only
the man who is like a little child, and feels the delight of having
some one to look up to, who will ever feel delight in looking
up to Jesus Christ, who is the Lord of lords, and King of kings.
It was the want of respect, it was the dislike of feeling any one
superior to himself, which made the devil rebel against God,
and fall from heaven. It will be the feeling of complete respect
— the feeling of kneeling at the feet of one who is immeasurably
superior to ourselves in everything, that will make up the greatest
happiness of heaven. This is a hard saying, and no man can
understand it, save he to whom it is given by the Spirit of God.
That the apostles had this feeling of immeasurable respect

XV.] THE TRANSFIGURATION. 117

for Christ there is no doubt, else they would never have been
apostles. But they felt more than this. There were other
wonders in that glorious vision besides the countenance of our
Lord. His raiment, too, was changed, and became all brilliant,
white as the light itself. Was not that a lesson to them ? Was
it not as if our Lord had said to them, ' I am a king, and have
put on glorious apparel, but whence does the glory of my
raiment come ? T have no need of fine linen, and purple, and
embroidery, the work of men's hands ; I have no need to send
my subjects to mines and caves to dig gold and jewels to adorn
my crown : the earth is mine, and the fulness thereof. All this
glorious earth, with its trees and its flowers, its sunbeams and
its storms, is mine. I made it — I can do what I will with it.
All the mysterious laws by which the light and the heat flow out
for ever from God's throne, to lighten the sun, and the moon,
and the stars of heaven — they are mine. / am the light of the
world — the light of men's bodies as well as of their souls ; ana
here is my proof of it. Look at me. I am He that " decketh
himself with light as it were with a garment, who layeth the
beams of His chambers in the waters, and walketh upon the
wings of the wind." ' This was the message which Christ's
glory brought the apostles — a message which they could never
forget. The spiritual glory of His countenance had shown them
that He was a spiritual king — that His strength lay in the spirit
cf power, and wisdom, and beauty, and love, which God had
given Him without measure; and it showed them, too, that
there was such a thing as a spiritual body, such a body as each
of us some day shall have if we be found in Christ at the resur
rection of the just — a body which shall not hide a man's spirit
when it becomes subject to the wear and tear of life, and dis
ease, and decay ; but a spiritual body — a body which shall be
filled with our spirits, which shall be perfectly obedient to our
spirits — a body through which the glory of our spirits shall shine
out, as the glory of Christ's spirit shone out through His body
at the transfiguration. ' Brethren, we know not yet what we

Il8 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
shall be, but this we do know, that when He shall appear, we
shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.' (i John iii. 3.)
Thus our Lord taught them by His appearance that there is
such a thing as a spiritual body, while, by the glory of His
raiment, in addition to His other miracles, He taught them that
He had power over the laws of nature, and could, in his own good
time, ' change the bodies of their humiliation, that they might
be made like unto His glorious body, according to the mighty
working by which He is able to subdue all things to Himself.'
But there was yet another lesson which the apostles learnt
from the transfiguration of our Lord. They beheld Moses and
Elijah talking with Him : — Moses, the great lawgiver of their
nation ; Elijah, the chief of all the Jewish prophets. We must
consider this a little to find out the whole depth of its meaning.
You remember how Christ had spoken of Himself as having
come, not to destroy the Law and the Prophets, but to fulfil
them. You remember, too, how He had always said that He
was the person of whom the Law and the Prophets had spoken.
Here was an actual sign and witness that His words were
true— here was Moses, the giver of the Law, and Elijah, the
chief of the Prophets, talking with Him, bearing witness to Him
in their own persons, and showing, too, that it was His death
and His perfect sacrifice that they had been shadowing forth in
the sacrifices of the law and in the dark speeches of prophecy.
For they talked with Him of His death, which He was to
accomplish at Jerusalem. What more perfect testimony could
the apostles have had to show them that Jesus of Nazareth,
their Master, was He of whom the Law and the Prophets spoke
— that He was indeed the Christ for whom Moses and Elijah,
and all the saints of old, had looked ; and that He was come
not to destroy the Law and the Prophets, but to fulfil them ?
We can hardly understand the awe and the delight with which
the disciples must have beheld those blessed Three — Moses,
and Elias, and Jesus Christ, their Lord — talking together before
their very eyes. For of all men in the world, Moses and Elias

xv.] THE TRANSFIGURATION.

Iig

were to them the greatest. All true-hearted Israelites, who
knew the history of their nation, and understood the promises
of God, must have felt that Moses and Elias were the two
greatest heroes and saviours of their nation, whom God had
ever yet raised up. And the joy and the honour of thus seeing
them face to face, the very men whom they had loved and
reverenced in their thoughts, whom they had heard and read of
from their childhood, as the greatest ornaments and glories of
their nation — the joy and the honour, I say, of that unexpected
sight, added to the wonderful majesty which was suddenly
revealed to their transfigured Lord, seemed to have been too
much for them — they knew not what to say. Such company
seemed to them for a moment heaven enough ; and St. Peter,
first finding words, exclaimed, ' Lord, it is good for us to be
here. If Thou wilt, let us build three tabernacles, one for
Thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elias.' Not, I fancy,
that they intended to worship Moses and Elias, but that they
felt that Moses and Elias, as well as Christ, had each a divine
message, which must be listened to ; and therefore they wished
that each of them might have his own tabernacle, and dwell
among men, and each teach his own particular doctrine and
wisdom in his own school. It may seem strange that they
should put Moses and Elias so on an equality with Christ ; but
the truth was, that as yet they understood Moses and Elias
better than they did Christ. They had heard and read of
Moses and Elijah all their lives — they were acquainted with all
their actions and words — they knew thoroughly what great and
noble men the Spirit of God had made them, but they did not
understand Christ in like manner. They did not yet feel that
God had given Him the Spirit without measure — they did not
understand that He was not only to be a lawgiver and a
prophet, but a sacrifice for sin, the conqueror of death and hell,
who was to lead captivity captive, and receive inestimable gifts
for men. Much less did they think that Moses and Elijah were
but His servants — that all their spirit and their power had beer

120 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
given by Him. But this also they were taught a moment after
wards; for a bright cloud overshadowed them, hiding from
them the glory of God the Father, whom no man hath seen or
can see, who dwells in the light which no man can approach
unto ; and out of that cloud, a voice saying, ' This is my
beloved Son ; hear ye Him ; ' and then, hiding their faces in
fear and wonder, they fell to the ground ; and when they looked
up, the vision and the voice had alike passed away, and they
saw no man but Christ alone. Was not that enough for them ?
Must not the meaning of the vision have been plain to them ?
They surely understood from it that Moses and Elijah were, as
they had ever believed them to be, great and good, true mes
sengers of the living God ; but that their message and their
work was done — that Christ, whom they had looked for, was
come — that all the types of the law were realized, and all the
prophecies fulfilled, and that henceforward Christ, and Christ
alone, was to be their Prophet and their Lawgiver. Was not
this plainly the meaning of the Divine voice ? For when they
wished to build three tabernacles, and to honour Moses and
Elijah, the Law and the Prophets, as separate from Christ —
that moment the heavenly voice warned them : ' This— this is
my beloved Son — hear ye Him, and Him only, henceforward.'
And Moses arid Elijah, their work being done, forthwith
vanished away, leaving Christ alone to fulfil the Law and the
Prophets, and all other wisdom and righteousness that ever was
or shall be. This is another lesson which Christ's transfigura
tion was meant to teach them and us, that Christ alone is to be
henceforward our guide ; that no philosophies or doctrines of
any sort which are not founded on a true faith in Jesus Christ,
and His life and death, are worth listening to ; that God has
manifested forth His beloved Son, and that Him, and Him
only, we are to hear. I do not mean to say that Christ came
into the world to put down human learning. I do not mean
that we are to despise human learning, as so many are apt to
do now-a-days ; for Christ came into the world not to destroy

xv.] THE TRANSFIGURATION. 121
human learning, but to fulfil it — to sanctify it — to make human
learning true, and strong, and useful, by giving it a sure founda
tion to stand upon, which is the belief and knowledge of His
blessed self. Just as Christ came not to destroy the Law and
the Prophets, but to fulfil them — to give them a spirit and a
depth in men's eyes which they never had before — just so He
came to fulfil all true philosophies, all the deep thoughts which
men had ever thought about this wonderful world and their own
souls, by giving them a spirit and a depth which they never had
before. Therefore, let no man tempt you to despise learning,
for it is holy to the Lord.
There is one more lesson which we may learn from our
Lord's transfiguration. When St. Peter said, 'Lord, it is good
for us to be here,' he spoke a truth. It was good for him to be
there ; nevertheless, Christ did not listen to his prayers. He
and his two companions were not allowed to stay in that
glorious company. And why ? Because they had a work to do.
They had glad tidings of great joy to proclaim to every creature,
and it was, after all, but a selfish prayer, to wish to be allowed
to stay in ease and glory on the mount while the whole world
was struggling in sin and wickedness below them : for there is
no meaning in a man's calling himself a Christian, or saying
that he loves God, unless he is ready to hate what God hates
and to fight against that which Christ fought against, that is
sin. No one has any right to call himself a servant of God, who
is not trying to do away with some of the evil in the world
around him. And therefore Christ was merciful, when, instead
of listening to St. Peter's prayer, He led the apostles down
again from the mount, and sent them forth, as he did afterwards,
to preach the Gospel of the kingdom to all nations. For Christ
put a higher honour on St. Peter by that than if He had let
him stay on the mount all his life, to behold His glory, and
worship and adore. And He made St. Peter more like Him
self by doing so. For what was Christ's life ? Not one of deep
speculations, quiet thoughts, and bright visions, such as St. Peter

122 VILLAGE SERMONS.
wished to lead ; but a life of fighting against evil ; earnest, awful
prayers and struggles within, continual labour of body and mind
without, insult, and danger, and confusion, and violent exertion.,
and bitter sorrow. This was Christ's life — this is the life of
almost every good man I ever heard of ; — this was St. Peter, and
St. James, and St. John's life afterwards. This was Christ's cup,
which they were to drink of as well as He; — this was the
baptism of fire with which they were to be baptized of as well
as He ; — this was to be their fight of faith ; — this was the tribu
lation through which they, like all other great saints, were to
enter into the kingdom of heaven ; for it is certain that the
harder a man fights against evil, the harder evil will fight against
him in return ; but it is certain too that the harder a man fights
against evil, the more he is like his Saviour Christ, and the
more glorious will be his reward in heaven. It is certain too
that what was good for St. Peter is good for us. It is good
for man to have holy and quiet thoughts, and at moments to
see into the very deepest meaning of God's word and God's
earth, and to have, as it were, heaven opened before his eyes ;
and it is good for a man sometimes actually to feel his heart
overpowered with the glorious majesty of God, and to feel it
gushing out with love to his blessed Saviour : but it is not good
for him to stop* there, any more than it was for the apostles :
they had to leave that glorious vision and come down from the
mount, and do Christ's work; and so have we; for, believe me,
one word of warning spoken to keep a little child out of sin, —
one crust of bread given to a beggarman, because he is your
brother, for whom Christ died,— one angry word checked, when
it is on your lips, for the sake of Him who was meek and lowly
of heart ; in short, any, the smallest endeavour of this kind to
lessen the quantity of evil which is in yourselves, and in those
around you, is worth all the speculations, and raptures, and
visions, and frames, and feelings in the world ; for those are the
good fruits of faith, whereby alone the tree shall be known
whether it be good or evil.

SERMON XVI.
THE CRUCIFIXION.

Isaiah liii. 7.
He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter.
^~\N this day, my friends, was offered up upon the cross, the
^^ Lamb of God, — slain in eternity and heaven before the
foundation of the world, but slain in time and space upon this
day. All the old sacrifices, the lambs which were daily offered
up to God in the Jewish Temple, the lambs which Abel, and
after him the patriarchs offered up, the Paschal Lamb slain at
the Passover, our Eastertide, all these were but figures of
Christ — tokens of the awful and yet loving law of God, that
without shedding of blood there is no remission of sin. But
the blood of dumb animals could not take away sin. All man
kind had sinned, and it was therefore necessary that all man
kind should suffer. Therefore He suffered, the new Adam, the
Man of all men, in whom all mankind were, as it were, collected
into one and put on a new footing with God; that hencefor
ward to be a man might mean to be a holy being, a forgiven
being, a being joined to God, wearing the likeness of the Son of
God — the human soul and body in which He offered up all
human souls and bodies on the cross. For man was originally
made in Christ's likeness; He was the Word of God who
walked in the garden of Eden, who spoke to Adam with a

124 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
human voice; He was the Lord who appeared to the patriarchs
in a man's figure, and ate and drank in Abraham's tent, and
spoke to him with a human voice ; He was the God of Israel,
whom the Jewish elders saw with their bodily eyes upon Mount
Sinai, and under His feet a pavement as of a sapphire stone.
From Him all man's powers came — man's speech, man's under
standing. All that is truly noble in man was a dim pattern of
Him in whose likeness man was originally made. And when man
had fallen and sinned, and Christ's image was fading more and
more out of him, and the likeness of the brutes growing more
and more in him year by year, then came Christ, the head and
original pattern of all men, to claim them for His own again, to
do in their name what they could never do for themselves, to
offer Himself up a sacrifice for the sins of the whole world : so
that He is the real sacrifice, the real lamb; as St. John said
when he pointed Him out to his disciples, ' Behold the Lamb
of God, which taketh away the sin of the world ! '
Oh, think of that strong and patient Lamb, who on this day
showed Himself perfect in fortitude and nobleness, perfect in
meekness and resignation. Think of Him who, in His utter
love to us, endured the cross, despising the shame. And what
a cross ! Truly said the prophet, ' His visage was marred more
than any man? and His form more than the sons of men: ' in
hunger and thirst, in tears and sighs, bruised and bleeding, His
forehead crowned with thorns, His sides torn with scourges, His
hands and feet gored with nails, His limbs stretched from their
sockets, naked upon the shameful cross, the Son of God hung,
lingering slowly towards the last gasp, in the death of the felon
and the slave ! The most shameful sight that this earth ever
saw, and yet the most glorious sight. The most shameful sight,
at which the sun in heaven veiled his face, as if ashamed, and
the skies grew black, as if to hide those bleeding limbs from the
foul eyes of men; and yet the noblest sight, for in that death
upon the cross shone out the utter fulness of all holiness, the
utter fulness of all fortitude, the utter fulness of that self-sacri-

xvi.] THE CRUCIFIXION. 125
ficing love which had said, 'The Son of Man came to seek and
to save that which was lost;' the utter fulness of obedient
patience, which could say, ' Father, not My will, but Thine be
done;' the utter fulness of generous forgiveness, which could
pray, ' Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do; '
the utter fulness of noble fortitude and endurance, which could
say at the very moment when a fearful death stared Him in the
face, ' Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to the Father, and
He will send me at once more than twelve armies of angels?
But how then would the Scriptures be fulfilled that thus it
must be ?'
Oh, my friends, look to Him, the author and perfecter of all
faith, all trust, all loyal daring for the sake of duty and of God !
Look at His patience. See how He endured the cross, despis
ing the shame. See how He endured — how patience had her
perfect work in Him — how in all things He was more than
conqueror. What gentleness, what calmness, what silence,
what infinite depths of Divine love within Him ! A heart
which neither shame, nor torture, nor insult, could stir from its
God-like resolution. When looking down from that cross He
beheld none almost but enemies, heard no word but mockery ;
when those who passed by reviled Him, wagging their heads
and saying, ' He saved others, Himself He cannot save ;' His
only answer was a prayer for forgiveness for that besottec
mob who were yelling beneath Him like hounds about theii
game. Consider Him, and then consider ourselves, ruffled and
put out of temper by the slightest cross accident, the slightest
harsh word, too often by the slightest pain— not to mention
insults, for we pride ourselves in not bearing them.
Try, my friends, if you can, even in the dimmest way, fancy
yourselves for one instant in His place this day 1815 years.
Fancy yourselves hanging on that cross — fancy that mocking
mob below— fancy— but I dare not go on with the picture.
Only think— think what would have been your temper there,
and then you may get some slight notion of the boundless love

126 VILLAGE SERMONS. [seem.
and the boundless endurance of the Saviour whom we love so
little, for whose sake most of us will not endure the trouble of
giving up a single sin.
And then consider that it was all of His own free will ; that
at any moment, even while He was hanging upon the cross, He
might have called to earth and sun, to heaven and hell, ' Stop !
thus far, but no further,' and they would have obeyed Him;
and all that cross, and agony, and the fierce faces of those
furious Jews, would have vanished away like a hideous dream
when one awakes. For they lied in their mockery. Any
moment He might have been free, triumphant again in His
eternal bliss, but He would not. He Himself kept Himself on
that cross till His Father's will was fulfilled, and the sacrifice
was finished, and we were saved. And then at last, when there
was no more human nobleness, no more agony left for Him to
fulfil, no gem in the crown of holiness which He had not won
as His own; no drop in the cup of misery which He had not
drained as His own; when at last He was made perfect through
suffering, and His strength had been made perfect in weakness,
then He bowed that bleeding, thorn-crowned head, and said,
'It is finished. Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit'
And so He died.
How can cmr poor words, our poor deeds, thank Him?
How mean and paltry our deepest gratitude, our highest
loyalty, when compared with Him to whom it is due — that
adorable victim, that perfect sin-offering, who this day offered
up Himself upon the altar of the cross, in the fire of His own
boundless zeal for the kingdom of God, His Father, and of His
boundless love for us, His sinful brothers ! ' Oh, thou blessed
Jesus ! Saviour agonizing for us ! God Almighty, who
didst make Thyself weak for the love of us! oh, write that
love upon our hearts so deeply that neither pleasure nor sorrow,
life nor death, may wipe it away ! Thou hast sacrificed Thyself
for us; oh, give us the hearts to sacrifice ourselves for Thee!
Thou art the Vine, we are the branches. Let Thy priceless

xvi.] THE CRUCIFIXION. 127
blood shed for us on this day flow like life-giving sap through
all our hearts and minds, and fill us with Thy righteousness,
that we may be sacrifices fit for Thee. Stir us up to offer to
Thee, O Lord, our bodies, our souls, our spirits, in all we love
and all we learn, in all we plan and all we do, to offer our
labours, our pleasures, our sorrows, to Thee; to work for Thy
kingdom through them, to live as those who are not their own,
but bought with Thy blood, fed with Thy body; and enable us
now, in Thy most holy Sacrament, to offer to Thee our repen
tance, our faith, our prayers, our praises, living, reasonable, and
spiritual sacrifices, — Thine from our birth-hour, Thine now,
and Thine for ever!'

SERMON XVII.
THE RESURRECTION.

Luke xxiv. 6.
He is not here — He is risen.
T 1 7"E are assembled here to-day, my friends, to celebrate the
joyful memory of our blessed Saviour's Resurrection.
All Friday night, Saturday, and Saturday night, His body lay in
the grave ; His soul was — where we cannot tell. St. Peter tells
that He went and preached to the spirits in prison — the sinners
of the old world, who are kept in the place of departed souls
— most likely in the depths of the earth, in the great fire-king
dom, which boils and flames miles below our feet, and breaks
out here and there through the earth's solid crust in burning
mountains and streams of fire. There some say — and the Bible
seems to say — sinful souls are kept in chains until the judgment-
day ; and hither they say Christ went to preach — no doubt to
save some of those sinful souls who had never heard of Him.
However this may be, for those two nights and day there was
no sign, no stir in the grave where Christ was laid. His body
seemed dead — the stone lay still over the mouth of the tomb
where Joseph and Nicodemus laid him ; the seal which Pilate
had put on it was unbroken ; the soldiers watched and watched,
but no one stirred; the priests and Pharisees were keeping
their sham Passover, thinking, no doubt, that they were well rid
of Christ and of His rebukes for ever.

THE RESURRECTION. 129

But early on the Sunday morn — this day, as it might be — in
the grey dawn of morning there came a change — a wondrous
change. There was a great earthquake ; the solid ground and
rocks were stirred — the angel of the Lord came down from
heaven, and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon
it, waiting for the King of glory to arise from His slumber, and
go forth the conqueror of Death.
His countenance was like lightning, and His raimont white
as snow ; and for fear of Him those fierce, hard soldiers, who
feared neither God nor man, shook, and became as dead men.
And Christ arose and went forth. How He rose — how He
looked when He arose, no man can tell, for no man saw. Only
before the sun was risen came Mary Magdalene, and the other
Mary, and found the stone rolled away, and saw the angel sitting
clothed in white, who said, ' Fear not, for I know that ye seek
Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here, for He is risen.
Come, see the place where the Lord lay.'
What must they have thought, poor, faithful souls, who came,
lonely and broken-hearted, to see the place where He, their only
hope, was, as they thought, shut up and lost for ever, to hear
that He was risen and gone? Half terrified, half delighted,
they went back with other women who had come on the same
errand, with spices to anoint the blessed body, and told the
apostles. Peter and John ran to the sepulchre, and saw the
linen clothes lie, and the napkin that was about His blessed
head, wrapped together by itself. They then believed. Then
first broke on them the meaning of His old saying, that He
must rise from the dead ; and so, wondering and doubting what
to do, they went back home.
But Mary — faithful, humble Mary — stood without, by the
sepulchre, weeping. The angel called to her, ' Woman, why
weepest thou ? ' ' They have taken away my Lord,' said she ;
'and I know not where they have laid Him. '
Then, in a moment, out of the air, He appeared behind her.
His body had been changed; it was now a glorified, spiritual

130 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
body, which could appear and disappear when and how He
liked. She turned back, and saw Him standing, but she knew
Him not. A wondrous change had come over Him since last
she saw Him hanging, bleeding, pale, and dying, on the cross of
shame. ' Woman,' said He, ' why weepest thou ? ' She, fancy
ing it was the gardener, said to Him, ' Sir, if thou hast borne
Him hence, tell me where thou hast laid Him, and I will take
Him away.' Jesus said to her, ' Mary.' At the sound of that
beloved voice — His own voice — calling her by her name, her
recollection came back to her. She knew Him — knew Him
for her risen Lord; and, falling at His feet, cried out, 'My
Master !'
So Jesus Christ, the Son of God, rose from the dead !
Now come the questions, Why did Christ rise from the
dead? — and how did He rise? And, first, I will say a few
words about how He rose from the dead. And this the Bible
will answer for us, as it will everything else about the spirit-
world. Christ, says the Bible, was put to death in the flesh ;
but quickened, that is, brought to life, by the Spirit. Now,
what is the Spirit but the Lord and Giver of Life, — life of all
sorts— life to the soul — life to the body — life to the trees and
plants around us ? With that Spirit Christ is filled infinitely
without measufe ; it is His spirit. He is the Prince of Life ;
and the Spirit which gives life is His Spirit, proceeding from the
Father and the Son. Therefore the gates of hell could not pre
vail against Him — therefore the heavy gravestone could not hold
Him down — therefore His flesh could not see corruption and
decay as other bodies do ; not because His body was different
from other bodies in its substance, but because He was filled,
body and soul, with the great Spirit of Life. For this is the
great business of the Spirit of God, in all nature, to bring life
out of death — new generations out of old. What says David?
' When Thou, O God, turnest away Thy face, things die and re
turn again to the dust ; when Thou lettest Thy breath (which is
the same as Thy Spirit) go forth, they are made, and Thou renew-

xvn.] THE RESURRECTION. 131
est the face of the earth.' This is the way that seeds, instead of
rotting and perishing, spring up and become new plants — God
breathes His spirit on them. The seeds must have heat, and
damp, and darkness, and electricity, before they can sprout;
but the heat, and damp, and darkness do not make them sprout;
they want something more to do that. A philosopher can find
out exactly what a seed is made of, and he might make a seed of
the proper materials, and put it in the ground, and electrify it —
but would it grow ? Not it. To grow it must have life — life
from the fountain of life — from God's Spirit. All the philo
sophers in the world have never yet been able, among all the
things which they have made, to make a single living thing —
and say they never shall ; because, put together all they will, still
one thing is wanting — life, which God alone can give. Why do
I say this? To show you what God's Spirit is; to put you in
mind that it is near you, above you, and beneath you, about
your path in your daily walk. And also to explain to you
how Christ rose by that Spirit, — how your bodies, if you claim
your share in Christ's Spirit, may rise by it too.
You can see now, how Christ, being filled with God's Spirit
rose of Himself. People had risen from the dead before Christ's
time, but they had been either raised in answer to the prayers of
holy men who had God's Spirit, or at some peculiar time when
heaven was opened, and God chose to alter His laws (as we
call it) for a moment.
But here was a Man who rose of Himself. He was raised by
God, and therefore He raised Himself, for He was God.
You all know what life and power a man's own spirit will often
give him. You may have heard of ' spirited ' men in great dan
ger, or 'spirited' soldiers in battle ; when faint, wounded, having
suffered enough, apparently, to kill them twice over, still strug
gling or fighting on, and doing the most desperate deeds to the
last, from the strength and courage of their spirits conquering
pain and weakness, and keeping off, for a time, death itself.
We all know how madmen, diseased in their spirits, will, when

i32 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
the fit is on them, have for a few minutes ten men's strength.
Well, just think, if a man's own spirit, when it is powerful, can
give his body such life and force, what must it have been with
Christ, who was filled full of the Spirit — God's Spirit, the Lord
and Giver of life. The Lord could not help rising. All the dis
ease, and poison, and rottenness in the world, could not have
made His body decay : mountains on mountains could not
have kept it down. His body — the Prince of Life ! — He that
was the life itself! It was impossible that death could hold
Him. And does not this show us why He rose, that we might rise
with Him ? What did He say about His own death ? ' Except
a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone,
but if it die it bringeth forth much fruit.' He was the grain
which fell into the ground and died, and from His dead body
sprung up another body — His glorified body ; and we, His
church, His people, fed with that body — His members, however
strange it may sound — St. Paul said it, and therefore I dare to
say it, little as I know what it means — members of His flesh and
of His bones. But think ! Remember what St. Paul tells you
about this very matter in that glorious chapter which is read in
the burial service, ' how when thou sowest seed, thou sowest
not that body which it will have, but bare grain ; but God gives
it a body as it hath pleased Him, and to every seed its own
body.' For the wheat-plant is in reality the same thing as the
wheat-seed, and its life the same life, different as the outside of
it may look. Dig it up just at this time of year, and you will
find the seed-corn all gone, sucked dry; the life of the wheat-
seed has formed it into a wheat plant — yet it is the same indi
vidual thing. The substance of the seed has gone into the root
and the young blade; but it is the same individual substance.
You know it is, and though you cannot tell why, yet you say,
' What a fine plant that seed has grown into,' because you feel
it is so, that the seed is the very same thing as the plant which
springs up from it, though its shape is changed, and its size,

xvn.] THE RESURRECTION. 1 33
and its colour, and the very stuff of which it was made is
changed, since it was a mere seed. And yet it is at bottom the
same individual thing as the seed was, with a new body and
shape. So with Christ's body. It was changed after He rose. It
had gone through pain, and weakness, and death, gone down to
the lowest depth of them, and conquered them, and passed
triumphant through them and far beyond their power. His
body was now a nobler, a more beautiful, a glorified body, a
spiritual body, one which could do whatever His Spirit chose to
make it do, one which could never die again, one which could
come through closed doors, appear and vanish as He liked,
instead of being bound to walk the earth, and stand cold and
heat, sickness and weariness.
Yet it was the very same body, just as the wheat-plant is the
same as the wheat-seed — the very same body. Everyone knew
His face again after His resurrection. There was the very
print of the nails to be seen in His hands and feet, the spear
wound in His blessed side. So shall it be with us, my friends.
We shall rise again, and we shall be the same as we are now,
and yet not the same ; our bodies shall be the same bodies, and
yet nobler, purer, spiritual bodies, which can know neither
death, nor pain, nor weariness. Then, never care, my friends,
if we drop like ripe grain into the bosom of mother earth, — if
we are to spring up again as seedling plants, after death's long
svinter, on the resurrection morn. Truly says the poet,* how
Mother earth, she gathers all
Into her bosom, great and small:
Oh, could we look into her face,
We should not shrink from her embrace.
No, indeed ! for if we look steadily with the wise, searching
eye of faith into the face of mother earth, we shall see how
death is but the gate of life, and this narrow churchyard, with
* Von Stolberg.

134 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
its corpses close-packed underneath the sod, would not seem to
us a frightful charnel-house of corruption. No ! it would seem
like what it is — a blessed, quiet, seed-filled God's garden, in
which our forefathers, after their long life-labour, lay sown by
God's friendly hand, waiting peaceful, one and all, to spring up
into leaf, and flower, and everlasting paradise-fruit, beneath the
breath of God's Spirit at the last great day, when the Sun of
Righteousness arises in glory, and the summer begins which
shall never end.
One and all, did I say ? Alas ! would God it were so ! We
cannot hope as for all; but they are dead and gone, and we are
not here to judge the dead. They have another Judge, and all
shall be as He wills.
But we — we in whose limbs the breath of life still stirs — we
who can still work, let us never forget all grain ripens not.
There is some falls out of the ear unripe, and perishes; some is
picked out by birds ; some withers and decays in the ear, and
yet gets into the barn with the ripe wheat, and is sown too with
it, of which I never heard that any sprang up again — ploughed
up again it may be — a withered, dead husk of chaff as it died,
ploughed up to the resurrection of damnation to burn as chaff
in unquenchable fire ; but the good seed alone, ripe, and safe
with the wheat*plant till it is ripe, that only will spring up to
the resurrection of eternal life.
Now, consider again that parable of the wheat-plant After
it has sprang up, what does it next, but tiller ? — and every new
shoot that tillers out bears its own ear, ripens its own grain,
twenty, thirty, or forty stems, and yet they are all the same
plant, living with the life of that one original seed. So with
Christ's Church — His body the Church. As soon as He rose,
that new plant began to tiller. He did not keep His Spirit to
Himself, but poured it out on the apostles, and from them it
spread and spread — each generation of Christians ripening, and
bearing fruit, and dying, a fresh generation of fruit springing up
from them, and so on, as we are now at this day. And yet all

xvn.] THE RESURRECTION, 1 35
these plants, these millions and millions of Christian men and
women, who have lived since Christ's blessed resurrection, all
are parts of that one original seed, the body of Christ, whose
members they are, and all owe their life to that one spirit of
Christ, which is in them all and through them all, as the life of
the original grain is in the whole crop which springs from it.
And what can you learn from this ? Learn this, that in Christ
you are safe, out of Christ you are lost. But really in Christ, I
mean — not like the dead and dying grains, mildewed and worm-
eaten, which you find here and there on the finest wheat-plant.
Their end is to be burned, and so will ours be, for all our
springing out of Christ's root, if the angel reapers find us not
good wheat, but chaff and mildew. Every branch in Christ
which beareth not fruit, His heavenly Father taketh away.
Therefore, never pride yourself on having been baptized into
Christ, never pride yourself on showing some signs of God's
Spirit, on being really good, right in this and right in that, — the
question is, not so much, Are you in Christ at all, are you part
of His tree, a member of His body ? but, Are you ripening
there ? If you are not ripening, you are decaying, and your
end will be as God has said. And do you wish to know
whether you are in Christ, safe, ripening ? see whether you are
like Him. If the young grain does not show like the seed
grain, you may be sure it is making no progress ; and as surely
as a wheat-plant never brought forth rye, or a grape-tree thistles,
so surely, if you are not like Christ in your character, in pati
ence, in meekness, in courage, truth, purity, piety, and love, you
may be of His planting, but you are none of His ripening, and
you will not be raised with Him at the last day, to flower anew
in the gardens of Paradise, world without end.

SERMON XVIII.
IMPROVEMENT.

Psai.m xcii. 12.
The righteous shall flourish like the palm-tree : he shall grow like the cedar
in Lebanon. Those that be planted in the house of the Lord shall
flourish in the courts of our God. They shall still bring forth fruit in
old age : they shall be fat and flourishing.
""FHE Bible is always telling Christian people to go forioards
— to grow — to become wiser and stronger, better and
better day by day ; that they ought to become better and better,
because they can, if they choose, improve. This text tells us
so ; it says that we shall bring forth more fruit in our old age.
Another text tells us, that ' those who wait on the Lord shall
renew their strength ;' another tells us, that we ''shall go from
strength to strength.' Not one of St. Paul's Epistles but talks
of growing in grace, and in the knowledge of God, of being
filled with God's Spirit, of having our eyes more and more open
to understand God's truth. Not one of St. Paul's Epistles but
contains prayers of St. Paul that the men to whom he writes
may become holier and wiser. And St. Paul says that he him
self needed to go forward — that he wanted fresh strength — that
he had to forget what was past, and consider all he had done
and felt as nothing, and press forward to the prize of his high
calling; that he needed to be daily conquering himself more
and more, keeping down his bad feelings, hunting out one bad

IMPROVEMENT.

137

habit after another, lest, by any means when he had preached
to others, he himself should become a castaway. Therefore, I
said rightly, that the Bible is always bidding us to go forwards.
You cannot read your Bibles without seeing this. What else
was the use of St. Paul's Epistles ? They were written to
Christian men, redeemed men, converted men, most of them
'better, I fear, than ever we shall be; and for what? to tell them
not to be content to remain as they were, but to go forwards, to
improve, to remember that they were only just inside the gate
of God's kingdom, and that if they would go on to perfection,
they would find strength, and holiness, and blessing, and
honour, and happiness, which they as yet did not dream of.
' Be ye perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is per
fect,' said our blessed Lord to all men. ' Be ye perfect,' says
St. Paul to the Corinthians and the Ephesians, and all to whom
he wrote ; and so say I to you now in God's name, for Christ's
sake, as citizens of God's. kingdom, as heirs of everlasting glory,
' Be you perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.'
Now, I ask you, my friends, is not this reasonable ? It is
reasonable, for the Bible always speaks of our souls as living
things. It compares them to limbs of a body, to branches of a
tree, often to separate plants — as in our Lord's parable of the
tares and the wheat. Again, St. Paul tells us that we have
been planted in baptism in the likeness of Christ's death ; and
again, in the 1st Psalm, which says that the good man shall be
like a tree planted by the waterside ; and again in the text of
my sermon, which says, that ' those who are planted in the house
of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. They
shall still bring forth fruit in old age : they shall be fat ' and
flourishing.' Now, what does all this mean? It means that the life of our
souls is in some respects like the life of a plant ; and therefore.
that as plants grow, so our souls are to grow. Why do you
plant anything, but in order that it may grow, and become
larger, stronger, bear flower and fruit ? Be sure God has planted

138 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
us in His garden, Christ's Church, for no other reason. Con
sider again — What is life but a continual growing, or a con
tinual decaying ? If a tree does not get larger and stronger
year by year, is not that a sure sign that it is unhealthy, and
that decay has begun in it, that it is unsound at heart ? And
what happens then ? It begins to become weaker and smaller,
and cankered and choked with scurf and moss till it dies. If a
tree is not growing, it is sure in the long run to be dying ; and
so are our souls. If they are not growing, they are dying ; if
they are not getting better, they are getting worse. This is why
the Bible compares our souls to trees — not out of a mere pretty
fancy of poetry, but for a great, awful, deep, world-wide lesson,
that every tree in the fields may be a pattern, a warning, to us
thoughtless men, that as that tree is meant to grow, so our souls
are meant to grow. As that tree dies unless it grows, so our
souls must die unless they grow. Consider that !
But how does a tree grow ? How are our souls to grow ?
Now, here again, we shall understand heavenly things best by
taking and considering the pattern from among earthly things
which the Bible gives us — the tree, I mean. A tree grows in
two ways. Its roots take up food from the ground, its leaves
take up food from the air. Its roots are its mouth, we may say,
and its leaves afe its lungs. Thus the tree draws nourishment
from the earth beneath, and from the heaven above ; and so
must our souls, my friends : if they are to live and grow, they
must have food both from earth and from heaven. And this is
what I mean —
Why has God given us senses, eyes, and ears, and under
standing ? That by them we may feed our souls with things
which we see and hear — things which are going on in the world
round us. We must read, and we must listen, and we must
watch people and their sayings and doings, and what becomes
of them, and we must try and act, and practise what is right for
ourselves : and so we shall, by using our eyes and ears and our
bodies, get practice, and experience, and knowledge, from the

xviii.] IMPROVEMENT. 1 39
world around us — such as Solomon gives us in his Proverbs —
and so our eyes, and ears, and understandings are to be to us
like roots, by which we may feed our souls with earthly learning
and experience. But is this enough ? No, surely. Consider,
again, God's example which He has given us — a tree. If you
keep stripping all the leaves off a tree as fast as they grow,
what becomes of it ? It dies, because without leaves it cannot
get nourishment from the air, and the rain, and the sunlight.
Again, if you shut up a tree, where it can get neither rain, air,
nor light, what happens ? The tree certainly dies, though it
may be planted in the very richest soil, and have the very
strongest roots : and why ? — because it can get no food from
the sky above. So with our souls, my friends. If we get no
food from above, our souls will die, though we have all the wit,
and learning, and experience in the world. We must be fed,
and strengthened, and satisfied, with the grace of God from
above — with the Spirit of God. Consider how the Bible speaks
of God's Spirit as the breath of God ; for the very word spirit
means, originally, breath, or air, or gas, or a breeze of wind,
showing us that as without the airs of heaven the tree would
become stunted and cankered, so our souls will without the
fresh purifying breath of God's Spirit. Again, God's Spirit is
often spoken of in Scripture as dew and rain. His grace, or
favour, we read, is as dew on the grass ; and again, that God
shall come unto us as the rain, as the former and latter rain
upon the earth ; and again, speaking of the outpourings of God's
Spirit on His Church, the Psalmist says, that ' He shall come
down as the rain upon the mown grass, as showers that water
the earth : ' and to show us that as the tree puts forth buds and
leaves, and tender wood, when it drinks in the dew and rains,
so our hearts will become tender, and bud out into good
thoughts and wise resolves, when God's Spirit fills them with
His grace.
Moreover, the Scripture tells us again and again that our souls
want light from above ; and we all know by experience that the

140

VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.

trees and plants which grow on the earth want the light of the
sun to make them grow. So, doubtless, in this case also, the
Scripture example of a tree will hold good. Now, what does
the sunlight do for the tree? It does everything, for without
light, the soil, and air, and rain, are all useless. It stirs up the
sap, it hardens the wood, it brings out the blossom, it colours
the leaves and the flowers, it ripens the fruit. The light is the
life of the tree; and is there not one, my friends, of whom these
words are written — that He is the Life, and that He is the
Light — that He is the Sun of Righteousness and the bright and
morning star — that He is the Light which lighteth every
man that cometh into the world — that in Him was life, and the
life was the light of men ? Do you not know of whom I speak?
Even of Him that was born at Bethelem and died on the
cross, who now sits at God's right hand, praying for us,
offering to us His body and His blood ; — Jesus the Son of God.
He is the Light and the Life. From Him alone our light must
come, from Him alone our life must come, now and for ever,
Oh, think seriously of this — and think too how a short time
before He died on earth He spoke of Himself as the Bread of
life — the living Bread which comes down from heaven ; how He
declared to men, that unless they eat His flesh and drink His
blood, they have* no life in them. And lastly, consider this,
how the same night that He was betrayed, He took bread, and
when He had given thanks, He brake it, and said, 'Take, eat;
this is my body, which is given for you ; this do in remembrance
of me.' And how, likewise, He took the cup, and when He had
blessed it, He gave it to them, saying, ' Drink ye all of this,
for this is the new covenant in my blood, which is shed for you
and for many, for the forgiveness of sins ; this do, as oft as ye
drink it, in remembrance of me.' Oh, consider these words,
my friends — to you all and every one they were spoken.
' Drink ye all of this,' said the Blessed One ; and will you
refuse to drink it ? He offers you the bread of life, the sign and
the pledge of His body, which shall feed your- souls with ever-

-win.] IMPROVEMENT. I4I

lasting strength and life ; and will you refuse what the Son of
God offers you, what He bought for you with His death ?
God forbid, my friends ! This is your blessed right and privi
lege — the right and the privilege of every one of you — to qome
freely and boldly to that holy table, and there to remember
your Saviour. At that table to confess your Saviour before men
— at that table to show that you really believe that Jesus Christ
died for you — at that table to claim your share in the strength
of His body, in the pardon of His blood, which cleanses from
all sin — and at that table to receive what you claim, to receive
at that table the wine, as a sign from Christ Himself, that His
blood has washed away your sins ; and the bread, as a sign that
His body and His spirit are really feeding your spirits, that your
souls are strengthened and refreshed by the body and blood of
Christ, as your bodies are with the bread and wine. I have
shown you that your souls must be fed from heaven, — that the
Lord's Supper is a sign to you that they are fed from heaven.
You pray to God, I hope, many of you, that He would give you
His Holy Spirit, that He would change, and renew, and
strengthen your souls — you pray God to do this, I hope.
Well, then, there is the answer to your prayers. There your
souls will be renewed and strengthened — there you will claim
your share in Christ, who alone can renew and strengthen them.
The bread which is there broken is the communion, the sharing
of the body of Christ ; the cup which is there blessed is the
communion of the blood of Christ : to that heavenly treat, to
that spiritual food of your souls, Jesus Himself invites you, He
who is the life of men. Do not let it be said at the last day of
any one of you, that when the Son of God Himself invites you,
you would not come to Him that you might have life.

SERMON XIX.
MAN'S WORKING DAY.

John xi. 9, 10.
Jesus answered, Are there not twelve hours in the day? If any man walk
in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world.
But if a man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is no light
in him.
T^HIS was our blessed Lord's answer to His disciples when
they said to Him, ' Master, the Jews of late tried to stone
Thee, and goest Thou among them again ?' And ' Jesus
answered, Are there not twelve hours in the day ? If any man
walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light
of this world. But if a man walk in the night, he stumbleth,
because there is no light in him.'
Now, at first sight, one does not see what this has to do with
the disciples' question — it seems no answer at all to it. But
we must remember who it was who gave that answer. The
Son of God, from whom all words come, who came to do good,
and only good, every minute of his life. And, therefore, we
may be sure that He never threw away a single word. And
we must remember, too, to whom He spoke — to His disciples,
whom He was training to be apostles to the whole world,
teaching them in everything some deep lesson, to fit them for
their glorious calling, as preachers of the good news of His
coming. So we may be sure that He would never put off any

MAN'S WORKING DAY.

H3

question of theirs ; we may be certain that whatever they asked
Him, He would give them the best possible answer ; not
perhaps just the answer for which they wished, but the answer
which would teach them most. Therefore I say, we must
believe that there is some deep, wonderful lesson in this text —
that it is the very best and fullest answer which our Lord could
have made to His disciples when they asked Him why Pie was
going again to Judea, where He stood in danger of His life.
Let us think a little about this text in faith, that is, sure that
there is a deep, blessed meaning in it, if we can but find it out.
Let us take it piece by piece ; we shall never get to the bottom
of it, of course, but we may get deep enough into it to set us
thinking a little between now and next Sunday.
' Are there not twelve hours in the day ? ' said our Lord.
We know there are, and we know, too, that if any man walks
in the day, and keeps his eyes open, he does not stumble,
because he has the light of this world to guide him. Twelve
hours for business, and twelve for food, and sleep, and rest, is
our rule for working men, or, indeed, not our rule, but God's.
He has set the sun for the light of this world, to rule the day,
to settle for us how long we are to work. In this country
days vary. In summer they are more than twelve hours, and
then men work early and late ; but that is made up to us by
winter, when the days are less than twelve hours, and men work
short time. In the very cold countries, again, far away in the
frozen north, the sun never sets all the summer, and never rises
all the winter, and there is six months day and six months night.
Wonderful ! But even there God has fitted the land and men's
lives to that strange climate, and they can gather in enough
meat in the summer to keep them all the winter, that they may
be able to spend the long six months' night of winter warm in
their houses, sleeping and resting, with plenty of food. So that
even to them there are twelve hours in the day, though their
hours are each a fortnight long, — I mean a certain fixed time
in which to work, and do the business which they have to do

144 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
before the long frozen night comes wherein no man can work,
because the sun, the light of this world, is hid from them below
the ice for six whole months. So that our Lord's words hold
true of all men, even of those people in the icy north. But in
by far the most parts of the world, and especially in the hot
countries, where our Lord lived, there are twelve common
hours in every day, wherein men may and ought to work.
Now, what did our Lord mean by reminding His disciples of
this, which they all knew already ? He meant this, — that God
His Father had appointed Him a certain work to do, and a
certain time to do it in ; that though His day was short, only
thirty-three years in all, while we have, many of us, seventy
years given us, yet that there were twelve hours in His day in
which He must work — that God would take care that He lived
out His appointed time, provided He was ready and earnest in
doing God's work in it — and that He must work in that time
which God had given Him, whatever came of it, and do His
appointed work before the night of death came, in which no
man can work.
There was a heathen king once, named Philip of Macedon,
and a very wise king he was, though he was a heathen, and one
of the wisest of his plans was this : — he had a slave, whom he
ordered to come in to him every morning of his life, whatever
he was doing, and say to him in a loud voice, ' Philip, remember
that thou must die ! '
He was a heathen, but a great many who call themselves
Christians are not half so wise as he, for they take all possible
care not to remember that they must die, but to forget
that they must die ; and yet every living man has a servant
who, like King Philip's, puts him in mind, whether he likes
it or not, that his day will run out at last, and his twelve
hours of life be over, and then die he must. And who
is that servant ? A man's own body. Happy for him though
if his body is his servant — not his master and his tyrant. But
still, be that as it may, every finger-ache that one's body has,

xix.] MAN'S WORKING DAY. 145
every cough and cold one's body catches, ought to be to us a
warning like King Philip's servant, ' Remember that thou must
die.' Every little pain and illness is a warning, a kindly hint
from our Father in heaven, that we are doomed to death ; that
we have but twelve hours in this short day of life, and that the
twelve must end ; and that we must get our work done and our
accounts settled, and be ready for our long journey, to meet
our Father and our King, before the night comes wherein no
man can work, but only take his wages; for them who have
done good the wages of life eternal, and for them who have
done evil — God help them ! we know what is written — ' the
wages of sin is death ! '
Now, observe next, that those who walk in the day do not
stumble, because they see the light of this world, and those who
walk in the night stumble — they have no light in them. If
they are to see, it must be by the help of some light outside
themselves, which is not part of themselves, or belonging to
themselves at all. We only see by the light which God has
made ; when that is gone, our eyes are useless.
So it is with our souls. Our wits, however clever they may
be, only understand things by the light which God throws on
those things. He must explain and enlighten all things to us.
Without His light — His Spirit, all the wit of the world is as
useless as a pair of eyes in a dark night.
Now, this earthly world which we do see is an exact picture and
pattern of the spiritual, heavenly world which we do not see; as
Solomon says in the Proverbs, 'The things which are seen are
the doubles of the things which are not seen.' And as there is
a light for us in this earth, which is not ourselves, namely, the
sun, so there is a light to us in the spirit-world, which is not
ourselves. And who is that? The blessed Lord shall answer
for Himself. He says, ' I am the light of the world;' and St.
John bears witness to Him, 'In Him was life, and the life was
the light of men.' And does not St. Paul say the same thing,
when he blessed God so often for having called him and his
K

I46 VILLAGE SERMONS. [seri.I.
congregations out of darkness into that marvellous light? If
you read his Epistles, you will find what he meant, by the
darkness, what he meant by the light The darkness was
heathendom, knowing nothing of Christ. The light was
Christianity, knowing Christ the light ; and more being in the
light, belonging to Christ — being joined to Him, as the leaves
are to the tree, — living by trust in Christ, being taught and
made true men and true women of, by the Noble and Holy
Spirit of Christ — seeing their way through this world by trust in
Christ and His promises, — That was light.
And there is no other light. If a man does not work trusting
in Christ, whom God has set for the light of the world, he works
in the night, where God never set or meant him to work; and
stumble he will, and make a fool of himself sooner or later,
because he is walking in the night, and sees nothing plainly or
in a right view. For, as our Lord says truly, 'There is no light
in him.' No light in him? In one sense there is no light in
any one, be he the wisest or holiest man who ever lived. But
this is just what three people out of four will not believe. They
will not believe that the Spirit of God gives man understanding.
They fancy that they have light in themselves. They try,
conceitedly and godlessly, to walk by the light of their own
eyes — to make •their own way plain before their face for them
selves. They will not believe David, a man who worked, and
fought, and thought, and saw far more than any one of us will
ever do, when he tells them again and again in his Psalms, that
the Lord is his light, that the Lord must guide a man, and
inform him with His eye, and teach him in the way in which he
should go. And therefore they will not pray to God for light —
therefore they will not look for light in God's Word, and in the
writings of godly men ; and they are like a man in the broad
sunshine, who should choose to shut his eyes close, and say,
' I have light enough in my own head to do without the sun ; '
and therefore they walk on still in darkness, and all the founda
tions of the earth are out of course, because men forget the

xix.] MAN'S WORKING DAY. 147
first universal ground rules of common sense, and reason, and
love, which God's Spirit teaches. I tell you, all the mistakes
that you ever made — that ever were made since Adam fell,
came from this, that men will not ask God for light and wisdom ;
they love darkness rather than light, and therefore, though
God's light is ready for every man, shining in the darkness
to show every man his way, yet the darkness will not compre
hend it — will not take it in, and let God change its blindness
into day.
Now, then, to gather all together, what better answer could
our Lord have given to His disciples' question than this, ' Are
there not twelve hours in the day ? If a man walk in the day
he does not stumble, because he seeth the light of this world ;
but if a man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is
no light in him.'
It was as if He had said, ' However short my day of life may
be, there are twelve hours in it, of my Father's numbering and
measuring, not of mine. My times are in His hand ; as long
as He pleases I shall live. He has given me a work to do, and
He will see that I live long enough to do it. Into his hands I
commend my spirit, for, living or dying, He is with me.
Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, He
will be with me. He will keep me secretly in His tabernacle
from the strife of tongues, and will turn the furiousness of my
enemies to His glory ; and as my day my strength will be.
And I have no fear of running into danger needlessly. I have
prayed to Him daily and nightly for light, for His Spirit — the
spirit of wisdom and understanding, of prudence and courage ;
and His word is pledged to keep me in all my ways, so that I
dash not my foot against a stone. Know ye not that I must
be about my Father's business ? While I am about that, I am
safe. It is only if I go about my own business — my own
pleasure ; if I forget to ask Him for His light and guidance,
that I shall put myself into the night, and stumble and fall.
Well, my friends, what is there in this which we may not say

148 VILLAGE SERMONS.
as well as our Lord ? In this, as in all things, Christ set Him
self up as our pattern. Oh, believe it — believe that your time
— your measure of life, is in God's hand. Believe that He is
your light, that He will teach and guide you into all truth, and
that all your mistakes come from not asking counsel of Him in
prayer, and thought, and reading of His Holy Bible. Believe
His blessed promise, that He will give His Holy Spirit to those
who ask Him. Believe, too, that He has given you a work to
do — prepared good works already for you to walk in. Be you
labourer or gentleman, maid, wife, or widow, God has given
you a work to do ; there is good to be done lying all round you,
ready for you. And the blessed Jesus who bought you, body
and soul, with His own blood, commands you to work for Him:
' Whatsoever your hand finds to do, do it with all your
might' Work ye manful while ye may,
Work for God in this your day ;
Night must stop you, rich or poor —
Godly deeds alone endure.
And then, whether you live or die, your Father's smile will be
on you, and His everlasting anns beneath you, and at your last
hour you shall find that ' Blessed are the dead that die in the
Lord, for they rest from their labour, and their works do
follow them.'

SERMON XX.
ASSOCIATION.

Galatians vi. 2.
Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.
T F I were to ask you, my friends, why you were met together
here to-day, you would tell me, I suppose, that you were
come to church as members of a benefit club ; and quite right
you are in coming here as such, and God grant that we may
meet together here on this same errand many more Whit-Mon
days. But this would be no answer to my question : I wish to
know why you come to church to-day sooner than to any other
place ? What has the church to do with the benefit club?
Now this is a question which I do not think all of you could
answer very readily, and therefore I wish to make you, especially
the younger members of the club, think a little seriously about
the meaning of your coming here to-day. You will be none the
less cheerful this evening for having had some deep and godly
thoughts in your heads this morning.
Now, these benefit clubs are also called provident societies,
and a very good name for them. You become members of
them, because you are prudent, or provident — that is, because
you are careful, and look forward to a rainy day. But why
does not each of you lay up his savings for himself, instead of
putting them into a commaa purse, and. so forming, a club ?

150 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
Because you have found out, what everyone else in the world,
but madmen, ought to have found out, that two are better than
one; that if a great many men join together in any matter, they
are a great deal stronger when working together than if they
each worked just as hard, but each by himself; that the way to
be safe is not to stand each of you alone, but to help each other ;
in short, that there is no getting on without bearing one
another's burdens.
Now, this plan of bearing one another's burdens is not only
good in benefit clubs — it is good in families, in parishes, in
nations, in the Church of God, which is the elect of all man
kind. Unless men hold together, and help each other, there is
no safety for them.
Let us consider what there is bearing on this matter of
prudence, that makes one of the greatest differences between a
man and a brute beast. It is not that the man is prudent, and
the beast is not. Many beasts have forethought enough ; the
very sleepmouse hoards up acorns against the winter ; a fox will
hide the game he cannot eat. No ; the great difference between
man and beast is, that the beast has forethought only for him
self, but the man has forethought for others also ; beasts have
not reason enough to bear each other's burdens, as men
have. And wnat is it that makes us call the ant and the bee
the wisest of animals, except that they do, in some degree,
behave like men, in helping one another, and having some sort
of family feeling, and society, and government among them,
by which they can help bear each other's burdens? So
that we all confess, by calling them wise, how wise it is
to help each other. Consider a family, again. In order
that a family may be happy and prosperous, all the members of
it must bear each other's burdens. If the father only thought
of himself, and the mother of herself, and each of the children
did nothing but take care of themselves, would not that family
come to misery and ruin ? But if they all helped each other —
all thought of each other more than of themselves- -all were

xx.] ASSOCIATION. 15 1
ready to give up their own comfort to make each other com
fortable, that family would be peaceful and prosperous, and
would be doing a great deal towards fulfilling the law of
Christ. It is just the same in a parish. If the rich help and defend
the poor, and the poor respect and love the rich, and are ready
to serve them as far as they can — in short, if all ranks bear each
other's burdens, that parish is a happy one ; and if they do not,
it is a miserable one.
Just the same with a 'nation. If the king only cares about
making himself strong, and the noblemen and gentlemen about
their rank and riches, and the poor people, again, only care for
themselves, and are trying to pull down the rich, and so get
what they can for themselves, — if a country is in this state, what
can be more wretched ? Neither a house nor a country divided
against itself can ever stand. But if the king and the nobles
give their whole minds to making good laws, and seeing justice
done to all, and workmen fairly paid; and if the poor, in their
turns, are loyal and ready to fight and work for their king and
their nobles, then will not that country be a happy and a great
country ? Surely it will, because its people, instead of caring
every man for himself only, help each other and bear one
another's burdens.
And just in the same way with Christ's Church, with the
company of true Christian men. If the clergymen thought only
of themselves, and neglected the people, and forgot to labour
among them, and pray for them, and preach to them ; and if
each of the people cared for himself, and never prayed to God
to give him a spirit of love and charity, and never helped
his neighbours, or did unto others as he wished to be done by ;
and, above all, if Christ, our Head, left His Church, and cared
no more about us, what would become of Christ's Church ?
What would happen to the whole race of sinful man, but misery
in this world, and ruin in the next ? But if the people love and
help each other, and obey their ministers, and pray for them ;

1 52 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
and if the ministers labour earnestly after the souls and bodies
of their people ; and Christ in heaven helps both minister and
people with His Spirit, and His providence and protection ; in
short, if all in the whole Church bear each other's burdens, then
Christ's Church will stand, and the gates of hell will not prevail
against it.
Thus you see that this text of bearing one another's burdens
is no new or strange commandment, but the very state in which
every man is meant to live, both in his family, his parish, his
country, and his Church — all his life helping others, and being
helped by them in turn. And because families and nations,
and the Church of Christ above all, are good, and holy, and
beautiful, therefore any society which is formed upon the same
plan — I mean of helping each other — must be good also. And
therefore benefit societies are right and reasonable things ; and
among all the good which they do, they do this one great good,
that they teach men to remember that there is no use trying to
stand alone, but that the way to be safe and happy is to bear
each other's burdens.
Thus benefit societies are patterns of Christ's Church. But
now, my friends, there is another point for each of you to con
sider, which is this — the benefit club is a good thing, but are
you a good metaber of the club ? Do you do your duty, each
of you, in the club as Christian men should ?
I do not ask whether you pay your subscriptions regularly or
not — that is quite right and necessary, but there is something
more than that wanted to make a club go on rightly. Mere
paying and receiving money will never keep men together any
more than any other outward business. A man may pay his
club-money regularly, and yet not be a really good member.
And how is this? You remember that I tried to show you that
a family, and a nation, and a church, all were kept together by
the same principle of bearing one another's burdens, just as a
benefit club is. Now, what makes a man a good member of
Christ's Church, — a good Christian, in short? A man may pay

xx.] ASSOCIATION. 153
his tithes to the rector, and his church-rates to repair God's
house, and his poor-rates to maintain God's poor, all very
regularly, and yet be a very bad member of Christ's Church.
These payments are all right and good ; but they are but the
outside, the letter of what God requires of him. What is
wanted is, to serve God in the spirit, to have the spirit — the will,
of a Christian in him ; that is, to do all these things for God's
sake — not of constraint, but willingly— ' not grudgingly, for
God loveth a cheerful giver." No ! If a man is really a good
member of Christ's Church, he lives a life of faith in Jesus
Christ, and of thankfulness to Him for His infinite love and
mercy in coming down to die for us, and thus the love of God
rnd man is shed abroad in his heart by God's Spirit, which is
given to him. Therefore, that man thinks it an honour to pay
church-rates, and so help towards keeping God's house in repair
and neatness. He pays his tithes cheerfully, because he loves
God's ministers, and feels their use and worth to him. He
pays his poor-rates with a willing mind, for the sake of that God
who has said, that ' he who gives to the poor lends to the
Lord.' And so he obeys not only the letter but the spirit of
the law.
But the man does more than this. Besides obeying not only
the letter but the spirit of the law, he helps his brethren in a
thousand other ways. He shows, in short, by every action,
that he believes in God and loves his neighbour.
And why should it not be just the same in a benefit club ?
There the good member is not the man who pays his money
merely to have a claim for relief when he himself is sick, and
yet grudges every farthing that goes to help other members.
That man is not a good member. He has come into the club
merely to take care of himself, and not to bear others' burdens.
He may obey the letter of the club rules by paying in his sub
scriptions and by granting relief to sick members, but he does
not obey the spirit of them. If he did, he would be glad to
bear his sick neighbour's burden with so little trouble to him-

154 VILLAGE SERMONS.
self. He would therefore grant club relief willingly and cheer
fully when it was wanted, — ay, he would thank God that he
had an opportunity of helping his neighbours. He would feel
that all the members of the society were his brothers in a double
sense : first, because they had joined with him to help and sup
port each other in the society ; and next, that they were his
brothers in Christ, who had been baptized into the same Church
of God with himself. And he would therefore delight in sup
porting them in their sickness, and honouring them when they
died, and in helping their widows and orphans in their afflic
tion ; in short, in bearing his neighbour's burdens, and so fulfill
ing the law of Christ. And do you not see, that if any of you
subscribe to this benefit society in such a spirit as this, that
they are the men to give an answer to the question I asked at
first, ' Why are you all here at church to-day ? ' They come
here for the same reason that you all ought to come, to thank
God for having kept them well, and out of the want of relief
for the past year, and to thank Him, too, for having enabled
them to bear their sick neighbours' burdens. And they come
also to pray to God to keep them well and strong for the year
to come, and to raise up those members who are in sickness
and distress, that they may all worship God here together
another year, as a company of faithful friends, helping each
other on through this life, and all on the way to the same
heavenly home, where there will be no more poverty, nor
sorrow, nor sickness, nor death, and God shall wipe away tears
from all widows' and orphans' eyes.
And now, my friends, I have tried to put some new and true
thoughts into your head about your club and your business in
this church to-day. And I pray, God grant that you may re
member them, and think of this whole matter as a much more
solemn and holy one than you ever did before.

SERMON XXI.
PIEAVEN ON E ART H.

i Cor. x. 31.

Whether ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the
glory of God.
HP HIS is a command from God, my friends, which is well
worth a few minutes' consideration this day ; — well worth
considering, because though it was spoken eighteen hundred
years ago, yet God has not changed since that time ; Pie is just
as glorious as ever : and Christian men's relation to God has not
changed since that time ; they still live, and move, and have
their being in God ; they are still His children — His beloved ;
Christ who died for us is still our King ; God's spirit is still with
us, God's mercy still saves us : we owe God as much as any
people ever did. If it was ever any one's duty to show forth
God's glory, surely it is our duty too.
Worth considering, indeed, is this command ; for though it is
in the Bible, and has been there for eighteen hundred years, it
is seldom read, seldomer understood, and still more seldom put
into practice. Men eat, and drink, and do all manner of
things, with all their might and main; but how many of them
do they do to the glory of God? No ; this is the fault — the
especial curse of our day, that religion does not mean any
longer, as it used, the service of God — the being like God, and

156 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
showing forth God's glory. No ; religion means, now-a-days,
the art of getting to heaven when we die, and saving our own
miserable souls from hell, and getting God's wages without
doing God's work — as if that was godliness, — as if that was
anything but selfishness ; as if selfishness was any the better foi
being everlasting selfishness ! If selfishness is evil, my friends,
the sooner we get rid of it the better, instead of mixing it up as
we do with all our thoughts of heaven, and making our own en
joyment and our own safety the vile root of our hopes for all
eternity. And therefore it is that people have forgotten what
God's glory is. They seem to think that God's highest glory is
saving them from hell-fire. And they talk not of God and the
wondrous majesty of God, but only of the wonder of God's hav
ing saved them — looking at themselves all the time, and not at
God. We must get rid of this sort of religion, my friends, at all
risks, in order to get rid of all sorts of irreligion, for one is the
father of the other.
It is a wonder, indeed, that we are saved from hell, much
more raised to heaven, such peevish, cowardly, pitiful creatures
as the best of us are ; and yet the more we think of it, the less
wonder we shall find it. The more we think of the wonder
of all wonders,— God Himself, His majesty, His power, His
wisdom, His love, His pity, His infinite condescension, the less
reason we shall have to be surprised that he has stooped to
save us. Yes, do not be startled — for it is true, that God has
done for sinful men nothing contrary to Himself, but just what
was to be expected from such unutterable condescension, and
pity, and generosity, as God's is. And so recollecting this, we
shall begin to forget ourselves, and look at God; and in
thinking of Him we shall get beyond mere wondering at Him,
to something higher — to worshipping Him.
Yes, my friends, this is what we must try at if we would be
really godly— to find out what God is— to find out His likeness,
His character, as He is : and has He not shown us what He
is? He who has earnestly read Christ's story — he who has

xxi.] HEAVEN ON EARTH. 1 57
understood, and admired, and loved Christ's character, and its
nobleness and beauty— he who can believe that Jesus Christ is
now, at this minute, raising up his heart to good, guiding his
thoughts to good, he has seen God ; for he has seen the Son,
who is the exact likeness of the Father's glory, in whom dwells
all the fulness of the Godhead in a bodily shape. Remember,
he who knows Christ knows God; and that knowledge will help
us up a noble step further — it will help us to show forth God's
glory. For when we once kriow what God's glory is, we shall
see how to make others know it too. We shall know how to
do God justice, to set men right as to their notions of God, to
give them, at all events, in our own lives and characters, a
pattern of Christ, who is the pattern of God ; and whatsoever
we do, we shall be able to do all to God's glory.
For what is doing everything to the glory of God ? It is
this : — we have seen what God's glory is : He is Plis own glory.
As you say of any very excellent man, you have but to know
him to honour him ; or of any very beautiful woman, you have
but to see her to love her ; so I say of God, men have but to
see and know Him to love and honour Him.
Well, then, my friends, if we call ourselves Christian men, if
we believe that God is our Father, and delight, as on the
grounds of common feeling we ought, to honour our Father, we
should try to make every one honour Him. In short, whatever
we do we should make it tend to His glory — make it a lesson
to our neighbours, our friends, and our families. We should
preach God's glory day by day, not by words only, often not
by words at all, but by our conduct. Ay, there is the secret. —
If you wish other men to believe a thing, just behave as if you
believed it yourself. Nothing is so infectious as example. If
you wish your neighbours to see what Jesus Christ is like, let
them see what He can make you like. If you wish them to
know how God's love is ready to save them from their sins, let
them see His love save you from your sins. If you wish them
to see God's tender care in every blessing and every sorrow

158 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
they have, why, let them see you thanking God for every
sorrow and every blessing you have. I tell you, friends,
example is everything. One good man, — one man who
does not put his religion on once a week with his Sunday coat,
but wears it for his working dress, and lets the thought of God
grow into him, and through and through him, till everything he
says and does becomes religious, that man is worth a thousand
sermons — he is a living Gospel — he comes in the spirit and
power of Elias — he is the image of God. And men see his
good works, and admire them in spite of themselves, and see
that they are Godlike, and that God's grace is no dream, but
that the Holy Spirit is still among men, and that all nobleness
and manliness is His gift, His stamp, His picture ; and so they
get a glimpse of God again in His saints and heroes, and glorify
their Father who is in heaven.
Would not such a life be a heavenly life ? Ay, it would be
more, it would be heaven — heaven on earth : not in mere fine
words, but really. We should then be sitting, as St. Paul tells
us, in heavenly places with Jesus Christ, and having our con
versation in heaven. All the while we were doing our daily
work, following our business, or serving our country, or sitting
at our own firesides with wife and child, we should be all that
time in heaven. *Why not? we are in heaven now — if we had
but faith to see it. Oh, get rid of those carnal, heathen notions
about heaven, which tempt men to fancy that, after having
misused this place — God's earth — for a whole life, they are to
fly away when they die, like swallows in autumn, to another
place — they know not where — where they are to be very happy —
they know not why or how, nor do I know either. Heaven is
not a mere place, my friends. All places are heaven if you will
be heavenly in them. Heaven is where God is and Christ is ;
and hell is where God is not and Christ is not. The Bible says,
no doubt, there is a place now — somewhere beyond the skies —
where Christ especially shows forth His glory — a heaven of
heavens : and for reasons which I cannot explain, there must

xxi.] HEAVEN ON EARTH. 159
be such a place. But, at all events, here is heaven ; for Christ
is here and God is here, if we will open our eyes and see them.
And how? — How? Did not Christ Himself say, 'If a man
wul love Me, My Father will love him ; and we, My Father and
I, will come to him, and make our abode with him, and we will
show ourselves to him ? ' Do those words mean nothing or
something? If they have any meaning, do they not mean this,
that in this life we can see God — in this life we can have God
and Christ abiding with us ? And is not that heaven ? Yes,
heaven is where God is. You are in heaven if God is with you,
you are in hell if God is not with you ; for where God is not,
darkness and a devil are sure to be.
There was a great poet once — Dante by name — who described
most truly and wonderfully, in his own way, heaven and hell,
for indeed he had been in both. He had known sin and
shame, and doubt and darkness and despair, which is hell. And
after long years .of misery, he had got to know love and hope,
and holiness and nobleness, and the love of Christ and the peace
of God, which is heaven. And so well did he speak of them,
that the ignorant people used to point after him with awe in
the streets, and whisper, There is the man who has been in hell.
Whereon some one made these lines on him : —
Thou hast seen hell and heaven? Why not? since heaven and hell
Within the struggling soul of every mortal dwell.
Think of that ! — thou — and thou — and thou ! — for in thee,
at this moment, is either heaven or hell. And which of them ?
Ask thyself, ask thyself, friend. If thou art not in heaven in
this life, thou wilt never be in heaven in the life to come. At
death, says the wise man, each thing returns into its own
element, into the ground of its life ; the light into the light, and
the darkness into the darkness. As the tree falls, so it lies.
My friends, you who call yourselves enlightened Christian folk,
do you suppose that you can lead a mean, worldly, covetous,
spiteful life here, and then, the moment your soul leaves the

l6o VILLAGE SERMONS.
body, that you are to be changed into the very opposite charac
ter, into angel and saints, as fairy tales tell of beasts changed
into men ? If a beast can be changed into a man, then
death can change the sinner into a saint — but not else.
If a beast would enjoy being a man, then a sinner would
enjoy being in heaven — but not else. A sinful, worldly man
enjoy being in heaven? Does a fish enjoy being on dry land ?
The sinner would long to be back in this world again. Why,
what is the employment of spirits in heaven, according to the
Bible (for that is the point to which I have been trying to lead
you round again ? What but glorifying God ? Not trying only
to do everything to God's glory, but actually succeeding in
doing it — basking in the sunshine of His smile, delighting to
feel themselves as nothing before His glorious majesty, medi
tating on the beauty of His love, filling themselves with the
sight of His power, searching out the treasures of His wisdom,
and finding God in all and all in God — their whole eternity one
act of worship, one hymn of praise. Are there not some among
us who will have had but little practice at that work ? Those
who have done nothing for God's glory here, how do they
expect to be able to do everything for God's glory hereafter ?
Those who will not take the trouble of merely standing up at
the Psalms, like the rest of their neighbours, even if they cannot
sing with their voices God's praises in this church, how will
they like singing God's praises through eternity ? No ; be sure
that the only people who will be fit for heaven, who will like
heaven even, are those who have been in heaven in this life —
the only people who will be able to do everything to God's
glory in the new heavens and new earth, are those who have
been trying honestly to do all to His glory in this heaven and
this earth.
Think over, in the meantime, what I have said this day ; con
sider it, and you will have enough to think of, and pray over
too, till we meet here again.

SERMON XXII.
NATIONAL PRIVILEGES.

Luke x. 23.
Blessed are the eyes which see the things which ye see : for I tell you, that
many prophets and kings have desired to see those things which ye
see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear,
and have not heard them.
'"THIS is a noble text, my friends— and yet an awful
one, for if it does not increase our godliness, it will
certainly increase our condemnation. It tells us that
we, even the meanest among us, are more favoured by God than
the kings, and judges, and conquerors of the old world, of whom
we read this afternoon in the first lesson ; that we have more
light, and knowledge of God, than even the prophets David,
Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, to whom God's glory
appeared in visible shape. It tells us that we see things which
they longed to see, and could not ; that words are spoken to us
for which their ears longed in vain ; that they, though they died
in hope, yet received not the promises, God having provided
some better things for us, that they without us should not be
made perfect.
Now, what was this which they longed for, and had not, and
yet we have? It is this — a Saviour and a Saviour's kingdom.
All' wise and holy hearts for ages — as well heathens as Jews-^-
had had this longing. They wanted a Saviour — one who
T.

162 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
should free them from sin and conquer evil — one who should
explain to them all the doubt and contradiction and misery of
the world, and give them some means of being freed from it —
one who should set them the perfect pattern of what a man
should be, and join earth and heaven, and make godliness part
of man's daily life. They longed for a Saviour, and for a
heavenly kingdom also. They saw that all the laws in the
world could never make men good ; that one half of men broke
them, and the other half only obeyed them unwillingly, through
slavish fear, loving the sin they dared not do. That men got
worse and worse as time rolled on. That kings, instead of being
shepherds of their people, were only wolves and tyrants to keep
them in ignorance and misery. That priests only taught the
people lies, and fattened themselves at their expense. That, in
short, as David said, men would not learn or understand, and
all the foundations of the earth, the grounds and principles of
society, politics, and religion, were out of course, and the devil
very truly the king of this lower world ; so they longed for a
heavenly kingdom — a kingdom of God — one in which men
should obey God for love and not for fear, and man for
God's sake ; a spiritual kingdom — a kingdom whose laws should
be written in men's hearts and spirits, and be their delight and
glory, not the^r dread. They longed for a King of kings, who
should teach all kings and magistrates to rule in love and
wisdom. They longed for a High-priest, who should teach all
priests to explain the wonder and the glory that there is in every
living man, and in heaven and earth, and all that therein lies,
and lead men's hearts into love and purity, and noble thoughts
and deeds. They longed, in short, for a kingdom of God, a
golden age, a regeneration of the world, as they called it, and
rightly. Of course the Jewish prophets saw most clearly how
this would be brought about, and how utterly necessary a
Saviour and his kingdom was to save mankind from utter ruin.
They, I say, saw this best. But still all the wise and pious
heathens, each according to his measure of light, saw the same

XXII.] NATIONAL PRIVILEGES. 163
necessity, or else were restless and miserable because they could
not see it. So that in all ages of the world, in a thousand
different shapes, there was rising up to heaven a mournful,
earnest prayer, — 'Thy kingdom come!'
And now this kingdom is come, and the King of it, the
Saviour of men, is Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Long men
prayed, and long men waited, and at last, in the fulness of God's
good time, just when the night seemed darkest, and, under the
abominations of the Roman Empire, religion, honesty, and
common decency seemed to have died out, the Sun of Right
eousness rose on the dead and rotten world, to bring life and
immortality to light. God sent forth His Son made of a
woman, not to condemn the world, but that the world through
Him might be saved. He sent Him to be our Saviour, to die
on the cross for our sins and our children's, that all our guilt
might be washed away, and that we might come boldly to the
throne of grace, with our hearts sprinkled from an evil con
science, and our bodies washed in the waters of baptism. He
sent Him to be our Teacher in the perfect law of love, our
pattern in everything which a man should be and is not. He
sent Him to conquer death by rising from the dead, that He
might have power to raise us also to life and immortality. He
sent Him to fill men with His Spirit, the Spirit of reason and
truth, the Spirit of love and courage, that they might know the
will of God, and do it as our Saviour did before us. He sent
Him to found a Church, to join all men into one brotherhood,
one kingdom of God, whose rulers are kings and parliaments,
whose ministers are the clergy, whose prophets are all poets and
philosophers, authors and preachers, who are true to their own
calling ; whose signs and tokens are the sacraments : a kingdom
which should never be moved, but should go on for ever,
drawing it into all honest and true hearts, and preserving them
ever for Christ their Lord.
And that we might not doubt that we too belonged to this
kingdom, He has placed in this land His ministers and

164 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
teachers, Christ's sacraments, Christ's churches in every parish
in the land, Christ's Bible, or the means of attaining the Bible,
in every house and every cottage ; that from our cradle to our
grave we might see that we belonged, as sworn servants and
faithful children, to the great Father in heaven and Jesus Christ,
the King of the earth.
Thus, my friends, all that all men have longed for we
possess ; we want no more, and we shall have no more. If,
under the present state of things, we cannot be holy, we shall
never be holy. If we cannot use our right in this kingdom of
Christ, how can we become citizens of God's everlasting
kingdom, when Christ shall have delivered up the dominion
to His father, and God shall be all in all ? God has done all
for us, as far as we know, that God will do. He has given us
His Son for a Saviour, and a Church in which and by which
to worship that Saviour; and what more would we have?
Alas ! my friends, have we yet used fairly what God has
given us ? and if not, how terrible will be our guilt ! ' How
shall we escape if we neglect' so great salvation?' And yet
how many do neglect ! — how few live as if they were citizens
of Christ's kingdom ! It seems as if God had been too good
to us, and heaped us so heavily with blessings, that we were
tired of them, and despised them as common things. Common
things ? They are the very things, as I said, which the great
and the wise in all ages have longed for and prayed for, and
yet never found ! Surely, surely, God may well say to us,
' What could have been done unto my vineyard which has not
been done to it?' What, indeed ! I wish I could take some
of you into a heathen country for a single week, that you
might see what it is not to know of a Saviour — not to be
members of His Church, as we are. Why, we here in England
are in the very garden of the Lord. We have but to stretch
out our hand to the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever.
From our cradle to our grave, Christ the King is ready to
guide, to teach, to comfort, to deliver us. When we are born,

XXII.] NATIONAL PRIVILEGES. 165

we are christened in His name, made members of Christ,
children of God, and inheritors by hope of the kingdom of
heaven. Is that nothing ? It is, alas ! nothing in the eyes of
most parents. As we grow older, are we not taught who we
are — taught to call God our Father — taught about Jesus
Christ, who He is, and what He is? Is that, too, nothing?
Alas ! that knowledge is generally a mere meaningless school-
lesson, cared for neither by child nor by man. At confirmation,
again, we solemnly declare that we belong to Christ's kingdom,
and that we will live as His subjects, and His alone. And
we are brought to His bishops, to be received as free, reason
able, Christian people, to claim our citizenship in the kingdom
of God. Is that nothing? Yet that, too, is nothing with
three-fourths of us. Nothing? Hear me, young people — as
I have often told you — you are ready enough to excuse
yourselves from your confirmation vows by saying you were
not taught to understand them— were not taught how to put
them into practice. That may be true, or it may not ; your
sin is just the same. No one with any common honesty or
common sense could answer as you have to the bishop's
questions at confirmation, without knowing that you did make
a promise, and knowing well enough what you promised—
and you who carried to confirmation a careless heart and a
lying tongue, have only yourselves to blame for it ! — But to
proceed. Is not Christ present, or ready to be present, with
us? Sunday after Sunday, for years, have not the churches
been opened all around us, inviting us to enter and worship
Christ, knowing that where two or three are gathered together,
there is Christ in the midst of them ? Is that nothing ? This
Creed — these lessons — these prayers, which Sunday after
Sunday you have used ; are they nothing ? Are they not all
proofs that the kingdom of God is come to you, and means
whereby you can behave like children of the kingdom ? And
not on Sundays alone. Have we not been taught daily, in
our own houses, in our own hearts, in all danger and trouble,

166 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.

and temptation, to pray to Jesus Christ, our King, knowing
that He will hear and save all them that put their trust in
Him? Is that nothing? On our happy marriage morn, too,
was it not in God's house, before Christ's minister, in Christ's
name, that we were married ? Surely the kingdom of God is
come to us, when our wedlock, as well as our souls and
bodies, is holy to the Lord. Is that nothing? How few
think of their marriage joys as holy things — an ordinance
of Christ's kingdom, which He delights in and blesses with
His presence and His special smile, seeing that it is the
noblest and the purest of all things on earth — the picture of
the great mystery which shall be the bridal of all bridals, the
marriage of Christ and His Church ! People do not now-a-
days believe in marriage as a part of their religion ; and so,
according to their want of faith, it happens to them, their
marriage is not holy, and the love and joy of their youth wither
into a peevish, careless, lonely old age ; — and yet over their
heads these words were said, ' They are man and wife together,
in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Ghost ! ' This comes of not believing in Christ's presence and
Christ's favour ; of not believing, in short, in what the Creed
truly calls the Holy Catholic Church. Neither after that
does Christ llave us. Every time a woman is churched, is not
that meant to be a sign of thankfulness to Christ, the Great
Physician, to whom she owes her life and health once more ?
Then season after season is the sacrament of Christ's body and
blood offered you. Is that no sign that Christ is here among
us ? Ah ! blessed are the eyes which see that — blessed are the
ears which hear those words, 'Take, eat; this is My body
which is given for you.' Truly, that honour— that blessing —
is so vast, the love and the condescension of Christ, the Lamb
of God, are so unutterable, that prophets and kings, whatever
they believed, never could have desired, never could have
imagined, that the Son of God should offer to the sons of men,
year after year, in their little parish churches, His most precious

xxn.] NATIONAL PRIVILEGES. 167
body, His most precious blood. And another thing, too,
those prophets and kings would never have imagined — that
when Christ, in those churches, offers His body and His blood,
nine-tenths of the congregation, calling themselves Christians,
should quietly walk out, and go home, and leave the sacra
ments of Christ's body and Christ's blood behind as a useless
and unnecessary matter ! That indeed the old prophets and
kings never saw, and never expected to see — but so it is.
Christ is among us, and our eyes are holden, and we know
Him not.
And then, at last, after all these blessed privileges, these
tokens of God's kingdom, have been neglected through a long
life, does Christ neglect us in the hour of death ? Ah, no !
He is at the grave, as He was at the font, at the marriage-bed,
at His own holy table in God's house ; and the body is laid in
the ground by Christ's minister, in the certain hope of a joyful
resurrection. But what — a sure and certain hope for each and
all? The resurrection is a joyful hope — but is it so for all?
Only, too often, a faint, dim longing that clings to the last
chance, and dares not confess to itself how hopeless must be
the death of that man or woman whose life was spent in the
kingdom of God, in the midst of blessings which kings and
prophets desired in vain to see, and yet who neglected them
all — never entered into the spirit of them — never loved them —
never lived according to them, but despised and trampled
under foot the kingdom of God from their childhood to their
grave, as three-fourths of us do. Christ came to judge no
man, and therefore Christ's ministers judge no man, and read
the Christian funeral service over all, and pray Christ to be
there, and to remember His blessed promise of raising up the
body and soul to everlasting life. But how can they help
fearing that Christ will not hear them — that after all His offers
and gifts in this life have been despised, He will give nothing
after death but death ; and that it were better for the sinful
worldly, sham Christian, when lying in his coffin, if he had

1 68 VILLAGE SERMONS.
never been bom? How can those escape who neglect such
great salvation ?
Ah, my friends — my friends, take this to heart ! Blessed
indeed are the eyes which see what you see, and hear what you
hear ; prophets and kings have desired to see and hear them,
and have not seen or heard ! But if you, cradled among all
these despised honours and means of grace, bring forth no fruit
in your lives— shut out from yourselves the thought of your
high calling in Jesus Christ, what shall be your end but ruin?
He that despises Christ, Christ will despise him. And say not
to yourselves, as many do, We are church-goers — we are all
safe. I say to you, God is able, from among the Negro and
the Savage — ay, God is able of these stones to raise up children
to the Church of England, while those of you, the children of
the kingdom, who lived in the Church of your fathers, and
never used or loved her or Christ her King, shall be cast into
outer darkness, where there shall be weeping and gnashing of
teeth.

SERMON XXIII.
LENTEN THOUGHTS.

Haggai i. 5.
Now therefore thus saith the Lord of Hosts, Consider your ways.
"\T EXT Wednesday is Ash- Wednesday, the first day of Lent,
the season which our forefathers have appointed for us
to consider and mend our ways, and to return, year by year,
heart and soul to that Lord and Heavenly Father from whom
we are daily wandering. Now, we all know that we ought to have
repented long ago ; we all know that, sinning in many things
daily, as we do, we ought all to repent daily. But that is not
enough ; we do want, unless we are wonderfully better than the
holy men of old, — we do want, I say, a particular time in which
we may sit down deliberately and look our own souls steadily
in the face, and cast up our accounts with God, and be
thoroughly ashamed and terrified at those accounts when we
find, as we shall, that we cannot answer God one thing in a
thousand. It is all very well to say, ' I confess and repent of
my sins daily ; why should I do it especially in Lent ? ' Very
true. Let us see, then, by your altered life and conduct, that
you have repented during this Lent, and then it will be time to
talk of repenting every day after Lent. But, in fact, a man
might just as well argue, ' I say my prayers every day, and God
hears them ; why should I say them more on Sundays than

170 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
any other day ? ' Why ? not only because your forefathers, and
the Church of your forefathers, have advised you, which,
though not an imperative reason, is still a strong one, surely,
but because the thing is good, and reasonable, and right in
itself. Because, as they found, in their own case, and as you
may find in yours, if you will but think, the hurry and bustle of
business is daily putting repentance and self-examination out of
our heads. A man may think much, and pray much, thank
Ood, in the very midst of his busiest work, but he is apt to be
hurried; he has not set his thoughts especially on the
matters of his soul, and so the soul's work is not thoroughly
done. Much for which he ought to pray he forgets to pray for.
Many sins and failings of which he ought to repent, slip past
him out of sight in the hurry of life. Much good that might
be done is put off and laid by, often till it is too late. But now
here is a regular season in which we may look back and say to
ourselves, ' How have I been getting on for this twelvemonth,
not in pocket, but in character? not in the appearance of
character in my neighbour's eyes, but in real character — in the
eyes of God ? Am I more manly, or more womanly — more
godly, more true, more humble, above all, more loving, than I
was this time last year ? What bad habits have I conquered ?
What good habits have grown upon me ? What chances of
doing good have I let slip ? What foolish, unkind things have
I done ? My duty to God and my neighbours is so and so ;
how have I done it ? Above all, this Saviour and King in
heaven, in whom I profess to believe, to whom I have sworn
to be loyal and true, and to help His good cause, the cause of
godliness, manliness, and happiness among my neighbours, in
ray family, in my own heart, — how have I felt towards Him ?
Have I thought about Him more this year than I did last?
Do I feel any more loyalty, respect, love, gratitude to Him than
I did ? Ay, more, do I think about Him at all as a living man,
much less as my King and Saviour ; or, is all I really know
about Him the sound of the words, " Jesus Christ," and the

XXIII,] LENTEN THOUGHTS. 171

story about Him in the Apostles' Creed ? Do I really believe-
and trust in "Jesus Christ," or do I not ? ' These are sharp,.
searching questions, my friends, — good Lenten food for any
man's soul, — questions which it is much more easy to ask
soberly and answer fairly now when you look quietly back on,
the past year, than it is, alas ! to answer them day by day amid.
all the bustle of your business and your families. But you will
answer, ' This bustle will go on just as much in Lent as ever.
Our time and thoughts will be just as much occupied. We
have our livings to get. We are not fine gentlemen and ladies.
who can lie by for forty days and do nothing but read and pray,
while their tradesmen and servants are working for them from
morning to night. How, then, can we give up more time to-
religion now than at other times ? '
This is all true enough ; but there is a sound and true
answer to it. It is not so much more time which you are asked
to give up to your souls in Lent, as it is more heart. What do.
I talk of? Giving up more time to your souls ? And yet this.
is the way we all talk, as if our time belonged to our bodies,
and so we had to rob them of it, to give it up to our souls —
as if our bodies were ourselves, and our souls were troublesome
burdens, or peevish children hanging at our backs, which would
keep prating and fretting about heaven and hell, and had to be
quieted, and their mouths stopped as quickly and easily as.
possible, that we might be rid of them, and get about our true
business, our real duty, — this mighty work of eating and drink
ing, and amusing ourselves, and making money. I am afraid —
afraid there are too many who, if they spoke out their whole
hearts, would be quite as content to have no souls, and no
necessity to waste their precious time (as they think) upon
religion. But, my friends, my friends, the day will come when
you will see yourselves in a true light ; when your soul will not
seem a mere hanger-on to your body, but you will find out thai
you are your soul. Then there will be no more forgetting that
you have souls, and thrusting them into the background, be to

172 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
fed at odd minutes or left to starve, — no more talk oi giving up
time to the care of your souls ; your souls will take the time for
themselves then — and the eternity, too ; they will be all in all to
you then, perhaps when it is too late !;
Well, I want you, just for forty days, to let your souls be all
in all to you now ; to make them your first object — your first
thought in the morning, the last thing at night, your thought at
every odd moment in the day. You need not neglect your
business ; only for one short forty days do not make your
business your God. We are all to apt to try the heathen plan,
of seeking first everything else in the world, and letting the
kingdom of God and His righteousness be added to us over
and above — or not added, as it may happen. Try for once the
plan the Lord of heaven and earth advises, and seek first the
kingdom of God and His righteousness, and see whether
everything else will not be added to you. . Again, you need
not be idle a moment more in Lent than at any other time.
But I daresay that none of you are so full of business that you
have not a free ten minutes in the morning, and ten minutes
at night of which the best of uses may be made. What do I
say? Why, of all men in the world, farmers and labourers
have most time, I think, to themselves ; working, as they
do, the greater part of their day in silence and alone ; what
opportunities for them to have their souls busy in heaven,
while they are pacing over the fields, ploughing and hoeing !
I have read of many, many labouring men who had found out
their opportunities in this way, and used them so well as
to become holy, great, and learned men. One of the most
learned scholars in England at this day was once a village
carpenter, who used, when young, to keep a book open before
him on his bench while he worked, and thus contrived to teach
himself, one after the other, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. So
much time may a man find who looks for time !
But after all, and above all, believe this — that if your business
or your work does actually give you no time to think about God

xxiii.] LENTEN THOUGHTS. 173
and your own souls, — if in the midst of it all you cannot find
leisure enough night and morning to pray earnestly, to read
your Bible carefully, — if it so swallows up your whole thoughts,
during the day, that you have no opportunity to recollect
yourself, to remember that you are an immortal being, and that
you have a Saviour in heaven, whom you are serving faithfully,
or unfaithfully, — if this work or business of yours will not give
you time enough for that, then it is not God's business, and
ought not to be yours either.
But you have time, — you have all time. When there is a
will there is a way. Make up your minds that there shall be a
will, and pray earnestly to God to give it you, if it is but for
forty days : and in them think seriously, slowly, solemnly over
your past lives. Examine yourselves and your doings. Ask
yourselves fairly — ' Am I going forward or back ? ' Am I
living like a child of God, or like a mere machine for
making food and wages ? Is my conduct such as the Holy
Scripture tells me that it should be ? You will not need to go
far for a set of questions, my friends, or rules by which to
examine yourselves. You can hardly open a page of God's
book without finding something which stares you in the face
with the question, ' Do I do thus ? or, Do I not do thus ? '
Take, for example, the Epistle of this very day. What better
test can we have for trying and weighing our own souls ?
What says it? That though we were wise, charitable,
eloquent — all that the greatest of men can be, and yet had not
charity — love, we are nothing ! — nothing ! And how does it
describe this necessary, indispensable, heavenly love ? Let us
spend the last few minutes of this sermon in seeing how. And
if that description does not prick all our hearts on more points
than one, they are harder than I take them for — far harder,
certainly, than they should be.
This charity, or love, we hear, which each of us ought to have
and must have, ' suffers long, and is kind.' What shall we say to
that ? How many hasty, revengeful thoughts and feelings have

174 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
•arisen in the hearts of most of us in the last year ? — Here is
one thought for Lent. ' Charity envies not' Have we envied
any their riches, their happiness, their good name, health, and
youth ? — Another thought for Lent. ' Charity boasts not her
self.' Alas ! alas ! my friends, are not the best of us apt to
make much of the little good we do — to pride ourselves on
the petty kindnesses we show — to be puffed up with easy self-
¦satisfaction, just as charity is not puffed up ? — Another Lenten
thought. ' Charity does not behave herself unseemly ; ' is
never proud, noisy, conceited ; gives every man's opinion a fair
kindly hearing ; making allowances for all mistakes. Have we
done so ? — Then there is another thought for Lent. ' Charity
seeks not her own ; ' does not stand fiercely and stifly on her
own rights, on the gratitude due to her ; while we — are we
not too apt, when we have done a kindness, to fret and fume,
and feel ourselves deeply injured, if we do not get repaid at
once with all the humble gratitude we expected ? Of this also
we must think. ' Charity thinks no evil ; ' sets down no bad
motives for any one's conduct, but takes for granted that he
means well, whatever appearances may be ; while we (I speak
of myself just as much as of any one), are we not continually
apt to be suspicious, jealous, to take for granted that people
mean harm ; ana even when we find ourselves mistaken, and
that we have cried out before we are hurt, not to consider it as
any sin against our neighbour, whom in reality we have been
silently slandering to ourselves ? ' Charity rejoices not in
iniquity,' but in the truth, whatever it may be ; is never glad to
see a high professor prove a hypocrite, and fall into sin, and
show himself in his true foul colours ; which we, alas ! are too
apt to think a very pleasant sight. Are not these wholesome
meditations for Lent? 'Charity hopes all things' of every
one ; ' believes all things,' all good that is told of every one ;
' endures all things,' instead of flying off and giving up a
person at the first fault Are not all these points which our
own hearts, consciences, common sense, or whatever you like

xxiii.] LENTEN THOUGHTS. 175

to call it (I shall call it God's Spirit), tell us are right, true,
necessary ? And is there one of us that can say that he has
not offended in many, if not in all these points? And is not that
unrighteousness — going out of the right, straightforward, child
like, loving way of looking at all people ? And is not all
unrighteousness sin ? And must not all sin be repented of,
and that as soon as we find it out? And can we not all find
time this Lent to throw over these sins of ours — to confess
them with shame and sorrow — to try like men to shake them
off? Oh, my friends ! you who are too busy for forty short
days to make your immortal souls your first business, take
care — take care lest the day shall come when sickness, and
pain, and the terror of death shall keep you too busy to pre
pare those unrepenting, unforgiven, sin-besotted souls of yours
for the kingdom of God.

SERMON XXIV.
ON BOOKS.

John i. i.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God,
and the Word was God.
f DO not pretend to be able to explain this text to you, for
no man can comprehend it but He of whom it speaks,
Jesus Christ, the Word of God. But I can, by God's grace,
put before you some of the awful and glorious truths of which
it gives us a sight, and may Christ, who is the Word, direct you,
and grant me words to bring the matter home to you, so as to
make some of*you, at least, ask yourselves the golden question,
' If this is true, what must we do to be saved ? '
The text says, that the Word was from the beginning with
God, ay, God Himself. Who the Word is, there is no doubt,
from the rest of the chapter, which you heard read this morning.
But why is Christ called the Word of all words — the Word of
God ? Let us look at this. Is not Christ the man, the head
and pattern of all men who are what men ought to be ? And
did He not tell me that He is the Life ? That all life is given
by Him and out of Him ? And does not St. John tell us that
Christ the Life is the light of men — the true light which lighteth
every man who cometh into the world ?
Remember this, and then think again, what is it which makes

ON BOOKS. 177

men different from all other living things we know of. Is it
not speech — the power of words ? The beasts may make each
other understand many" things, but they have no speech. These
glorious things — words — are man's right alone, part of the
image of the Son of God — the Word of God, in which man was
created. If men would but think what a noble thing it is
merely to be able to speak in words, to think in words, to write
in words ! Without words we should know no more of each
other's hearts and thoughts than the dog knows of his fellow-
dog ; — without words to think in ; for if you will consider, you
always think to yourself in words, though you do not speak
them aloud ; and without them all our thoughts would be mere
blind longings, feelings which we could not understand our
ownselves. Without words to write in we could not know what
our forefathers did — we could not let our children after us know
what to do. But now books — the written word of man — are
precious heirlooms from one generation to another, training us,
encouraging us, teaching us, by the words and thoughts of men,
whose bodies are crumbled into dust ages ago, but whose words
— the power of uttering themselves, which they got from the
Son of God — still live and bear fruit in our hearts, and in the
hearts of our children after us, till the last day !
But where did these words — this power of uttering our
thoughts, come from ? Do you fancy that men first began like
brute beasts or babies, with strange cries and mutterings, and
so gradually found out words for themselves ? Not they ; the
beasts have been on the earth as long as man, and yet they can
no more speak than they could when God created Adam ; but
Adam, we find, could speak at once. God spoke to Adam the
moment he was made, and Adam understood Him; so he
knew the power and the meaning of words. Who gave him
that power ? Who but Jehovah — Jesus — the Word of God,
who imparted to him the word of speech and the light of
reason ? Without words what use would there have been in
saying to him, ' Thou shalt not eat of the tree of knowledge ? '
M

178 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
Without words what would there have been in God's bringing
to him all the animals to see what he would call them, unless
He had first given Adam the power of understanding words,
and thinking of words, and speaking words ? This was the
glorious gift of Christ — the Voice or Word of the Lord God,
as we read in the second chapter of Genesis, whom Adam
heard another time with fear and terror — ' The voice of the
Lord walking in the garden in the cool of the day.' — A text and
a story strange enough, till we find in the first chapter of- St.
John the explanation of it, telling us that the Word was in the
beginning with God — very God, and that He was the light
which lighteth every man who cometh into the world. There
fore Christ is the light which lighteth every man who cometh into
the world. How are we to understand that, when there are so
many who live and die heathens or reprobates — some who never
hear of Christ — some, alas ! in Christian lands, who are dead to
every doctrine or motive of Christianity? Yet the Bible says that
Christs lights every man who comes into the world. Difficult
to understand at first sight, yet most true, and simple too, at
bottom. For how is every one, whether heathen or Christian child or
man, enlightened or taught, to live and behave ? Is it not by
the words of tkose around him, by the words he reads in books,
by the thoughts which he thinks out and puts into shape for
himself? All this is the light which every human being has
his share of. And has not every man, too, the light of reason
and good feeling, more or less, to tell him whether each thing
is right or wrong, noble or mean, ugly or beautiful ? This is
another way by which the light which lighteth every man works.
And St. John tells us in the text, that He who works in this
way- -He who gives us the power of understanding, and think
ing, and judging, and speaking, is the very same Word of God
who was made flesh, and dwelt among men, and died on the
cross for us ; ' the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sins of
the world ! '

xxiv.] ON BOOKS. 179
He is the Word of God — by Him God has spoken to man in
all ages. He taught Adam. He spoke to Abraham as a man
speaketh with his friend. It was He, Jehovah, whom we
call Jesus, whom Moses and the seventy elders saw— saw with
their bodily eyes on Mount Sinai, who spoke to them with
human voice from amid the lightning and the rainbow. It must
have been only He, the Word, by whom God the Father utters
Himself to man, for no man hath seen God at any time ; only
the Word, the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the
Father, He hath declared Him. And who put into the mouth
of David those glorious Psalms — the songs in which all true
men for three thousand years have found the very things they
longed to speak themselves, and could not ? Who but Christ,
the Word of God, the Lord, as David calls Him, put a new
song into the mouth of His holy poet, the sweet singer of
Israel? Who spake by the prophets, again ? What do they say
themselves ? — ¦' The Word of the Lord came to me, saying.'
And then, when the Spirit of God stirred them up, the Word of
God gave them speech, and they spake the sayings which shall
never pass away till all be fulfilled. And who was it who,
when He was upon earth, spake as never man spake — whose
words were the simplest, and yet the deepest — the tenderest,
and yet the most awful, which ever broke the blessed silence
upon this earth — whose words, now to this day, come home
to men's hearts, stirring them up to the very roots, piercing
through the marrow of men's souls ? Whose but Christ's, the
Word, who was made flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace
and truth ? And who since then, do you think, has it been
who has given to all wise and holy poets, philosophers, and
preachers, the power to speak and write the wonderful truths
which, by God's grace, they thought out for themselves and for
all mankind — who gave them utterance ? Who but Christ, the
Lord of men's spirits, the Word of God, who promised to give
to all His true disciples a mouth and wisdom, which their
enemies should not be able to gainsay or resist ?

l8o VILLAGE. SERMONS. [serm.
Well, my friends, ought not the knowledge of this to make
us better and wiser ? Ought it not to make us esteem, and
reverence, and use many things of which we are apt to think too
lightly? How it should make us reverence the Bible, the written
word of God's saints and prophets, of God's apostles, of Christ,
the Word Himself! Oh, that men would use that treasure
of the Bible as it deserves ; — oh, that they would believe from
their hearts, that whatever is said there is truly said, that what
ever is said there is said to them, that whatever names things
are called there are called by their right names. Then men
would no longer call the vile person beautiful, or call pride and
vanity honour, or covetousness respectability, or call sin worldly
wisdom ; but they would call things as Christ calls them — they
would try to copy Christ's thoughts and Christ's teaching ; and
instead of looking for instruction and comfort to lying opinions
and false worldly cunning, they would find their only advice in
the blessed teaching, and their only comfort in the gracious
promises, of the word of the Book of Life.
Again, how these thoughts ought to make us reverence all
books. Consider ! except a living man, there is nothing more
wonderful than a book ! a message to us from the dead — from
human souls whom we never saw, who liyed perhaps thousands
of miles away ; and yet these, in those little sheets of paper,
speak to us, amuse us. terrify us, teach us, comfort us, open
their hearts to us as brothers.
Why is it that neither angels, nor saints, nor evil spirits,
appear to men now to speak to them as they did of old? Why,
but because we have books, by which Christ's messengers and the
devil's messengers too, can tell what they will to thousands of
human beings at the same moment, year after year, all the
world over ! I say, we ought to reverence books, to look at
them as awful and mighty things. If they are good and true,
whether they are about religion or politics, farming, trade, or
medicine, they are the message of Christ, the Maker of all
things, the Teacher of all Truth, which He has put into the

xxiv.] ON BOOKS. 1S1
heart of some man to speak, that he may tell us what is good
for our spirits, for our bodies, and for our country. And at
the last day, be sure of it, we shall have to render an account
— a strict account — of the good books which we have read,
and of the way in which we have obeyed what we read, just as
if we had had so many prophets or angels sent to us.
If, on the other hand, books are false and wicked, we ought
to fear them as evil spirits loose among us, as messages from
the father of lies, who deceives the hearts of evil men, that
they may spread abroad the poison of his false and foul mes
sages, putting good for evil, and evil for good, sweet for bitter,
and bitter for sweet — saying to all men, ' I too have a tree of
knowledge, and you may eat of the fruit thereof, and not die.'
But believe him not. When you see a wicked book, when you
find in a book anything which contradicts God's book, cast it
away, trample it under foot ; believe that it is the devil tempt
ing you by his cunning, alluring words, as he , tempted Eve,
your mother. Would to God all here would make that rule,
— never to look into an evil book, or a filthy ballad ! Can a
man take a snake into his bosom and not be bitten? — can we
play with fire and not be burnt ? — can we open our ears and
eyes to the devil's message, whether of covetousness, or filth, or
folly, and not be haunted afterwards by its wicked words, rising
up in our thoughts like evil spirits, between us and our pure
and noble duty — our baptismal vows ?
I might say much more about these things, and, by God's
help, in another sermon I will go on and speak to you of the
awful importance of spoken words, of the sermons and the
conversation to which you listen, the awful importance of
every word which comes out of your own mouth. But I have
spoken only of books this morning; for this is the age of
books — the time, one would think, of which Daniel prophesied
that many should run to and fro, and knowledge should be
increased. A flood of books, newspapers, writings of all sorts,
good and bad, is spreading over the whole land, and young

1 82 VILLAGE SERMONS. [SERM.
and old will read them. We cannot stop that ; we ought not ;
it is God's ordinance. It is more; it is God's grace and mercy
that we have a free press in England — liberty for every man,
that if he have any of God's truth to tell, he may tell it out
boldly, in books or otherwise. A blessing from God ! one
which we should reverence, for God knows it was dearly
bought. Before our forefathers could buy it for us, many an
honoured man left house and home to die in the battle-field
or on the scaffold, fighting and witnessing for the right of
every man to whom God's Word comes, to speak God's Word
openly to his countrymen. A blessing, and an awful one ! for
the same gate which lets in good, lets in evil. The law dare
not silence bad books. It dare not root up the tares, lest it
root up the wheat also. The men who died to buy us liberty,
knew that it was better to let in a thousand bad books than
shut out one good one; for a grain of God's truth will ever
outweigh a ton of the devil's lies. We cannot, then, silence
evil books, but we can turn away our eyes from them ; we can
take care that what we read, and what we let others read, shall
be good and wholesome. Now, if ever, are we bound to
remember that books are words, and that words come either
from Christ or the devil ; now, if ever, we are bound to try all
books by the Word of God ; now, if ever, are we bound to
put holy and wise books, both religious and worldly, into the
hands of all around us, that if, poor souls ! they must needs eat
of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, they may also eat of the
tree of life ; and now, if ever, are we bound to pray to Christ,
the Word of God, that He will raise up among us wise and
holy writers, and give them words and utterance to speak to
the hearts of all Englishmen the message of God's covenant,
and that He may confound the devil and his lies, and all that
swarm of writers who are filling England with trash, filth,
blasphemy, and covetousness, with books which teach men that
our wise forefathers, who built our churches, and founded our
constitution, and made England the queen of nations, were but

xxiv.] ON BOOKS. 183
ignorant knaves and fanatics, and that selfish money-making
and godless licentiousness are the only true wisdom ; and so
turn the divine power of words, and the inestimable blessing of
a free press, into the devil's engine, and not Christ's, the Word
of God. But their words shall be brought to nought.
May God preserve us and all our friends from that defile
ment ! and may He give you all grace, in these strange times,
to take care what you read and how you read, and to hold fast
by the Book of all books, and Christ the Word of God ! Try
by them all books and men ; for if they speak not according
to God's law and testimony, it is because there is no truth in
them.

SERMON XXV.
THE COURAGE OF THE SAVIOUR.

John xi. 7, 8.
Then after that saith He to His disciples, Let us go into Judea again. His
disciples say to Him, Master, the Jews of late sought to stone Thee, and
goest Thou thither again ?
"V "X 7"E all admire a brave man. And we are right. To be
brave is God's gift. To be brave is to be like Jesus
Christ. Cowardice is only the devil's likeness. But we must
take care what we mean by being brave. Now, there are two
sorts of bravery — courage and fortitude. And they are very
different : courage is of the flesh, fortitude is of the spirit.
Courage is good, but dumb animals have it just as much as we.
A dog, a tiger, and a horse, have courage, but they have no
fortitude; because fortitude is a spiritual thing, and beasts
have no spirits like ours.
What is fortitude? It is the courage which will make us
not only fight in a good cause, but suffer in a good cause.
Courage will help us only to give others pain ; fortitude will
help us to bear pain ourselves. And more, fortitude will make
a fearful person brave, and very often the more brave the more
fearful they are. And thus it is that women are so often braver
than men. We men are made of coarser stuff ; we do not feel
pain as keenly as women; and if we do feel, we are rightly

THE COURAGE OF THE SAVIOUR. 185
ashamed to show it. But a tender woman, who feels pain and
sorrow infinitely more than we do, who need not be ashamed
of being frightened, who perhaps is terrified at every mouse
and spider, — to see her bearing patiently pain, and sorrow, and
shame, in spite of all her fearfulness, because she knows it is
her duty — that is Christ's likeness — that is true fortitude — that
is a sight nobler than all the 'bull-dog courage' in the world.
For what is the courage of the bull-dog after all, or of the
strong quarrelsome man ? He is confident in his own strength ;
he is rough and hard, and does not care for pain ; and when
he thrusts his head into a fight, like a surly dog, he does it not
because it is his duty, but because he likes it, because he is
angry ; and then every blow and every wound makes him more
angry, and he fights on, forgetting his pain from blind rage.
That is not altogether bad; men ought to be courageous.
But, oh ! my friends, is there not a more excellent way to be
brave ? and which is nobler, to suffer bravely for God's sake, or
to beat men made in God's image bravely for one's own sake ?
Think of any fight you ever saw, and then compare with that
the stories of those old martyrs who died rather than speak a
word against their Saviour. If you want to see true fortitude,
think of what has happened thousands of times when the
heathen used to persecute the Christians. How delicate
women, who would not venture to set the sole of their foot to
the ground for tenderness, would submit, rather than give up
their religion and deny the Lord who died for them, to be torn
from husband and family, and endure nakedness, and insult,
and tortures, to read of which makes one's blood run cold, till
they were torn slowly piecemeal, or roasted in burning flames,
without a murmur or an angry word — knowing that Christ, who
had borne all things for them, would give them strength to bear
all things for Him; trusting that if they were faithful unto
death, He would give them a crown of life. There was true
fortitude — there was true faith— there was God's strength made
perfect in woman's weakness ! Do you not see, my friends,

1 86 VILLAGE SERMONS. [serm.
that such a death was truly brave ? How does bull-dog courage
show beside that courage — the courage which conquers grief
and pain for duty's sake, instead of merely forgetting them in
rage and obstinacy ?
And do you not see how this bears .on my text ? how it bears
on our Lord's whole life ? Was He not indeed the perfectly
brave man — the man who endured more than all living men
put together, at the very time that He had the most intense fear
of what He was going to suffer ? And, stranger still, endured
it all of His own will, while He had it in His power to shake it
all off at any instant, and free Himself utterly from pain and
suffering. Now, this speech of our Lord's in the text is just a case of
true fortitude. He was beyond Jordan. He had been forced
to escape thither to save His life from the mad, blinded Jews.
He had no foolhardiness ; He knew that He had no more right
than we have to put His life in danger when there was no good
to be done by it. But now there was good to be done by it.
Lazarus was dead, and He wanted to raise Him to life. There
fore He said to His disciples, 'Let us go into Judea again.'
They knew the danger ; they said, ' Master, the Jews of late
sought to stone Thee, and goest Thou thither again ? ' But He
would go ; He had a work to do, and He dared bear anything
to do his work. Aye, here is the secret, this is the feeling
which gives a man true courage — the feeling that he has a work
to do at all costs — the sense of duty. Oh ! my friends, let men,
women, or children once feel that they have a duty to perform ;
let them once say to themselves, ' I am bound to do this thing
— it is right for me to do this thing ; I owe it as a duty to my
family ; I owe it as a duty to my country ; I owe it as a duty to
God, who called me into this station in life ; I owe it as a duty
to Jesus Christ, who bought me with His blood, that I might
do His will and not my own pleasure. When a man has once
said that honestly to himself, when that glorious heavenly
thought, ' It is my duty! has risen upon his soul, like the sun

xxv.] THE COURAGE OF THE SAVIOUR. 187
upon the earth, warming his heart and enlightening it and mak
ing it bring forth all good and noble fruits, then that man will
feel a strength come to him, and a courage from God above,
which will conquer all his fears and his selfish love of ease and
pleasure, and enable him to bear insults, and pain, and poverty,
and death itself, provided he can but do what is right, and be
found by God, whatever happens to him, working God's will
where God has put him. This is fortitude— this is true courage
— this is Christ's likeness — this is the courage which weak
women on sick beds may have as well as strong men on the
battle-field. Even when they shrink most from suffering, God's
Spirit will whisper to them, ' It is thy duty, it is thy Father's
will,' and then they will find His strength made perfect in their
weakness; and when their human weakness fails most, God
will give them heavenly fortitude, and they will be able, like St
Paul, to say, ' When I am weak, then I am strong, for I can do
all things through Christ, who strengtheneth me.'
And now, remember, that there was no pride, no want of
feeling, to keep up our Lord's courage. He has tasted sorrow
for every man, woman, and child, and therefore He has tasted
fear also ; tempted in all things like as we are, that in all things
He might be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, — that
there might be no poor souls terrified at the thought of pain or
scrrow, but could comfort themselves with the thought. Well,
the Son of God knows what fear is. He who said that His soul
was troubled — He who at the thought of death was in such
agony of terror that His sweat ran down to the ground like
great drops of blood — He who cried in His agony, ' Father, if
it be possible, let this cup pass from me ' — He understands my
pain, — He tells me not to be ashamed of crying in my pain,
like him, ' Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me ; '
for He will give me the strength to finish that prayer of His,
and in the midst of my trouble say, ' Nevertheless, Father, not
as I will, but as Thou wilt.' Remember, again, that our Lord
was not like the martyrs of old, forced to undergo His sufferings

188 VILLAGE SERMONS. ' [SERM.
whether He liked them or not. We are too apt to forget that,
and therefore we misunderstand our Lord's example ; and there
fore we misunderstand what true fortitude is. Jesus Christ
was the Son of God ; He had made the very men who were
tormenting him ; He had made the very wood of the cross on
which He hung, the iron which pierced His blessed hands;
and, for aught we know, one wish of His, and they would all
have crumbled into dust, and He have been safe in a moment.
But He would not ; He endured the Cross. He was the only
man who ever really endured anything at all, because He alone
of all men had perfect power to save Himself, even when He
was nailed to the tree, fainting, bleeding, dying. It was never
too late for Him to stop. As He said to Peter when he wanted
to fight for Christ, ' Thinkest thou that I cannot pray to my
Father, and He will send me instantly more that twelve legions
of angels ? ' But He would not. He had to save the world,
and He was determined to do it, whatever agony or fear it cost
Him. St. Peter was a brave man. He drew his sword in the
garden, and attacked, single-handed, that great body of armed
soldiers ; cutting down a servant of the high-priest's. But he
was only brave ; our Lord was more. The blessed Jesus had
true fortitude ; He could bear patiently, while Peter could only
rage and fight uselessly. And see how Christ's fortitude lasted
Him, while Peter's mere courage failed him. While our Lord
was witnessing that glorious confession of His before Pilate,
bearing on through without shrinking, even to the cross itself,
where was Peter? He had denied his Master, and ran shame
fully away. He had a long lesson to learn before he was
perfect, had Peter. He had to learn, not how to fight, but how
to suffer— and he learnt it ; and in his old age that strong, fierce
St. Peter had true fortitude to give himself up to be crucified,
like his Lord, without a murmur, and preach Christ's Gospel as
he hung for twelve whole days upon the torturing cross. There
was fortitude; that violence of his in the garden was only
courage as of a brute animal- courage of the flesh, not the true

xxv.] THE COURAGE OF THE SAVIOUR. 189
courage of the spirit. Oh, my friends, that we could all learn
this lesson, that it is better to suffer than revenge, better to be
killed than to kill ! There are times when a man must fight —
for his country, for just laws, for his family, but for himself it is
very seldom that he must fight. He who returns good for evil,
— he who, when he is cursed, blesses those who curse him, — he
who takes joyfully the spoiling of his goods, who submits to be
cheated in little matters, and sometimes in great ones, sooner
than ruin the poor sinful wretch who has ill-used him, — that
man has really put on Christ's likeness, that man is really going
on to perfection, and fulfilling the law of love ; and for every
thing which he gives up for the sake of peace and mercy, that
is, for God's sake, God will reward him sevenfold into his
bosom. There are times when a man is bound to go to law,
bound to expose and punish evil-doers, lest they should, being
unpunished, become confident and go on from bad to worse,
and so hurt others as well as him. A man sometimes is bound
by his duty to his neighbours and to society to defend himself,
to go to law with those who injure him — sometimes ; but never
bound to revenge himself, never bound to say, ' He has hurt
me, and I will pay him off for it at law ; ' that is abusing law,
which is God's ordinance, for mere selfish revenge. You may
say, it is difficult to know which is which, when to defend one
self, and when not. It is difficult ; without the light of God's
Spirit, I think no man will know. But let a man live by God's
Spirit, let him pray for kindliness, mercifulness, manliness, and
patience, for true fortitude to bear and to forbear, and God will
surely open his eyes to see when he is called on to avenge an
injury, and when he is called on to suffer patiently. God will
show him. If a man wishes to be like Christ, and to work like
Christ, at doing good, God will teach him and guide him in all
puzzling matters like this. And do not be afraid of being called
cowards and milksops for bearing injuries patiently ; those who
call you so will be likely to be the greatest cowards themselves.
Patience is the truest sign of courage. Ask old soldiers, who

190 VILLAGE SERMONS.
have seen real war, and they will tell you that the bravest men,
the men who endured best, not in mere fighting, but in standing
still for hours to be mowed down by cannon-shot ; who were
most cheerful and patient in shipwreck, and starvation, and de
feat — all things ten times worse than fighting, — ask old soldiers,
I say, and they will tell you that the men who showed best in
such miseries, were generally the stillest and meekest men in
the whole regiment : that is true fortitude ; that is Christ's image
— the meekest of men, and the bravest too. And so books say,
and seem to prove it by many strange stories, that the lion,
while he is the strongest and bravest of beasts of prey, is also
the most patient and merciful. He knows his own strength
and courage, and therefore he does not care to be showing it
off. He can afford to endure an affront. It is only the
cowardly cur who flies out and barks at every passer-by. And
so it is with our blessed Lord. The Bible calls Him the Lion
of Judah ; but it also calls Him the Lamb dumb before the
shearers. Ah ! my friends, we must come back to Him ; for all
the little that is great or noble in man or woman, or dumb
heast even, is perfected in Him : He only is perfectly great,
perfectly noble, brave, meek. He who, to save us sinful men,
¦endured the cross, despising the shame, till He sat down at the
right hand of the Majesty on high, perfectly brave He is, and
perfectly gentle, and will be so for ever ; for even at his second
coming, when He shall appear the Conqueror of hell, with tens
of thousands of angels, to take vengeance on those who know
not God, and destroy the wicked with the breath of His mouth,
even then, in His fiercest anger, the Scripture tells us His anger
shall be ' the anger of the Lamb.' Almighty vengeance and
just anger, and yet perfect gentleness and love all the while. —
Mystery of mysteries !— The wrath of the Lamb. May God
give us all to feel in that day, not the wrath, but the love, of
the Lamb who was slain for us !

TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.

SERMON I.
HOW TO KEEP PASSION WEEK.
(Preached before the Queen.')

Philippians ii. 5-11.
Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus : who, being in
the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God : but
made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a
servant, and was made in the likeness of men : and being found in
fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto
death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly
exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name :
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven,
and things in earth, .and things under the earth; and that every
tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God
the Father.
*"FHIS is the first day of Passion Week; and this text is
the key-note of Passion Week. It tells us of the
obedience of Christ; of the unselfishness of Christ; and,
therefore, of the true glory of Christ.
It tells us of One who was in the form of God ; the Co-equal
and Co-eternal Son; the brightness of his Father's glory,
the express image of his Father's person : but who showed
forth his Father's glory, and proved that he was the express
likeness of his Father's character, by the very opposite means
N

194 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
to those which man takes, when he wishes to show forth his
own glory.
He was in the form of God. But he did not (so the text
seems to mean) think that the bliss of God was a thing to be
seized on greedily for himself. He did not think fit merely
to glorify himself; to enjoy himself. He was not like the
false gods of whom the heathen dreamed, who sat aloft in
heaven and enjoyed themselves, careless of mankind.
No. He obeyed his Father utterly, and at all costs. He
emptied himself (says St. Paul). He took on him the form of
a slave. He humbled himself. He became obedient;
obedient to death ; and that death the shameful and dreadful
death of the cross.
Therefore God has highly exalted him ; has declared him to
be perfectly good, worthy of all praise, honour, glory, power,
and dominion ; and has given him a name above all names,
the name of Jesus — Saviour. One who saved others, and
cared not to save himseif.
And therefore, , too, God has given him that dominion of
which he is worthy, and has proclaimed him Lord and Creator
of all beings and all worlds, past, present, and to come.
It is of him; of his obedience; of his unselfishness, that
Passion Week speaks to us. It tell us of the mind of Christ,
and says, ' Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ
Jesus.' How, then, shall we keep his Passion Week? There are
several ways of keeping it, and all more or less good. Wisdom
is justified of all her children.
But no way will be safe for us, unless we keep in mind the
mind of Christ — obedience and self-sacrifice.
Some, for instance, are careful this week to attend church
as often as possible ; and who will blame them ?
But unless they keep in mind the mind of Christ, they are
apt to fall into the mistake of using vain repetitions, as the
heathen do; and of fancying, like them, that they shall be

i.] HOW TO KEEP PASSION WEEK. 195
heard for their much speaking, forgetting their Father in
heaven knows what they have need of, before they ask him.
And that is not like the mind of Christ. It is not like the
mind of Christ to fancy that God dwells in temples made with
hands ; or that he can be worshipped with men's hands, as
though he needed anything ; seeing he giveth to all life, and
breath, and all things. For in him we live, and move, and
have our being ; and (as even the heathen poet knew), are the
offspring, the children, of God.
It is not according to the mind of Christ, to worship God as
the heathen do, in order to win him to do our will. It is
according to the mind of Christ to worship God, in order that
we may do his will ; to believe that God's will is a good will,
good in itself, and good for us, and for all things and beings ;
and, therefore, to ask for strength to do God's will, whatever it
may cost us. That is the mind of Christ, who came not to do
his own will, but the will of him who sent him ; who taught us
to pray, as the greatest blessing for which we can ask, ' Father,
thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven;' who himself.
in his utter agony, cried, ' Father, not my will, but thine, be
done.' Therefore, it is good to go to church ; and good, for some
at least, to go as often as possible : but only if we remember
why we go, and whom we go to worship — a Father, who asks
of us to worship him in spirit and in truth. A Father who has
told us what that worship is like.
' Is this (God asked the Jews of old) the fast which I have
chosen? Is it a day for a man to afflict his soul, and bow
down his head like a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and
ashes under him (playing at being sad, while God has not
made him sad) ? Wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable
day to the Lord?'
' Is not this the fast which I have chosen ? to loose the
bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let
the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke ? Is it

196 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and to bring the poor
that are cast out to thine house ; when thou seest the naked,
that thou cover him, and that thou hide not thyself from
thine own flesh.'
This is that pure worship and undefiled before God and the
Father, of which St. James tells us ; and says that it consists
in this — ' to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction ;
and to keep ourselves unspotted from the world.'
In a word, this worship in the spirit, and in truth, is nought
else but the mind of Christ. To believe in, to adore the
Father's perfect goodness; to long and try to copy that
goodness here on earth. That is what Christ did utterly and
perfectly, that is what we have to do, each according to our
powers ; and without it, without the spirit of obedience, all our
church-going is of little worth in the eyes of our heavenly
Father. Others, again, go into retirement for this week, and spend it
in examining themselves, and thinking over the sufferings ol
Christ. And who, again, will blame them, provided they do
not neglect their daily duty meanwhile ?
But they, too, need to keep in mind the mind of Christ, if
they mean to keep Passion Week aright.
They need it, indeed. And such a man, before he shuts
himself up, and begins to examine himself, would do well to
examine himself as to why he is going to examine himself, and to
ask, Why am I going to do this ? Because it is my interest ?
Because I think I shall gain more safety for my soul ? Because
I hope it will give me more chance of pleasure and glory in the
next world ? But, it so ; have I the mind of Christ ? For he
did not think of his own interest, his own gain, his own
pleasure, his own glory. How is this, then? I confess that
the root of all my faults is selfishness. Shall I examine into my
own selfishness for a selfish end — to get safety and pleasure by
it hereafter? I confess that the very glory of Christ is, that there
is no selfishness in him. Shall I think over the sufferings of the

I.] HOW TO KEEP PASSION WEEK. 197
unselfish Christ for a selfish end— to get something by it after
I die ? I am too apt already to make myself the centre, round
which all the world must turn : to care for everything only as
far as it does me good or harm. Shall I make myself the
centre round which heaven is to turn ? Shall I think of God
and of Christ only as far as it will profit me ? And this week,
too, of all weeks in the year ? God forgive me ! Into what a
contradiction I am running unawares !
No. If I do shut myself up from my fellowmen, it shall be
only to think how I may do my duty better to my fellowmen.
If I do think over Christ's sufferings, it shall be only that I may
learn from him how to suffer, if need be, at the call of duty ; at
least, to stir up in me obedience, usefulness, generosity, that I
may go back to my work cheerfully, willingly, careless what
reward I get, provided only I can do good in my station.
But, after all, will not the text tell us best how to keep
Passion Week? Will not our Lord's own example tell us?
Can we go wrong, if we keep our Passion Week as Christ
kept his ?
And how did he keep it ? Certainly not by shutting himself
up apart. Certainly not by mere thinking over the glory of
self-sacrifice He taught daily, we read, in the temple. Instead
of giving up his work for a while, he seems to have worked
more earnestly than ever. As the terrible end drew near ; and
his soul was troubled; and he was straitened as he looked
forward to his baptism of fire; and the struggle in him grew
fiercer (for the Bible tells us that there was a struggle) between
the Man's natural desire to save his life, and the God's heavenly
desire to lay down his life, he threw himself more and more
into the work which he had to do. We hear more, perhaps, of
our Lord's saying and doings during this week, up to the very
moment before he was betrayed to death, than we do of the
whole three years of his public life. His teaching was never, it
seems, so continual; his appeals to the nation which he was
trying to save were never so pathetic as at the very last ; his

198 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
warnings to the bigots who were destroying his nation never so
terrible ; his contempt for personal danger never so clear. The
Bible seems to picture him to us as gathering up all his strength
for one last effort, if by any means he might save that doomed
city of Jerusalem, and in his divine spirit, courting death the
more, the more his human flesh shrank from it.
This — the pattern of perfect obedience, perfect unselfishness,
perfect generosity, perfect self-sacrificing love — is what we are
to look at in Passion Week. This, I believe, is what we are
meant to copy in Passion Week; that we may learn the habit of
copying it all our lives long.
Why should not we, then, keep Passion Week somewhat as
our Lord kept it before us? Not by merely hiding in our
closets to meditate, even about him : but by going about our
work, each in his place, dutifully, bravely, as he went? By
doing the duty which lies nearest us, and trying to draw our
lesson out of it.
Thus we may keep Passion Week in spirit and in truth;
though some of us may hardly have time to enter a church,
hardly have time for an hour's private thought about religion.
Amid the bustle of daily duties; amid the buzz of petty
cares; amid the anxieties of great labours; amid the roar of
the busy world, which cannot stop (and which ought not to
stop), for our convenience; we may keep Passion Week in
spirit and in truth, if we will do the duty which lies nearest us,
and try to draw our lesson out of it.
For practice — and, I believe, practice alone — will teach us to
restrain ourselves, and conquer ourselves. Experience — and, I
believe, experience alone— will show us our own faults and
weaknesses. Every man— every human spirit on God's earth has spiritual
enemies — habits and principles within him — if not other spirits
without him, which hinder him, more or less, from being all
that God meant him to be. And we must find out those
enemies, and measure their strength, not merely by reading of

1.] HOW TO KEEP PASSION WEEK.

199

them in books; not merely by fancying them in our own minds;
but by the hard blows, and sudden falls, which they too often
give us in the actual battle of daily life.
And how can we find them out?
This at least we can do.
We can ask ourselves at every turn, — For what end am I
doing this, and this? For what end am I living at all? For
myself, or for others?
Am I living for ambition? for fame? for show? for money?
for pleasure? If so, I have not the mind of Christ. I have not
found out the golden secret. I have not seen what true glory
is; what the glory of Christ is — to live for the sake of doing my
duty — for the sake of doing good.
And am I — I surely shall be if I am living for myself —
struggling, envying, casting an evil eye on those more fortunate
than I ; perhaps letting loose 'against them a cruel tongue ? If
I am doing thus, God forgive me. What have I of the mind of
Christ? What likeness between me and him who emptied
himself of self, who humbled himself, gave himself up utterly,
even to death ? Is this the mind of Christ ? Is this the spirit
whose name is Love ?
And yet there should be a likeness. A likeness between
Christ and us. A likeness between God and us. For Chris'
is the likeness of his Father; and not only of his Father, but of
our Father, The Father in heaven. And what should a child
be, but like his father? What should man be, but like God?
But how shall we get that likeness ? How shall we get the
mind of Christ which is the Spirit of God ?
This at least we know. That the father will surely hear the
child, when the child cries to him. Perhaps will hear him all
the more tenderly, the more utterly the child has strayed
away. Our highest reason, the instincts of our own hearts, tell us
so. Christ himself has told us so; and said to the Jews of old :
' If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children,

200 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.

how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy
Spirit to those who ask him ? '
Shall give ? Yes ; and has given already. From that Spirit
of God have come, and will always come, all our purest,
highest, best thoughts and feelings.
From him comes all which raises us above the animals, and
makes us really and truly men and women. All sense of duty,
obedience, order, justice, law; all tenderness, pity, generosity,
honour, modesty; all this, if you will receive it, is that Christ in
us of whom St. Paul tells us, and tells us that he is our hope of
glory. Yes, these feelings in us, which, just as far as we obey them,
make us respect ourselves, and make us blessings to our fellow
men; what are they but the Spirit of Christ, the likeness of
Christ, the mind of Christ in us; the hope of our glory; because,
if we obey them, we shall attain to something of the true glory,
the glory with which Christ himself is glorious.
Then let us pray to God, now in this Passion Week, to stir
up in us that generous spirit; to deepen in us that fair likeness;
to fill us with that noble mind. Let us ask God to quench in us
aU which is selfish, idle, mean; to quicken to life in us all which
is godlike, and from God ; that so we may attain, at last, to the
true glory, the glory which comes not from selfish ambition;
not from selfish pride; not from selfish ease; but from getting
rid of selfishness, in all its shapes. The glory which Christ
alone has in perfection. The glory before which every knee
will one day bow, whether in earth or heaven. Even the glory
of doing our duty, regardless of what it costs us in the station
to which each of us has been called by his Father in heaven.
Amen.

SERMON II.
THE DIVINE HUNGER AND THIRST.
(Preached before the Queen. )

Psalm xxxvi. 7, 8, 9.
How excellent is thy loving-kindness, O God! therefore the children of
men put their trust under the shadow of thy wings. They shall be
abundantly satisfied with the fatness of thy house; and thou shalt make
them drink of the river of thy pleasures. For with thee is the fountain
of life: in thy light shall we see light.
rT"1HIS is a great saying. So great that we shall never know,
certainly never in this life, how much it means.
It speaks of being satisfied ; of what alone can satisfy a man.
It speaks of man as a creature who is, or rather ought to be,
always hungering and thirsting after something better than he
has, as it is written : ' Blessed are they which hunger and thirst
after righteousness; for they shall be filled.' So says David,
also, in this Psalm.
I say man ought to be always hungering and thirsting for
something better. I do not mean by that that he ought to be
discontented. Nothing less. For just in as far as a man
hungers and thirsts after righteousness and truth, he will hunger
and thirst after nothing else. As long as a man does not care
for righteousness, does not care to be a better man himself, and
to see the world better round him, so long will he go longing

202 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
after this fine thing and that, tormenting himself with lusts and
passions, greediness and covetousness of divers sorts; and little
satisfaction will he get from them. But, when he begins to
hunger and thirst after righteousness, that heavenly and spiritual
hunger destroys the old carnal hunger in him. He cares less
and less to ask, What shall I eat and drink, wherewithal shall I
be clothed? — Or how shall I win for myself admiration, station,
and all the fine things of this world? — What he thinks of more
and more is, — How can I become better and more righteous?
How can I make my neighbours better likewise? How the
world ? As for the good things of this life, if they will make me
a better man, let them come. If not, why should I care so
much about them? What I want is, to be righteous like God,
beneficent and good-doing like God.
That is the man of whom it is written, that he shall be satis
fied with the plenteousness of God's house, God's kingdom; for
with God is the fountain of life.
Again, as long as a man has no hunger and thirst after truth,
he is easily enough interested, though he is not satisfied. He
reads, perhaps, and amuses his fancy, but he does no more.
He reads again, really to instruct his mind, and learns about
this and that: but he does not learn the causes of things; the
reasons of the chances and changes of this world; and so he is
not satisfied; he takes up doctrines, true ones, perhaps, at
secondhand out of books and out of sermons, without having
had any personal experience of them; and so, when sickness or
sorrow, doubt or dread, come, they do not satisfy him. Then
he longs— he ought at least to long — for truth. He thirsts for
truth. O that I could know the truth about myself; about my
fellow-creatures; about this world. , What am I really? What
are they? Where am I? What can I know? What ought I
to do? I do not want secondhand names and notions. I want
to be sure.
That is the divine thirst after truth, which will surely be satis
fied. He will drink of the pleasure of true knowledge, as out

ll.] THE DIVINE HUNGER AND THIRST. 203
of an overflowing river; and the more he knows, the more he
will be glad to know, and the more he will find he can know, if
only he loves truth for truth's own sake; for, as it is written, in
God's light shall that man see light.
With God is the well of life; and in his light we shall see light.
The first is the answer to man's hunger after righteousness, the
second answers to his thirst after truth.
With God is the well of life. There is the answer. Thou
wishest to be a good man; to live a good life; to live as a good
son, good husband, good father, good in all the relations of
humanity; as it is written, ' And Noah was a just man, and per
fect in his generations; and Noah walked with God.' Then do
thou walk with God. For in him is the life thou wishest for.
He alone can quicken thee, and give thee spirit and power to
fulfil thy duty in thy generation. Is not his Spirit the Lord and
Giver of life — the only fount and eternal spring of life? From
him life flows out unto the smallest blade of grass beneath thy
feet, the smallest gnat which dances in the sun, that it may live
the life which God intends for it. How much more to thee,
who hast an altogether boundless power of life ; whom God has
made in his own likeness, that thou mayest be called his son,
and live his life, and do, as Christ did, what thou seest thy
heavenly Father do.
Thou feelest, perhaps, how poor and paltry thine own life is,
compared with what it might have been. Thou feelest that thou
hast never done thy best. When the world is praising thee
most, thou art most ashamed of thyself. Thou art ready to cry
all day long, ' I have left undone that which I ought to have
done;' till, at times, thou longest that all was over, and thou
wert beginning again in some freer, fuiler, nobler, holier life,
to do and to be what thou hast never done nor been here ; and
criest with the poet —
'Tis life, whereof my nerves are scant;
'Tis life, not death, for which I pant;
More life, and fuller, that I want.

204 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
Then have patience. With God is the fount of life. He will
refresh and strengthen thee; and raise thee up day by day to
that new life for which thou longest. Is not Holy communion
his own pledge that he will do so? Is not that God's own sign
to thee, that though thou canst not feed and strengthen thine
own soul, he can and will feed and strengthen it; and feed it —
mystery of mysteries — with himself; that God may dwell in
thee, and thou in God. And if God and Christ live in
thee, and work in thee to will and to do of their own good
pleasure, that shall be enough for thee, and thou shalt be
satisfied. And just so, again, with that same thirst after truth. That,
too, can only be satisfied by God, and in God. Not by the
reading of books, however true; not by listening to sermons,
however clever ; can we see light : but only in the light of God.
Know God. Know that he is justice itself, order itself, love
itself, patience itself, pity itself. In the light of that, all things
will become light and bright to thee. Matters which seemed
to have nothing to do with God, the thought of God will ex
plain to thee, if thou thinkest aright concerning God ; and the
true knowledge of him will be the key to all other true know
ledge in heaven and earth. For the fear of the Lord is the be
ginning of wisdom, and a good understanding have all they that
do thereafter. Must it not be so ? How can it be otherwise ?
For in God all live and move and have their being ; and all
things which he has made are rays from off his glory, and
patterns of his perfect mind. As the Maker is, so is his work ;
if, therefore, thou wouldest judge rightly of the work, acquaint
thyself with the Maker of it, and know first, and know for ever,
that his name is Love.
Thus, sooner or later, in God the Father's good time, will
thy thirst for truth be satisfied, and thou shalt see the light of
God. He may keep thee long waiting for full truth. He may
send thee by strange and crooked paths. He may exercise and
strain thy reason by doubts, mistakes, and failures ; but sooner

u.J THE DIVINE HUNGER AND THIRST. 205
or later, if thou dost not faint and grow weary, he will show to
thee the thing which thou knewest not ; for he is thy Father,
and wills that all his children, each according to their powers,
should share not only in his goodness, but in his wisdom
also. Do any of you say, ' These are words too deep for us ;
they are for learned people, clever, great saints?' I think
not. I have seen poor people, ignorant people, sick people, poor
old souls on parish pay, satisfied with the plenteousness of
God's house, and drinking so freely of God's pleasure, that
they knew no thirst, fretted not, never were discontented.
All vain longings after this and that were gone from their
hearts. They had very little; but it seemed to be enough.
They had nothing indeed, which we could call pleasure in
this world ; but somehow what they had satisfied them, be
cause it came from God. They had a hidden pleasure, joy,
content, and peace.
They had found out that with God was the well of life ; that
in God they lived and moved, and had their being. And as
long as their souls lived in God, full of the eternal life and
goodness, obeying his laws, loving the thing which he com
manded, and desiring what he promised, they could trust him
for their poor worn-out dying bodies, that he would not let
them perish, but raise them up again at the last day. They
knew very little ; but what they did know was full of light.
Cheerful and hopeful they were always ; for they saw all things
in the light of God. They knew that God was light, and God
was love ; that his love was shining down on them and on all
around them, warming, cheering, quickening into life all things
which he had made ; so that when the world should have looked
most dark to them, it looked most bright, because they saw it
lightened up by the smile of their Father in heaven.
O may God bring us all to such an old age, that, as our
mortal bodies decay, our souls may be renewed day by day ;

206 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
that as the life of our bodies grows cold and feeble, the life ol
our souls may grow richer, warmer, stronger, more useful to all
around us, for ever and ever ; that as the light of this life fades,
the light of our souls may grow brighter, fuller, deeper ; till all
is clear to us in the everlasting light of God, in that perfect day
for which St. Paul thirsted through so many weary years ; when
he should no more see through a glass darkly, or prophesy in
part, and talk as a child, but see face to face, and know even as
he was known.

SERMON III.
THE TRANSFIGURATION.
(Preached before the Queen. ).

Matthew xvii. 2 and 9.
And he was transfigured before them. . . . And he charged them, say
ing, Tell the vision to no man, until the Son of Man be risen again
from the dead.
A NY one who will consider the gospels, will see that there is
a peculiar calm, a soberness and modesty about them,
very different from what we should have expected to find in
them. Speaking, as they do, of the grandest person who ever
trod this earth, of the grandest events which ever happened
upon this earth — of the events, indeed, which settled the future
of this earth for ever, — one would not be surprised at their
using grand words — the grandest they could find. If they had
gone off into beautiful poetry ; if they had filled pages with
words of astonishment, admiration, delight; if they had told us
their own thoughts and feelings at the sight of our Lord ; if
they had given us long and full descriptions of our Lord's face
and figure, even (as forged documents have pretended to do) to
the very colour of his hair, we should have thought it but
natural. But there is nothing of the kind in either of the four gospels,
even when speaking of the most awful matters. Their words

208 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
are as quiet and simple and modest as if they were written of
things which might be seen every day. When they tell of our
Lord's crucifixion, for instance, how easy, natural, harmless,
right, as far as we can see, it would have been to have poured
out their own feelings about the most pitiable and shameful
crime ever committed upon earth ; to have spoken out all their
own pity, terror, grief, indignation ; and to have stirred up ours
thereby. And yet all they say is, — ' And they crucified him.'
They feel that is enough. The deed is too dark to talk about.
Let it tell its own story to all human hearts.
So with this account of the Lord's transfiguration. ' And he
took Peter, and James, and John, his brother, up into a high
mountain, apart, and was transfigured before them ; and his
face did shine as the sun ; and his raiment was white as the
light ; . • . and while he yet spake a bright cloud overshadowed
them ; and, behold, a voice out of the cloud, which said : This
is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Hear ye
him.' How soberly, simply, modestly, they tell this strange story.
How differently they might have told it. A man might write
whole poems, whole books of philosophy, about that transfigura
tion, and yet never reach the full depth of its beauty and of its
meaning. But the evangelists do not even try to do that As
with the crucifixion, as with all the most wonderful passages of
our Lord's life, they simply say what happened, and let the
story bring its own message home to our hearts.
What may we suppose is the reason of this great stillness and
soberness of the gospels ? I believe that it may be explained
thus. The men who wrote them were too much awed by our
Lord, to make more words about him than they absolutely
needed. Our Lord was too utterly beyond them. They felt that they
could not understand him ; could not give a worthy picture of
him. He was too noble, too awful, in spite of all his tender
ness, for any words of theirs, however fine. We all know that

in.] THE TRANSFIGURATION. 209
the holiest things, the deepest feelings, the most beautiful sights,
are those about which we talk least, and least like to hear others
talk. Putting them into words seems impertinent, profane. No
one needs to gild gold, or paint the lily. When we see a
glorious sunset ; when we hear the rolling of the thunder-storm ;
we do not talk about them; we do not begin to cry, How awful,
how magnificent ; we admire them in silence, and let them tell
their own story. Who that ever truly loved his wife talked
about his love to her ? Who that ever came to Holy Com
munion in spirit and in truth, tried to put into words what he
felt as he knelt before Christ's altar ? When God speaks, man
had best keep silence.
So it was, I suppose, with the writers of the gospels. They
had been in too grand company for them to speak freely of
what they felt there. They had seen such sights, and heard
such words, that they were inclined to be silent, and think over
it all, and only wrote because they must write. They felt that
our Lord, as I say, was utterly beyond them, too unlike any
one whom they had ever met before ; too perfect, too noble,
for them to talk about him. So they simply set down his words
as he spoke them, and his works as he did them, as far as they
could recollect, and left them to tell their own story. Even St.
John, who was our Lord's beloved friend, who seems to have
caught and copied exactly his way of speaking, seems to feel
that there was infinitely more in our Lord than he could put
into words, and ends with confessing, — 'And there are also
many more things which Jesus did, the which if they should be
written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could
not contain the books that should be written.'
The first reason then, I suppose, for the evangelists' modesty,
was their awe and astonishment at our Lord. The next, I think,
may have been that they wished to copy him, and so to please
him. It surely must have been so, if, as all good Christians
believe, they were inspired to write our Lord's life. The Lord
would inspire them to write as he would like his life to be

2io TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.

written, as he would have written it (if it be reverent to speak
of such a thing) himself. They were inspired by Christ's
Spirit; and, therefore, they wrote according to the Spirit of
Christ, soberly, humbly, modestly, copying the character of
Christ. Think upon that word modestly. I am not sure that it is the
best; I only know that it is the best which I can find, to
express one excellence which we see in our Lord, which is like
what we call modesty in common human beings.
We all know how beautiful and noble modesty is ; how we
all admire it ; how it raises a man in our eyes to see him afraid
of boasting; never showing off; never requiring people to
admire him ; never pushing himself forward ; or, if his business
forces him to go into public, not going for the sake of display,
but simply because the thing has to be done ; and then quietly
withdrawing himself when the thing is done, content that none
should be staring at him or thinking of him. This is modesty ;
and we admire it not only in young people, or those who have
little cause to be proud: we admire it much more in the
greatest, the wisest, and the best ; in those who have, humanly
speaking, most cause to be proud. Whenever, on the other
hand, we see in wise and good men any vanity, boasting,
pompousnes» of any kind, we call it a weakness in them, and
are sorry to see them lowering themselves by the least want
of divine modesty.
Now, this great grace and noble virtue should surely be in
our Lord, from whom all graces and virtues come ; and I think
we need not look far through the gospels to find it.
See how he refused to cast himself down from the temple,
and make himself a sign and a wonder to the Jews. How he
refused to show the Pharisees a sign. How in this very text,
when it seemed good to him to show his glory, he takes only
three favourite apostles, and commands them to tell no man till
he be risen again. See, again, how when the Jews . wanted to
take him by force, and make him a king, he escaped out of their

ill.J THE TRANSFIGURATION. 2I1
hands. How when He had been preaching to, or healing the
multitude, so that they crowded on him, and became excited
about him, he more than once immediately left them, and
retired into a desert place to pray.
See, again, how when he did tell the Jews who he was, in
words most awfully unmistakeable, the confession was, as it
were, drawn from him, at the end of a long argument, when he
was forced to speak out for truth's sake. And, even then,
how simple, how modest (if I dare so speak), are his words.
' Before Abraham was, I am.' The most awful words ever
spoken on earth ; and yet most divine in their very simplicity.
The Maker of the world telling his creatures that he is their
God ! What might he not have said at such a moment ?
What might we not fancy his saying? What words, grand
enough, awful enough, might not the evangelists have put into
his mouth, if they had not been men full of the spirit of truth ?
And yet what does the Lord say ? ' Before Abraham was,
I am.' Could he say more? If you think of the matter,
No. But could he say less ? If you think of the manner, No,
likewise. Truly, 'never man spake as he spake:' because never man
was like him. Perfect strength, wisdom, determination,
endurance; and yet perfect meekness, simplicity, sobriety.
Zeal and modesty. They are the last two virtues which go
together most seldom. In him they went together utterly;
and were one, as he was one in spirit.
Him some of the evangelists saw, and by him all were
inspired; and, therefore, they toned their account of him to
his likeness, and, as it were, took their key-note from him, and
made the very manner and language of their gospels a pattern
of his manners and his life.
And, if we wanted a fresh proof (as, thank God, needs not)
that the gospels are true, I think we might find it in this.
For when a man is inventing a wonderful story out of his own
head, he is certain to dress it up in fine words, fancies, shrewd

212 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
reflections of his own, in order to make people see, as he goes
on, how wonderful it all is. Whereas, no books on earth
which describe wonderful events, true or false, are so sober and
simple as the gospels, which describe the most wonderful of all
events. And this is to me a plain proof (as I hope it will be
to you) that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were not
inventing but telling a plain and true story, and dared not
alter it in the least; and, again, a story so strange and
beautiful, that they dared not try to make it more strange, or
more beautiful, by any words of their own.
They had seen a person, to describe whom passed all their
powers of thought and memory, much more their power of
words. A person of whom even St. Paul could only say,
'that he was the brightness of his Father's glory, and the
express image of his person.'
Words in which to write of him failed them ; lor no words
could suffice. But the temper of mind in which to write of
him did not fail them ; for, by gazing on the face of the Lord,
they had been changed, more or less, into the likeness of his
glory ; into that temper, simplicity, sobriety, gentleness,
modesty, which shone forth in him, and shines forth still in
their immortal words about him. God grant that it may
shine forth fh us. God grant it truly. May we read their
words till their spirit passes into us. May we (as St. Paul
expresses it) looking on the face of the Lord, as into a glass,
be changed into his likeness, from glory to glory. May he
who inspired them to write, inspire us to think and work, like
our Lord, soberly, quietly, simply. May God take out of us all
pride and vanity, boasting and forwardness ; and give us the
true courage which shows itself by gentleness ; the true wisdom
which show itself by simplicity ; and the true power which
show itself by modesty. Amen.

SERMON IV.
A SOLDIER'S TRAINING.

Luke vii. 2-9.
And a certain centurion's servant, who was dear unto him, was sick, and
ready to die. And when he heard of Jesus, he sent unto him the elders
of the Jews, beseeching him that he would come and heal his servant.
And when they came to Jesus, they besought him instantly, saying,
That he was worthy for whom he should do this : For he loveth our
nation, and he hath built us a synagogue. Then Jesus went with them.
And when he was now not far from the house, the centurion sent friends
to him, saying unto him, Lord, trouble not thyself; for I am not worthy
that thou shouldest enter under my roof : Wherefore neither thought I
myself worthy to come unto thee : but say in a word, and my servant
shall be healed. For I also am a man set under authority, having under
me soldiers, and I say unto one, Go, and he goeth ; and to another,
Come, and he cometh ; and to my servant, Do this, and he doeth it.
When Jesus heard these things he marvelled at him, and turned him
about, and said unto the people that followed him, I say unto you, I
have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel.
'"THERE is something puzzling in this speech of the cen-
turion's. One must think twice, and more than twice,
to understand clearly what he had in his mind. I, indeed, am
not quite sure that I altogether understand it. But I may,
perhaps, help you to understand it, by telling you what this
centurion was.

214 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
He was not a Jew. He was a Roman, and a heathen;
a man of our race, very likely. And he was a centurion, a
captain in the army ; and one, mind, who had risen from the
ranks, by good conduct, and good service. Before he got his
vine-stock, which was the mark of his authority over a hundred
men, he had, no doubt, marched many a weary mile under a
heavy load, and fought, probably, many a bloody battle in
foreign parts. That had been his education, his training,
namely, discipline, and hard work. And because he had
learned to obey, he was fit to rule. He was helping now to
keep in order those treacherous, unruly Jews, and their worth
less puppet-kings, like Herod ; much as our soldiers in India
are keeping in order the Hindoos, and their worthless puppet-
kings. Whether the Romans had any right to conquer and keep
down the Jews as they did, is no concern of ours just now.
But we have proof that what this centurion did, he did wisely
and kindly. The elders of the Jews said of him, that he loved
the Jews, and had built them a synagogue, a church. I sup
pose that what he had heard from them about a one living
God, who had made all things in heaven and earth, and given
them a law, which cannot be broken, so that all things obey
him to this day — I suppose, I say, that this pleased him better
than the Roman stories of many gods, who were capricious,
and fretful, and quarrelled with each other in a fashion which
ought to have been shocking to the conscience and reason of a
disciplined soldier.
There was a great deal, besides, in the Old Testament, which
would, surely, come home to a soldier's heart, when it told him
of a God of law, and order, and justice, and might, who defen
ded the right in battle, and inspired the old Jews to conquer
the heathen, and to fight for their own liberty. For what was
it, which had enabled the Romans to conquer so many great
nations ? What was it which enabled them to keep them in
order, and, on the whole, make them happier, more peaceable,

iv.] A SOLDIER'S TRAINING. 215
more prosperous, than they had ever been ? What was it which
had made him, the poor common soldier, an officer, and a
wealthy man, governing, by his little garrison of a hundred
soldiers, this town of Capernaum, and the country round?
It was this. Discipline; drill; obedience to authority. That
Roman army was the most admirably disciplined which the
world till then had ever seen. So, indeed, was the whole
Roman Government. Every man knew his place, and knew
his work. Every man had been trained to obey orders; if he
was told to go, to go; if he was told to do, to do, or to die in
trying to do, what he was bidden.
This was the great and true thought which had filled this
good man's mind — duty, order, and obedience. And by
thinking of order, and seeing how strength, and safety, and
success lie in order, and by giving himself up to obey orders,
body and soul, like a good soldier, had that plain man (who
had certainly no scholarship, perhaps could barely read or write)
caught sight of a higher, wider, deeper order than even that of
a Roman army. He had caught sight of that divine and
wonderful order, by which God has constituted the services
of men, and angels, and all created things ; that divine
and wonderful order by which sun and stars, fire and hail,
wind and vapour, cattle and creeping things fulfil his
word. Fulfil God's word. That was the thought, surely, which was
in the good soldier's mind, and which he was trying to speak
out; clumsily, perhaps, but truly enough. I suppose, then,
that he thought in his own mind somewhat in this way. 'There
is a word of command among us soldiers. Has God, then, no
word of command likewise ? And that word of command is
enough. Is not God's word of command enough likewise ? I
merely speak, and I am obeyed. I am merely spoken to, and
I obey. Shall not God merely speak, and be obeyed likewise ?
There is discipline and order among men, because it is neces
sary. An Army cannot be manoeuvred, a Government cannot be

2l6 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
carried on, without it. Is there not a discipline and order in
all heaven and earth ? And that discipline is carried out by
simple word of command. A word from me will make a man
rush upon certain death. A word from certain other men will
make me rush on certain death. For I am a man under
authority. I have my tribune (colonel, as we should say) over
me ; and he, again, the perfect (general of brigade) over him.
Their word is enough for me. If they want me to do a
thing, they do not need to come under my roof, to argue
with me, to persuade me, much less to thrust me about,
and make me obey them by force. They say to me, 'Go,'
and I go ; and I say to those under me, ' Go,' and they go
likewise. And if I can work by a word, cannot this Jesus work by a
word likewise ? He is a messenger of God, with commission
and authority from God, to work his will on his creatures. Are
not God's creatures as well ordered, disciplined, obedient, as
we soldiers are ? Are they not a hundred times better ordered ?
A messenger from God ? Is he not a God himself ; a God in
goodness and mercy ; a God in miraculous power ? Cannot he
do his work by a word, far more certainly than I can do mine ?
If my word can send a man to death, cannot his word bring a
man back to Hfe ? Surely it can. ' Lord, thou needest not to
come under my roof; speak the word only, and my servant
shall be healed.'
By some such thoughts as these, I suppose, had this good
soldier gained his great faith ; his faith that all God's creatures
were in a divine, and wonderful order, obedient to the will of
God who made them ; and that Jesus Christ was God's viceroy
and lieutenant (I speak so, because I suppose that is what he,
as a soldier, would have thought), to carry out God's commands
on earth.
Now remember that he was the first heathen man of whom
we read, that he acknowledged Christ. Remember, too, that
the next heathen of whom we read, that he acknowledged

iv.] A SOLDIER'S TRAINING. 217
Christ, was also a Roman centurion, he whom the old legends
call Longinus, who, when he saw our Lord upon the cross, said,
' Truly this was the Son of God.' Remember, again, that the
next heathen of whom we read as having acknowledged Christ,
he to whom St. Peter was sent, at Joppa, who is often called
the first fruits of the heathen, was a Roman centurion like
wise. Surely, there must have been a reason for this. There must
be a lesson in this ; and this, I think, is the lesson. That the
soldierlike habit of mind is one which makes a man ready to
receive the truth of Christ. And why? Because the good
soldier's first and last thought is Duty. To do his duty by those
who are set over him, and to learn to do his duty 'to those who
are set under him. To turn his whole mind and soul to doing,
not just what he fancies, but to what must be done, because it
is his duty. This is the character which makes a good soldier,
and a good Christian likewise. If we be undisciplined and
undutiful, and unruly; if we be fanciful, self-willed, dis
obedient; then we shall not understand Christ, or Christ's
rule on earth and in heaven. If there be no order within
us, we shall not see his divine and wonderful order all
around us. If there be no discipline and obedience within
us, we shall never believe really that Christ disciplines all
things, and that all things obey him. If there be no sense
of duty in us, governing our whole lives and actions, we shall
never perceive the true beauty and glory of Christ's character,
who sacrificed himself for his duty, which was to do his
Father's will.
I tell you, my friends, that nothing prevents a man from
gaining either right doctrines or right practice, so much as the
undutiful, unruly, self-conceited heart. We may be full of
religious knowledge, of devout sentiments, of heavenly
aspirations : but in spite of them all, we shall never get beyond
false doctrine, and loose practice, unless we have learned to
obey; to rule our own minds, and hearts, and tempers, soberly

218 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
and patiently; to conform to the laws, and to all reasonable
rules of society, to believe that God has called us to our station
in life, whatever it may be; and to do our duty therein, as
faithful soldiers and servants of Christ. For, if you will receive
it, the beginning and the middle, and the end of all true
religion is simply this. To do the will of God on earth, as it is
done in heaven.

SERMON V.
CHRIST'S SHEEP.

Mark vi. 34.

And Jesus, when he came out, saw much people, and was moved with com
passion toward them, because they were as sheep not having a shepherd:
and he began to teach them many things.
""THIS is a text full of comfort, if we will but remember one
thing: that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, to-day,
and for ever ; and, therefore, what he did when he was upon
earth, he is doing now, and will do till the end of the world.
If we will believe this, and look at our Lord's doings upon earth
as patterns and specimens, as it were, of his eternal life and
character, then every verse in the gospels will teach us some
thing, and be precious to us.
The people came to hear Jesus in a desert place ; a wild
forest country, among the hills on the east side of the Lake of
Gennesaret. ' And Jesus, when he came out, saw much people,
and was moved with compassion toward them, because they were
as sheep having no shepherd : and he taught them many things.'
And, what kind of people were these, who so moved our
Lord's pity? The text tells us, that they were like sheep.
Now, in what way were they like sheep ?
A sheep is simple, and harmless, and tractable, and so, I
suppose, were these people. They may not have been very

220 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
clever and shrewd; not good scholars. No doubt they were
a poor, wild, ignorant, set of people ; but they were tractable ;
they were willing to come and learn; they felt their own ignor
ance, and wanted to be taught. They were not proud and self-
sufficient, not fierce or blood-thirsty. The text does not say
that they were like wild beasts having no keeper : but like
sheep having no shepherd. And therefore Christ pitied them,
because they were teachable, willing to be taught, and worth
teaching; and yet had no one to teach them.
The Scribes and Pharisees, it seems, taught them nothing.
They may have taught the people in Jerusalem, and in the great
towns, something: but they seem, from all the gospels, to have
cared little or nothing for the poor folk out in the wild moun
tain country. They liked to live in pride and comfort in the
towns, with their comfortable congregations round them, ad
miring them; but they had no fancy to go out into the deserts,
to seek and to save those who were lost. They were bad
shepherds, greedy shepherds, who were glad enough to shear
God's flock, and keep the wool themselves : but they did not.
care to feed the flock of God. It was too much trouble ; and
they could get no honour and no money by it. And most
likely they did not understand these poor people ; could not
speak, hardly* understand, their country language; for these
Galileans spoke a rough dialect, different from that of the upper
classes. So the Scribes and Pharisees looked down on them as a bad,
wild, low set of people, with whom nothing could be done ; and
said, ' This people who knoweth not the law, is accursed.'
But what they would not do, God himself would. God in
Christ had come to feed his own flock, and to seek the lost
sheep, and bring them gently home to God's fold. He could
feel for these poor wild foresters and mountain shepherds ; he
could understand what was in their hearts; for he knew the
heart of man ; and, therefore, he could make them understand
him. And it was for this very reason, one might suppose, that

v.] CHRIST'S SHEEP. 221
our Lord was willing to be brought up at Nazareth, that he
might learn the country speech, and country ways, and that the
people might grow to look on him as one of themselves. Those
Scribes and Pharisees, one may suppose, were just the people
whom they could not understand; fine, rich scholars, proud
people talking very learnedly about deep doctrines. The
country folk must have looked at them as if they belonged to
some other world, and said, — Those Pharisees cannot understand
us, any more than we can them, with their hard rules about this
and that. Easy enough for rich men like them to make rules
for poor ones. Indeed our Lord said the very same of them —
' Binding heavy burdens, and grievous to be borne, and laying
thern on men's shoulders ; while they themselves would not
touch them with one of their fingers.'
Then the Lord himself came and preached to these poor
wild folk, and they heard him gladly. And why ? Because his
speech was too deep for them ? Because he scolded and
threatened them? No.
We never find that our Lord spoke harshly to them. They
had plenty of sins, and he knew it : but it is most remarkable
that the Evangelists never tell us what he said about those sins.
What they do tell us is, that he spoke to them of the common
things around them, of the flowers of the field, the birds
of the air, of sowing and reaping, and feeding sheep ; and
taught them by parables, taken from the common country life
which they lived, and the common country things which they
saw ; and shewed them how the kingdom of God was like unto
this and that which they had seen from their childhood, and
how earth was a pattern of heaven. And they could understand
that. Not all of it perhaps: but still they heard him gladly.
His preaching made them understand themselves, and their own
souls, and what God felt for them, and what was right and
wrong, and what would become of them, as they never felt
before. It is plain and certain that the country people could
understand Christ's parables, when the Scribes and Pharisees

222 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
could not. The Scribes and Pharisees, in spite of all their
learning, were those who were without (as our Lord said) ; who
had eyes and could not see, and ears and could not hear, for
their hearts were grown fat and gross. With all their learning,
they were not wise enough to understand the message which
God sends in every flower and every sunbeam; the message
which Christ preached to the poor, and the poor heard him
gladly ; the message which he confirmed to them by his miracles.
For what were his miracles like? Did he call down lightning
to strike sinners dead, or call up earthquakes, to swallow them ?
No ; he went about healing the sick, cleansing the leper, feeding
the hungry in the wilderness ; that therefore they might see by
his example, the glory of their Father in heaven, and understand
that God is a God of Love, of mercy, a deliverer, a Saviour, and
not, as the Scribes and Pharisees made him out, a hard task
master, keeping his anger for ever, and extreme to mark what
was done amiss.
Ah that, be sure, was what made the Scribes and Pharisees
more mad than anything else against Christ, that he spoke to
the poor ignorant people of their Father in heaven. It made
them envious enough to see the poor people listening to Christ,
when they would not listen to them ; but when he told these
poor folk, wh®m they called ' accursed and lost sinners,' that
God in heaven was their Father, then no name was too bad for
our Lord ; and they called him the worst name which they could
think of — a friend of publicans and sinners. That was the
worst name, in their eyes : and yet, in reality, it was the highest
honour. But they never forgave him. How could they ? They
felt that if he was doing God's work, they were doing the devil's;
that either he or they must be utterly wrong : and they never
rested till they crucified him, and stopped him for ever, as they
fancied, from telling poor ignorant people laden with sins to
consider the flowers of the field how they grow, and learn from
them that they have a Father in heaven who knoweth what they
have need of before they ask him.

v.] CHRIST'S SHEEP. 223
But they did not stop Christ : and, what is more, they will
never stop him. He has said it, and it remains true for ever ;
for he is saying it over and over again, in a thousand ways, to
his sheep, when they are wandering without a shepherd.
Only let them be Christ's sheep, and he will have compassion
on them, and teach them many things. Many may neglect
them: but Christ will not. Whoever you may be, however
simple you are, however ignorant, however lonely, still, if you
are one of Christ's sheep, if you are harmless and teachable,
willing and wishing to learn what is right, then Christ will surely
teach you in his good time. There never was a soul on earth,
I believe, who really wished for God's light, but what God's
light came to it at last, as it will to you, if you be Christ's sheep.
If you are proud and conceited, you will learn nothing. If you
are fierce and headstrong, you will learn nothing. If you are
patient and gentle, you will learn all that you need to know ;
for Christ will teach you. He has many ways of teaching you.
By his ministers; by the Bible; by books; by good friends; by
sorrows and troubles; by blessings and comforts; by stirring
up your mind to think over the common things which lie all
around you in your daily work. But what need for me to go
on counting by how many ways Christ will lead you, when he
has more ways than man ever dreamed of? Who hath known
the mind of the Lord ; or who shall be his counsellor ? Only
be sure that he will teach you, if you wish to learn ; and be sure
that this is what he will teach you — to know the glory of his
Father and your Father, whose name is Love.

SERMON VI.
THE HEARING EAR AND THE SEEING EYE.

Proverbs xx. 12.
The hearing ear, and the seeing eye, the Lord hath made even both of
them.
""PHIS saying may seem at first a very simple one ; and some
may ask, What need to tell us that ? We know it already.
God, who made all things, made the ear and the eye likewise.
True, my friends : but the simplest texts are often the deepest ;
and that, just because they speak to us ot the most common
things. For the most common things are often the most
wonderful, and deep, and difficult to understand.
The hearing of the ear, and the seeing of the eye. — Every one
hears and sees all day long, so perpetually that we never think
about our hearing or sight, unless we find them fail us. And
yet, how wonderful are hearing and sight How we hear, how
we see, no man knows, and perhaps ever will know.
When the ear is dissected and examined, it is found to be a
piece of machinery infinitely beyond the skill of mortal man to
make. The tiny drum of the ear, which quivers with every
sound which strikes it, puts to shame with its divine workman
ship all the clumsy workmanship of man. But recollect that it
is not all the wonder, but only the beginning of it. The ear is
wonderful : but still more wonderful is it how the ear hears. It

THE HEARING EAR AND THE SEEING EYE. 225
is wonderful, I mean, how the ear should be so made, that each
different sound sets it in motion in a different way : but still
more wonderful, how that sound should pass up from the ear to
the nerves and brain, so that we hear. Therein is a mystery
w'hich no mortal man can explain.
So of the eye. All the telescopes and microscopes which
man makes, curiously and cunningly as they are made, are
clumsy things compared with the divine workmanship of the
eye. I cannot describe it to you ; nor, if I could, is this alto
gether a fit place to do so. But if any one wishes to see the
greatness and the glory of God, and be overwhelmed with the
sense of his own ignorance, and of God's wisdom, let him read
any book which describes to him the eye of man, or even of
beast, and then say with the psalmist, ' I am fearfully and
wonderfully made. Marvellous are thy works, O Lord, and
that my soul knoweth right well'
And remember, that as with the ear, so with the eye, the
mere workmanship of it is only the beginning of the wonder.
It is very wonderful that the eye should be able to take a picture
of each thing in front of it ; that on the tiny black curtain at the
back of the eye, each thing outside should be printed, as it
were, instantly, exact in shape and colour. But that is not
sight. Sight is a greater wonder, over and above that. Seeing
is this, that the picture which is printed on the back of the eye,
is also printed on our brain, so that we see it. There is the
wonder of wonders.
Do some of you not understand me ? Then look at it thus.
If you took out the eye of an animal, and held it up to any
thing, a man or a tree, a perfect picture of that man or that tree
would be printed on the back of the dead eye : but the eye
would not see it. And why ? Because it is cut off from the
live brain of the animal to which it belonged ; and therefore,
though the picture is still in the eye, it sends no message about
itself up to the brain, and is not seen.
And how does the picture on the eye send its message about
p

226 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
itself to the brain, so that the brain sees it ? And how, again —
for here is a third wonder, greater still — do we ourselves see
what our brain sees ?
That no man knows, and, perhaps, never will know in this
world. For science, as it is called, that is, the understanding
of this world, and what goes on therein, can only tell us as yet
what happens, what God does : but of how God does it, it can
tell us little or nothing ; and of why God does it, nothing at all ;
and all we can say is, at every turn, " God is great.''
Mind, again, that these are not all the wonders which are in
the ear and in the eye. It is wonderful enough, that our brains
should hear through our ears, and see through our eyes : biit it
is more wonderful still, that they should be able to recollect
what they have heard and seen. That you and I should be
able to call up in our minds a sound which we heard yesterday,
or even a minute ago, is to me one of the most utterly astonish
ing things I know of. And so of ordinary recollection. What
is it that we call remembering a place, remembering a person's
face ? That place, or that face, was actually printed, as it were,
through our eye upon our brain. We have a picture of it some
where ; we know not where, inside us. But that we should be
able to call that picture up again, and look at it with what we
rightly call* our mind's eye, whenever we choose; and not
merely that one picture only, but thousands of such ; — that is a
wonder, indeed, which passes understanding. Consider the
hundreds of human faces, the hundreds of different things and
places, which you can recollect; and then consider that all
those different pictures are lying, as it were, over each other in
hundreds in that small place, your brain, for the most part with
out interfering with, or rubbing out each other, each ready to
be called up, recollected, and used in its turn.
If this is not wonderful, what is? So wonderful, that no
man knows, or, I think, ever will know, how it comes to pass.
How the eye tells the brain of the picture which is drawn upon
the back of the eye — how the brain calls up that picture when

vi.] THE HEARING EAR AND THE SEEING EYE. 227
it likes— these are two mysteries beyond all man's wisdom to
explain. These are two proofs of the wisdom and the power of
God, which ought to sink deeper into our hearts than all signs
and wonders; — greater proofs of God's power and wisdom,
than if yon fir-trees burst into flame of themselves, or yon
ground opened, and a fountain of water sprung out. Most
people think much of signs and wonders. Just in proportion
as they have no real faith in God, just in proportion as they
forget God, and will not see that he is about their path, and
about their bed, and spying out all their ways, they are like
those godless Scribes and Pharisees of old, who must have signs
and wonders before they would believe. So it is : the com
monest things are as wonderful, more wonderful, than the un
common ; and yet, people will hanker after the uncommon, as
if they belonged to God more immediately than the commonest
matters. If yon trees burst out in flame ; if yon hill opened, and a
fountain sprang up, how many would cry, ' How awful ! How
wonderful ! Here is a sign that God is near us ! It is time
to think about our souls now ! Perhaps the end of the world
is at hand !' And all the while they would be blind to that
far more awful proof of God's presence, that all around them,
all day long, all over the world, millions of human ears are
hearing, millions of human eyes are seeing, God alone knows
how ; millions of human brains are recollecting, God alone
knows how. That is not faith, my friends, to see God only in
what is strange and rare : but this is faith, to see God in what
is most common and simple ; to know God's greatness not so
much from disorder, as from order; not so much from those
strange sights in which God seems (but only seems) to break
his laws, as from those common ones in which he fulfils his
laws. I know it is very difficult to believe that. It has been always
difficult; and for this reason. Our souls and minds are dis
orderly ; and therefore order does not look to us what it is, the

228 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.

likeness and glory of God. I will explain. If God, at any
moment, should create a full-grown plant with stalk, leaves, and
flowers, all perfect, all would say, There is the hand of God !
How great is God ! There is, indeed, a miracle ! — Just because
it would seem not to be according to order. But the tiny seed
sown in the ground, springing up into root-leaf! stalk, rough
leaf, flower, seed, which will again be sown and spring up into
leaf, flower, and seed ; — in that perpetual miracle, people see no
miracle : just because it is according to order : because it comes
to pass by regular and natural laws. And why ? Because, such
as we are, such we fancy God to be. And we are all of us
more or less disorderly : fanciful ; changeable ; fond of doing not
what we ought, but what we like ; fond of showing our power,
not by keeping rules, but by breaking rules ; and we fancy too
often that God is like ourselves, and make him in our image,
after our own likeness, which is disorder, and self-will, and
changeableness ; instead of trying to be conformed to his image
and his likeness, which is order and law eternal : and, therefore,
whenever God seems (for he only seems to our ignorance) to be
making things suddenly, as we make, or working arbitrarily as
we work, then we acknowledge his greatness and wisdom.
Whereas his greatness, his wisdom, are rather shown in not
making as w% make, not working as we work : but in this is the
greatness of God manifest, in that he has ordained laws which
must work of themselves, and with which he need never inter
fere : laws by which the tiny seed, made up only (as far as we
can see) of a little water, and air, and earth, must grow up into
plant, leaf, and flower, utterly unlike itself, and must produce
seeds which have the truly miraculous power of growing up in
their turn, into plants exactly like that from which they sprung,
and no other. Ah, my friends, herein is the glory of God : and
he who will consider the lilies of the field, how they grow, that
man will see at last that the highest, and therefore the truest,
notion of God is, not that the universe is continually going
wrong, so that he has to interfere and right it < but that the uni-

VI.] THE HEARING EAR AND THE SEEING EYE. 229
verse is continually going right, because he hath given it a law
which cannot be broken.
And when a man sees that, there will arise within his soul a
clear light, and an awful joy, and an abiding peace, and a sure
hope ; and a faith as of a little child.
Then will that man crave no more for signs and wonders,
with the superstitious and the unbelieving, who have eyes, and
see not ; ears, and cannot hear ; whose hearts are waxen gross,
so that they cannot consider the lilies of the field, how they
grow : but all his cry will be to the Lord of Order, to make
him orderly ; to the Lord of Law, to make him loyal ; to the
Lord in whom is nothing arbitrary, to take out of him all that
is unreasonable and self-willed ; and make him content, like
his Master Christ before him, to do the will of his Father in
heaven, who has sent him into this noble world. He will no
longer fancy that God is an absent God, who only comes down
now and then to visit the earth in signs and wonders : but he
will know that God is everywhere, and over all things, from the
greatest to the least ; for in God, he, and all things created,
live and move and have their being. And therefore, knowing
that he is always in the presence of God, he will pray to be
taught how to use all his powers aright, because all of them are
the powers of God ; pray to be taught how to see, and how to
hear ; pray that when he is called to account for the use of this
wonderful body which God has bestowed on him, he may not
be brought to shame by the thought that he has used it merely
for his own profit or his own pleasure, much less by the thought
that he has weakened and diseased it by misuse and neglect :
but comforted by the thought that he has done with it what the
Lord Jesus did with his body — made it the useful servant, and
not the brutal master, of his immortal soul.
And he will do that, I believe, just as far as he keeps in mind
what a wonderful and useful thing his body is; what a perpetual
token and witness to him of the unspeakable greatness and
wisdom of God ; just in proportion as he says day by day, with

230 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
the Psalmist, ' Thou hast fashioned me behind and before, and
laid thine hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful
and excellent for me ; I cannot attain unto it. Whither shall
I go, then, from thy Spirit; or whither shall I go from thy
presence? If I climb up into heaven, thou art there. If I
go down to hell, thou art there also. If I take the wings of
the morning, and remain in the uttermost parts of the sea,
even there also shall thy hand lead me, thy right hand shall
hold me.' —
Just in proportion as he recollects that, will he utter from
his heart the prayer which follows, ' Try me, O God, and seek ,
the ground of my heart ; prove me, and examine my thoughts.
Look well if there be any way of wickedness in me, and lead
me in the way everlasting.'

SERMON VII.
THE VICTORY OF FAITH.
{First Sunday after Easter!)

i John v. 4, 5.
Whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world : and this is the victory
which overcometh the world, even our faith. Who is he that overcometh
the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?
"\ \ 7"HAT is the meaning of 'overcoming the world?' What
is there about the world which we have to overcome ?
lest it should overcome us, and make worse men of us than we
ought to be. Let us think awhile.
1. In the world all seems full of chance and change. One
man rises, and another falls, one hardly knows why : they hardly
know themselves. A very slight accident may turn the future
of a maris whole life, perhaps of a whole nation. Chance and
change — there seems to us, at times, to be little else than
chance and change. Is not the world full of chance? Are
not people daily crushed in railways, burnt to death, shot with
their own guns, poisoned by mistake, without any reason that
we can see, why one should be taken, and another left ? Why
should not an accident happen to us, as well as to others ? Why
should not we have the thing we love best snatched from us
this day? Why not, indeed? What, then, will help us to
overcome the fear of chances and accidents ? How shall we

232 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
keep from being fearful, fretful, full of melancholy forebodings !
Where shall we find something abiding and eternal, a refuge
sure and steadfast, in which we may trust, amid all the chances
and changes of this mortal life ? St. John tells us — In that
within you which is born of God.
2. In the world so much seems to go by fixed law and rule.
That is even more terrible to our minds and hearts — to find that
all around us, in the pettiest matters of life, there are laws and
rules ready made for us, which we cannot break ; laws of trade;
laws of prosperity and adversity ; laws of health and sickness ;
laws of weather and storms ; laws by which not merely we, but
whole nations, grow, and decay, and die. — All around us, laws,
iron laws, which we do not mr.ke, and which we dare not try to
break, lest they go on their way, and grind us to powder.
Then comes the awful question, Are we at the mercy of these
laws ? Is the world a great machine, which goes grinding on
its own way without any mercy to us or to anything ; and are
we each of us parts of the machine, and forced of necessity to
do all we do ? Is it true, that our fate is fixed for us from the
cradle to the grave, and perhaps beyond the grave? How shall
we prevent the world from overcoming us in this ? How shall
we escape the temptation to sit down and fold our hands in
sloth and despair, crying, What we are, we must be ; and what
will come, must come ; whether it be for our happiness or
misery, our life or death ? Where shall we find something to
trust in, something to give us confidence and hope that we can
mend ourselves, that self-improvement is of use, that working is
of use, that prudence is of use, for God will reward every man
according to his work ? St. John tells us — In that within you
which is born of God.
3. Then, again, in the world how much seems to go by
selfishness. Let every man take care of himself, help himself,
fight for himself against all around him, seems to be the way of
the world, and the only way to get on in the world. But is it
really to be so ? Are we to thrive only by thinking of our-

VII.] THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 233
selves ? Something in our hearts tells us, No. Something in
our hearts tells us that this would be a very miserable world if
every man shifted for himself; and that even if we got this
world's good things by selfishness, they would not be worth
having after all, if we had no one but ourselves to enjoy them
with. What is that ? St. John answers — That in you which is
born of God. It will enable you to overcome the world's
deceits, and to see that selfishness is not the way to prosper.
4. Once, again ; in the world how much seems to go by mere
custom and fashion. Because one person does a thing right or
wrong, everybody round fancies himself bound to do likewise.
Because one man thinks a thing, hundreds and thousands begin
to think the same from mere hearsay, without examining and
judging for themselves. There is no silliness, no cruelty, no
crime into which people have not fallen, and may still fall, for
mere fashion's sake, from blindly following the example of those
round him. ' Everybody does so ; and I must. Why should
I be singular ? ' Or, ' Everybody does so ; what harm can
there be in my doing so ? '
But there is something in each of us which tells us that that
is not right ; that each man should act according to his own
conscience, and not blindly follow his neighbour, not knowing
whither, like sheep over a hedge ; that a man is directly
responsible at first for his own conduct to God, and that ' my
neighbours did so ' will be no excuse in God's sight. What is
it which tells us this ? St. John answers, That in you which is
born of God ; and it, if you will listen to it, will enable you to
overcome the world's deceit, and its vain fashions, and foolish
hearsays, and blind party-cries ; and not to follow after a multi
tude to do evil.
What, then, is this thing ? St. John tells us that it is born of
God; and that it is our faith. Faith will enable us to overcome
the world. We shall overcome by believing and trusting in
something which we do not see. But in what ? Are we to
believe and trust that we are going to heaven ? St. John does

234 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
not say so ; he was far too wise, my friends, to say so : for a
man's trusting that he is going to heaven, if that is all the faith
he has, is more likely to make the world overcome him, than
him overcome the world. For it will make him but too ready
to say, ' If I am sure to be saved after I die, it matters not so
very much what I do before I die. I may follow the way of
the world here, in money-making and meanness, and selfish
ness ; and then die in peace, and go to heaven after all.'
This is no fancy. There are hundreds, nay thousands, I
fear, in England now, who let the world and its wicked ways
utterly overcome them, just because their faith is a faith in their
own salvation, and not the faith of which St. John speaks —
Believing that Jesus is the Son of God.
But some may ask, ' How will believing that Jesus is the
Son of God help us more than believing the other ? For, after
all, we do believe it. We all believe that Jesus is the Son of
God : but as for overcoming the world, we dare not say too
much of that. We fear we are letting the world overcome us ;
we are living too much in continual fear of the chances and
changes of this mortal life. We are letting things go too much
their own way. We are trying too much each to get what he
can by his own selfish wits, without considering his neighbours.
We are following too much the ways and fashions of the day,
and doing and saying and thinking anything that comes upper
most, just because others do so round us.'
Is it so, my friends ? But do you really believe that Jesus
is the Son of God ? For sure I am, that if you did, and I did,
really and fully believe that, we could all lead much better
lives than we are leading, manful and godly, useful and
honourable, truly independent and yet truly humble; fearing
God and fearing nothing else. But do you believe it ? Have
you ever thought of all that those great words mean, ' Jesus is
the Son of God ' ? — That he who died on the cross, and rose
again for us, now sits at God's right hand, having all power
given to him in heaven and earth ? For, think, if we really

vii.] THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 235,
believed that, what power it would give us to overcome the
world, and all its chances and changes ; all its seemingly iron
laws ; all its selfish struggling ; all its hearsays and fashions.
1. Those chances and changes of mortal life of which I
spoke first. We should not be afraid of them, then, even if
they came. For we should believe that they were not chances
and changes at all, but the loving providence of our Lord and
Saviour, a man of the substance of his mother, born in the
world, who therefore can be touched with a feeling of our
infirmities, and knows our necessities before we ask, and our
ignorance in asking, and orders all things for good to those
who love him, and desire to copy his likeness.
2. Those stern laws and rules by which the world moves,.
and will move as long as it lasts — we should not be afraid of
them either, as if we were mere parts of a machine forced by
fate to do this thing and that, without a will of our own. For
we should believe that these laws were the laws of the Lord
Jesus Christ ; that he had ordained them for the good of man,
of man whom he so loved that he poured out his most precious
blood upon the cross for us ; and therefore we should not fear
them ; we should only wish to learn them, that we might obey
them, sure that they are the laws of life; of health and wealth,
peace and safety, honour and glory in this world and in the
world to come ; and we should thank God whenever men of
science, philosophers, clergymen, or any persons whatsoever,.
found out more of the laws of that good God, in whom we and
all created things live and move and have our being.
3. If we believe really that Jesus was the Son of God, we
should never believe that selfishness was to be the rule of our
lives. One sight of Christ upon his cross would tell us that
not selfishness, but love, was the likeness of God, that not
selfishness, but love, which gives up all that it may do good,.
was the path to honour and glory, happiness and peace.
4. If we really believe this, we should never believe that:
custom and fashion ought to rule us. For we should live by

236 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
the example of some one else : but by the example of only one
— of Jesus himself. We should set him before us as the rule
of all our actions, and try to keep our conscience pure, not
merely in the sight of men who may mistake, and do mistake,
but in the sight of Jesus, the Word of God, who pierces the
very thoughts and intents of the heart; and we should say
daily with St. Paul, ' It is a small thing for me to be judged
by you, or any man's judgment, for he that judges me is the
Lord.' And so we should overcome the world. Our hearts and
spirits would rise above the false shows of things, to God who
has made all things ; above fear and melancholy ; above
laziness and despair; above selfishness and covetousness;
above custom and fashion; up to the everlasting truth and
order, which is the mind of God; that so we might live joyfully
and freely in the faith and trust that Christ is our king, Christ
is our Saviour, Christ is our example, Christ is our judge ; and
that as long as we are loyal to him, all will be well with us in
this world, and in all worlds to come. — Amen.

SERMON VIII.
TURNING-POINTS.

Luke xix. 41, 42.
And when Jesus was come near, he beheld the city, and wept over it,
saying, If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the
things which belong unto thy peace 1 but now they are hid from thine
eyes.
A /I Y dear friends, here is a solemn lesson to be learnt from
this text. What is true of whole nations, and of whole
churches, is very often true of single persons — of each of us.
To most men — to all baptized Christian men, perhaps —
there comes a day of visitation, a crisis, or turning-point in our
lives. A day when Christ sets before us, as he did to those '
Jews, good and evil, light and darkness, right and wrong, and
says, Choose ! Choose at once, and choose for ever ; for by
what you choose this day, by that you must abide till death.
If you make a mistake now, you will rue it to the last. If you
take the downward road now, you will fall lower and lower upon
it henceforth. If you shut your eyes now to the things which
belong to your peace, they will be hid from your eyes for ever ;
and nothing but darkness, ignorance, and confusion will be
before you henceforth.
What will become of the man's soul after he dies, I cannot
say. Christ is his judge, and not I. He may be saved, yet

238 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
•so as by fire, as St. Paul says. Repentance is open to all men,
and forgiveness for those who repent. But from that day, if he
chooses wrongly, true repentance will grow harder and harder
to him — perhaps impossible at last. He has made his bed,
and he must lie on it. He has chosen the evil, and refused
the good ; and now the evil must go on getting more and
more power over him. He has sold his soul, and now he must
pay the price. Again, I say, he may be saved at last. Who
am I, to say that God's mercy is not boundless, when the
Bible says it is ? But one may well say of that man, ' God
help him,' for he will not be able to help himself henceforth.
It is an awful thing, my friends, to think that we may fix our
own fate in this world, perhaps in the world to come, by one
act of wilful folly or sin : but so it is. Just as a man may do
one tricky thing about money, which will force him to do
another to hide it, and another after that, till he becomes a
confirmed rogue in spite of himself. Just as a man may run
into debt once, so that he never gets out of debt again ; just as
a man may take to drink once, and the bad habit grow on him
tilL'ne is a confirmed drunkard to his dying day. Just as a
v man may mix in bad company once, and so become entangled
as in a net, till he cannot escape his evil companions, and
lowers himself t» their level day by day, till he becomes as bad
as they. Just as a man may be unfaithful to his wife once, and
so blunt his conscience till he becomes a thorough profligate,
breaking her heart, and ruining his own soul. Just as — but
why should I go on, mentioning ugly examples, which we all
know too well, if we will open our own eyes and see the world
and mankind as they are ? I will say no more, lest I should
set you on judging other people, and saying, ' There is no hope
for them. They are lost.' No ; let us rather judge ourselves,
as any man can, and will, who dares face fact, and look steadily
at what he is, and what he might become. Do we not know
that we could, any one of us, sell our own souls, once and for
all, if we choose ? I know that I could. I know that there

vm.] TURNING-POINTS. 239
are things which I might do, which if I did from that moment
forth, I should have no hope, but only a fearful looking for
ward to judgment and fiery indignation. And have you never
felt, when you were tempted to do wrong : ' I dare not do it
for my own sake ; for if I did this one wickedness, I feel sure
that I never should be an honest man again ? ' If you have
felt that, thank God, indeed; for then you have seen the
things which belong to your peace ; you have known the day
of your visitation ; and you will be a better man as long as you
live, for having fought against that one temptation, and
chosen the good, and refused the evil, when God put them
unmistakeably before you.
No ; the real danger is, lest a man should be as those Jews,
and not know the day of his visitation. Ah, that is ruinous
indeed, when a man's eyes are blinded as those Jews' eyes
were ; when a great temptation comes on him, and he thinks it
no temptation at all ; when hell is opening beneath him, with
the devils trying to pluck him down, and heaven opening above
him, with God's saints and martyrs beckoning him up, looking
with eyes of unutterable pity and anxiety and love on a poor
soul; and that poor soul sees neither heaven nor hell, nor
anything but his own selfish interest, selfish pleasure, or selfish
pride, and snaps at the devil's bait as easily as a silly fish;
while the devil, instead of striking to frighten him, lets him
play with the bait, and gorge it in peace, fancying that he is
well off, when really he is fast hooked for ever, led captive
thenceforth from bad to worse by the snare of the devil. Oh
miserable blindness, which comes over men sometimes, and
keeps them asleep at the very moment that they ought to be
most wide awake !
And what throws men into that sleep ? What makes them do
in one minute something which curses all their lives afterwards?
Love of pleasure ? Yes : that is a common curse enough, as
we all know. But a worse snare than even that is pride and
self-conceit. That was what ruined those old Jews. That was

240 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.

what blinded their eyes. They had made up their minds that
they saw ; therefore they were blind : that they could not go
wrong ; therefore they went utterly and horribly wrong thence
forth : that they alone of all people knew and kept God's law ;
therefore they cmcified the Son of God himself for fulfilling
their law. They were taken unawares, because they were
asleep in vain security.
And so with us. By conceit and carelessness, we may ruin
ourselves in a moment, once and for all. When a man has
made up his mind that he is quite worldly-wise ; that no one
can take him in ; that he thoroughly understands his own
interest; then is that man ripe and ready to commit some enor
mous folly, which may bring him to ruin.
When a man has made up his mind that he knows all
doctrines, and is fully instructed in religion, and can afford to
look down on all who differ from him ; then is that man ripe
and ready for doing something plainly wrong and wicked, which
will blunt his conscience from that day forth, and teach him to
call evil good, and good evil more and more; till, in the midst
of all his fine religious professions, he knows not plain right
from plain wrong — full of the form of godliness, but denying
the power of it in scandal of his every-day life.
Yes, my friends, our only safeguard is humility. Be not
high-minded, but fear. Avoid every appearance of evil.
Believe that in every temptation heaven and hell may be at
stake : and that the only way to be safe is to do nothing wilfully
wrong at all, for you never know how far downward one wilful
sin may lead you. The devil is not simple enough to let you
see the bottom of his pitfall : but it is so deep, nevertheless,
that he who falls in, may never get out again.
And do not say in your hearts about this thing and that,
' Well, it is wrong : but it is such a little matter.' A little
draught may give a great cold; and a great cold grow to a
deadly decline. A little sin may grow to a great bad habit; and
a great bad habit may kill both body and soul in hell. A little

viii.] TURNING-POINTS. 24 1
bait may take a great fish; and the devil fishes with a very fine
line, and is not going to let you see his hook. The only way
to be safe is to avoid all appearance of evil, lest when you
fancy yourself most completely your own master, you find your
self the slave of sin.
Oh, may God give us all the spirit of watchfulness and godly
fear ! Of watchfulness, lest sin overtake us unawares; and of
godly fear, that we may have strength to say with Joseph, ' How
can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God ? ' Of
watchfulness, too, not only against sin, but for God; of godly
fear, not only fear of God's anger, but fear of God's love.
Do you ask what I mean? This, my friends; that as we
cannot tell at any moment what danger may be coming on us,
so we cannot tell at any moment what blessing from God may
be coming on us. Those Jews, in the day of their visitation,
were blind, and they rejected Christ : but recollect, that it was
Christ whom they rejected; that Christ was there, not in anger,
but in love; not to judge, but to save; that the power of the
Lord was present, not to destroy, but to heal them. They
would have none of him. True ; but they might have had him
if they had chosen. They denied him ; but he could not deny
himself. He was there to teach and to save, as he comes to
teach and to save every man.
Therefore, I say, be watchful. Believe that Christ is looking
for you always, and expect to meet him at any moment. I do
not mean in visible form, in vision or apparition. No. He
comes, not by observation, that a man may say, ' Lo, here; and
lo, there ; ' but he comes within you, to your hearts, with the
still, small voice, which softens a man and sobers him for a
moment, and makes him yearn after good, and say in his heart,
' Ah, that I were as when I was a child upon my mother's
knee.' Oh ! listen to that softening, sobering voice. Through
very small things it may speak to you : but it is Christ himself
who speaks. Whenever your heart is softened to affection
toward parent, or child, or your fellowman, then Christ is
Q

242 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
speaking to you, and showing you the things which belong to
your peace. Whenever the feeling of justice, and righteous
horror of all meanness rises strong in you, then Christ is
speaking to you. Whenever your heart burns within you with
admiration of some noble action, then Christ is speaking to you.
Whenever a chance word in sermons or in books touches your
conscience, and reproves you, then Christ is speaking to you.
Oh turn not a deaf ear to those instincts. They may be the
very turning-points of your lives. One such godly motion, one
such pure inspiration of the Spirit of God listened to humbly,
and obeyed heartily, may be the means of putting you into the
right path thenceforward, that you may go on and grow in
strength and wisdom, and favour with God and man ; till you
become again, in the world to come, what you were when you
were carried home from the baptismal font, a little child, pure
from all spot of sin.

SERMON IX.
OBADIAH.

i Kings, xviii. 3, 4.
And Ahab called Obadiah, which was the governor of his house. (Now
Obadiah feared the Lord greatly : for it was so, when Jezebel cut off the
prophets of the Lord, that Obadiah took an hundred prophets, and hid
them by fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread and water. )
'""THIS is the first and last time throughout the Bible, that we
-^ find this Obadiah mentioned. We find the same name
elsewhere, but not the same person. It is a common Jewish
name, Obadiah, and means, I believe, the servant of the Lord.
All we know of the man is contained in this chapter. We do
not read what became of him afterwards. He vanishes out of
the story as quickly as he came into it, and, as we go on through
the chapter and read of that grand judgment at Carmel between
Elijah and the priests of Baal, and the fire of God which came
down from heaven, to shew that the Lord was God, we forget
Obadiah, and care to hear of him no more.
And yet Obadiah was a great man in his day. He' was, it
seems, King Ahab's vizier, or prime minister ; the second man
in the country after the king ; and a prime minister in those
eastern kingdoms had, and has now, far greater power than he
has in a free country like this. Yes, Obadiah was a great man
in his day, I doubt not ; and people bowed before him when he

244 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.

went out, and looked up to him, in that lawless country, for life
or death, for ruin or prosperity. Their money, and their land,
their very lives might depend on his taking a liking toward
them, or a spite against them. And he had wealth, no doubt,
and his fair and great house there among the beautiful hills of
Samaria, ceiled with cedar and painted with vermilion, with its
olive groves and vineyards, and rich gardens full of gay flowers
and sweet spices, figs and peaches, and pomegranates, and all
the lovely vegetation which makes those Eastern gardens like
Paradise itself. And he had his great household of slaves, men-
servants and maidservants, guards and footmen, singing men
and singing women — perhaps a hundred souls and more eating
and drinking in his house day by day for many a year. A great
man ; full of wealth, and pomp, and power. We know that it must
have been so, because we know well in what luxury those great
men in the East lived. But where is it now ?
Where is it now ? Vanished and forgotten. Be not thou afraid,
though one be made rich, or if the glory of his house be
increased. For he shall carry nothing away with him when he
dieth ; neither shall his pomp follow him.
See— of all Obadiah's wealth and glory, the Bible does not
say one word. It is actually not worth mentioning. People
admired Obadiah, I doubt not, while he was alive ; envied him
too, tried to thrust him out of his place, slander him to King
Ahab, drive him out of favour, and step into his place, that they
might enjoy his wealth and his power instead of him. The fine
outside of Obadiah was what they saw, and coveted, and envied
— as we are tempted now to say in our hearts, ' Ah, if I 'was
rich like that man. Ah, if I could buy what I liked, go where
I liked, do what I liked, like that great Lord ! ' — and yet, that
is but the outside, the shell, the gay clothing, not the persons
themselves. The day must come, when they must put off all
that ; when nothing shall remain but themselves ; and they
themselves, naked as they were born, shall appear before the
judgment -seat of God.

IX.] OBADIAH. 245
And did Obadiah, then, carry away nothing with him when
he died ? Yes ; and yet again, No. His wealth and his power
he left behind him : but one thing he took with him into the
grave, better than all wealth and power ; and he keeps it now,
and will keep it for ever ; and that is, a good, and just, and
merciful action — concerning which it is written, ' Blessed are
the dead which die in the Lord ; for they rest from their labours,
and their works do follow them.' Yes, though a man's wealth
will not follow him beyond the grave, his works will ; and so
Obadiah's one good deed has followed him. ' He feared the
Lord greatly, and when Jezebel cut off the prophets of the Lord,
Obadiah took a hundred prophets, and hid them by fifty in a
cave, and fed them with bread and water.'
That has followed Obadiah ; for by it we know him, now two
thousand years and more after his death, here in a distant land
of the name of which he never heard. By that good deed he
lives. He lives in the pages of the Holy Bible ; he lives in our
minds and memories ; and more than all, by that good deed he
lives for ever in God's sight; he is rewarded for it, and the
happier for it, doubt it not, at this very moment, and will be the
happier for it for ever.
Oh blessed thought ! that there is something of which death
cannot rob us ! That when we have to leave this pleasant
world, wife and child, home and business, and all that has
grown up round us here on earth, till it has become like a part
of ourselves, yet still we are not destitute. We can turn round
on death and say — ' Though I die, yet canst thou not take .my
righteousness from me ! ' Blessed thought ! that we cannot do
a good deed, not even give a cup of cold water in Christ's
name, but what it shall rise again, like a guardian angel, to
smooth our death-bed pillow, and make our bed for us in our
sickness, and follow us into the next world, to bless us for ever
and ever !
And blessed thought, too, that what you do well and lovingly,
for God's sake, will bless you here in this world before you die !

246 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
Yes, my friends, in the dark day of sorrow and loneliness, and
fear and perplexity, you will find old good deeds, which you
perhaps have forgotten, coming to look after you, as it were,
and help you in the hour of need. Those whom you have
helped, will help you in return : and if they will not, God will ;
for he is not unrighteous, to forget any work and labour of love,
which you have showed for his name's sake, in ministering to
his saints. So found Obadiah in that sad day, when he met
Elijah. For he was in evil case that day, as were all souls, rich and
poor, throughout that hapless land. For three weary years, there
had been no drop of rain : the earth beneath their feet had been
like iron, and the heavens above them brass ; and Obadiah had
found poverty, want, and misery, come on him in the midst of
all his riches : he had seen his fair gardens wither, and his
olives and his vines burnt up with drought; — his cattle had
perished on the hills, and his servants, too, perhaps, in his
house. Perhaps his children at home were even then crying for
food and water, and crying in vain, in spite of all their father's
greatness. What was the use of wealth ? He could not eat gold, nor
drink jewels.. What was the use of his power? He could
not command the smallest cloud to rise up off the sea, and
pour down one drop of water to quench their thirst Yes,
Obadiah was in bitter misery that day, no doubt ; and all the
more, because he felt that all was God's judgment on the
people's sins. They had served Baalim and Ashtaroth, the
sun and moon and stars, and prayed to them for rain and
fruitful seasons, as if they were the rulers of the weather and
the soil, instead of serving the true God who made heaven and
earth, and all therein : and now God had judged them : he had
given his sentence and verdict about that matter, and told them,
by a sign which could not be mistaken, that he, and not the sun
and moon, was master of the sky and the sea, and the rain and
the soiL They had prayed to the sun and moon ; and this was

IX.1 OBADIAH.

247

the fruit of their prayers — that their prayers had not been heard:
but instead of rain and plenty, was drought and barrenness ; —
carcasses of cattle scattered over the pastures — every village
full of living skeletons, too weak to work (though what use in
working, when the ground would yield no crop?) — crawling
about, their tongues cleaving to the roof of their mouths, in vain
searching after a drop of water. Fearful and sickening sights
must Obadiah have seen that day, as he rode wearily on upon
his pitiful errand. And the thought of what a pitiful errand he
was going on, and what a pitiful king he served, must have
made him all the more miserable ; for, instead of turning and
repenting, and going back to the true God, which was the plain
and the only way of escaping out of that misery, that wretched
King Ahab seems to have cared for nothing but his horses.
We do not read that he tried to save one of his wretched
people alive. All his cry was, ' Go into the land, to all foun
tains of water and all brooks ; perhaps we shall find grass enough
to save the horses and mules alive : that we lose not all the
beasts.' The horses were what he cared for more than the
human beings, as many of those bad kings of Israel did. Moses
had expressly commanded them not to multiply horses to them
selves; but they persisted always in doing so, nevertheless.
And why ? Because they wanted horses to mount their guards ;
to keep up a strong force of cavalry and chariots, in order to
oppress the poor country people, whom they had brought down
to slavery, from having been free yeomen, as they were in the
days of Moses and Joshua. And what hope could he have for
his wretched country ? The people shewed no signs of coming
to their senses ; the king still less. His wicked Queen Jezebel
was as devoted as ever to her idols ; the false prophets of Baal
were four hundred and fifty men, and the prophets of the groves
(where the stars were worshipped) four hundred; and these
cheats contrived (as such false teachers generally do) to take
good care of themselves, and to eat at Jezebel's table, while all
the rest of the people were perishing. What could be before

248 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
the country, and him, too, but utter starvation, and hopeless
ruin ? And all this while his life was in the hands of a weak
and capricious tyrant, who might murder him any moment, and
of a wicked and spiteful queen, who certainly would murder
him, if she found out that he had helped and saved the prophets
of the Lord. Who so miserable as he? But on that day,
Obadiah found that his alms and prayers had gone up before
God, and were safe with God, and not to be forgotten for ever.
When he fell on his face before Elijah, in fear for his life, he
found that he was safe in God's hands ; that God would not
betray him or forsake him. Elijah promised him, with a solemn
oath, that he would keep his word with him ; he kept it, and
before many days were past, Obadiah had an answer to all his
prayers, and a relief from all his fears ; and the Lord sent a gra
cious rain on his inheritance, and refreshed it when it was weary.
Yes, my friends, though well-doing seems for a while not to
profit you, persevere : in due time you shall reap, if you faint
not. Though the Lord sometimes waits to be gracious, he
only waits, he does not forget ; and it is to be gracious that he
waits, not ungracious. Cast, therefore, thy bread upon the
waters, and thou shalt find it after many days. Give a portion
to seven, and also to eight, for thou knowest not what evil shall
be upon the earth. Do thy diligence to give of what thou hast;
for so gatherest thou thyself in the day of necessity, in which,
with what measure you have measured to others, God will
measure to you again.
This is true, for the Scripture says so ; this must be true, for
reason and conscience — the voice of God within us — tell us
that God is just ; that God must be true, though every man be
a liar. ' Hear,5 says our Lord, ' what the unjust judge says :
And shall not God (the just judge), avenge his own elect, who
cry day and night to him, though he bear long with them ? '
Yes, my friends, God's promise stands sure, now and for ever.
' Trust in the Lord, and do good ; so shalt thou dwell in the
land, and verily thou shalt be fed.' J

IX.] OBADIAH. 249

But now comes in a doubt — and it ought to come in — What
are our works at best ? What have we which is fit to offer to
God ? Full of selfishness, vanity, self-conceit, the best of them ;
and not half done either. What have we ever done right, but
what we might have done more rightly, and done more of it,
also ? Bad in quality our good works are, and bad in quantity,
too. How shall we have courage to carry them in our hand to
that God who charges his very angels with folly ; and the very
heavens are not clean in his sight ?
Too true, if we had to offer our own works to God. But,
thanks be to his holy name, we have not to offer them our
selves; for there is one who offers them for us — Jesus Christ
the Lord. He it is who takes these imperfect, clumsy works of
ours, all soiled and stained with our sin and selfishness, and
washes them clean in his most precious blood, which was shed
to take away the sin of the world : he it is who, in some
wonderful and unspeakable way, cleanses our works from sin,
by the merit of his death and sufferings, so that nothing may be
left in them but what is the fruit of God's own spirit; and that
God may see in them only the good which he himself put into
them, and not the stains and soils which they get from our
foolish and sinful hearts.
Oh, my friends, bear this in mind. Whensoever you do a
thing which you know to be right and good, instead of pridirig
yourself on it, as if the good in it came from you, offer it up to
the Lord Jesus Christ, and to your Heavenly Father, from
whom all good things come, and say, ' Oh Lord, the good in
this is thine, and not mine ; the bad in it is mine, and not
thine. I thank thee for having made me do right, for without
thy help I should have done nothing but wrong ; for mine is
the laziness, and the weakness, and the selfishness, and the
self-conceit; and thine is the kingdom, for thou rulest all
things; and the power, for thou doest all things; and the glory,
for thou doest all things well, for ever and ever. Amen.'

SERMON X.

RELIGIOUS DANGERS.
(Preached at the Chapel Royal, Whitehall, 1861, for the London Diocesan
Board of Education. )

St. Mark viii. 4, 5, 8.
And the disciples answered him, From whence can a man satisfy these men
with bread here in the wilderness ? . . . How many loaves have ye ?
And they said, Seven. ... so they did eat and were filled ; and they
took up of the broken meat that was left seven baskets.
T THINK that I can take no better text for the subject on
which I am about to preach, than that which the Gospel
for this day gives me.
For is not such a great city as this London, at least in its
present amorphous, unorganised state, having grown up, and
growing still, any how and any whither, by the accidental neces
sities of private commerce, private speculation, private luxury
— is it not, I say, literally a wilderness ?
I do not mean a wilderness in the sense of a place of want
and misery; on the contrary, it is a place of plenty and of
comfort. I think that we clergymen, and those good people
who help our labours, are too apt exclusively to forget
London labour, in our first and necessary attention to the
London poor; to fix our eyes and minds on London want
and misery, till we almost ignore the fact of London

RELIGIOUS DANGERS.

251

wealth and comfort. We must remember, if we are to be
just to God, and just to our great nation, that there is
not only more wealth in London, but that that wealth is
more equitably and generally diffused through all classes,
from the highest to the lowest, than ever has been the case
in any city in the world. We must remember that there is
collected together here a greater number of free human beings
than were ever settled on the same space of earth, earning an
honest, independent, and sufficient livelihood, and enjoying the
fruits of their labour in health and cheapness, freedom and
security, such as the world never saw before. There is want
and misery. I know it too well. There are great confusions
to be organised, great anomalies to be suppressed. But re
member, that if want and misery, confusion and anomaly were
the rule of London, and not (as they are) the exception, then
London, instead of increasing at its present extraordinary pace;
would decay ; London work, instead of being better and better
done, would be worse and worse done, till it stopped short in
some such fearful convulsion as that of Paris in 1793. No, my
friends ; compare London with any city on the Continent ;
compare her with the old Greek and Roman cities ; with Alex
andria, Antioch, Constantinople, with that Imperial Rome itself,
which was like London in nothing but its size, and then thank
God for England, for freedom, and for the Church of Christ.
And yet I have called London a wilderness. I have. There
is a wilderness of want ; but there is a wilderness of wealth
likewise. And the latter is far more dangerous to human
nature than the former one. It is not in the waste and howling
wilderness of rock, and sand and shingle, with its scanty acacia
copses, and groups of date trees round the lonely well, that
nature shews herself too strong for man, and crushes him down
to the likeness of the ape. There the wild Arab, struggling to
exist, and yet not finding the struggle altogether too hard for
him, can gain and keep, if not spiritual life, virtue and godliness,
yet still something of manhood ; something of —

252 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
The reason firm, the temperate will,
Endurance, foresight, thought, and skill.
No ; if you would see how low man can fall, you must go to the
tropic jungle, where geniality of climate, plenty and variety of
food, are in themselves a cause of degradation to the soul, as
long as the Spirit of Christ is absent from it. Not in the barren
desert, but in the rich forest, wanders the true savage, eating
and eating all day long, like the ape in the trees above his
head; and (I had almost said), like the ape, too, with no
thoughts save what his pampered senses can suggest. I had
almost said it. Thank God, I dare not say it altogether ; for,
after all, the savage is a man, and not an ape. Yes, to the
lowest savage in the forests of the Amazon, comes a hunger of
the soul, and whispers from the unseen world, to remind him
of what he might have been, and still may be. In the dreams
of the night they come ; in vague terrors of the unseen, vague
feelings of guilt and shame, vague dread of the powers of
nature ; driving him to unmeaning ceremonies, to superstitious
panics, to horrible and bloody rites — as they might drive,
to-morrow, my friends, an outwardly civilized population,
debauched by mere peace and plenty, entangled and imprisoned
in the wilderness of a great city.
I can imagine — imagine? — Have we not seen again and
again human souls so entangled and opprest by this vast
labyrinth of brick and mortar, as never to care to stir outside
it and expand their souls with the sight of God's works as long
as their brute wants are supplied, just as the savage never cares
to leave his accustomed forest haunt, and hew himself a path
into the open air through the tangled underwood. I can
imagine — nay, have we not seen that, too ? — and can we not
see it any day in the street? — human souls so dazzled and
stupefied, instead of- being quickened, by the numberless
objects of skill and beauty, which they see in their walks
through the streets, that they care no more for the wonders of
maris making, than the savage does for the wonders of God's

x.] RELIGIOUS DANGERS. 253

making, which he sees around him in every insect, bird, and
flower. The man who walks the streets every day, is the very
man who will see least in the streets. The man who works in
a factory, repeating a thousand times a day some one dull
mechanical operation, or even casting up day after day the
accounts of it, is the man who will think least of the real
wonderfulness of that factory; of the amount of prudence,
skill, and science, which it expresses ; of its real value to him
self and to his class ; of its usefulness to far nations beyond the
seas. He is like a savage who looks up at some glorious tree,
capable, in the hands of civilized man, of a hundred uses, and
teeming to him with a hundred scientific facts ; and thinks all
the while of nothing but his chance of finding a few grubs
beneath its bark.
Think over, I beseech you, this fact of the stupefying effect
of mere material civilization ; and remember that plenty and
comfort do not diminish but increase that stupefaction ; that
Hebrew prophets knew it, and have told us, again and again,
that, by fulness of bread the heart waxeth gross ; that Greek
sages knew it, and have told us, again and again, that need,
and not satiety, was the quickener of the human intellect.
Believe that man requires another bread than the bread of the
body; that sometimes the want of the bodily bread will
awaken the hunger for that bread of the soul. Bear in mind
that the period during which the middle and lower classes of
England were most brutalized, was that of their greatest
material prosperity, the latter half of the eighteenth century.
Remember that with the distress which came upon them, at
the end of the French war, their spiritual hunger awakened —
often in forms diseased enough : but growing healthier, as well
as keener, year by year; and that if they are not brutalized
once more by their present unexampled prosperity, it will be
mainly owing to the spiritual life which was awakened in those
sad and terrible years. Remember that the present careless
ness of the masses about either religious or political agitation.

254 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
though it may be a very comfortable sign to those who believe
that a man's life consists in the abundance of the things which
he possesses, is a very ominous sign to some who study history,
and to some also who study their Bibles : and ask yourselves
earnestly the question, ' From where shall a man find food for
these men in this wilderness, not of want, but of wealth?'
For, believe me, that spiritual hunger, though stopped awhile
by physical comfort, will surely reawaken. Any severe and
sudden depression in trade — the stoppage of the cotton crop,
for instance, will awaken in the minds of hundreds of thousands
deep questions — for which we, if we are wise, shall have an
¦explicit answer ready.
For it is a very serious moment, my friends, when large
masses have had enough to eat and drink, and have been say
ing, ' Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die ; ' and then,
suddenly, by not having enough to eat and drink, and yet
finding themselves still alive, are awakened to the sense that
there is more in them than the mere capacity for eating and
drinking. Then begin once more the world-old questions,
Why are we thus ? Who put us here ? Who made us ? God ?
Is there a God? and if there be, what is he like ? What is his
will toward us, good or evil ? Is it hate or love ?
My friends', those are questions which have been asked often
•enough in the world's history, by vast masses at once. And
they may be answered in more ways than one.
They may be answered as the weavers of a certain country
(thank God, not England) answered them in the potato famine
with their mad song, " We looked to the earth, and the earth
deceived us. We looked to the kings, and the kings deceived
us. We looked to God, and God deceived us. Let us lie
-down and die.'
Or they may answer them — they will be more likely to
answer them in England just now, because there are those who
will teach them so to answer — in another, but a scarcely less
terrible tone. ' Yes, there is a God ; and he is angry with us.

X.] RELIGIOUS DANGERS. 255

And why? Because there is something, or some one, in the
nation which he abhors — heretics, papists' — what not — any
man, or class of men, on whom cowardly and terrified
ignorance may happen to fix as a scapegoat, and cry,
' These are the guilty ! We have allowed these men, in
dulged them; the accursed thing is among us, therefore the
face of the Lord is turned from us. We will serve him truly
henceforth — and hate those whom he hates. We will be
orthodox henceforth — and prove our orthodoxy by persecuting
the heretic'
Does this seem to you extravagant, impossible ? Remember,
my friends, that within the last century Lord George Gordon's
riots convulsed London. Can you give me any reason why
Lord George Gordon's riots cannot occur again ? Believe me,
the more you study history, the more you study human nature,
the more possible it will seem to you. It is not, I believe,
infidelity, but fanaticism, which England has to fear just now.
The infidelity of England is one of mere doubt and denial, a
scepticism ; which is in itself weak and self-destructive. The
infidelity of France in 1793 was strong enough, but just because
it was no scepticism, but a faith ; a positive creed concerning
human reason, and the rights of man, which men could
formulize, and believe in, and fight for, and persecute for, and,
if need was, die for. But no such exists in England now.
And what we have most to fear in England under the pressure
of some sudden distress, is a superstitious panic, and the
wickedness which is certain to accompany that panic; mean
and unjust, cruel and abominable things, done in the name of
orthodoxy : though meanwhile, whether what the masses and
their spiritual demagogues will mean by orthodoxy, will be the
same that we and the Church of England mean thereby, is a
question which I leave for your most solemn consideration.
That, however, rather than any proclamation of the abstract
rights of man, or installations of a goddess of Reason, is the
form which spiritual hunger is most likely to take in England

2$6 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
now. Alas ! are there not tokens enough around us now,
whereby we may discern the signs of this time ?
I say, the spiritual hunger will reawaken ; and woe to us who
really understand and love the Church of England ; woe to us
who are really true to her principles, honestly subscribe her
formulas, if we cannot appease it in that day.
But wherewith ? We may look, my friends, appalled at the
danger and the need. We may cry to our Lord, ' From whence
can a man satisfy these men with bread in the wilderness?'
But his answer will be, as far as I dare to predict it, the same as
to his apostles of old on another and a similar occasion, ' Give
ye them to eat. They need not depart '
I am not going to draw any far-fetched analogy between the
miracle recorded in the gospel, and the subject on which I am
speaking. I am not going to put any mystical and mediseval
interpretation on the seven loaves, or the two small fishes.
I only ask you to accept the plain moral practical lesson which
the words convey. 
Use the means which you have already, however few and
weak they seem. If Christ be among you, as he is indeed, he
will bless them, and multiply them you know not how.
Use the means which you have ; though they may seem to
you inadequate, though they may seem to the world antiquated,
and decrepit, try them. They need not depart from us, these
masses, to seek spiritual food, they know not where, if we have
but faith. Let us give them what we have ; the organization of
the Church of England, and the teaching of the Church of
England. The organization of the Church. Not merely its Parochial
system, but its Diocesan system. In London, more than in any
part of England, the Diocesan system is valuable. A London
parish is not like a country one, a self-dependent, corporate
body, made up of residents of every rank, capable of providing
for the physical and spiritual wants of its own stationary
population. In London, population fluctuates rapidly, some-

x.] RELIGIOUS DANGERS. 257
times rolling away from one quarter, always developing itself in
fresh quarters ; in London all ranks do not dwell side by side
within sight and sound of each other : but the rich and the poor,
the employed and the unemployed, dwell apart, work apart, and
are but too often out of sight, out of mind. These, and many
other reasons, make it impossible for the mere parochial system
to bring out the zeal and the liberality of London Churchmen.
If they are to realize their unity and their strength, they must do
so not as members of a Parish, but of a Diocese ; their Bishop
must be to them the sign that they are one body ; their good
works must be organized more and more under him, and round
him. This is no new theory of mine ; it is a historic law. The
Priest for the village, the Bishop for the city, has been the
natural and necessary organization of the Church in every age ;
and it was in strict accordance with this historic law, that the
London Diocesan Board of Education was founded in 1846,
not to override the parochial system, but to do for it what it
cannot, in a great city, do for itself; to establish elementary
schools (and now I am happy to say, evening schools also) in
parishes which were too poor to furnish them for themselves.
I, as the son of a London Rector, can bear my testimony to the
excellent working of that Board; and it is with grief I hear that,
in spite of the vast work which it has done since 1846, and
which it is still doing, on an income which is now not ^300 a
year — proving thereby how cheaply and easily your work may
be done when it is done in the right way — it is with grief, I say,
that I hear that it is more and more neglected by the religious
public. With grief : but not with surprise. For the religious public,
even the Church portion of it, has of late been more and
more inclined to undervalue the organization and the teaching
of the Church of England, and to supply its place with
nostrums, borrowed from those denominations who disagree
with the Church, alike in their doctrines of what man should
be, and of what God is. How have their energies, their zeal,
R

258 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.

their money (for zealous they are, and generous too) been
frittered away ! But I will not particularize, lest I hurt the
feelings of better people than myself, by holding up their good
works to the ridicule of those who do us no good works at all.
But I entreat them to look at their own work ; to look at the
vastness of its expense, compared with the smallness of its
results ; and then to ask themselves, whether the one cause of
their failure — for failures I must call too many of the religious
movements of this day, in spite of their own loud self-laudations
— whether, I say, one cause of these failures may not be, that
the religious world is throwing itself into anything and every
thing novel and exciting, rather than into the simple and
unobstrusive work of teaching little children their Catechism,
that they may go home as angels of God and missionaries of
Christ, teaching their parents in turn as they have been taught
themselves, and so awakening that sacred family life, without
which there can be no sound Christianity. I know well that
there has been much work done in the right direction ; but
when I look at the ugly fact, that the population of London is
increasing far faster than its schools; that in 25 of the poorest
parishes thereof there are now nearly 60,000 children who go to
no school at all; and that' the proportion of scholars to the
population is lower in Middlesex than in almost any county in
England, while the proportion of crime is highest; I cannot but
sigh over the thousands which I see squandered yearly on rash
novelties by really pious and generous souls, and cry, Ah, that
one-fourth, one-tenth of it all had been spent in the plain work
of helping elementary schools ; I cannot but call on all London
churchmen of the plain old school, to stand by the organization
and the doctrines of the Church to which they belong ; to rally
in this matter round their bishop ; and work for him, and with
him. And now, there may be some here who will ask, scorn
fully enough, And do you talk of nostrums? and then, after
confessing that the masses are hungering for the bread of

x.] RELIGIOUS DANGERS. 259
life, offer them nothing but your own nostrum, the Cate
chism ?
Yes, my friends, I do. I know that the Church Catechism
is not the bread of life. Neither, I beg you to remember, is
any other Catechism, or doctrine, or tract, or sermon, or book
, or anything else whatsoever. Christ is the Bread of Life. But
how shall they know Christ, unless they be taught what Christ
is ; and how can they be taught what Christ is, unless, the con
ception of him which is offered them be true ?
And, I say, that the Catechism does give a true conception
of Christ; and more; a far truer one — I had almost said, an
infinitely truer — than any which I have yet seen in these realms :
that from the Catechism a child may learn who God is, who
Christ is, who he himself is, what are his relation and duty to
God, what are his relation and duty to his neighbours, to his
country, and to the whole human race, far better than from any
document of the kind of which I am aware.
I know well the substitutes for the Catechism which are
becoming more and more fashionable; the limitations, the
explainings away, the non-natural and dishonest interpretations,
which are more and more applied to it when it is used ;
and I warn you, that those substitutes for, and those deface
ments of, the Catechism, will be no barrier against an outburst
of fanaticism, did one arise ; nay, that many of them would
directly excite it; and prove, when too late, that instead of
feeding the masses with the bread of life, which should pre
serve them, soul and body, some persons had been feeding
them with poison, which had maddened them, soul and body.
But I see no such danger in the Catechism. I see in the Cate
chism ; in its freedom alike from sentimental horror and senti
mental raptures ; its freedom alike from slavish terror, and from
Pharisaic assurance; a guarantee that those who learn it will
learn something of that sound religion, sober, trusty, cheerful,
manful, which may be seen still, thank God, in country Church
folk of the good old school ; and which will, in the day of trial,

260 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
be proof against the phantoms of a diseased conscience, and
the ravings of spiritual demagogues.
And therefore I preach gladly for this institution ; therefore
I urge strongly its claims on you, whom I am bound to suppose
honest Churchmen, because the fact of its being a Diocesan
Board of Education is, at least in this diocese, a guarantee that
the schools which it supports will teach their children, honestly
and literally, the Catechism of the Church of England, which
may God preserve !
Not that I expect it to teach only that. I take for granted,
that that will be its primary object, the guarantee that all the
rest is well done : but I know that much more than that must
be done ; that much more will be done, even unintentionally.
For, shall I — I trust that I shall not — make a too fanciful
application of the last fact recorded of this great miracle, if I
bid you find in it a fresh source of hope in your work ?
' And they took up of the fragments which were left seven
baskets full.'
The plain historic fact is, that not only do the seven loaves
feed 4,000, but that what they leave, and are about to throw
away, far exceeds the original supply.
I believe the fact : I ask you to consider why it was recorded?
Surely, like all facts in the gospels, to teach us more of the
character of Christ, which (a fact too often forgotten in these
days) is the character of God. To teach us that he is an
utterly bountiful God. That as in him there is no weakness,
nor difficulty, so in him is no grudging, no parsimony. That
he is not only able, but willing, to give exceeding abundantly,
beyond all that we can ask or think. That there is a magnifi
cence in God and in God's workings, which ought to fill us with
boundless hope, if we are but fellow-workers with God.
You see that magnificence in the seeming prodigality of
nature; in the prodigality which creates a thousand beautiful ,
species of butterfly, where a single plain one would have
sufficed ; in the prodigality which creates a thousand acorns,

X.] RELIGIOUS DANGERS. 261
only one of which is destined to grow into an oak. Everywhere
in the kingdom of nature it shows itself; believe that it exists
as richly in the higher kingdom of grace. Yes. Believe, that
whenever you begin to work according to God's law and God's
will, let your means seem as inadequate as they may, not only
will your work multiply, as by miracle, under your hands ; but
the very fragments of it, which you are inclined to neglect and
overlook, will form in time a heap of unexpected treasure.
Plans which you have thrown aside, because they seemed to
fail, details which seemed to encumber you, accessory work
which formed no part of your original plan, all will be of use to
some one, somehow, somewhere.
You began, for instance, by wishing to educate the masses of
London ; you are educating over and above, indirectly, thou
sands who never saw London. You began by wishing to teach
them spiritual truth; you have been drawn on to give them
an excellent secular education besides. You intended to make
them live as good Christians here at home. But since you
began, the inter-penetration of town and country by railroads,
and the rush of emigrants to our colonies, have widened in
finitely the sphere of your influence ; and you are now teaching
them also to live as useful men in the farthest corners of these
isles, and in far lands beyond the seas, to become educated emi
grants, loyal colonists ; to raise, by their example, rude settlers,
and ruder savages; and so, the very fragments of your good work,
without your will or intent, will bless thousands of whom you
never heard, and help to sow the seeds of civilization and Chris
tianity, wherever the English flag commands Justice, and the
English Church preaches Love.

SERMON XI.
BLESSING AND CURSING.
(Preached at the Chapel Royal, Whitehall, Ash Wednesday, i860.)

Deuteronomy xxviii. 15.
It shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the Lord
thy God, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes which
I command thee this day; that all these curses shall come upon thee,
and overtake thee.
TV /T ANY good people are pained by the Commination Service
which we have just heard read. They dislike to listen to
it. They cannot say 'Amen' to its awful words. It seems to
them to curse men ; and their conscience forbids them to join in
curses. To imprecate evil on any living being seems to them
unchristian, barbarous, a relic of dark ages and dark super
stitions. But does the Commination Service curse men ? Are these
good people (who are certainly right in their horror of cursing)
right in the accusations which they bring against it ? Or have
they fallen into a mistake as to the meaning of the service,
owing, it may be supposed, to that carelessness about the exact
use of words, that want of accurate and critical habits of mind,
which is but too common among religous people at the present
day? I cannot but think that they mistake, when they say that the

BLESSING AND CURSING. 263
Commination Service curses men. For to curse a man, is to
pray and wish that God may become angry with him, and may
vent his anger on the man by punishing him. But I find.no
such prayer and wish in any word of the Commination Service.
Its form is not, 'Cursed be he that doeth such and such things,'
but ' Cursed is he that doeth them.'
Does this seem to you a small difference ? A fine-drawn
question of words? Is it, then, a small difference whether I say
to my fellow-man, I hope and pray that you may be stricken
with disease, or whether I say, You are stricken with disease,
whether you know it or not. I warn you of it, and I warn you
to go to the physician? For so great, and no less, is the
difference. And if any one shall say, that it is very probable that the
authors of the Liturgy were not conscious of this distinction ;
but that they meant by cursing what priests in most ages have
meant by it ; I must answer, that it is dealing them most hard
and unfair measure, to take for granted that they were as care
less about words as we are ; that they were (like some of us) so
ignorant of grammar as not to know the difference between the
indicative and the imperative mood ; and to assume this, in
order to make them say exactly what they do not say, and to
impute to them a ferocity of which no hint is given in their
Commination Service.
But some will say, Granted that the authors of the Commin
ation Service did not wish evil to sinners — granted that they did
not long to pray, with bell, book,, arid candle, that they might
be tormented for ever in Gehenna— granted that they did not
desire to burn their bodies on earth ; those words are still dark
and unchristian. They could only be written by men who
believed that God hates sinners, that his will is to destroy them
on earth, and torture them for ever after death.
We may impute, alas ! what motives and thoughts we choose,
in the face of our Lord's own words, Judge not, and ye shall
not be judged. But we -shall not be fair and honest in imputing,

264 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM
unless we first settle what these men meant, in the words which
they have actually written. What did they mean by 'cursed' is
the question. And that we can only answer by the context of
the Commination Service. And that again we can only answer
by seeing what it means in the Bible, which the Reformers
profess to follow in all their writings.
Now, what does the Bible mean by a curse, and cursing ? —
For we are bound to believe, in all fairness, that the Reformers
meant the same, and neither more nor less.
The text, I think, tells us plainly enough.
We know that its words came true. We know that the Jews
did perish out of their native land, as the Author of this book
foretold, in consequence of doing that against which Moses
warned them. We know also that they did not perish by any
miraculous intervention of Providence : but simply as any other
nation would have perished; by profligacy, internal weakness,
civil war, and, at last, by foreign conquest.
We know that their destruction was the natural consequence
of their own folly. Why are we to suppose that the prophet
meant anything but that ? He foretells the result. Why are
we to suppose that, he did not foresee the means by which that
result woulddrappen ? Why are we, in the name of all justice,
to impute to him an expectation of miraculous interferences,
about which he says no word ? The curse which he foretold
was the natural consequence of the sins of the nation. Why are
we not to believe that he considered it as such ? Why are we
not to believe that the Bible meaning of a curse, is simply the
natural ill-consequence of men's own ill-actions ? I believe that
if you will apply the same rule to other places of Scripture, you
will have reason to reverence the letter and the Spirit of
Scripture more and more, and will free your minds from many
a superstitious and magical fancy, which will prevent you alike
from understanding the Bible and the Commination Service.
The Book of Deuteronomy, like the rest of Moses' laws, says
nothing whatever about the life to come. It says, that sin is to

XI.] BLESSING AND CURSING. 265
be punished, and virtue rewarded, in this life ; and the Com
mination Service, when it quotes the Book of Deuteronomy,
means so, so I presume, likewise. Indeed, if we look at the
very remarkable, and most invaluable address which the Com
mination Service contains, we shall find its author saying the
same thing, in the very passages which are to some minds most
offensive. For even in this life the door of mercy may be shut, and we
may cry in vain for mercy, when it is the time for justice. This is
not merely a doctrine : it is a fact ; a common, patent fact.
Men do wrong, and escape, again and again, the just punish
ment of their deeds ; but how often there are cases in which a
man does not escape; when he is filled with the fruit of his own
devices, and left to the misery which he has earned ; when the
covetous and dishonest man ruins himself past all recovery ;
when the profligate is left in a shameful old age, with worn-out
body and defiled mind, to rot into an unhonoured grave ;
when the hypocrite who has tampered with his conscience is left
without any conscience at all.
They have chosen the curse, and the curse is come upon
them to the uttermost. So it is. Is the commination service
uncharitable, is the preacher uncharitable, when they tell men
so ? No more so, than the physician is uncharitable, when he
says, — ' If you go on misusing thus your lungs, or your digestion,
you will ruin them past all cure.' Is God to be blamed because
this is a fact ? Why then because the other is a fact likewise ?
Now if this be, as I believe, the doctrine of the commination
service ; if this be, as I believe, the message of Ash-Wednesday,
it is one which is quite free from superstition or cruelty : but it
is a message more disagreeable, and more terrible too, than any
magical imprecations of harm to the sinner could bring. More
disagreeable. For which is more galling to human pride, to be
told, — Sin is certainly a clever, and politic, and successful trade,
as far as this world is concerned. It is only in the next world,
or in the case of rare and peculiar visitations and judgments in

266 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
this world, that it will harm you ? Or to be told, — Sin is no
more clever, politic, or successful here, than hereafter. The
wrong-doing which looks to you so prudent is folly. You, man
of the world as you may think yourself, are simply, as often as
you do wrong, blind, ignorant, suicidal. You are your own
curse; your acts are their own curse. The injury to your own
character and spirit, the injury to your fellow-creatures, which
will again re-act on you, — these are the curses of God, which
you will feel some day too heavy to be borne. And which is
more terrible ? To tell a man, that God will judge and curse
him by unexpected afflictions, or at least by casting him into
Gehenna in the world to come : or to tell him, ' You are judged
already. The curse is on you already ? '
The first threat he may get rid of, by denying the fact; by
saying that God does not generally interfere to punish bad men
in this life ; that he does not strike them dead, swallow them
up ; and he may even quote Scripture on his side, and call on
Solomon to bear witness how as dieth the fool, so dieth the
wise man ; and that there is one event to the righteous and to
the wicked.
As for the fear of Gehenna, again, after he dies : that is too
dim and distant ; too unlike anything which he has seen in this
life (now that the tortures and Autos da fe of the middle age
have disappeared) to frighten him very severely, except in rare
moments, when his imagination is highly excited. And even
then, he can — in practice he does — look forward to ' making his
peace with God ' as it is called, at last, and fulfilling Baalam's
wish of dying the death of the righteous, after living the life of
the wicked. He knows well, too, that when that day comes, he
can find — alas ! that it should be so— priests and preachers in
plenty, of some communion or other, who will give him his
viaticum, and bid him depart in peace to that God, who has
said that there is no peace to the wicked.
But terrible, truly terrible and heart searching for the wrong
doer is the message— God does not curse thee : thou hast cursed

xi.] BLESSING AND CURSING. 267
thyself. God will not go out of his way to punish thee : thou
hast gone out of his way, and thereby thou art punishing thyself.
Just as, by abusing thy body, thou bringest a curse upon it ; so
by abusing thy soul. God does not break his laws to punish
drunkenness or gluttony. The laws themselves, the laws of
nature, the beneficent laws of life, nutrition, growth, and health,
they punish thee ; and kill by the very same means by which
they make alive. And so with thy soul, thy character, thy
humanity. God does not break his laws to punish its sins.
The laws themselves punish ; every fresh wrong deed, and
wrong thought, and wrong desire of thine sets thee more and
more out of tune with those immutable and eternal laws of the
Moral Universe, which have their root in the absolute and
necessary character of God himself. All things that he has
ordained; the laws of the human body, the laws of the human
soul, the laws of society, the laws of all heaven and earth are
arrayed against thee ; for thou hast arrayed thyself against them.
They have not excommunicated thee : thou hast, single-handed,
excommunicated thyself. In thine own self-will, thou hast set
thyself to try thy strength against God and his whole universe.
Dost thou fancy that he needs to interfere with the working of
that universe, to punish such a worm as thee ? No more than
the great mill engine need stop, and the overseer of it interfere
with the machinery, if the drunken or careless workman should
entangle himself among the wheels. The wheels move on, doing
their duty, spinning cloth for the use of man : but the workman
who should have worked with them, is entangled among them.
He is out of his place ; and slowly, but irresistibly, they are
grinding him to powder, as the whole universe is grinding thee.
Heart-searching, indeed, is such a message ; for it will come
home, not merely to that very rare character, the absolutely
wicked man, the ideal sinner, at whom the preacher too often aims
ideal arrows, which vanish in the air : not to him merely will it
come home, but to ourselves, to us average human beings, in
consistent, half-formed, struggling lamely and confusedly between

268 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. j
good and evil. Oh let us take home with us to-day this b>elief,
the only belief in this matter possible in an age of science, which
i3 daily revealing more and more that God is a God, not of dis
order, but of order. Let us take home, I say, the awful belief,
that every wrong act of ours does of itself sow the seeds of its
own punishment; and that those seeds will assuredly bear fruit,
now, here in this life. Let us believe that God's judgments,
though they will culminate, no doubt, hereafter in one great
day, and " one divine far-off event, to which the whole creation
moves," are yet about our path and about our bed, now, here, in
this life. Let us believe, that if we are to prepare to meet our
God, we must do it now, here in this life, yea and all day long ;
for he is not far off from any one of us, seeing that in him we
live, and move, and have our being ; and can never go from his
presence, never flee from his spirit. Let us believe that God's
good laws, and God's good order, are in themselves and of
themselves, the curse and punishment of every sin of ours ; and
that Ash- Wednesday, returning year after year, whether we be
glad or sorry, good or evil, bears witness to that most awful and
yet most blessed fact.
My friends, this is the preacher's Ash-Wednesday's message :
but, thanks be to God, it is not all. It is written — 'If thou,
Lord, wilt be extreme to mark what is done amiss : Oh Lord,
who may abide it ? For there is mercy with thee ; therefore
shalt thou be feared.'
It is written — ' On whomsoever this stone shall fall, it shall
grind him to powder:' but it is written too — 'Whosoever shall
fall on this stone shall be broken ; ' and again, 'The broken and
the contrite heart, O God, thou shall not despise.' There is such
a thing as pardon ; pardon full and free, for the sake of the pre
cious blood of Christ. Lent may be a time of awe and of shame :
but it is not a time of despair. Meanwhile remember this; that
God has set before you blessing and cursing, and that you may
turn your life and God's whole universe, as you will, either into
that blessing or into that curse.

SERMON XII.
WORK.
(Twenty-fourth Sunday after Trinity^

Proverbs xiv. 23.
In all labour there is profit.
T FEAR there are more lessons in the Book of Proverbs than
most of us care to learn. There is a lesson in every
verse of it, and a shrewd one. Certain I am, that for a
practical, business man, who has to do his duty and to make
his way in this world, there is no guide so safe as these same
Proverbs of Solomon. In this world, I say ; for they say little
about the world to come. Their doctrine is, that what is good
for the next world, is good for this ; that he who wishes to go
out of this world happily, must first go through this world
wisely ; and more, that he who wishes to go through this world
happily, must likewise go through it wisely.
The righteous, says Solomon, shall be recompensed in the
earth, and not merely at the end of judgment hereafter : much
more the wicked and the sinner.
That is the doctrine of the Proverbs ; that men do, to a very
great extent, earn for themselves their good or their evil
fortunes, and are filled with the fruit of their own devices ; and
it is that doctrine which makes them the best of text-books for
the practical man.

270 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
For the Proverbs do not look on religion as a thing to be
kept out of our daily dealings, and thought of only on Sundays :
they look on true religion, which is to obey God, as a thing
which mixes itself up with all the cares and business of this
mortal life, this work-day world; and, therefore, they are
written in work-day language ; in homely words taken from the
common doings of this mortal life, as our Lord's parables are.
And, like the most simple of those parables, the most simple of
the proverbs have often the very deepest meaning.
' In all labour there is profit.' Whatsoever is worth doing,
is worth doing well. It is always worth while to take pains.
In another proverb, homely enough — but if it be in the Bible,
it is not too homely for us — ' Where no oxen are, the crib is
clean,' Solomon says the same thing as in the text He says,
' Where no oxen are, the farmer is saved trouble ; the clearing
away of dirt and refuse ; and all the labour required to keep
his cattle in condition : but all that trouble,' Solomon says,
if a man will but undergo it, will repay itself; for much
increase is in the strength of the ox.' For the ox, in that
country, as in most parts of the world now, is the beast used
for ploughing, and for all the work of the farm.
Now, herein, I think, Solomon gives us a lesson which holds
good through* all matters of life. That it is a short-sighted
mistake to avoid taking trouble ; for God has so well ordered
this world, that industry will always repay itself. No doubt it
is much easier and pleasanter for the savage to scratch the
seed into the ground with some rude wooden tool, and sit
idle till the grain ripens : much easier and pleasanter, than to
breed and break in beasts, and to labour all the year round at
the different duties of a well-ordered farm : but here is the
mighty difference ; that the savage, growing only enough for
himself, is in continual danger of famine, he and all his tribe ;
while the civilized farmer, producing many times more than he
needs for himself, gains food, comfort, and safety, not only for
himself, but for many other human beings. The savage has an

xii.] WORK. 271
easy life enough, if that be any gain : but it is a life of poverty,
uncertainty, danger of starvation. The civilized man works
hard and heavily, using body and mind more in one month
than the savage does in the whole year : but he gains in
return a life of safety, comfort, and continually increasing
prosperity. This is Solomon's lesson : and be sure it holds good, not
only of tilling the ground, but of all other labours, all other
duties, to which God may call us. 'Whatsoever thy hand
findeth to do,' says Solomon, ' do it with all thy might.' God
has set thee thy work ; then fulfil it. Fill it full. Throw thy
whole heart and soul into it. Do it carefully, accurately, com
pletely. It will be better for thee, and for thy children after
thee. All neglect, carelessness, slurring over work, is a sin ; a
sin against God, who has called us to our work ; a sin against
our country and our neighbours, who ought to profit by our
work; and a sin against ourselves also, for we (as I shall
shew you soon) ought to be made wiser and better men by our
work. Oh, if there is one rule above another which I should like to
bring home to young men and women setting out in life, it is
this — Take pains. Take trouble. Whatever you do, do
thoroughly. Whatever you begin, finish. It may not seem to
be worth your while at the moment, to be so very painstaking,
so very exact. In after years, you will find that it was worth
your while ; that it has paid you, by training your character and
soul ; paid you, by giving you success in life ; paid you, by
giving you the respect and trust of your fellowmen; paid
you, by helping you towards a good conscience, and
enabling you in old age to look back, and ' say, I have
been of use upon the earth; I leave this world, according
to my small powers, somewhat better than I found it : instead
of having to look back, as too many have, upon opportunities
thrown away, plans never carried out, talents wasted, a whole
life a failure, for want of taking pains.

272 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
Why do I say these things to you? To persuade you to
work? Thank God, there is no need of that, for you are
Englishmen ; and it has pleased God to put into the hearts of
Englishmen a love of work, and a power of work, which has
helped to make this little island one of the greatest nations
upon earth. No, thanks be to God, I say, there is no need to
bid you work. What I ask you to do, is to look upon your
work as an honourable calling, and as a blessing to yourselves,
not merely as a hard necessity, a burden which must be borne
merely to keep you from starvation. It is not that, my friends,
but far more than that. For what is more honourable than to
be of use? And in all labour, as Solomon says, there is profit;
it is all of use. And all trade, manufacture, tillage, even of the
smallest, all management and ordering, whether of an estate, a
parish, or even of the pettiest office in it, all is honourable,
because all is of use ; all helping forward, more or less, the
well-being of God's human creatures, and of the whole world.
And therefore all is worth taking trouble over, worth doing
as diligently and honestly as possible, in sure trust that it will
bring its reward with it. Why not? Almsgiving is blessed
in God's sight, and charity to the poor ; and God will repay it :
but is not useful labour blessed in his sight also ? and shall he
not repay it r Will he not say of it, as well as of almsgiving,
' Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these
little ones, ye have done it unto me ? ' We may trust so, my
friends ; indeed, I may say more than, ' We may trust.' We
can see ; see that industry has its reward. By increasing the
well-being of others, and the safety of others, you increase your
own. So it is, and so it should be ; for God has knit us all
together as brethren, members of one family of God ; and the
well-being of each makes up the well-being of all, so that
sooner or later, if one member rejoice, all the others rejoice
with it.
But more. And here I speak to young people; for their
elders, I doubt not, have found it out long since for them-

xii.] WORK. 273
selves. Work, hard work, is a blessing to the soul and
character of the man who works. Young men may not think
so. They may say, What more pleasant than to have one's
fortune made for one, and have nothing before one than to
enjoy life? What more pleasant than to be idle : or, at least,
to do only what one likes, and no more than one likes ?
But they would find themselves mistaken. They would
find that idleness makes a man restless, discontented,
greedy, the slave of his own lusts and passions, and see
too late, that no man is more to be pitied than the man
who has nothing to do. Yes; thank God every morning,
when you get up, that you have something to do that day
which must be done, whether you like or not. Being forced
to work, and forced to do your best, will breed in you tem
perance and self-control, diligence and strength of will, cheer
fulness and content and a hundred virtues which the idle
man will never know. The monks in old time found it so.
When they shut themselves up from the world to worship
God in prayers and hymns, they found that, without working,
without hard work either of head or hands, they could not
even be good men. The devil came and tempted them,
they said, as often as they were idle. An idle monk's soul
was lost, they used to say; and they spoke truly. Though
they gave up a large portion of every day, and of every night
also, to prayer and worship, yet they found they could not
pray aright without work. And 'working is praying,' said
one of the holiest of them that ever lived; and he spoke
truth, if a man will but do his work for the sake of duty,
which is for the sake of God. And so they worked, and
worked hard, not only at teaching the children of the poor,
but at tilling the ground, clearing the forests, building noble
churches, which stand unto this day; none among them
were idle at first ; and as long as they worked, they were
good men, and blessings to all around them, and to this land
of England, which they brought out of heathendom to the

274 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [sek.m.
knowledge of Christ and of God; and it was not till they
became rich and idle, and made other people work for them
and till their great estates, that they sank into sin and shame,
and became despised and hated, and at last swept off the face
of the land. Lastly, my friends, if you wish to see how noble a
calling Work is, consider God himself; who, although he is per
fect, and does not need, as we do, the training which comes by
work, yet works for ever with and through his Son, Jesus .Christ,
who said, 'My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.' Yes;
think of God, who, though he needs nothing, and therefore
need not work to benefit himself, yet does work, simply be
cause, though he needs nothing, all things need him. Think of
God as a king working for ever for the good of his subjects, a
Father working for ever for the good of his children, for ever
sending forth light and life and happiness to all created things,
and ordering all things in heaven and earth by a providence so
perfect, that not a sparrow falls to the ground without his know
ledge, and the very hairs of your head are all numbered.
And then think of yourselves, called to copy God, each in
his station, and to be fellow-workers with God for the good of
each other and of yourselves. Called to work, because you are
made in God's image, and redeemed to be the children of God.
Not like the Drutes, who cannot work, and can therefore never
improve themselves, or the earth around them ; but like children
of God, whom he has called to the high honour of subduing
and replenishing this earth which he has given you, and of
handing down by your labour blessings without number to
generations yet unborn. And when you go back, one to his
farm, another to his shop, another to his daily labour, say to
yourselves, This, too, as well as my prayers in church, is my
heavenly Father's command; in doing this my daily duty
honestly and well, I can do Christ's will, copy Christ, approve
myself to Christ ; single-eyed and single-handed, doing my .work
as unto God, and not unto men ; and so hear, I may hope at
last, Christ's voice saying to me, ' Well done, thou good and

xn.] WORK. 275
faithful servant. I set thee not to govern kingdoms, to lead
senates, to command armies, to preach the gospel, to build
churches, to give large charities, to write learned books, to do
any great work in the eyes of men. I set thee simply to buy
and sell, to plough and reap like a Christian man, and to bring
up thy family thereby, in the fear of God and in the faith of
Christ. And thou hast done thy duty more or less ; and, in
doing thy duty, has taught thyself deeper and sounder lessons
about thy life, character, and immortal soul, than all books
could teach thee. And now thou hast thy reward. Thou
hast been faithful over a few things : I will make thee ruler
over many things. Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.'

SERMON XIII.
FALSE PROPHETS.
(Eighth Sunday after Trinity.)

Matthew vii. 16.
Ye shall know them by their fruits.
"DEOPLE are apt to overlook, I think, the real meaning of
these words. They do so, because they part them from
the words which go just before them, about false prophets
They consider that ' fruit ' means only a man's conduct, —
that a man is known by his conduct. That professions are
worth nothing, and practice worth everything. That the good
man, after all, is the man who does right ; and the bad man, the
man who does wrong. Excellent doctrine ; and always needed.
God grant that we may never forget it.
But the text surely does not quite mean that. ' Fruit ' here
does not mean a man's own conduct, but the conduct of those
whom he teaches. For see, — our Lord is talking of prophets ;
that is preachers, who set up to preach the Word of God, in the
name of God. ' Beware,' he says, ' of false prophets. By their
fruits ye shall know them. By what you gather from them,'
he says. ' For do men gather grapes off thorns, or figs off
thistles ? '
Now what is a preacher's fruit? Surely the fruit of his

FALSE PROPHETS. 277

preaching ; and that is, not what he does himself, but what he
makes you do. His fruit is what you gather from him ; and
what you gather from him is, not merely the notions and doc
trines which he puts into your head, but the way of life in which
he makes you live. What he makes you do, is the fruit which
you get from him. Does he make you a better man, or does
he not ? that is the question. That is the test whether he is a
false prophet, or a true one ; whether he is preaching to you the
eternal truth of God, or man's inventions and devil's lies.
Does he make you a better man ? Not — Does he make you
feel better ? but — Does he make you behave better ? There is
too much preaching in the world which makes men feel better
— so much better, indeed, that they go about like the Pharisee,
thanking God that they are not as other men, before they have
any sound reason to believe that they are not as other men ;
because they live just such lives as other men do, as far as re
spectability, and the fear of hurting their custom or their char
acter, allow them to do. They have their prophets, their
preachers who teach them ; and by their fruits in these men, the
preachers may be known, by those who have eyes to see, and
hearts to understand.
Therefore beware of false prophets. There are too many of
them in the world now, as there were in our Lord's time ; men
who go about with the name of God on their lips, and the Bible
in their hands, in sheep's clothing outwardly; but inwardly
ravening wolves. In sheep's clothing, truly, smooth and sanc
timonious, meek, and sleek. But wolves at heart; wolves in
cunning and slyness, as you will find, if you have to deal with
them ; wolves in fierceness and cruelty, as you will find if you
have to differ from them ; wolves in greediness and covetous
ness, and care of their own interest and their own pockets.
And wolves, too, in hardness of heart ; in the hard, dark, hor
rible, unjust doctrines, which they preach with a. smile upon
their lips, not merely in sermons, but in books and tracts in
numerable, making out the Heavenly Father, the God whose

278 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.

name is Love and Justice, to be even such a one as themselves.
Wolves, too, in their habit of hunting in packs, each keeping up
his courage by listening to the howl of his fellows. They may
come in the name of God. They may tell you that they preach
the Gospel ; that no one but they preach the Gospel. But by
their fruits ye shall know them.
Will they make yOu better men ? Is it not written, ' The
disciple is not above his master ? ' What will you learn from
them, but to be like them ? And the more you take in their
doctrines, the more like them you will be ; for is it not written,
' He that is perfect shall be as his master.' Can they lead you
to eternal life ? Is it not written, ' If the blind lead the blind,
both shall fall into the ditch ? '
But by their fruits ye shall know them. By their fruits in the
world at large, if you have eyes to see it. By their fruits in
your own lives, if you give yourselves up to listen to their false
doctrines, for you will surely find, that, in the first place, they
will not make you honest men. They will not teach you to be
just and true in all your dealings. They will not teach you
common morality. No, my friends, it is most sad to see, how
much preaching and tract-writing there is in England now,
which talks loud about Protestant doctrine, and Gospel truths,
while all the fruit of it seems to be, to teach men to abuse the
Pope, and to fancy that every one is going to hell, who does not
agree with their opinions ; while their own lives, their own con
duct, their own morality, seems not improved one whit by all
this preaching. And yet men like such preaching, and run to
hear it. Of course they do ; for it leaves them to behave all
the week as if there was no Law of God, if only they will go on
Sundays, and listen to what is called, I fear most untruly, the
Gospel of God ; leaves them, on condition of belonging to some
particular party, and listening to some favourite preacher, free
to give way to their passions, their spite, their meanness ; to
grind their servants, cheat their masters, trick their customers,
adulterate their goods, and behave in money-matters as if all

FALSE PROPHETS.

2/9

was fair in business, and the Gospel of Jesus Christ had nothing
to do with common honesty ; and all the while,
Compound for sins they are inclined to,
By damning those they have no mind to.
My friends, these things ought not so to be. There is a
Gospel of God, which preaches full forgiveness for the sake of
Jesus Christ, to all who turn from their sins. But there is a
Law of God, likewise, which executes sure vengeance against
all who do not turn from their sins; be their professions as high,
or their doctrines as correct as they may. A law which is in the
Gospel itself, and says, by the mouth of the Apostle St. John,
' Little children, let no man deceive you : he that doeth righ
teousness is righteous, even as God is righteous ' — he — and not
he who expects to be saved by listening to some false preacher
who teaches his congregation how to go to heaven without
having thought one heavenly thought, or done one heavenly
deed. Yes. There is an eternal law of God, which people are for
getting, I often fear, more and more, in England just now. I
sometimes dread, lest we should be sinking into that hideous
state of which the old Hebrew prophet speaks — 'The prophets
prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means; and
my people love to have it so : and what will ye do in the end
thereof?' What, indeed; if people are to be taught more and
more, that religion is a matter merely of doctrines and fancies
and feelings, and has nothing to do with common morality,
and common honesty, and common self-control and improve
ment of character and conduct ?
My friends, in these dangerous days, for dangerous they truly
are — like those of the Scribes and Pharisees of old ; days in
which bigotry and hardness of heart, hypocrisy and lip-profes
sion stalk triumphant ; days, in which men, like the Scribes and
Pharisees of old, boast of the Bible, worship the Bible, think
they have eternal life in the Bible, spend vast sums every year

280 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.

in spreading the Bible; and yet will neither read the Bible
honestly, nor obey its plain commands — In such days as these,
what prophet shall we fall back upon? What preacher shall
we trust ?
We can at least trust our Bible. We can read it honestly, if
only there be in us the honest and good heart ; we can obey its
plain commands, if only we hunger and thirst after righteous
ness, and desire really to become good men. Read your Bibles
for yourselves with a single eye, and with a pure heart which
longs to know God's will because it longs to do God's will ; and
you will need no false prophets, under pretence of explaining it
to you, to draw you away from the Holy Catholic faith into
which you were baptized.
But if you must have a commentary on the Bible ; if you
must have some book to give you a general notion of what the
Bible teaches you, and what it expects of you; go to the prayer-
book. Go to the good old Catechism which you learnt at
school. There, though not from the popular preachers, you
will learn that God is just and true, loving and merciful, and no
respecter of persons. There you will learn, that Christ died not
for a few elect, but for the sins of the whole world. There you
will learn that in baptism, by God's free grace, and not by any
experiences or feelings of your own, you were made children of
God, members of Christ, and inheritors of the kingdom of
heaven. There you will learn, that the elect whom the Holy
Spirit sanctifies, are not merely a favoured few, but you — every
baptized man, woman, and child. That the Holy Spirit is with
you, every one of you, to sanctify you, if you will open your
hearts to his gracious inspirations. And there you will learn
what sanctification really means. Not a few fancies and feelings
about which any man can deceive himself, and any man, also,
deceive his neighbours. No, that sanctification means being
made holy, righteous, virtuous, good. That sanctification means
' To love your neighbour as yourself, and to do to all men as
they should do unto you — to love, honour, and succour your

XIII.] FALSE PROPHETS. 28l
father and mother ' — Shall I go on ? Or do you all know the
plain old duty to your neighbours, which stands in the Church
Catechism. If you do, thank God that you were taught it in
your youth. Read it over and over again. Think over it. Pray
to God to give you grace to act upon it, and to shew the fruit
of it in your lives. And then, ' By its fruits you shall know it'
By its fruits you shall know the virtue of the Catechism, and of
the great and good men, true prophets of God, who wrote that
Catechism. Yes. Cling to that Catechism, even if it convinces
you of many sins, and makes you sadly ashamed of yourselves
again and again ; for, believe me, it will prove your best safe
guard in doctrine, your best teacher in practice, in these
dangerous days — days in which every man who believes that
right is right, and wrong is wrong, has need to pray with all his
heart — ' From all false doctrine, heresy, and schism; from hard
ness of heart, and contempt of thy word and commandments ;
good Lord, deliver us ! '

SERMON XIV.
THE ROCK OF AGES.
(Ninth Sunday after Trinity.)

i Corinthians x. 4.
They drank of that Spiritual Rock which followed them ; and that Rock
was Christ.
CT, PAUL has been speaking to the Corinthians about the
Holy Communion.
In this text, St. Paul is warning the Corinthians about
it. He says, ' You may be Christian men ; you may have the
means of grace; you may come to the Communion and use
the means ofgrace; and yet you may become castaways.'
St. Paul himself says, in the very verse before, ' I keep under
my body, and bring it into subjection : lest .... I myself
should be a castaway.' Look, he says then, 'at the old Jews
in the wilderness. They all partook of God's grace : but they
were not all saved. They were all baptized to Moses in, the
cloud and in the sea. They all ate the same spiritual meat, the ¦,
manna from heaven. They all drank the same spiritual drink,
the water out of the rock in Horeb. And yet with many of
them God was not well pleased ; ' for they were overthrown —
their corpses were scattered far and wide — in the wilderness.
The spiritual meat and the spiritual drink could not keep them
alive, if they sinned, and deserved death. ' So,' says St. Paul,

THE ROCK OF AGES. 283

' with you. You are members of Christ's body. The cup of
blessing which we bless, is the communion of the blood of
Christ ; the bread which we break, is the communion of the
body of Christ :' but beware, they will not save you, if you sin.
Nothing will save you, if you sin. If you lust after evil things,
as those old Jews did ; if you are idolaters, as they were ; if you
are profligates, as they were ; if you tempt Christ, as they did ; if
you murmur against God, as they murmured, you will be des
troyed like them.
Note here two things. First, that St. Paul says that we
really receive Christ in the Holy Communion. He does not
say, as some do, that the Communion is merely a remembrance
of Christ's death. He says that the faithful verily and indeed
receive Christ's body and blood in the Sacrament. He says
so, distinctly, plainly, literally ; and if that be not true, his
whole argument goes for nothing, and will not stand. The
Jews, he says, drank of the spiritual Rock which followed them,
and that Rock was Christ ; and so he says to you. But that
did not save them from the punishment of their sins, when they
went and sinned afresh : neither will it save you.
But now — What are these strange words which St. Paul
uses? These old Jews drank of the spiritual Rock which
followed them, and that Rock was Christ? Where in the Old
Testament do we read of the Rock following them ? We read
of Moses striking the rock in Horeb, at the beginning of their
wanderings in the wilderness ; but not of its following them
afterwards. St. Paul is here using a beautiful old tradition of the Rabbis,
that the rock which Moses struck in Horeb followed the Jews
through all their forty years' wanderings, and that on every
Sabbath day when they stoped, it stopped also, and the elders
called to it, ' Flow out, O fountain,' and the water flowed. A
beautiful old story, which St. Paul turns into an allegory, to
teach, as by a picture, the deepest and the highest truth.
Whether that rock followed them or not, he says, there was One

284 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
who did follow them, from whom flowed living water ; and that
Rock is Christ. Christ followed them. Christ the creator, the
preserver, the inspher, the light, the life, the guide of men, and
of all the universe. It was to Christ they owed their deliverance
from Egypt ; to Christ they owed their knowledge of God, and
of the law of God, to Christ they owed whatever reason, justice,
righteousness, good government, there was among them. And
to Christ we owe the same.
The rock was a type of him from whom flows living water.
As he himself said on earth, ' Whosoever drinketh of the water
which I shall give him, shall never thirst ; but the water which
I shall give him shall be in him a well of water, springing up to
everlasting life.' Just as the manna also was a type of him, as
he himself declared, when the Jews talked to him of the manna ;
' Our fathers did eat manna in the desert, as it is written, He
gave them bread from heaven to eat' Then Jesus said to them,
' Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread
from heaven.' No : but only a type and picture of it. ' My
Father giveth you the true bread from heaven. For the bread
of God is he which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life
unto the world. ... I am that bread of life.'
My friends, herein is a great mystery. Something of what it
means, however, we may learn from that wise and good Jew,
Philo, who was St. Paul's teacher according to the flesh, before
he became a Christian ; and who himself was so near to the
kingdom of God, that St. Paul often in his epistles uses Philo's
very words, putting into them a Christian meaning. And what
says he concerning the Rock of living waters ?
The soul, he says, falls in with a scorpion in the wilderness ;
and then thirst, which is the thirst of the passions — of the lusts
which war in our members — seizes on it ; till God sends forth
on it the stream of his own perfect wisdom, and causes the
changed soul to drink of unchangeable health. For the steep
rock is the wisdom of God (by whom he means the Word of
God, whom Philo knew not in the flesh, but whom we know, as

Xiv.] THE ROCK OF AGES. 285
the Lord Jesus Christ), which, being both sublime and the
first of all things ; he quarried out of his own powers ; and
of it he gives drink to the souls which love God ; and they,
when they have drunk, are filled with the most universal
manna. So says Philo, the good Jew, who knew not Christ; and
therefore he says only a part of the truth. If you wish to learn
the whole truth, you must read St. John's Gospel, and St. Paul's
Epistles, especially this very text ; and again, the opening of the
Epistle to the Ephesians ; and again, that most royal passage
in the opening of the Colossians, where he speaks of the
Everlasting Being of Christ, who is before all things, and by
whom all things consist — in whom dwells all the fulness of
the Godhead bodily, and in whom are hid all the treasures
of wisdom and knowledge.
Therefore he is rightly called the Rock, the Rock of Ages,
the Eternal Rock; because on him all things rest, and have
rested since the foundation of the world, being made, and kept
together, and ruled, and inspired by him alone. Therefore he
is rightly called the Rock of living waters ; for in him are hid
all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, and from him they
flow forth freely to all who cry to him in their thirst after truth
and holiness. Yes, my friends, by Christ all things live ; and
therefore, most of all, by Christ our souls live. To be parted
from Christ is death. To be joined to Christ and the body of
Christ is life.
But what life? The life of the soul. And what is the
life of the soul? Holiness, righteousness, sanctification^ vir
tue, — call it what pleases you best. I shall call it good
ness. That is the only life of the soul. And why? Because
it is the life of Christ. That is the only wisdom of the
soul. And why? Because it is the mind of Christ. That
is the living water. And why? Because it flows eternally
from Christ.
For who is Christ, but the likeness of God, and the glory of

286 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
God? And what is the likeness of God, but goodness; and
what is the glory of God, but goodness? Therefore Christ is
goodness itself, as it is written, ' Now the Lord is that Spirit.'
Yes, if you will believe it, Christ, the only-begotten Son, co-equal
and co-eternal, ij the very and essential goodness of the Father,
coming out everlastingly in action and in life, in himself, and in
his people, who are his mystical body, filled with the Spirit of
him and his Father ; who is the Holy Spirit, the spirit of good
ness. From Christ, and not from any created being, comes all
goodness in man or angel. Comes from Christ ? It were more
right, and more according to St. Paul's own words, to say, that
all goodness is Christ ; Christ dwelling in a man, Christ forming
himself in a man, little by little, step by step, as he grows in
grace, in purity, in self-control, in experience, in knowledge, in
wisdom, in strength, in patience, in love, in charity; till he
comes to the stature of a perfect man,, to the measure of the
fulness of Christ.
Meanwhile, let the good which a man does be much, or be it
little, he must say, ' The good which I do, / do not, but Christ
who dwelleth in me.'
For in every age of man, it is Christ who is awakening in
him the hunger and thirst after righteousness, and then satisfying
it with the only«thing which can satisfy them, namely, his most
blessed self.
Yes, believe it. It is Christ in the child which makes it
speak the truth ; Christ in the child which makes it shrink from
whatever it has been told is wrong. It is Christ in the young
man, which fills him with lofty aspirations, hopes of bettering
the world around him, hopes of training his soul to be all that
it can be, and of putting forth all his powers in the service of
Christ It is Christ in the middle-aged man, which makes him
strong in good works, labouring patiently, wisely, and sturdily ;
so that having drunk of the living waters himself, they may flow
out of him again to others in good deeds ; a fountain springing
up in him to an eternal life of goodness. It is Christ in the old

xiv.] THE ROCK OF AGES. 287
man, which makes him look on with calm content while his
own body and mind decay, knowing that the kingdom of God
cannot decay ; for Christ is ruling it in righteousness ; and all
will be well with him, and with his children after him,
and with all mankind, and all heaven and earth, if they
themselves only will it, long after he has been gathered to
his fathers.
Yes, such a man knows in whom he has believed. He
knows that the spiritual Rock has been following him through
all his wanderings in this weary world ; and that that Rock is
Christ. He can recollect how, again and again, at his Sabbath
baitings in his life's journey, it was to him in the Holy
Communion as to the Israelites of old in their haltings in the
wilderness, when the priests of Jehovah cried to the mystic
rock, ' Flow forth, O fountain,' and the waters flowed. So can
he recollect how, in Holy Communion, there flowed into his
soul streams of living water, the water of life, quenching that
thirst of his soul, which no created thing could slake; the
water of life ; of Christ's life, which is the light of men, shewing
them what they ought to be and do ; the life which is the
light; the life which is according to the eternal and divine
reason ; the life of wisdom ; which is the life of love ; which is
the life of justice; which is the life of Christ; which is the life
of God.
But if these things are so — and so they are, for Christ has
said it, St. Paul has said it, St. John has said it — but if these
things are so, will they not teach us much about Holy
Communion, how we may receive it worthily, and how
unworthily ?
If what we receive in the Communion be Christ himself,
the good Christ who is to make us good ; then how can we
receive it worthily, if we do not hunger and thirst after good
ness ? If we do not come thither, longing to be made good,
and sanctified, then we come for the wrong thing, to the wrong
place. We are like those Corinthians who came to the Lord's

288 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
supper not to be made good men, but to exalt their own
spiritual self-conceit; and so only ate and drank their own
damnation, not discerning the Lord's body, that it was a holy
body, a body of righteousness and goodness.
But if we come hungering and thirsting to be made good
men, then we come for the right thing, to the right place.
Then we need not stay away, because we feel ourselves
intolerably burdened with many sins ; that will be our very
reason for coming, that we may be cleansed from our sins —
cleansed not only from their guilt, but from their power ; and
cry, in spirit and in truth, as we kneel at that holy table —
Rock of ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in thee ;
By the water and the blood,
From thy riven side which flowed,
Be of sin the double cure,
Cleanse me from its guilt and power.
Yes, from its guilt and from its power also. Let us all pray,
each in his own fashion : —
Oh Lamb eternal, beyond all place and time ! Oh Lamb
slain eternally, before the foundation of the world ! Oh Lamb,
which liest slain eternally, in the midst of the throne of God !
Let the blood of life, which flows from thee, procure me pardon
for the past ; let the water of life, which flows from thee, give
me strength for the future. I come to cast away my own life,
my life of self and selfishness, which is corrupt according to the
deceitful lusts, that I may live it no more ; and to receive thy
life, which is created after the likeness of God, in righteousness
and true holiness, that I may live it for ever and ever, and find
it a well of life springing up in me to everlasting life. Eternal
Goodness, make me good like thee. Eternal Wisdom, make
me wise like thee. Eternal Justice, make me just like thee.
Eternal Love, make me loving like thee. Then I shall
hunger no more, and thirst no more ; for

Xiv.J THE ROCK OF AGES. 289

h

Thou, O Christ, art all I want ;
More than all in thee I find ;
Raise me, fallen ; cheer me, faint ;
Heal me, sick ; and lead me, blind.
Thou of life the fountain art ;
Freely let me take of thee ;
Spring thou up within my heart ;
Rise to all eternity.
Oh come to Holy Communion with the words of that
glorious hymn not merely on your lips, but in your hearts;
and you will never come amiss.

SERMON XV.
ANTIPATHIES.
(Tenth Sunday after Trinity.)

I Cor. xii. 3, 4, 5, 6.
Wherefore, I give you to understand, that no man speaking by the Spirit
of God calleth Jesus accursed : and that no man can say that Jesus is the
Lord, but by the Holy Ghost. Now there are diversities of gifts, but
the same Spirit. And there are differences of administrations, but the
same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same
God which worketh all in all.
\\ J"E are to come to the Communion this day in love and
charity with all men. But are we in love and charity
with all men ?
I do not mean, are there any persons whom we hate;
against whom we bear a spite ; whom we should be glad to see
in trouble or shame? God forbid, my friends, God forbid.
There are, indeed, devil's tempers. And yet more easy for us
to keep in the bottom of our hearts, and more difficult to root
them out, than we fancy.
It is easy enough for us to forgive (in words at least) a man
who has injured us. Easy enough to make up our minds that
we will not revenge ourselves. Easy enough to determine,
even, that we will return good for evil to him, and do him a
kindness when we have a chance. Yes, we would not hurt

ANTIPATHIES. 291

him for the world : but what if God hurt him ? What if he
hurt himself? What if he lost his money ? What if his child
ren turned out ill? What if he made a fool of himself, and
came to shame ? What if he were found out and exposed, as
we fancy that he deserves ? Should we be so very sorry ?
We should not punish him ourselves. No. But do we never
catch ourselves thinking whether God may not punish him ;
thinking of that with a base secret satisfaction ; almost hoping
for it, at last ? Oh if we ever do, God forgive us ! If we ever
find those devil's thoughts rising in us, let us flee from them as
from an adder ; flee to the foot of Christ's Cross, to the cross
of him who prayed for his murderers, Father, forgive them, for
they know not what they do ; and there cry aloud for the blood
of life, which shall cleanse us from the guilt of those wicked
thoughts, and for the water of life, which shall cleanse us from
the power of them: lest they get the dominion over us, and
spring up in us, and spread over our whole hearts ; not a well
of life, but a well of poison, springing up in us to everlasting
damnation. Oh let us pray to him to give us truth in our
inward parts ; that we may. forgive and love, not in word only,
but in deed and in truth.
I could not help saying this in passing. But it is not what
the text is speaking of ; not what I want to speak of myself
to-day. I want to speak of a matter which is smaller, and not
by any means so sinful : and which yet in practice is often
more tormenting to a truly tender conscience, because it is
more common and more continual.
How often, when one examines oneself, whether one be in
love and charity with all men, one must recollect that there are
many people whom one does not like. I do not mean that
one hates them. Not in the least : but they do not suit one.
There is something in them which we cannot get on with, as
the saying is. Something in their opinions, manners, ways of
talking ; even — God forgive us — merely in their voice, or their
looks, or their dress, which frets us, and gives us what is called

292 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
an antipathy to them. And one dislikes them; though they
never have harmed us, or we them ; and we know them,
perhaps, to be better people than ourselves. Now, are we in
love and charity with these people ? I am afraid not
I know1 one is tempted to answer; but I am afraid the
answer is worth very little — Why not? We cannot help it
You cannot expect us to like people who do not suit us;
any more than you can expect us to like a beetle or a spider.
We know the beetle or the spider will not harm us. We know
that they are good in their places, and do good, as all God's
creatures are and do ; and there is room enough in the world
for them and us : but we have a riatural dislike to them, and
cannot help it; and so with these people. We mean no
harm in disliking them. It is natural to us ; and why blame
Us for it.
Now what is the mistake here ? Saying that it is natural to
us. We are not meant to live according to nature, but
according to grace ; and grace must conquer nature, my friends,
if we wish to save our souls alive. It is nature, brute nature,
which makes some dogs fly at every strange dog they meet.
It is nature, brute nature, which makes a savage consider every
strange savage as his enemy, and try to kill him. But unless
nature be conquered in that savage, it will end, where following
brute nature always ends, in death ; and the savages will (as all
Savages are apt to do) destroy each other off the face of the
earth, by continual war and murder. It is brute nature which
makes low and ignorant persons hate foreign people, because
their dress and language seem strange. But unless that
natural feeling had been in most of us conquered by the grace
of God, which is the spirit of justice and of love, then England
would have remained alone in conceit and ignorance, hated by
all the nations ; instead of being what, thank God ! she is — the
Sanctuary of the world; to which all the oppressed of the
earth may flee ; and find a welcome, and safety, and freedom,
and justice, and peace.

XV.] ANTIPATHIES. 293
And so with us, my friends. It is natural, and according to
the brute nature of the old Adam, to dislike this person and
that, just because they do not suit us. But it is according to
grace, and the new Adam, who is the Lord from heaven, to
honour all men; to love the brotherhood; to throw away our
own private fancies and personal antipathies; and, like the Lord
Jesus Christ, copy the all-embracing charity of God. And no
one has a right to answer, 'But I must draw the line somewhere.'
Thou must not I am afraid that thou wilt, and that I shall,
too, God forgive us both ! because we are sinful human beings..
We may, but we must not, draw a line as to whom we shall
endure in charity. For Christ draws no line. Is it not written,
'No man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost'
Is not the Spirit of Christ in a Christian man, unless he be a
reprobate ? and who is reprobate, we know not, and dare not
try to know; for it is written, ' Judge not, and ye shall not be
judged : condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned.'
But what has the text to do with all this ?
My friends, is not this just what the text is telling us? I said
this moment, that the Spirit of Christ was in a Christian man,
unless he be a reprobate. And the text says further, that there
are diversities of gifts in Christian men: but the same spirit in
all of them.
Yes : people will be different one from another. There are
diversities of gifts. Differences in talents, in powers, in char
acter, in kinds of virtue and piety; so that you shall find no two
good men, no two useful men, like each other. But there is
the same Spirit. The same Spirit of God is in each, though
bearing different fruit in each. And there are differences of
administrations, of offices, in God's kingdom. God sets one
man to do one work, and another to do another: but it is the
same Lord who puts each man in his place, and shows him his
work, and gives him power to do it. And there are diversities
of operations, that is, of ways of working; so that if you put any
two men to do the same thing, they will most probably do it each

294 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
in a different way, and yet both do it well. But it is the same
God, who is working in them both; the God who works all in
all, and has his work done by a thousand different hands, by a
thousand different ways.
And it is right and good that people should be so different
from each other. 'For the manifestation of the Spirit is given
to every man to profit withal.' To profit, to be of use. If all
men were alike, no one could learn from his neighbour. If all
mankind were as like each other as a flock of sheep, there would
be no more work, no more progress, no more improvement in
mankind, than there is in a flock of sheep. Now each man can
bring his own little share of knowledge or usefulness into the
common stock. Each man has, or ought to have, something
to teach his neighbour. Each man can learn something from
his neighbour : at least he can learn this — to have patience with
his neighbour. To live and let live. To bear with what in
him seems odd and disagreeable, trusting that God may have
put it there; that God has need of it; that God will make
use of it. God makes use of many things which look to us
ugly and disagreeable. He makes use of the spider and
of the beetle. How much more of our brethren, members
of Christ, children of God, inheritors of the kingdom of
heaven. Shall they be to us, even if they be odd or disa
greeable in some things— shall they be to us as the beetle
or the spider, or any other merely natural things? They
are men and women, in whom is the Spirit of the living
God. And my friends, if they are good enough for God,
they are good enough for us. Think but one moment. God
the Father adopts a man as his child, God the Son dies for
that man, God the Holy Ghost inspires that man; and shall
we be more dainty than God ? If, in spite 01 the man's little
weaknesses and oddities, God shall condescend to come down
and dwell in that man, making him more or less a good man,
doing good work; shall we pretend that we cannot endure what
God endures ? Shall we be more dainty, I ask again, than the

XV.J ANTIPATHIES. 295
holy and perfect God ? Oh my friends, let us pray to him to
take out of our hearts all selfishness, fancifulness, fastidiousness,
and hasty respect of persons, of all which there is none in God.
Let us ask for his Spirit, the Spirit of Charity, which sees God
in all, and all in God, and therefore sees good in all, and sees
all in love.
Then we shall see how much more there is in our neighbours
to like, than to dislike. Then all these little differences will
seem to us trifles not to be thought of, before the broad fact of
a man's being, after all, a man, an Englishman, a Christian, and
a good Christian, doing good work where God has put him.
Then we shall be ashamed of our old narrowness of heart ;
ashamed of having looked so much at the little evil in our
neighbours, and not at the great good in them. Then we shall
go about the world cheerfully ; and our neighbour's faces will
seem to us full of light : instead of seeming full of darkness,
because our own eyes and minds are dark for want of charity.
Then we shall come to the Communion, not with hearts narrowed
and shut up, perhaps, from the very person who kneels next to
us : but truly open-hearted ; with hearts as wide — ah God, that
it were possible ! — as the sacred heart of Christ, in which is
room for all mankind. And so receiving his body, which is the
blessed company of all faithful people, we shall receive Christ,
who dwelleth in them, and they in him.

SERMON XVI.
ST. PAUL.
(Eleventh Sunday after Trinity.)

i Cor. xv.' 8.
Last of all he was seen of me, also, as of one born out of due time. For I
am the least of the Apostles, that am not meet to be called an apostle,
because I persecuted the church of God.
"V7"OU heard in this text (part of the epistle for this day) St.
Paul's opinion of himself. You heard, also, in the Second
Lesson for this day, the ninth chapter of Acts, the extraordinary
story of his conversion.
And what may1 we learn from that story? We may learn
many lessons ; lessons without number.
We may learn, first; not to be astonished, if we have to change
our opinions as we grow older. When we are young, we are
very positive about this thing and that, as St. Paul was ; violent
in favour of our own opinions; ready to quarrel with any one
who differs from us, as St. Paul was. But let ten years, twenty
years, roll over our heads, and we may find our opinions utterly
changed, as St. Paul did, and look back with astonishment on
ourselves, for having been foolish enough to believe what we
did, as St. Paul looked back ; and with shame, as did St. Paul
likewise, at having said so many violent and unjust things against
people, who, we now see, were in the right after all.

ST. PAUL.

297

Next; we may learn not to be ashamed of changing our minds :
but if we find ourselves in the wrong, to confess it boldly and
honestly, as St. Paul did. What a fearful wrench to his mind
and his heart ; what a humiliation to his self-conceit, to have to
change his mind once for all on all matters in heaven and earth.
What must it not have cost him to throw up at once all his
friends and relations ; to part himself from all whom he loved
and respected on earth, to feel that henceforth they must look
upon him as a madman, an infidel, an enemy. To an affec
tionate man, and St. Paul was an extremely affectionate man,
what a bitter struggle that must have cost him. But he faced
that struggle, and conquered in it, like a brave and honest man.
And the consequence was, that he had, in time, and after many
lonely years, many Christian friends for each Jewish friend that
he had lost ; and to him was fulfilled (as it will be to all men)
our Lord's great saying, ' There is no man that hath left house,
or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children,
or lands for my sake, and the gospel's, but he shall receive an
hundredfold now in this time, . . . and in the world to come
eternal life.'
Next ; we may take comfort, in the hope that God will not
impute to us these early follies and mistakes of ours ; if only
there be in us, as there was in St. Paul, the honest and good
heart ; that is, the heart which longs to know what is true and
right, and bravely acts up to what it knows. St. Paul did so.
God, when he set him apart, as he says, from his very birth,
gave him a great grace, even the honest and good heart ; and
he was true to it, and used it. He tried to learn his best, and
do his best. He profited in the Jews' religion, beyond all his
fellows. He was, touching the righteousness which was in the
law, blameless. He was so zealous for what he thought right,
that he persecuted the Church of Christ, as the Pharisees, his
teachers, had taught him to do. In all things, whether right or
wrong in each particular case, he was an honest, earnest seeker
after truth and righteousness. And therefore Christ, instead of

298 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
punishing him, fulfilled to him his own great saying, — ' To him
that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance.' He
had not yet, as he himself says, again and again, the grace of
Christ, which is love to his fellow-men ; and therefore his works
were not pleasing to God, and had, as the article says, the
nature of sin. His empty forms and ceremonies could not
please God. His persecuting the Church had plainly the nature
of sin. But there was something which God had put in him,
and which God would not lose sight of, or suffer to be lost ; and
that was, the honest and good heart, of which our Lord speaks
in the parable of the sower. In that Christ sowed the word of
God, even himself, and his grace and Holy Spirit ; and, behold,
it sprang up and bore fruit a hundredfold, over all Christian
nations to this day.
Keep, therefore, if you have it, the honest and good heart
If .you have it not, pray for it earnestly. Determine to learn
what is true, whatever be the trouble ; and to do what is right,.
whatever be the cost ; and then, though you may make many
mistakes, and have more than once, perhaps, to change your
mind in shame and confusion, yet all will come right at last, for
the grace of Christ, sooner or later, will lead you into all truth
which you require for this world and all worlds to come.
Again, we may learn from St. Paul this lesson. That though
God has forgiven a man, that is no reason that he should for
give himself. That may seem a startling saying just now. For
the common teaching now is, that if a man finds, or fancies,
that God has forgiven him, he may forgive himself at once ;
that if he gets assurance that his sins are washed away in
Christ's blood, he may go swaggering and boasting about the
world (I can call it no less), as if he had never sinned at all ;
that he may be (as you see in these revivals, from which God
defend us !) one moment in the deepest agonies of conscience,
and dread of hell-fire, and the next moment in raptures of joy,
declaring himself to be in heaven. Alas, alas ! such people
forget that sin leaves behind it wounds, which even the grace of

xvi.] ST. PAUL. 299
Christ takes a long time in healing, and which then remain as
ugly, but wholesome scars, to remind us of the fools which we
have been. They are like a man who is in great bodily agony,
and gets sudden relief from a dose of laudanum. The pain
stops ; and he feels himself, as he says, in heaven for the time :
but he is too apt to forget that the cause of the pain is still in
his body, and that if he commits the least imprudence, he will
bring it back again ; just as happens, I hear, in too many of
these hasty and noisy conversions now-a-days.
That is one extreme. The opposite extreme is that of
many old Roman Catholic saints and hermits who could not
forgive themselves at all, but passed their whole lives in fasting,
poverty, and misery, bewailing their sins till their dying day.
That was a mistake. It sprang out of mistaken doctrines, of
which I shall not speak here : but it did not spring entirely from
them. There was in them a seed of good, for which I shall
always love and honour them, even though I differ from them ;
and that was, a noble hatred of sin. They felt the sinfulness of
sin ; and they hated themselves for having sinned. The mercy
of God made them only the more ashamed of themselves for
having rebelled against him. Their longing after holiness only
made them loathe the more their past unholiness. They car
ried that feeling too far : but they were noble people, men and
women of God ; and we may say of them, that, ' Wisdom is.
justified of all her children.'
But I wish you to run into neither extreme. I only ask you
to look at your past lives, if you have ever been open sinners,.
as St. Paul looked at his. There is no sentimental melancholy
in him ; no pretending to be miserable ; no trying to make
himself miserable. He is saved, and he knows it He is an
apostle, and he stands boldly on his dignity. He is cheerful,
hopeful, joyful : but whenever he speaks of his past life (and he
speaks of it often), it is with noble shame and sorrow. Then
he looks to himself the chief of sinners, not worthy to be called
an apostle, because he persecuted the Church of Christ What

300 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
he is, he will not deny. What he was, he will not forget, he
dare not forget, lest he should forget that the good which he
does, he does not — for in him (that is, in his flesh, his own
natural character), dwelleth no good thing — but Christ, who
dwells in him ; lest he should grow puffed up, careless, self-in
dulgent; lest he should neglect to subdue his evil passions;
and so, after having preached to others, himself become a
castaway. So let us do, my friends. Let us not be too hasty in forgiv
ing ourselves. Let us thank God cheerfully for the present.
Let us look on hopefully to the future ; let us not look back too
much at the past, or rake up old follies which have been par
doned and done away. But let us thank God whenever he
thinks fit to shew us the past, and bring our sin to our remem
brance. Let us thank him, when meeting an old acquaintance,
passing by an old haunt, looking over an old letter, reminds us
what fools we were ten, twenty, thirty years ago. Let us thank
him for those nightly dreams, in which old tempers, old mean
nesses, old sins, rise up again in us into ugly life, and frighten
us by making us in our sleep, what we were once, God forgive
us ! when broad awake. I am not superstitious. I know that
those dreams are bred merely of our brain and of our blood.
But I know that they are none the less messages from God.
They tell us unmistakeably that we are the same persons that
we were twenty years ago. They tell us that there is the same
infection of nature, the same capability of sin, in us, that there
was of old. That in our flesh dwells no good thing : that by
the grace of God alone we are what we are : and that did his
grace leave us, we might be once more as utter fools as we
were in the wild days of youth. Yes : let us thank God for
everything which reminds us of what we once were. Let us
humble ourselves before him whenever those memories return
to us ; and let us learn from them what St. Paul learnt. To be
charitable to all who have not yet learnt the wisdom which God
(as we may trust) has taught to us ; to feel for them, feel with

xvi.] ST. PAUL. 301
them, be sure that they are our brothers, men of like passions
with ourselves, who will be tried by the same standard as we ;
whom therefore we must not judge, lest we be judged in turn :
and let us have, as St. Paul had, hope for them all ; hope that
God, who has forgiven us, will forgive them ; that God who has
raised us from the death of sin, to something of the life of
righteousness, will raise them up likewise, in his own good time.
Amen.

SERMON XVII.
THE BROKEN AND CONTRITE HEART.

Isaiah, Ivii. 15—21.
For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name
is Holy ; I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a
contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to
revive the heart of the contrite ones. For I will not contend for ever,
neither will I be always wroth : for the spirit should f?:il before me,
and the souls which I have made. For the iniquity of his covetousness
was I wroth, and smote him : I hid me, and was wroth, and he went
on frowardly in the way of his heart. I have seen his ways, and will
heal him : I will lead him also, and restore comforts unto him and to
his mourners. I create the fruit of the lips : Peace, peace to him that
is far off, and to him that is near, saith the Lord : and I will heal him.
But the wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, whose
waters cast up mire and dirt. There is no peace, saith my God, to
the wicked.
" I 'HIS is part of Isaiah's prophecy. He is telling the Jews
that they should come back safe at last to their own land.
He tells them why God had driven them out, and why God
was going to bring them back.
He had driven them out for their sins. But he was not going
to bring them back for their righteousness. He was going to
bring them back out of his own free grace, his own pure love
and mercy, which was wider, deeper, and higher, than all their
sins, or than the sins of the whole world. He had sworn to

THE BROKEN AND CONTRITE HEART. 303
Abraham to be the friend of those foolish rebellious Jews, and
he would keep his promise for ever. Their wickedness could
not conquer his goodness, or their denying him make him deny
himself. But one thing he did require of them. Not that they should
turn and do right all at once. That must come afterwards.
But that they should open their eyes, and see that they had
done wrong. He wanted to produce in them the humble and
the contrite heart.
Now, as I told you last Sunday, a contrite heart does not
merely mean a broken heart ; it means more. It means literally
a heart crushed ; a heart ground to powder. You can have no
stronger word.
It was this heart which God wished to breed in these re
bellious Jews. A heart like Isaiah's heart, when he said, after
having seen God's glory, ' Woe is me, for I am a man of un
clean lips, and dwell among a people of unclean lips.' A
heart like Jeremiah's heart, when he said, ' Oh, that my head
were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might
weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people.'
A heart like Daniel's heart, when he confessed before God
that, to him and all his people belonged shame and confusion
of face.
Why do I mention these three men ? They were not bad
men, but good men. What need had they of a contrite heart ?
I mention them, because they were good men. And why
were they good men ? For any good works of their own ? Not
in the least. What made them good men was, just the having
the humble and the contrite heart ; just feeling that in them
selves they were as bad as the sinners round them ; that the
only thing which kept them out of the idolatry and profligacy
of their neighbours was confessing their own weakness, and
clinging fast to God by faith ; confessing that their own right
eousness was as filthy rags, and that God must clothe them with
his righteousness.

304 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. '[serm.
Do you suppose that Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel would
have been good men, if they had said to themselves, ' We are
prophets ; we are inspired ; we know God's law : and therefore
we are righteous ; we are safe : but these people — these idola
ters, these drunkards, these covetous, tyrannous, profligate
people round, to whom we preach, and who know not the law —
they are accursed.' If they had, they would have said just
what the Pharisees said afterwards. And what came of their
saying so ? Instead of knowing the Lord Christ, when he came
they crucified him, showing that they were really worse at heart
than the ignorant common people, instead of better.
No, my friends, Isaiah, and Jeremiah, and Daniel, were,
better men than those round them, just because they had the
humble and contrite heart; because they confessed that the
root of sin was in them too, as much as in their fellow-country
men ; because they took their share of the public blame, their
share of the public burden.
And their work and wish was, to breed in their fellow-coun
trymen the same humble and contrite heart which they had ; to
make them confess that their only hope lay in turning back to
God, and doing right. But they could not succeed. Sin was
too strong for them. So as Isaiah had warned the Jews, God
did the work himself. God took the matter into his own hands,
and arose out of his place to punish those Jews, and to make
short work with them, by famine, and pestilence, and earth
quake, and foreign invasion, till they were all carried away
captive to Babylon : to see if that would teach them to know that
God was the Lord ; to see if that would breed in them the
humble and contrite heart.
But God says to these poor Jews, Do not fancy that I have
taken a spite against you. Not so. I will not contend for ever.
I will not be always angry ; for then the spirit would fail before
me, and the souls which I have made. I have made you, God
says ; and I love you. I wish to save you, and not to destroy
you. If God really hated any man, do you suppose that he

xvil.j THE BROKEN AND CONTRITE HEART. 305
would endure that man for a moment in his universe ? Do you
suppose that he would not sweep that man away, as easily and
as quickly as we do a buzzing gnat when it torments us ? Do
you fancy that God lets you, or me, or any man, or any
creature live one single instant, except in the hope of saving
him, and of making him better than he is ; of making him of
some use, somewhere, some day or other ? Do you suppose, I
say, that God endures sinners one moment, save because he
loves sinners, and willeth not the death of a sinner, but that he
should be converted and live ? No. ' God our Saviour,' says
St. Paul to Timothy, ' willeth that all men should be saved, and
come to the knowledge of the truth ; ' and therefore if they are
not saved it must be their own fault, and not God's ; it must be
they who will not be saved, though God wills that they should
be, as Isaiah goes on to show. For he says — God cries to men,
Peace ! I create the fruit of the lips ; that is, I give men cause
to thank me. I create it. I make it without their help. I do
not sell them my mercy. I give it them freely. I say, Peace,
peace, to them all, To him who is near, and him who is afar
off; peace to all mankind; peace on earth, and goodwill to
men. God is everlastingly at peace with himself, and at peace
with all his creatures, and with all his works ; and he wills, in
his boundless love, to bring them all into his peace, the peace
which passeth understanding ; that they may be at peace with
him; and, therefore at peace with themselves, and at peace
with each other.
But how can they be at peace, when there is no peace in
them? If they will do wrong ; if they will quarrel ; if they will
defraud each other; if they will give way to the lusts and
passions which war within them : how can they be at peace ?
They are like a troubled sea, says Isaiah, when it cannot rest,
which casts up mire and dirt; and there is no peace to them.
It is not God who casts up the mire and dirt. It is they who
cast it up. God has not made them restless : but they them
selves, with their pride, selfishness, violent passions, longings
u

j06 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
after this and that. God has not made them foul and dirty, but
they themselves, with their own foul words and foul deeds,
which keep them from being at peace with themselves, because
they are ashamed of them all the while ; which keep them from
being at peace with their neighbours ; which make them hate
) and fear their neighbours, because they know that their neigh
bours do not respect them, or are afraid of their neighbours
finding them out.
What says brave, plain-spoken St. James ? — ' Let no man say
when he is tempted, I am tempted of God : for God cannot be
tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man.' ' From
whence come wars and fightings among you ? Come they not
hence, even of your lusts that war in your members ? Ye lust,
and have not : ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain :
ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not'
But as for God, he says, from him comes nothing but good.
Do not fancy anything else. ' Do not err, my beloved brethren.
Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and
cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no ¦
variableness, neither shadow of turning. Of His own will begat
He us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first-
fruits of His creatures.'
My friends, all tfeese things were written for our examples.
God grant that we may lay the lesson to heart. A dark night
may come to any one of us, a night of darkness upon darkness,
and sorrow upon sorrow, and bad luck upon bad luck ; till we
know not what is going to happen next; and are ready to say
/ with David — 'All thy waves and thy billows are gone over me;'
and with Hezekiah — 'I reckoned till morning, that, as a lion, so
will he break all my bones : from day even to night wilt thou
make an end of me.'
God grant, that before that day comes, we may have so
learnt to know God, as to know that the billows are God's
I billows, and the storms his storms; and, after a while, not to be
afraid, though all earthly hope and help seem swept away.

xvn.] THE BROKEN AND CONTRITE HEART. 307
God grant that when trouble comes after trouble, we may be
able to see that our Father in heaven is only dealing with us as
he dealt with those poor Jews; that he is all the while saying
'Peace !' to us, whether we be near him, or far off from him;
and is ready to heal us, the moment that he has worked in us
the broken and contrite heart. And we may trust him that he
will do it. With him one day is as a thousand years. And in
one day of bitter misery he can teach us -lessons, which we ,
could not teach ourselves in a thousand years of reading and /
studying, or even of praying. But our prayers, we shall find,
have not been in vain. He has not forgotten one of them; and
there is the answer, in that very sorrow. In sorrow, he is
making short work with our spirits. In one terrible and
searching trial our souls may be, as the Poet says —
Heated hot with burning fears,
And bathed in baths of hissing tears;
And battered by the strokes of doom,
To shape and use.
Yes. He will make short work at times with men's spirits.
He grinds hearts to powder, that they may be broken and
contrite before him: but only that he may heal them; that out
of the broken fragments of the hard, proud, self-deceiving heart
of stone, he may create a new and harder heart of flesh, human
and gentle, humble and simple. And then he will return and
-have mercy. He will show that he will not contend for ever.
He will show that he does not wish our spirits to fail before
him, but to grow and flourish before him to everlasting life.
He will create the fruit of the lips, and give us cause to thank
him in spirit and in truth. He will show us that he was nearest
when he seemed furthest off; and that just because he is the high
and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy,
who dwelleth in the high and holy place, for that very reason
he dwells also with the humble and the contrite heart; because
that heart alone can confess his height and its own lowliness,

308 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
confess its own sin and his holiness; and so can cling to his
majesty by faith, and partake of his holiness by the inspiration
of his Holy Spirit.
God grant that we may all so humble ourselves under his
mighty hand, whenever that hand lies heavy upon us, that he
may raise us up in due time, changed into his divine likeness,
from glory to glory; till we come to the measure of Christ, and
to the stature of perfect men, renewed into the image of the Son
of Man, Jesus Christ our Lord ! Amen.

SERMON XVIII.
ST. PETER.

Matt. xvi. 18.
Thou art Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church.
TTHIS is St. Peter's day. It will be well worth our while to
think a little over St. Peter, and what kind of man he was.
For St. Peter was certainly one of the most important and most
famous men who ever lived in the whole world. You just heard
what our Lord said to him in the text. And certainly, from
those words, and from many other things which are told ox
St. Peter, he was the chief of the apostles — at least till St. Paul
arose. St. Paul says himself, that he had as much authority as
St. Peter, and that he was not a whit behind the very chiefest
of the apostles: but St. Peter, for some time after our Lord's
death, seems to have been looked up to, by the rest of the
apostles and the disciples, as their leader, the man of most
weight and authority among them. It was to St. Peter espe
cially that our Lord looked to strengthen the other apostles,
after he had been converted himself. It was to St. Peter that
our Lord first revealed that great gospel, that the Gentiles were
fellow-heirs with the Jews in all God's promises. The same
thing was afterwards revealed to St. Paul too, and far more fully:
but it was St. Peter whohad the great honour of baptizing the

310 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
first heathen; and of using, as our Lord had bid him do, the
keys of the kingdom of heaven, to open its doors to all the
nations upon earth.
Now, what sort of a man was this on whom the Lord Jesus
Christ put so great an honour ? If we say that St. Peter was
nothing in himself ; that all the goodness and worth in him was
given him by Jesus Christ, then we must ask, what sort of good
ness, what sort of worth, did the Lord give St. Peter to make
him fit for so great an office ? And how did he use Christ's
gifts ? For, mind, he might have used them wrongly, as well
as rightly; and the greater gifts he had, the more harm he
would have done if he had Used them ill. We shall see, pre
sently, how he did use them ill, more than once ; and how our
Lord had to reprove him, and say very stern and terrible words
to him, to bring him to his senses.
But this we may see, that St. Peter was always a frank, brave,
honest, high-spirited man ; who, if he thought that a thing ought
to be done, would do it at once.
The first thing we hear of him is, how Jesus, walking by the
Lake of Galilee, saw Peter with his brother, casting a net into the
sea, for they were fishers. And he said unto them, ' Follow me,
and I will make you fishers of men. And they straightway left
their nets, and followed him.' This was most likely not the first
time that St. Peter had seen our Lord, or heard him speak.
Living in the same part of the country, he must have known alt
his miracles : but still it was a great struggle, no doubt, for
him (and doubly so because he was a married man), to throw
up his employment, and go wandering after one who had not
where to lay his head : yet he did it, and did it at once. And
you may see that he did it for a much higher and nobler reason
than if he had only gone to wonder at our Lord's miracles, as
the multitude did, or even to be able to work miracles himself.
Jesus did not say to him, Follow me, and I will give you the
power of working miracles, and being admired, and wondered
at ; all he says is, I will make you fishers of men ; I will make

XVIII.] ST. PETER. 3H
you able to get a hold on men's hearts, and teach them, and
make them happier and better. And for that St. Peter followed
him. It seems as if from the first his wish was to do good to
his fellow-creatures.
And, gradually, he seems to have become the spokesman
for the other apostles. When they wished to ask our Lord
anything, we generally find St. Peter asking ; and when (as in
the gospel for to-day), our Lord asks them a question, St. Peter
answers for them all. Whom say ye that I am ? And Peter
answered and said, ' Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living
God.' This is what St. Peter had learnt ; because he had kept his
eyes and his ears open, and his heart ready and teachable, that
he might see God's truth when it should please God to show it
him ; and God did show it him : and taught him something
which his own eyes and ears could not teach him ; which all
his thinking could not have taught him ; which no man could
have taught him ; flesh and blood could not reveal to him that
Jesus was the Son of God ; flesh and blood could not draw
aside the veil of flesh and blood, and make him see in that poor
man of Nazareth, who was called the carpenter's son, the only-
begotten of the Father, God made man. No. God the Father
only could teach him that, by the inspiration of his Holy Spirit :
but do you think that God would have taught St. Peter that, or
that St. Peter could have learnt it, if his mind had been merely
full of thoughts about himself, and what honour he was to get
for himself, or what profit he was to get for himself, out of the
Lord Jesus Christ ?
No : St. Peter loved the Lord Jesus ; loved him with his
whole heart. When afterwards our Lord asked him, ' Simon,
son of Jonas, lovest thou me ? ' He answered, ' Lord, thou
knowest that I love thee.' And because he loved him, he saw
how beautiful and glorious the Lord's character was ; and his
eyes were opened to see that the Lord was too beautiful, too
glorious, to be merely a mortal man ; and, at last, to see that

312 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
he was the brightness of God's glory, and the express image of
his Father's person.
But, as I said just now, St. Peter's great and excellent gifts
might have made him only the more dangerous man, if he used
them ill. And this seems to have been his danger. He was
plainly a very bold and determined man, who knew his own
power, and was ready to use it fearlessly : and what would he
be tempted to do ! To fancy that his power belonged to him,
and not to Christ; that his wisdom belonged to himself; that
his faith belonged to himself; his authority belonged to himself;
and that, therefore, he could use his excellent gifts as he liked,
and not merely as Christ liked. He was liable, as we say in
homely English, to ' have his head turned ' by his honour and
his power.
For instance, immediately after our Lord had put this great
honour on him, ' I will give thee the keys of the kingdom of
heaven,' we find Peter mistaking his power, and, therefore, mis
using it. ' From that time forth began Jesus to show unto his
disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many
things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed,
and be raised again the third day. Then Peter took him, and
began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from Thee, Lord : this
shall not be unto thee. But he turned, and said unto Peter,
Get thee behind me, Satan : thou art an offence unto me : for
thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be
of men.' St. Peter's words, in the Greek tongue, really seem to
mean that St. Peter fancied that he could protect our Lord ; that
he had the power of delivering him, by binding his enemies the
Jews, and loosing the Lord himself. That seems to have been
the way in which he took our Lord's words : but what does our
Lord answer ? As stern words as man could hear. ' Get thee
behind me, Satan ; for thou art an offence unto me.' Or, rather,
thou art my stumbling-block. So that St. Peter, while he fancied
himself near to the angels, found out, to his shame, that he was
behaving like a devil, and had to be called Satan to his face ;

xvm.] ST. PETER.

313

and that while he thought he could save the Lord Jesus, he
found that he was doing all he could to harm and ruin his
master ; trying to do the very work which the Devil tried to do,
when he tempted the Lord Jesus in the wilderness. So near
beside each other do heaven and hell lie. So easy is it to give
place to the Devil, and fall into the worst of sin, just when we
are puffed up with spiritual pride.
And more than once afterwards, St. Peter had to learn that
same lesson; when, for instance, he leaped boldly overboard
from the boat, and came walking towards Jesus on the sea.
That was noble : worthy of St. Peter : but he fancied himself a
braver man than he was. He became afraid ; and the moment
that he became afraid, he began to sink. Jesus saved him, and
then told him why he had become afraid : because his faith had
failed him. He had ceased trusting in Christ's power to keep
him up ; and became helpless at once.
That should have been a lesson to St. Peter, that he was not
to be so very sure of his own faith and his own courage ; that
without his Lord he might become cowardly and helpless any
moment : but he did not take that gentle lesson ; so he had to
learn it once and for all by a very terrible trial. We all know
how he fell; — one day protesting vehemently to his Lord,
' Though I die with thee, I will not deny thee ; ' the next,
declaring, with oaths and curses, ' I know not the man.' No
wonder that when Jesus turned and looked on him, Peter went
out and wept bitterly, as bitter tears of shame as ever were shed
on earth. For he knew, he was sure, that he loved his Lord all
along : and now he had denied him. He who was so bold and
confident, to fall thus ! and into the very sins most contrary to
his nature ! the very sins in which he would have expected least
of all to fall ! He, so frank and honest and brave — He to turn
coward. He to tell a base lie ! I dare say, that for the moment
he could hardly believe himself to be himself.
But so it is, my friends. If we forget that all which is good
and strong in us comes from God, and not from ourselves ; if

314 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
we are conceited, and confident in ourselves ; then we cut our
selves off from God's grace, and give place to Satan the Devil,
that he may sift us like wheat, as he did St. Peter ; and then in
some shameful hour, we may find ourselves saying and doing
things which we would never have believed we could have done.
God grant, that if ever we fall into such unexpected sin, it may
happen to us as it did to St. Peter. For Satan gained little by
sifting St Peter. He sifted out the chaff: but the wheat was
left behind safe for God's garner. The chaff was St. Peter's
rashness and self-conceit, which came from his own sinful
nature ; and that went, and St. Peter was rid of it for ever. The
wheat was St. Peter's courage, and faith, and honour, which
came from God ; and that remained, and St. Peter kept them
for ever. That, we read, was St. Peter's conversion; that
worked the thorough and complete change in his character, and
made him a new man from that day forth. And then, after that
terrible and fiery trial, St. Peter was ready to receive the gift of
the Holy Spirit, which gave him courage with fervent zeal to
preach the gospel of his Crucified Lord, and at last to be cruci
fied himself for that Lord's sake ; and so fulfil the Lord's words
to him. ' When thou wast young, thou girdedst thyself, and
walkedst whither thou wouldest : but when thou shalt be old,
thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee,
and carry thee whither thou wouldest not' By that our Lord
seems to have meant, ' You were strong and proud and self-
willed enough in your youth. The day will come when you
will be tamed down, ready and willing to suffer patiently, even
agony from which your flesh and blood may shrink ; ' and the
Lord's words came true. For, say the old stories, when St.
Peter was led to be crucified, he refused to be crucified upright,
as the Lord Jesus had been, saying, ' That it was too great an
honour for him, who had once denied his Lord, to die the same
death as his Lord died.' So he was crucified, they say, with
his head downward; and ended a glorious life in a humble
martyrdom.

xvm.] ST. PETER.

315

And what may we learn from St. Peter's character ? I think
we may learn this. Frankness, boldness, a high spirit, a stout
will, and an affectionate heart ; these are all God's gifts, and
they are pleasant in his eyes, and ought to be a blessing to the
man who has them. Ought to be a blessing to him, because
they are the stuff out of which a good, and noble, and useful
Christian man may be made. But they need not be a blessing
to a man ; they are excellent gifts : but they will not of themselves.
make a man an excellent man, who excels ; that is, surpasses.
others in goodness. We may see that ourselves, from experi
ence. We see too many brave men, free-spoken men, affec
tionate men, who come to shame and ruin.
How then can we become excellent men, like St. Peter ? By
being baptised, as St. Peter was, with the Holy Ghost and with
fire. Baptized with the Holy Ghost, to put into our hearts good
desires ; to make us see what is good, and love what is good,
long to do good : but baptized with fire also. ' He shall
baptize you, John the Baptist said, with the Holy Ghost and
with fire.'
Does that seem a hard saying ? Do not some at least of you
know what that means ? Some know, I believe. All will know
one day ; for it is true for all. To all, sooner or later, Christ
comes to baptise them with fire; with the bitter searching
affliction which opens the very secrets of their hearts, and shows
them what their souls are really like, and parts the good from
the evil in them, the gold from the rubbish, the wheat from the
chaff. ' And he shall gather the wheat into his garner, but the
chaff he shall burn up with unquenchable fire.' God grant to-
each of you, that when that day comes to you, there may be
something in you which will stand the fire ; something worthy
to be treasured up in God's garner, unto everlasting life.
But do not think that the baptism of fire comes only once
for all to a man, in some terrible affliction, some one awful con
viction of his own sinfulness and nothingness. No ; with many

316 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
— and those, perhaps, the best people — it goes on month after
month, year after year : by secret trials, chastenings which none
but they and God can understand, the Lord is cleansing them
from their secret faults, and making them to understand wisdom
secretly ; burning out of them the chaff of self-will and self-con
ceit and vanity, and leaving only the pure gold of his righteous
ness. How many sweet and holy souls look cheerful enough
before the eyes of man, because they are too humble and too
considerate to intrude their secret sorrows upon the wcrld. And
yet they have their secret sorrows. They carry their cross un
seen all day long, and lie down to sleep on it at night : and
they will carry it for years and years, and to their graves, and
to the Throne of Christ, before they lay it down : and none but
they and Christ will ever know what it was ; what was the secret
chastisement which he sent to make that soul better, which
seemed to us to be already too good for earth. So does the
Lord watch his people, and tries them with fire, as the refiner
of silver sits by his furnace, watching the melted metal, till he
knows that it is purged from all its dross, by seeing the image
of his own face reflected in it. God grant that our afflictions
may so cleanse our hearts, that at the last Christ may behold
himself in us, and us in himself; that so we may be fit to be
with him wherahe is, and behold the glory which his Father
gave him before the foundation of the world.

SERMON XIX.
ELIJAH.
(Tenth Sunday after Trinity.)

i Kings xxi. 19, 20.
And thou shalt speak unto him, saying, Thus saith the Lord, Hast thou
killed, and also taken possession ? and thou shalt speak unto him, saying,
Thus saith the Lord, In the place where dogs licked the blood of
Naboth, shall dogs lick thy blood, even thine. And Ahab said to
Elijah, Hast thou found me, O mine enemy? And he answered, I have
found thee : because thou hast sold thyself to work evil in the sight of
the Lord.
(~\F all the grand personages in the Old Testament, there are
^^^ few or none, I think, grander than the prophet Elijah.
Consider his strange and wild life, wandering about in forests
and mountains, suddenly appearing, and suddenly disappearing
again, so that no man knew where to find him ; and, as
Obadiah said when he met him, ' If I tell my Lord, Behold,
Elijah is here ; then, as soon as I am gone from thee, the
Spirit of the Lord shall carry thee whither I know not.' Con
sider, again, his strange activity and strength, as when he goes,
forty days and forty nights, far away out of Judea, over the
waste wilderness, to Horeb the mount of God ; or, as again,
when he girds up his loins, and runs before Ahab's chariot for
many miles to the entrance of Jezreel. One can fancy him

318 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
from what the Bible tells us of him, clearly enough ; as a man
mysterious and terrible, not merely in the eyes of women and
children, but of soldiers and of kings.
He seems to have been especially a countryman ; a moun
taineer ; born and bred in Gilead, among the lofty mountains
and vast forests, full of wild beasts, lions and bears, wild bulls
and deer, which stretch for many miles along the further side
of the river Jordan, with the waste desert of rocks and sand
beyond therri. A wild man, bred up in a wild country, he had
learnt to fear no man, and no thing, but God alone. We do
not know what his youth was like ; we do not know whether he
had wife, or children, or any human being who loved him.
Most likely not. He seems to have lived a lonely life, in sad
and bad times. He seems to have had but one thought, that
his country was going to ruin, from idolatry, tyranny, false and
¦covetous ways ; and one determination ; to say so ; to speak
the truth, whatever it cost him. He had found out that the
Lord was God, and not Baal, or any of the idols ; and he
would follow the Lord ; and tell all Israel what his own heart
had told him, ' The Lord, he is God,' was the one thing which
he had to say ; and he said it, till it became his name ; whether
given him by his parents, or by the people, his name was
Eli-jah, 'The Losd is God.' ' How long halt ye between two
opinions?' he cries, upon the greatest day of his life. 'If the
Lord be God, then follow him ; but if Baal, then follow him.'
How grand he is, on Carmel, throughout that noble chapter
which we read last Sunday. There is no fear in him, no doubt
in him. The poor wild peasant out of the savage mountains
stands up before all Israel, before king, priests, nobles, and
people, and speaks and acts as he, too, were a king ; because
the Spirit of God is in him : and he is right, and he knows that
he is right. And they obey him as if he were a king. Even
before the fire comes down from heaven, and shows that God
is on his side, from the first they obey him. King Ahab him
self obeys him, trembles before him — 'And it came to pass,

xix.] ELIJAH. 319
when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him, Art thou he
that troubleth Israel ? And he answered, I have not troubled
Israel; but thou, and thy father's house, in that ye have
forsaken the commandments of the Lord, and thou hast
followed Baalim. Now therefore send, and gather to me all
Israel unto mount Carmel, and the prophets of Baal four
hundred and fifty, and the prophets of the groves four hundred,
which eat at Jezebel's table. So Ahab sent unto all the child
ren of Israel, and gathered the prophets together unto mount
Carmel.' The tyrant's guilty conscience makes a coward of
him ; and he quails before the wild man out of the mountains,
who has not where to lay his head, who stands alone against
all the people, though Baal's prophets are four hundred and
fifty men, and the prophets of the groves four hundred, and
they eat at the queen's table; and he only is left and they
seek his life : — yet no man dare touch him, not even the king
himself. Such power is there, such strength is there, in being
an honest and a God-fearing man.
Yes, my friends, this was the secret of Elijah's power. This
is the lesson which Elijah has to teach us. Not to halt between
two opinions. If a thing be true, to stand up for it ; if a thing
be right, to do it, whatsoever it may cost us. Make up your
minds then, my friends, to be honest men like Elijah the
prophet of old.
For your own sake, for your neighbour's sake, and for God's
sake, be honest men.
For your own sake. If you want to be respected ; if you
want to be powerful — and it is good to be powerful sometimes
—if God has set you to govern people, whether it be your
children and household, your own farm, your own shop, your
own estate, your own country or neighbourhood — Do you want
to know the great secret of success? — Be honest and brave.
Let your word be as good as your thought, and your deed as
good as your word. Who is the man who is respected ? Who
is the man who has influence? The complaisant man — the

320 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.

cringing man — the man who cannot say No, or dare not say
No? Not he. The passionate man who loses his temper
when anything goes wrong, who swears and scolds, and instead
of making others do right, himself does wrong, and lowers
himself just when he ought to command respect? My
experience is — not he : but the man who says honestly and
quietly what he thinks, and does fearlessly and quietly what
he knows. People who differ from him will respect him,
because he acts up to his principles. When they are in
difficulty or trouble, they will go and ask his advice, just
because they know they will get an honest answer. They will
overlook a little roughness in him ; they will excuse his speak
ing unpleasant truths : because they can trust him, even though
he is plain-spoken.
For your neighbour's sake, I say; and again, for your
children's sake ; for the sake of all with whom you have to do,
be honest and brave. For our children — O my friends, we
cannot do a crueller thing by them than to let them see that
we are inconsistent. If they hear us say one thing and do
another — if, while we preach to them we do not practice
ourselves, they will never respect us, and never obey us from
love and principle. If they do obey us, it will be only before
our faces, and from fear. If they see us doing only what we
like, when our backs are turned they will do what they like.
And worse will come than their not respecting us — they will
learn not to respect God. If they see that we do not respect
truth and honesty, they will not respect truth and honesty ; and
he who does not respect them, does not respect God. They
will learn to look on religion as a sham. If we are inconsistent,
they will be profane.
But some may say — 'I have no power; and I want none.
I have no people under me for whom I am responsible.'
Then, if you think that you need not be honest and brave
for your own sake, or for other peoples' sake, be honest and
brave for God's sake.

xix.] ELIJAH. 321
Do you ask what I mean ? I mean this. Recollect that
truth belongs to God. That if a thing is true, it is true because
God made it so, and not otherwise ; and therefore, if you deny
truth, you fight against God. If you are honest, and stand up
for truth, you stand up for God, and what God has done.
And recollect this, too. If a thing be right for you to do,
God has made it right, and God wills you to do it ; and, there
fore, if you do not do your duty, you are fighting against God ;
and if you do your duty, you are a fellow-worker with God,
fulfilling God's will. Therefore, I say, Be honest and brave
for God's sake. And in this way, my friends, all may be
brave, all may be noble. Speak the truth, and do your duty,
because it is the will of God. Poor, weak women, people
without scholarship, cleverness, power, may live glorious lives,
and die glorious deaths, and God's strength may be made per
fect in their weakness. They may live, did I say ? I may say
they have lived, and have died, already, by thousands. When
we read the stories of the old martyrs who, in the heathen
persecution, died like heroes rather than deny Chrict, and
scorned to save themselves by telling what they knew to be a
lie, but preferred truth to all that makes life worth having : —
how many of them — I may say the greater part of them — were
poor creatures enough in the eyes of man, though they were
rich enough, noble enough, in the eyes of God who inspired
them. ' Few rich and few noble,' as the apostle says, ' were
called.' It was to poor people, old people, weak women, ill-
used and untaught slaves, that God gave grace to defy all the
torments which the heathen could heap on them, and to defy
the scourge and the rack, the wild beasts and the fire, sooner
than foul their lips and their souls by denying Christ, and
worshipping the idols which they knew were nothing, and
worth nothing.
And so it may be with any of you here ; whosoever you may
be, however poor, however humble. Though your opportuni
ties may be small, your station lowly, your knowledge little ;

322 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
though you may be stupid in mind, slow of speech, weakly of
body, yet if you but make up your mind to say the thing
which is true, and to do the thing which is right, you may be
strong with the strength of God, and glorious with the glory of
Christ. It is a grand thing, no doubt, to be like Elijah, a stern and
bold prophet, standing up alone against a tyrant king and a
sinful people ; but it is even a greater thing to be like thai
famous martyr in old time, St. Blandina, who, though she was
but a slave, and so weakly, and mean, and fearful in body, that
her mistress and all her friends feared that she would deny
Christ at the very sight of the torments prepared for her, and
save herself by sacrificing to the idols, yet endured, day after
day, tortures too horrible to speak of, without cry or groan, or
any word, save ' I am a Christian ;' and, having outlived all
her fellow-martyrs, died at last victorious over pain and temp
tation, so that the very heathen who tortured her broke out in
admiration of her courage, and confessed that no woman had
ever endured so many and so grievous torments. So may
God's strength be made perfect in woman's weakness.
You are not called to endure such things. No : but you,
and I, and every Christian soul are called on to do what we
know to be rigkt. Not to halt between two opinions : but if
God be God, to follow Him. If we make up our minds to do
that, we shall be sure to have our trials : but we shall be safe,
because we are on God's side, and God on ours. And if God
be with us, what matter if the whole world be against us ? For
which is the stronger of the two, the whole world, or God who
made it, and rules it, and will rule it for ever?

SERMON XX.
THE LOFTINESS OF HUMILITY.

i Peter v. 5.
Be clothed with humility : for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace
to the humble.
"""PHIS is St. Peter's command. Are we really inclined to
obey it? For, if we are, there is nothing more easy.
There is no vice so easy to get rid of as pride : if one wishes.
Nothing so easy as to be humble : if one wishes.
That may seem a strange saying, considering that self-
conceit is the vice of all others to which man is most given ;
the first sin, and the last sin, and that which is said to
be the most difficult to cure. But what I say is true never
theless. Whosoever wishes to get rid of pride may do so. Who
soever wishes to be humble need not go far to humble
himself. But how ? Simply by being honest with himself, and look
ing at himself as he is.
Let a man recollect honestly and faithfully his past life ; let
him recollect his sayings and doings for the past week ; even
for the past twenty-four hours : and I will warrant that man
that he will recollect something, or, perhaps, many things
which will not raise him in his own eyes ; something which he

324 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
had sooner not have said or done ; something which, if he is
a foolish man, he will try to forget, because it makes him
ashamed of himself; something which, if he is a wise man, he
will not try to forget, just because it makes him ashamed of
himself; and a very good thing for him that he should be so.
I know that it is so for me ; and therefore I suppose it is so'
for every man and woman in this Church.
I am not going to give any examples. I am not going to
say, — ' Suppose you thought this and this about yourself, and
were proud of it ; and then suppose that you recollected that
you had done that and that : would you not feel very much
taken down in your own conceit ? '
I like that personal kind of preaching less and less. Those
random shots are dangerous and cruel ; likely to hit the wrong
person, and hurt their feelings unnecessarily. It is very easy
to say a hard thing : but not so easy to say it to the right
person and at the right time.
No. The heart knoweth its own bitterness. Almost every
one has something to be ashamed of, more or less, which
no one but himself and God knows of; and which, perhaps,
it is better that no one but he and God should know.
I do not mean any great sin, or great shame — God forbid ;
but some weak f>oint, as we call it. Something which he had
better not say or do; and yet which he is in the habit of
saying and doing. I do not ask what it is. With some it may
be a mere pardonable weakness ; with others it may be a very
serious and dangerous fault. All I ask now is, that each and
every one of us should try and find it out, and feel it, and keep
it in mind ; that we may be of a humble spirit with the lowly,
which is better than dividing the spoil with the proud.
But why better ?
The world and human nature look up to the proud success
ful man. One is apt to say, 'Happy is the man who has
plenty to be proud of. Happy is the man who can divide the
spoil of this world with the successful of this world. Happy is

XX.] THE LOFTINESS OF HUMILITY. 325
the man who can look down on his fellow-men, and stand over
them, and manage them, and make use of them, and get his
profit out of them.'
But that is a mistake. That is the high-mindedness which
goes before a fall, which comes not from above, but is always
earthly, often sensual, and sometimes devilish. The true and
safe high-mindedness, which comes from above, is none other
than humility. For, if you will look at it aright, the humble
man is really more high-minded than the proud man. Think.
Suppose two men equal in understanding, in rank, in wealth,
in what else you like, one of them proud, the other humble.
The proud man thinks — ' How much better, wiser, richer,
more highly born, more religious, more orthodox, am I than
other people round me.' Not, of course, than all round him,
but than those whom he thinks beneath him. Therefore he is
always comparing himself with those below himself; always
watching those things in them in which he thinks them worse,
meaner than himself; he is always looking down on his
neighbours. Now, which is more high-minded; which is nobler; which
is more fit for a man ; to look down, or to look up ? At all
events the humble man looks up. He thinks, ' How much
worse, not how much better, am I than other people.' He
looks at their good points, and compares them with his own
bad ones. He admires them for those things in which they
surpass him. He thinks of — perhaps he loves to read of —
men superior to himself in goodness, wisdom, courage. He
pleases himself with the example of brave and righteous deeds,
even though he fears that he cannot copy them ; and so he is
always looking up. His mind is filled with high thoughts,
though they be about others, not about himself. If he be a
truly Christian man, his thoughts rise higher still. He thinks
of Christ and of God, and compares his weakness, ignorance,
and sinfulness with their perfect power, wisdom, goodness.
Do you not see that this man's mind is full of higher, nobler

326 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
thoughts than that of the proud man ? Is he not more high-
minded who is looking up, up to God himself, for what is good,
noble, heavenly ? Even though it makes him feel small, poor,
weak, and sinful in comparison, still his mind is full of grace,
and wisdom, and glory. The proud man, meanwhile, for the
sake of feeding his own self-conceit at other men's expense, is
filling his mind with low, mean, earthly thoughts about the
weaknesses, sins, and follies, of the world around him. Is not
he truly low-minded, thinking about low things ?
Now, I tell you, my friends, that both have their reward.
That the humble man, as years roll on, becomes more and
more noble, and the proud man becomes more and more
low-minded; and finds that pride goes before a fall in more
senses than one. Yes. There is nothing more hurtful to our
own minds and hearts than a domineering, contemptuous
frame of mind. It may be pleasant to our own self-conceit :
but it is only a sweet poison. A man lowers his own character
by it He takes the shape of what he is always looking at ;
and, if he looks at base and low things, he becomes base and
low himself; just as slave-owners, all over the world, and in all
time, sooner and later, by living among slaves, learn to copy
their own slaves' vices; and, while they oppress and look
down on their tfellow-man, become passionate and brutal,
false and greedy, like the poor wretches whom they oppress.
Better, better to be of a lowly spirit. Better to think of
those who are nobler than ourselves, even though by so doing
we are ashamed of ourselves all day long. What loftier
thoughts can man have? What higher and purer air can a
man's soul breathe ? Yes, my friends ; believe it, and be sure
of it. The truly high-minded man is not the proud man, who
tries to get a little pitiful satisfaction from finding his brother
men, as he chooses to fancy, a little weaker, a little more
ignorant, a little more foolish, a little more ridiculous, than his
own weak, ignorant, foolish, and, perhaps, ridiculous self. Not
he ; but the man who is always looking upwards to goodness,

XX.] THE LOFTINESS OF HUMILITY. 327
to good men, and to the all-good God : filling his soul with the
sight of an excellence to which he thinks he can never attain ;
and saying, with David, ' All my delight is in the saints that
dwell in the earth, and in those who excel in virtue.'
But I do not say that he cannot attain to that excellence.
To the goodness of God, of course, no man can ; but to the
goodness of man he may. For what man has done, man may
do ; and the grace of God which gave power to one man to rise
above sin, and weakness, and ignorance, will give power to
others also. But only to those who look upward, at better men
than themselves : not to those who look down, like the Phari
see, but to those who look up like the Publican ; for, as the
text says, ' God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the
humble.' And why does God resist and set himself against the proud ?
To turn him out of his evil way, of course, if by any means he
may be converted (that is, turned round) and live. For the
proud man has put himself into a wrong position ; where no
immortal soul ought to be. He is looking away from God,
and down upon men ; and so he has turned his face and
thoughts away from God, the fountain of light and life ; and is
trying to do without God, and to stand in his own strength, and
not in God's grace, and to be somebody in himself, instead of
being only in God, in whom we live and move and have our
being. So he has set himself against God ; and God will, in
mercy to that foolish man's soul, set himself against him. God
will humble him ; God will overthrow him ; God will bring his
plans to nought ; if by any means he may make that man
ashamed of himself, and empty him of his self-conceit, that he
may turn and repent in dust and ashes, when he finds out what
those proud Laodicaean Christians of old had to find out — that
all the while that they were saying, 'I am rich, and increased
with goods, and have need of nothing,' they did not know that
they were wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and
naked.

328 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
And how does God give grace to the humble ? My friends,
even the wise heathen knew that. Listen to a heathen ; * a
good and a wise man, though ; and one who was not far from
the kingdom of God, or he would not have written such words
as these, — ¦
' It is our duty,' he says, ' to turn our minds to the best of
everything ; so as not merely to enjoy what we read, but to be
improved by it. And we shall do that, by reading the histories
of good and great men, which will, in our minds, produce an
emulation and eagerness, which may stir us up to imitation.
We may be pleased with the work of a man's hands, and yet set
little store by the workman. Perfumes and fine colours we may
like well enough : but that will not make us wish to be per
fumers, or painters : but goodness, which is the work, not of a
man's hands, but of his soul, makes us not only admire what is
done, but long to do the like. And therefore,' he says, he
thought it good to write the lives 'of famous and good men, and
to set their examples before his countrymen. And having
begun to do this,' he says in another place, 'for the sake of
others, he found himself going on, and liking his labour, for his
own sake : for the virtues of those great men served him as a
looking-glass, in which he might see how, more or less, to order
and adorn his own life. Indeed, it could be compared,' he
says, ' to nothing less than living with the great souls who were
dead and gone, and choosing out of their actions all that was
noblest and worthiest to know. What greater pleasure could
there be than that,' he asks, ' or what better means to improve
his soul? By filling his mind with pictures of the best and
worthiest characters, he was able to free himself from any low,
malicious, mean thoughts, which he might catch from bad com
pany. If he was forced to mix at times with base men, he
could wash out the stains of their bad thoughts and words, by
training himself in a calm and happy temper to view those noble
examples.' So says the wise heathen. Was not he happier,
* Plutarch.

XX.] THE LOFTINESS OF HUMILITY 329
wiser, better, a thousand times, thus keeping himself humble by
looking upwards, than if he had been feeding his petty pride by
looking down, and saying, ' God, I thank thee that I am not as
other men are ? '
If you wish, then, to be truly high-minded, by being truly
humble, read of, and think of, better men, wiser men, braver
men, more useful men than you are. Above all, if you be
Christians, think of Christ himself. That good old heathen
took the best patterns which he could find : but after all, they
were but imperfect, sinful men : but you have an example such
as he never dreamed of; a perfect man, and perfect God in one.
Let the thought of Christ keep you always humble : and yet let
it lift you up to the highest, noblest, purest thoughts which man
can have, as it will.
For all that this old heathen says of the use of examples of
good men, all that, and far more, St. Paul says, almost in the
same words. By looking at Christ, he says, we rise and sit with
him in heavenly places, and enjoy the sight of His perfect
goodness ; ashamed of ourselves, indeed, and bowed to the
very dust by the feeling of our own unworthiness ; and yet filled
with the thought of his worthiness, till, by, looking we begin to
admire, and, by admiring, we begin to love ; and so are drawn
and lifted up to him, till, by beholding as in a glass the glory of
the Lord, and the perfect beauty of his character, we become
changed into the same image, from glory to glory : and thus,
instead of receiving the just punishment of pride and contempt,
which is lowering our characters to the level of those on whom
we look down, we shall receive the just reward of true humility,
which is having our characters raised to the level of him up to
whom we look.
Oh young people, think of this ; and remember why God has
given you the advantage of scholarship and education. Not
that you may be proud of the very little you know ; not that you
may look down on those who are not as well instructed as you
are ; not that you may waste your time over silly books, which

330 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
teach you only to laugh at the follies and ignorance of some of
your fellow-men, to whom God has not given as much as to you ;
but that you may learn what great and good men have lived,
and still live, in the world; what wise, and good, and useful
things have been, and are being, done all around you ; and to
copy them : above all, that you may look up to Christ, and
through Christ, to God, and learn to copy him ; till you come,
as St. Paul says, to be perfect men ; to the measure of the stature
of the fulness of Christ To which may he bring you all of his
mercy. Amen.

SERMON XXI.
THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD.
( Trinity Sunday. )

John v. 19.

Then answered Jesus and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you,
The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do t
for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.
HPHIS is Trinity Sunday ; and on this day we are especially to-
think of the mystery of the ever-blessed Trinity, and on
the Athanasian Creed, which was read this morning. Now
there is much in this Athanasian Creed, which simple country
people, however good their natural abilities may be, cannot be
expected to understand. The Creed was written by scholars,
and for scholars ; and for very deep scholars, too, far deeper
than I pretend to be ; and the reasonable way for most men to
think of the Athanasian Creed, will be to take it very much
upon trust, as a child takes on trust what his father tells him,
even though he cannot understand it himself; or, as we all be
lieve, that the earth moves round the sun, and not the sun round
the earth, though we cannot prove it ; but only believe it, be
cause wiser men than we have proved it. So we must think of
the Athanasian Creed, and say to ourselves — ' Wiser men than
I can ever hope to be have settled that this is the true doctrine,.
and the true meaning of Holy Scripture, and I will believe them.:

332 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
They must know best.' Still, one is bound to understand as
much as one can ; one is bound to be able to give some reason
for the faith which is in us ; and, above all, one is bound not to
hold false doctrines, which are contrary to the Athanasian Creed
and to the Bible.
Some people are too apt to say now-a-days, ' But what matter
if one does hold false doctrine ? That is a mistake of the head
and not of the heart. Provided a man lives a good life, what
matter what his doctrines are ? " No doubt, my friends, if a
man lives a good life, all is well : but do people live good lives ?
I am not speaking of infidels. Thank God, there are none
here ; to God let us leave them, trusting in the Good Friday
collect, and the good-will of God, which is, that all should be
saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.
But, as for Christian people, this I will tell you, that unless
you hold true doctrines, you will not lead good lives. My
experience is, that people are often wrong, when they say false
doctrine is a mistake of the head and not of the heart. I
believe false doctrine is very often not bred in the head at all,
but in the heart, in the very bottom of a man's soul ; that it
rises out of his heart into his head ; and that if his heart was
right with God, he would begin at once to have clearer and
truer notions of the»true Christian faith. I do not say that it is
always so ; God forbid ! But I do say that it is often so,
because I see it so ; because I see every day false doctrines
about God making men lead bad lives, and commit actual sins ;
take God's name in vain, dishonour their fathers and mothers,
lie, cheat, bear false witness against their neighbours, and covet
other men's goods. I say, I see it, and I must believe my own
eyes and ears ; and when I do see it, I begin to understand the
text which says, ' This is eternal life, to know thee, the only
God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent ; ' and I begin to
understand the Athanasian Creed, which says, that if a man
does not believe rightly the name of God, and the Incarnation
of our Lord Jesus Christ, he will perish everlastingly; his soul

XXI.] THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD, 333
will decay more and more, become more and more weak,
unhealthy and corrupt, till he perishes everlastingly. And
whatsoever that may mean, it must mean something most awful
and terrible, worse than all the evil which ever happened to us
since we were born.
There is a very serious example of this, to my mind, in what
is called the Greek Church; the Greeks and Russians. They
split off from the rest of Christ's Catholic Church, many hundred
years ago, because they would not hold with the rest of the
Church that the Holy Spirit proceeded from the Son as well as
from the Father. They said that the Holy Spirit proceeded
from the Father alone. Now that may seem a slight matter of
words : but I cannot help thinking that it has been a very
solemn matter of practice with them. It seems to me — God
forgive me if I am judging them hardly ! — that because they
denied that the Holy Spirit proceeded from the Son, they forgot
that he was the Spirit of the Son, the Spirit of Jesus Christ, by
whom he says for ever, ' Father, not my will but thine be done ! '
and so they forgot that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Sonship,
the Spirit of adoption, which must proceed and come from
Christ to us, that we may call God our Father, and say with
Christ, ' Father, I come to do thy will ; ' and so, in course of
time, they seem to have forgotten that Christian men were in
any real practical sense, God's children ; and when people
forget that they are God's children, they forget soon enough to
behave like God's children, and to live righteous and Godlike
lives. I give you this as an example of what I mean ; how not
believing rightly the Athanasian Creed may make a man lead
a bad life.
Now let me give an example nearer home ; one which has to
do with you and me. God grant that we may all lay it to heart.
You read, in the Athanasian Creed, that we are not to confound
the persons of the Trinity, nor divide the substance ; but to
believe that such as the Father is, such is the Son. and such is

334 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
the Holy Ghost, the Glory equal, the Majesty co-eternal. Now
there is little fear of our confounding the persons, as some
people used to do in old times ; but there is great fear of our
dividing God's substance, parting God's substance, that is,
fancying that God is made up of different parts, and not per
fectly one God.
For people are very apt to talk as if God's love and God's
justice were two different things, different parts of God ; as if
his justice had to be satisfied in one way, and his love in another;
as if his justice wished to destroy sinners, and his love wished
to save sinners ; and so they talk as if there was a division in
God ; as if different attributes of God were pulling two different
ways, and that God has parts of which one desires to do one
thing, and one part another. It sounds shocking, I am sure
you will feel, when I put it into plain English. I wish it to
sound shocking. I wish you to feel how wrong and heretical
it is ; that you may keep clear of such notions, and believe the
orthodox faith, that God has neither parts nor passions, nor
¦division in his substance at all, but is absolutely and substantially
one; and that, therefore, his love and his justice are the very
same things ; his justice, however severe it may seem, is perfect
love and kindness ; and his love is no indulgence, but perfect
justice. #
But you may say — Very likely that is true ; but why need we
take so much care to believe it ?
It is always worth while to know what is true. You are
children of the Light, and of the Truth, adopted by the God of
truth, that you may know the truth and do it, and no mistake
or falsehood can, by any possibility, do anything for you, but
harm you. Always, therefore, try to find out and believe what
is true concerning everything ; and, above all, concerning God,
on whom all depend, in whom you live, and move, and have
your being. For all things in heaven and earth depend on
God ; and, therefore, if you have wrong notions about God, you
will sooner or later have wrong notions about everything else.

XXI.] THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. 335
For see, now, how this false notion of God's justice and love
being different things, leads people into a worse error still. A
man goes on to fancy, that while God the Son is full of love
towards sinners, God the Father is (or at least was once) only
full of justice and wrath against sinners ; but if a man thinks
that God the Son loves him better than God the Father does,
then, of course, he will love God the Son better than he loves
God the Father. He will think of Christ the Son with pleasure
and gratitude, because he says to himself, Christ loves me, cares
for me ; I can have pity and tenderness from him, if I do wrong.
While of God the Father he thinks only with dread and secret
dislike. Thus, from dividing the substance, he has been led
on to confound the persons, imputing to the Son alone that
which is equally true of the Father, till he comes (as I have
known men do) to make for himself, as it were, a Heavenly
Father of Jesus Christ the Son.
Now, my dear friends, it does seem to me, that if anything
can grieve the Spirit of Christ, and the sacred heart of Jesus,
this is the way to grieve him. Oh read your Bibles, and you
will see this, that whatever Jesus came down on earth for, it
certainly was not to make men love him better than they love
the Father, and honour him more than they honour the Father,
and rob the Father of his glory, to give it to Jesus. What did
the Lord Jesus say himself? That he did not come to seek his
own honour, or shew forth his own glory, or do his own will :
-_~but his Father's honour, his Father's glory, his Father's will.
Though he was equal with the Father, as touching his Godhead,
yet he disguised himself, if I may so say, and took on him the
form of a servant, and was despised and rejected of men.
Why ! That men might honour his Father rather than him.
That men might not be so dazzled by his glory, as to forget his
Father s glory. Therefore he bade his apostles, while he was
on earth, tell no man that he was the Christ. Therefore, when
he worked his work of love and mercy, he took care to tell the
Jews that they were not his works, but the works of his Father

336 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
who sent him ; that he was not doing his own will, but his
Father's. Therefore he was always preaching of the Father in
heaven, and holding him up to men as the perfection of all love
and goodness and glory : and only once or twice, it seems, when
he was compelled, as it were, for very truth's sake, did he say
openly who he was, and claim his co-equal and co-eternal glory,
saying, ' Before Abraham was, I am.'
And, after all this, if anything can grieve him now, must it
not grieve him to see men fancying that he is better than his
Father is, more loving and merciful than his Father is, more
worthy of our trust, and faith, and adoration, and gratitude than
his Father is ? — His Father, for whose honour he was jealous
with a divine jealousy — His Father, who, he knows well, loved
the world which shrinks from him so well that he spared not
his only begotten Son, but freely gave him up for it.
Oh, my friends, believe me, if any sin of man can add a fresh
thorn to Christ's crown, it is to see men, under pretence of
honouring him, dishonouring his Father. For just think for
once of this — What nobler feeling on earth than the love of a
son to his father ? What greater pain to a good son than to see
his father dishonoured, and put down below him ? But what is
the love of an earthly son to an earthly father, compared to the
love of The Son io the Father ? What is the jealousy of an
earthly son for his father's honour, compared with the jealousy
of God the Son for God the Father's honour ?
All men, the Father has appointed, are to honour the Son,
even as they honour the Father. Because, as the Athanasian
Creed says, ' such as the Father is, such is the Son.' But, if
that be true, we are to honour the Father even as we honour
the Son ; because such as the Son is, such is the Father. Both
are true, and we must believe both ; and therefore we must not
give to Christ the honour which we should to a loving friend,
and give to the Father the honour which we should to an awful
judge. We must give them both the same honour. If we have
a godly fear of the Father, we ought to have a godly fear of

XXI.] THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. 337
Christ; and if we trust Christ, we ought to trust the Father
also. We must believe that Jesus Christ, the Son, is the bright
ness of the Father's glory, and the express image of his person ;
and therefore we must believe that because Jesus is love, therefore
the Father is love ; because Jesus is long-suffering, therefore the
Father is long-suffering ; because Jesus came to save the world,
therefore the Father must have sent him to save the world, or
he would never have come ; for he does nothing, he says, of
himself. Because we can trust Jesus utterly, therefore we can
trust the Father utterly. Because we believe that the Son has
life in himself, to give to whomsoever he will, we must believe
that the Father has life in himself likewise, and not, as some
seem to fancy, only the power of death and destruction. Because
nothing can separate us from the love of Jesus, nothing can
separate us from the love of his Father and our Father, whose
name is Light and Love.
If we believe this, we shall indeed honour the Father, and
indeed honour the Son likewise. But if we do not, we shall
dishonour the Son, while we fancy we are honouring him : we
shall rob Christ of his true glory, to give him a false glory, which
he abhors. If we fancy that he does anything for us without
his Father's commands; if we fancy that he feels anything for us
which his Father does not feel, and has not always felt likewise :
then we dishonour him. For his glory is to be a perfectly good
an4 obedient Son, and we fancy him — may he forgive us for it !
— a self-willed Son. This is Christ's glory, that though he is
equal with his Father, he obeys his Father. If he were not equal
to his Father, there would be less glory in his obeying him. Take
away the mystery of the ever-blessed Trinity, and you rob Christ
of his highest glory, and destroy the most beautiful thing in
heaven, except one. The most beautiful and noble thing of all
in heaven — that (if you will receive it) out of which all other
beautiful and noble things in heaven and earth come, is the
Father for ever saying to the Son, ' Thou art my Son ; this day
have I begotten thee. And in thee I am well pleased.' The

338 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
other most beautiful thing is the co-equal and co-eternal Son for
ever saying to the Father, ' Father, not my will, but thine be
done. I come to do thy will, O God. Thy law is written in
my heart'
Do you not see it? Oh, my dear friends, I see but a very
little of it. Who am I, that I should comprehend God ? And
who am I, that I should be able to make you understand the
glory of God, by any dull words of mine ? But God can make
you understand it. The Spirit of God can and will shew you
the glory of God. Because he proceedeth from the Father, he
will shew you what the glory of the Father is like. Because he
proceedeth from the Son, he will shew you what the glory of
the Son is like. Because he is consubstantial, co-equal, and
co-eternal with the Father and the Son, he will shew you that
the glory of the Father and the Son is not the glory of mere
power ; but a moral and spiritual glory, the glory of having a
perfectly glorious, noble, and beautiful character. And unless
he shews you that, you will never be thoroughly good men.
For it is a strange thing that men are always trying, more or
less, to be like God. And yet, not a strange thing ; for it is a
sign that we all came from God, and can get no rest till we are
come back to God, because God calls us all to be his children,
and be like him. A blessed thing it is, if we try to be like the
true God : but a sad and fearful thing, if we try to be like some
false god of our own invention. But so it is. It was so even
among the old heathen. Whatsoever a man fancies God to be
like, that he will try himself to be like. So if you fancy that
God the Father's glory is stern and awful power, that he is
extreme to mark what is done amiss, or stands severely on his
own rights, then you will do the same ; you will be extreme to
mark what is done amiss; you will stand severely on your
rights ; you will grow stern and harsh, unfeeling to your children
and workmen, and fond of shewing your power, just for the sake
of shewing it. But if you believe that the glory of the Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit is all one ; and that it is a loving glory ;

xxi.j THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. 339
if you believe that such as Jesus Christ is, such is his Father,
gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and
repenting him of the evil ; if you believe that your Father in
heaven is perfect, just because he sendeth his sun to rise on the
evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the
unjust, and is good to the unthankful and the evil — if you
believe this, I say, then you will be good to the unthankful and
the evil ; you will be long-suffering and tender ; good fathers,
good masters, good neighbours ; and your characters will be
come patient, generous, forgiving, truly noble, truly godlike.
And all because you believe the Athanasian Creed in spirit and
in truth.
In like manner, if you believe that Jesus Christ is not a
perfect Son ; if you fancy that he has any will but his Father's
will ; that he has any work but what his Father gives him to
do, who has committed all things into his hands; that he
knows anything but what his Father sheweth him, who shewed*
him all things, because he loveth him; then you will be
tempted to wish for power and honour of your own; to
become ambitious, self-willed, vain, and disobedient to your
parents. But if you believe that Jesus is a perfect Son, all that you
would wish your son to be to you, and millions of times more ;
and if you believe that that very thing is Christ's glory ; that
his glory consists in being a perfect Son, perfectly obedient,
having no will or wish but his Father's ; then will you, by thus
seeing Christ in spirit and in truth, see how beautiful and
noble it is to be good sons ; and you will long to try to be
good sons : and what you long for, and try for, you will surely
be, in God's good time ; for he has promised, — ' Blessed are
they who hunger and thirst after righteousness : for they shall
be filled.' And all through believing the Athanasian Creed ?
All ? Yes, all.
But will not the Holy Spirit teach us, without the Athanasian
Creed?

340 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
The Holy Spirit will teach us. Must teach us, if we are
really to learn one word of all this in spirit and in truth. But
whether the Holy Spirit does teach us, will depend, I fear,
very much upon whether we pray for him; and whether we
pray for him aright will depend on whether we know who he
is, and what he is like ; and that, again, the Athanasian Creed
will tell us.
Now, go home with God's blessing. Remember that such
as the Son is, such is the Father, and such is the Holy Ghost.
Pray to be made good fathers, after the likeness of The Father,
from whom every fatherhood in heaven and earth is named ;
good sons, after the likeness of God The Son ; and good and
holy spirits, after the likeness of The Holy Spirit ; and you will
be such at last, in God's good time, as far as man can become
like God; for you will be praying for the Holy Spirit himself,
and he will hear you, and come to you, and abide with you,
and all will be well.

SERMON XXII.
THE TORMENT OF FEAR.
(First Sunday after Trinity.)

I John iv. 16, 18.
And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is
love ; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.
Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day
of judgment : because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no
fear in love ; but perfect love casteth out fear : because fear hath
torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.
HPHE text tells us how to get one of the greatest blessings ;
a blessing which all long for, but all do not find ; and
that is a happy death. All wish to die happily; even bad
men. Like Balaam when he was committing a great sin, they
can say, ' Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my
last end be like his.' But meanwhile, like Balaam, they find it
too hard to live the life of the righteous, which is the only way
to die the death of the righteous. But something within them
{if false preachers will but leave them alone) tells them that
they will not succeed. Reason and common sense tell them
so : for how can a man expect to get to a place without
travelling the road which leads to it ? And the Spirit of God,
the Spirit of truth and right, tells them that they will not
succeed : for how can a man win happiness, save by doing

342 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
right ? Every one shall ' receive the things done in his body,
according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.'
So says Scripture; and so say men's own hearts, by the
inspiration of God's Holy Spirit. And therefore such men's
fear of death continues. And why? The text tells us the
secret. As long as we do not love God, we shall be tormented
with fear of death. And as long as we do not love our
neighbour, we shall not love God. We may try, as thousands
have tried, and as thousands try still, to love God without
loving their neighbour ; to be very religious, and worship God,
and sing His praises, and think over all His mercy to them,
and all that he has done for them, by the death of His
blessed Son Jesus Christ ; and so to persuade themselves and
God that they love Him, while they keep in their hearts selfish
ness, pride, spite, uncharitableness : but they do not succeed.
If they think they succeed, they are only deceiving themselves.
So says St. John. ' He who loveth not his brother whom he
hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?'
But they cannot deceive themselves long. You will see, if you
watch such people, and still more if you watch yourselves, that
if you do not love your neighbours in spirit and in truth, then
those tormenting fears soon come back again, worse than ever.
Ay, whenever we indulge ourselves in hard words and cruel
judgments, the thought of God seems darkened to us there and
then ; the face of God seems turned from us ; and peace of
mind and brightness of spirit, and lightness of soul, do not
come back to us, till we have confessed our sins, and have let
the kindly, the charitable, the merciful thoughts rise up in
us once more, as, by the grace of Christ, they will rise up.
Yes, my friends, as far as I can see, people are filled with
the peace of God just in as far as they are at peace with their
fellow-men. They are bright, calm, and content, looking
forward with cheerfulness to death, and with a humble and
holy boldness to judgment, just in as far as their hearts are
filled with love, gentleness, kindness, to all that God has made.

XXII.] THE TORMENT OF FEAR. 343
They dwell in God, and God in them, and perfect love has
cast out fear.
But if a man does not live in love, then sooner or later he
will hear a voice within him, which whispers, Thou art going
wrong ; and, if thou art going wrong, how canst thou end at
the right place? None but the right road can end there.
The wrong road must lead to the wrong place.
Then the man gets disturbed and terrified in his mind, and
tormented with fears, as the text says. He knows that the
day of judgment is coming, and he has no boldness to meet it.
He shrinks from the thought of death, of judgment, of God.
He thinks — How shall I meet my God ? I do not love my
neighbour. I do not love God ; and God does not love me.
The truth is, that the man cannot love God even if he will.
He looks on God as his enemy, whom he has offended, who is
coming to take vengeance on him. And, as long as we are
afraid of any one, and fancy that they hate us, and are going
to hurt us, we cannot love them. So the man is tormented
with fear ; fear of death, fear of judgment, fear of meeting God.
Then he takes to superstition ; he runs from preacher to
preacher; and what not? — There is no folly men have not
committed, and do not commit still, to rid themselves of
that tormenting fear. But they do not rid themselves of it.
Sermons, church-goings, almsgivings ; leaving the Church and
turning Dissenters or Roman Catholics ; joining this sect and
that sect ; nothing will rid a man of his superstitious fear :
nothing but believing the blessed message of the text.
And what does the text say? It says this, — ' God is love.'
God does not hate thee, He loves thee. He willeth not thy
death, O sinner, but rather that thou shouldest turn from thy
wickedness and live. Thy sins have not made Him hate thee :
but only pity thee ; pity thy folly, which will lead on the road
to death, when He wishes to put thee on the road to life, that
thou mayest have boldness in the day of judgment, instead of
shrinking from God like a guilty coward. And what is the

344 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
way of life ? Surely the way of Christ, who is the life. Live
like Him, and thou wilt not need to fear to die. So says the
text. We are to have boldness in the day of judgment,
because as Christ is, so are we in this world. And how was,
and is, and ever will be, Christ in this world ? Full of love ;
of brotherly-kindness, charity, forgiveness, peace, and good will
to men. That, says St. John, is the life which brings a joyful
death ; for God is love ; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth
in God, and God in him.
Oh consider this, my good friends. Consider this ; lest
when you come to die the ghosts of all your sins should rise up
at your bedside, and torment you with fear — the ghosts of every
cruel word which you ever spoke against your fellow men ; of
every kind action which you neglected; as well as of every
unjust one which you ever committed. And, if they do rise up
in judgment against you, what must you do ?
Cast yourself upon the love of God, and remember that God
is love, and so loved us that He sent His Son to be the
propitiation for our sins. Ask Him to forgive you your sins,
for the sake of that precious blood which was shed on the
cross : but not that you may keep your sins, and may escape
the punishment of them. God forbid. What use in having
your past sins fiprgiven, if the sinful heart still remains to run
up fresh sins for the future ? No. Ask Him not merely to
forgive the past, but to mend the future ; to create in you a
new heart, which wishes no ill to any human being, and a
right spirit, which desires first and utterly to do right, and
is filled with the Holy Spirit of God, the Spirit of love,
by which God made and redeemed the world, and all that
therein is.
So will all tormenting fears cease. You will feel yourself in
the right way, the way of charity, the way in which Christ
walked in this world, and have boldness in the day of judg
ment, facing death without conceit, indeed, but also without
superstitious fear.

SERMON XXIII.
THE FLESH AND THE SPIRIT.
(Eighth Sunday after Trinity. )

Romans viii. 12.
Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh :
for if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die.
\ \ THAT does walking after the flesh mean ? St. Paul tells
us himself, in Gal. v., where he uses exactly the same
form of words which he does here. ' The works of the flesh,'
he says, ' are manifest' When a man gives way to his passions
and appetites — when he cares only about enjoying his own
flesh, and the pleasures which he has in common with the
brutes, then there is no mistake about the sort of life which he
will lead — ' Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are
these ; adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idola
try, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, sedi
tions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and
such like.' An ugly list, my friends ; and God have mercy on
the man who gives way to them. For disgraceful as they are
to him, and tormenting also to him in this life, the worst is, that
if he gives way to them, he will die.
I do not mean that he will bring his mortal body to an un
timely end ; that he will ruin his own health ; or that he will get
himself hanged, though that is likely enough— common enough.

346 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
I think St. Paul means something even worse than that. The
man himself will die. Not his body merely : but his soul, his
character, will die. All in him that God made, all that God in
tended him to be, will die. All that his father and mother
loved in him, all that they watched over, and hoped and prayed
that it might grow up into life, in order that he might become
the man God meant him to be, all that will die. His soul and
character will become one mass of disease. He will think
wrong, feel wrong, about everything of which he does think and
feel : while, about the higher matters, of which every man ought
to know something, he will not think or feel at all. Love to his
country, love to his own kinsfolk even ; above all, love to God,
will die in him, and he will care for nothing but himself, and
how to get a little more foul pleasure before he goes out of this
world, he dare not think whither. All power of being useful
will die in him. Honour and justice will die in him. He will
be shut up in himself, in the ugly prison-house of his own lusts
and passions, parted from his fellow-men, caring nothing for
them, knowing that they care nothing for him. He will have
no faith in man or God. He will believe no good, he will have
no hope, either for himself or for the world.
This, this is death, indeed ; the death of sin ; the death in
which human bejpgs may go on for years, walking, eating, and
drinking ; worse than those who walk in their sleep, and see
nothing, though their eyes are staring wide.
Oh pitiable sight! The most pitiable sight in the whole
world, a human soul dead and rotten in sin ! It is a pitiable
sight enough, to see a human body decayed by disease, to see
a poor creature dying, even quietly and without pain. Pitiable,
but not half so pitiable as the death of a human soul by sin.
For the death of the body is not a man's own fault. But that
death in life of sin, is a man's own fault. In a Christian coun
try, at least, it is a man's own fault, if he goes about the world,
as I have seen many a one go, having a name to live, and yet
dead in trespasses and sins, while his soul only serves to keep

xxm.] THE FLESH AND THE SPIRIT. 347
his body alive and moving. How shall we escape this death in
life ? St. Paul tells us, ' If ye through the Spirit do mortify the
deeds of the body, ye shall live.
Through the Spirit. The Spirit of God and of Christ. Keep-
that in mind, for that is the only way, the right way, to mortify
and kill in us these vices and passions, which, unless we kill
them, will kill us. The only way. For men have tried other
ways in old times, do try other ways now : but they fail. I could
mention many plans which they have tried. But I will only
mention the one which you and I are likely to try.
A young man runs wild for a few years, as young men are too
apt to do : but at last he finds that ill-living does not pay. It
hurts his health, his pocket, his character. He makes himself
ill ; he cannot get employed ; he has ruin staring him in the face,
from his wild living. He must mend. If he intends to keep
out of the workhouse, the gaol, the grave, he must mortify the
deeds of the body. He must bridle his passions, give up lying
about, drinking, swearing, cheating, running after bad women :
and if he has a strong will, he does it from mere selfish prudence.
But is he safe ? I think not, as long as he loves still the bad
ways he has given up. He has given them up, not because he
hates them, because he is ashamed of them, because he knows
them to be hateful to God, and ruinous to his own soul : but
because they do not pay. The man himself is not changed.
His heart within is not converted. The outside of his life is
whitewashed ; but his heart may be as foul as ever ; as full as
ever of selfishness, greediness, meanness. And what happens
to him ? Too often, what happened to the man in the parable,
when the unclean spirit went out of him, and came back again.
The unclean spirit found his home swept and garnished : but
empty. All very neat and respectable : but empty. There was.
no other spirit dwelling there. No good spirit, who could fight
the unclean sphit and keep him out So he took to himself
seven other spirits worse than himself — hypocrisy, cant, cunning,
covetousness, and all the smooth-shaven sins which beset

348 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
middle-aged and elderly men ; and they dwell there, and so does
the unclean spirit of youth too.
Alas ! How often have I seen men whom that description
would fit but too well — men who have kept themselves respect
able till they have got back their character in the world's eyes :
and when they get into years, and have risen perhaps in life,
and made money, are looked up to by their fellows : but what
are they at heart ? As great scoundrels as they were thirty
years before — cunning, false, covetous, and hypocritical — and
indulging, perhaps, the unclean spirit of youth, as much as they
dare without being found out. God help them ! for their last
state is worse than their first. But that is the fruit of trying to
mortify and kill their own vices by mere worldly prudence, and
not by the Spirit of God, which alone can cleanse the heart of
any man, or make him strong enough really to conquer and kill
his sins.
And what is this spirit of God ? We may know in this way.
What says our Lord in the Gospel ? ' The tree is known by its
fruits.' Then if we know the fruits of the Spirit, we shall surely
know something at least of what the Spirit is like. What then
says St. Paul, ' The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-
suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.'
Therefore the Spirit is a loving spirit— a peaceable, a gentle, a
good, a faithful, a sober and temperate sphit And if you
follow it, you will live. If you give yourselves up honestly,
frankly, and fully, to be led by that good spirit, and obey it
when it prompts you with right feelings, you, your very self, will
live. You will be what God intended you to be ; you will grow
as God intended you to grow; grow as Christ did, in grace ; in
all which is graceful, amiable, worthy of respect and love ; and
therefore in favour with God and man. Your character will
improve and strengthen day by day; and rise day by day to
fuller, stronger, healthier spiritual life. You will be able more
and more to keep down low passions, evil tempers, and all the
works of the flesh, when they tempt you; you will despise and

xxiii.] THE FLESH AND THE SPIRIT. 349
hate them more and more ; for having seen the beauty of good
ness, you will see the ugliness of sin. So the bad passions and
tempers, instead of being merely put to sleep for a while to
wake up all the stronger for their rest, will be really mortified
and killed in you. They will die out of you ; and you, the real
you whom God made, will live and grow continually. And, in
stead of having your character dragged down, diseased, and at
last ruined, it will rise and progress, as you grow older, in the
sure and safe road of eternal life. To which God bring us all
in his mercy ! Amen.

SERMON XXIV.
THE UNRIGHTEOUS MAMMON.
(Ninth Sunday after Trinity.)

Luke xvi. i — 8.
And he said also unto his disciples, There was a certain rich man, which
had a steward ; and the same was accused unto him that he had wasted
his goods. And he called him, and said unto him, How is it that I
hear this of thee? give an account of thy stewardship ; for thou mayest
be no longer steward. Then the steward said within himself, What
shall I do ? for my lord taketh away from me the stewardship : I cannot
dig ; to beg I am ashamed. I am resolved what to do, that, when I am
put out of the stewardship, they may receive me into their houses. So
lie called every one of his lord's debtors unto him, and said unto the
first, How much owest thou unto my lord ? And he said, An hundred
measures of oil. And he said unto him, Take thy bill, and sit down
quickly, and write fifty. Then said he to another, And how much
owest thou? And he said, An hundred measures of wheat. And he
said unto him, Take thy bill and write fourscore. And the lord
commended the unjust steward, because he had done wisely : for the
children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children
of light.
"""PHIS parable has always been considered a difficult one
to understand. Fathers and Divines, in all ages, have
tried to explain it in different ways ; and have never, it seems
to me, been satisfied with their own explanations. They have
=always felt it strange, that our Lord should seem to hold up,

THE UNRIGHTEOUS MAMMON. 351
as an example to us, this steward who, having been found out
in one villainy, escapes, (so it seems, from the common
explanation) by committing a second. They have not been
able to see either, how we are really to copy the steward.
Our Lord says, that we are to copy him by making ourselves
friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness : but how ? By
giving away a few alms, or a great many ? Does any rational
man seriously believe, that if his Mammon was unrighteous,
that is, if his wealth were ill-gotten, he would save his soul,
and be received into eternal life, for giving away part of it, or
even the whole of it ?
No doubt, there always have been men who will try. Men
who, having cheated their neighbours all their lives, have tried to
cheat " the Devil at last, by some such plan as the unjust
steward's, but that plan has never been looked on as either a
very honourable or a very hopeful one. I think, that if I had
been an usurer or a grinder of the poor all my life, I should
not save my soul by founding almshouses with my money when
I died, or even ten years before I died. It might be all that
I was able to do : but would it justify me in the sight of God ?
That which saves a soul alive is repentance ; and of repentance
there are three parts, contrition, confession, and satisfaction —
in plain English, making the wrong right, and giving each man
back, as far as one can, what one has taken from him. To
each man, I say ; for I have no right to rob one man and then
give to another. I ought to give back again to the man whom
I have robbed. I have no right to cheat the rich for the sake
of the poor ; and after I have cheated the rich, I do not make
satisfaction, either to god or man, by giving that money to the
poor. Good old Zaccheus, the publican, knew better what
true satisfaction was like. He had been gaining money not
altogether in an unjust way, but in a way which did him no
credit ; he had been farming the taxes, and he was dissatisfied
with his way of life. Therefore, Behold, Lord, he says, the
half of my goods, of what I have a right to in the world's eyes

352 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
—what is my own, and I could keep if I liked — I give to the
poor. But if I have done wrong to any man, I restore to
him fourfold. Then said the Lord, 'This day is salvation
come to this man's house ; forsomuch as he also is a son of
Abraham;' a just and faithful man, who knows what true
repentance is.
But now, my friends, suppose that this was just what our
Lord tells us to do in this parable. Suppose that this was
just what the unjust steward did. I only say, suppose; for I
know that more learned men than I explain the difficulty
otherwise. Only I ask you to hear my explanation.
The steward is accused of wasting his lord's goods.
He will be put out of his stewardship.
He goes to his lord's debtors, and bids them write them
selves down in debt to him at far less sums than they had
thought that they owed.
Now, suppose that these debtors were the very men whom
he had been cheating. Suppose that he had been overcharging
these debtors ; and now, in his need, had found out that
honesty was the best policy, and charged them what they
really owed him. They were, probably, tenants under his lord,
paying their rents in kind, as was often the custom in the East.
One rented an jplive garden, and paid for it so many measures
of oil ; another rented corn-land, and paid so many measures
of meal. Now suppose that the steward, as he easily might,
had been setting these poor men's rents too high, and taking
the surplus himself. That while he had been charging one
tenant a hundred, he had been paying to his lord only fifty,
and so forth.
What does he do, then, in his need ? He does justice to his
lord's debtors. He tells them what their debts really are.
He sets their accounts right. Instead of charging the first
man a hundred, he charges him fifty ; instead of charging the
second a hundred, he charges him eighty ; and he does not,
as far as we are told, conceal this conduct from his lord. He

xxiv.] THE UNRIGHTEOUS MAMMON. 353
rights them as far as he can now. So he shews that he honestly
repents. He has found out that honesty is the best policy;
that the way to make true friends is to deal justly by them ;
and, if he cannot restore what he has taken from them
already (for I suppose he had spent it), at least to confess
his sin to them, and to set the matter right for the time to
come. This, I think, is what our Lord bids us do, if we have
wronged any man, and fouled our hands with the unrighteous
mammon, that is, with ill-gotten wealth. And I think so all
the more from the verses which come after. For, when he
has said, ' Make yourselves friends of the mammon of un
righteousness,' he goes on in the very next verse to say, ' He
that is faithful in that which is least, is faithful also in that
which is much. If, therefore, ye have not been faithful in the
unrighteous mammon, who will commit to your trust the
true riches?' Now, surely, this must have something to do
with what goes before. And, if it has, what can it mean but
this — that the way to make friends out of the mammon
of unrighteousness, is to be faithful in it, just in it, honest
in it?
But some one may say, If mammon be unrighteous, how
can a man be righteous and upright in dealing with it? If
money be a bad thing in itself, how can a man meddle with it
with clean hands ?
So some people will say, and so some will be glad to say.
But why ? Because they do not want to be righteous, upright,
just, and honest in their money dealings ; and, therefore, they
are glad to make out that they could not be upright if they
tried; because money being a bad thing altogether, a man
must needs, if he has to do with money, do things which he
knows are wrong. I say some people are glad to believe that.
I do not mean any one in this congregation. God forbid ! I
mean in the world in general. We do see people, religious
people too, do things about money which they know are mean,

354 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
covetous, cruel, and then excuse themselves by saying, — Well,
of course I would not do so to my own brother ; but, in the
way of business, one can't help doing these things. Now, I
do not quite believe them. I have seldom seen the man who
cheated his neighbour, who would not cheat his own brother if
he had a chance : but so they say. And, if they be religious
people, they will quote Scripture, and say, — Ah ! it is the
fault of the unrighteous mammon; and, in dealing with the
unrighteous mammon, we cannot help these little failings, and
so forth : till they seem to have two quite different rules of
right and wrong; one for the saving of their own souls,
which they keep to when they are hearing sermons, and
reading good books; and the other for money, which they
keep to when they have to pay their debts or transact busi
ness. Now, my dear friends, be not deceived : God is not mocked.
God tempts no man. Man tempts himself by his own lusts
and passions. God does not tempt us when he gives us
money, puts us in the way of earning money, or spending
money. Money is not bad in itself; wealth is not bad in itself.
If mammon be unrighteous, we make money into mammon,
when we make an idol of it, and worship it more than God's
law of right and justice. We make it unrighteous, by being
unrighteous, and unjust ourselves.
Money is good ; for money stands for capital ; for money's
worth ; for houses, land, food, clothes, all that man can make ;
and they stand for labour, employment, wages ; and they stand
for human beings, for the bodily life of man. Without wealth,
where should we be now ? If God had not given to man the
power of producing wealth, where should we be now ? Not
here. Four-fifths of us would not have been alive at all.
Instead of eight hundred people in this parish, all more or less
well off, there would be, perhaps, one hundred — perhaps far
less, living miserably on game- and roots. Instead of thirty
millions of civilized people in Great Britain, there would be

xxiv.] THE UNRIGHTEOUS MAMMON. 355
perhaps some two or three millions of savages. Money, I say,
stands for the lives of human beings. Therefore money is
good ; an ordinance and a gift of God ; as it is written, ' It is
God that giveth the power to get wealth.' But, like every
other good gift of God, we may use it as a blessing ; or we may
misuse it, and make it a snare and a curse to our own souls.
If we let into our hearts selfishness and falsehood ; if we lose
faith in God, and fancy that God's laws are not well-made
enough to prosper us, but that we must break them if we want
to prosper ; then we turn God's good gift into an idol and a
snare ; into the unrighteous Mammon.
It is not the quantity of money we have to deal with which is
the snare, it is our own lusts and covetousness which are the
snares. It is just as easy to sell our souls for five pounds as for
five thousand. It is just as easy to be mean and tricky about
paying little debts of a shilling or two, as it is about whole
estates. I do not see that rich people are at all more unjust
about money than poor ones ; and if any say Yes, but the poor
are tempted more than the rich ; I answer, then look at those
who are neither poor nor rich ; who have enough to live on
decently, and are not tempted as the poor are, to steal, or
tempted as the rich are, to luxury and extravagance. Are they
more honest than either rich or poor? Not a whit. All depends
on the man's heart. If his heart be selfish and mean, he will be
dishonest as a poor man, as a middle-class man, as a great lord.
If his heart be faithful and true, he will be honest, whether he
lives in a cottage or in a palace. Any man can do justly, and
love mercy, if his heart be right with God. I have seen day-
labourers who had a hard struggle to live at all, keep out of
debt, and out of shame, and live in a noble poverty, rich in the
sight of God, because their hearts were rich in goodness. I have
seen tradesmen and farmers, among all the temptations of
business, keep their honour as bright as any gentleman's —
brighter than too many gentlemen's, because they had learnt to
fear God and work righteousness. I have seen great merchants

356 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.

and manufacturers, because that they were their brothers'
keepers, spread not only employment, but comfort, education,
and religion, among the hundreds of workmen whom God had
put into their charge. I have seen great landowners live truly
royal lives, doing with all their might the good which their hand
found to do ; and, after the likeness Of their heavenly Father,
causing their sun to shine on the evil and on the good, and
their rain to fall on the just and on the unjust. Yes; in every
station of life, thy dealings will be right with men, if thy heart
be right with God.
Yes. Let us bear in mind this — that whatever we cannot be,
we can at least be honest men. Let us go to our graves, if
possible, with the feeling that there is not a man on earth, a
penny the worse for us. And if we have ever fouled our hands
with the unrighteous Mammon, let us cleanse them by the only
possible plan, by making restitution to those whom we have
wronged; and so make friends of the Mammon of unrighteous
ness, who shall forgive us, and receive us as friends in heaven,
instead of making enemies, and going out of the world with
the fearful thought, that we shall meet at God's judgment-
seat people whom we have made miserable, who will rise up
to accuse us, and demand payment of us when it is too late
for ever.
Let us bear in mind, even though we cannot copy, the dying
words of Muhammed the Arab, who, when he found his end
draw near, went forth into the market-place, and asked before
all the people, 'Was there any man whom he had wronged?
If so, his own back should bear the stripes. Was there any
man to whom he owed money? and he should be paid.' ' Yes,'
cried some one, ' those coins which you borrowed from me on
such a day.' 'Pay him,' said Muhammed: 'better to be shamed
now on earth, than shamed in the day of judgment' He was
a heathen. And shall we Christians be worse than he ? Then
let us pray for the Holy Spirit of God, the Spirit of truth, which
will make us faithful and true; so that no man may be the

XXIV.] THE UNRIGHTEOUS MAMMON. 357
worse for us in this life ; no man may have to say of us,
when he hears that we lie dying, ' He wronged me, he
cheated me, he lied to me ; God forgive him : ' but that our
friends, as they carry us to the grave, may feel that they
have lost one whom they could respect and trust; and sayy as
the earth rattles in upon the coffin lid, ' There lies an honest
man.'

SERMON XXV.
THE SIGHS OF CHRIST.
(Twelfth Sunday after Trinity.)

Mark vii. 34, 35.
And looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha, that
is, Be opened. And straightway his ears were opened, and the string of
his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain.
"t \ 7"HY did the Lord Jesus look up to heaven ? And why,
too, did he sigh ?
He looked up to heaven, we may believe, because he looked
to God the Father ; to God, of whom the glorious collect tells
us, that he is more ready to hear than we to pray, and is wont
to give more than either we desire or deserve. He looked up
to the Father, who is the fountain of life, of order, of health, of
usefulness ; who hates all death, disease, infirmity ; who wills
that none should perish, body or soul.
My friends, think of these cheering words ; and try to look
up to God the Father, as Christ looked up. Look up to him,
I say, if but once, as a Father. Not merely as your Father,
but as the Father of the spirits of all flesh; the good God
who creates, and delights to create ; who orders all worlds and
heavens with perfect wisdom, perfect power, perfect justice,
perfect love; and peoples them with immortal souls and
spirits, that they may be useful, happy, blessed, in keeping his

THE SIGHS OF CHRIST.

359

laws, and doing the work which he has ordained for them.
Oh think, if but once, of God the perfect and all-loving
Father ; and then you will know why Jesus looked up to
him, And you will see, too, why Jesus sighed. He sighed be
cause he was one with the Father. He sighed because he had
the mind of God. Because God, the Lord of health and order,
hates disease and disorder. Because God, the Lord of bliss
and happiness, hates misery and sorrow. Because God made
the world at first very good ; and, behold, by man's sin, it has
become bad.
Why did he sigh ? Surely, also, from pity for the poor man.
His infirmity was no such great one ; he had an impediment in
his speech, and with it, as many are apt to have, deafness also :
but it was an infirmity. It was a disease. It was something
out of order, something gone wrong in God's world; and as
such, Christ could not abide it ; he grieved over it. He sighed
because there was sickness in a world where there ought to be
nothing but health, and sorrow where there ought to be nothing
but happiness. He sighed, because man had brought this sick
ness and sorrow on himself by sin ; for, remember, man alone is
subject to disease. The wild animal in the wood, the bird upon
the tree, seldom or never know what sickness is ; seldom or
never are stunted or deformed. They live according to their
nature, healthy and happy, and die in a good old age. While
man.  Why should I talk of what man is, of how far man is
fallen from what God the Father meant him to be, while one
hundred thousand corpses of brave men are now fattening the
plains of Italy for next year's crop ; while even in our favoured
land, we find at every turn prisons and reformatories, lunatic
asylums, hospitals for numberless kinds of horrible diseases ;
sickness, weakness, and death all round us? Only look up
yonder to Windsor Forest, and see the vast building now in
progress there before your eyes, for lunatic convicts — the most
miserable, perhaps, and pitiable of human beings, — and let that

360 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
building be a sign to you, how far man is fallen, and what cause
Jesus had to sigh, and has to sigh still, over the miseries of
fallen man.
Yes, my friends, not without reason did the old heathen poet,
who had no sure and certain hope of everlasting life, say, that
man was the most wretched of all the beasts of the field ; not
without reason did St. Paul say, that if in this life only we have
hope in Christ, then the Christian man, who dare not indulge
his passions and appetites, dare not say, Let us eat and drink,
for to-morrow we die : but must curb himself, and give up his
own pleasure and his own fancy at every turn, is of all men most
miserable. If Christ's work is done ; if his mercy and help ended when
he died upon the cross ; if all he did was to heal the sick for
three short years in Judea a long while ago : then what have we
to which we can look forward? What hope have we, not
merely for ourselves, who are here now, but for all the millions
who have died and suffered already ? Yes : what reasonable
hope for mankind can they have, who do not believe that Christ
is Very God of Very God, the perfect likeness of the heavenly
Father? But what if that which was true of him then, is true of him
now? What if he be the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever?
What if he be ascended on high, that he might fill all things
with his almighty power, and declare that almighty power most
chiefly by shewing mercy and pity ? What if he be for ever
looking up to his Father and our Father, to his God and our
God, interceding for ever for mankind ; for ever offering up to
the Father that sacrifice of himself which he perfected upon the
Cross, for the sins of the whole world ? What if he be for ever
sighing over every sin, every sorrow, every cruelty, every injus
tice, over all things, great and small, which go wrong throughout
the whole world ; and saying for ever, ' Father, this is not ac
cording to thy will. Let thy will be done on earth, as in
heaven.' And what, if he does not look up in vain, nor sigh

xxv.] THE SIGHS OF CHRIST. 361
in vain ? What if the will of God the Father be, that sin and
sorrow, disease and death, being contrary to his will and law,
should be at last rooted out of this world, and all worlds for
ever ? What if Christ have authority and commission from God
to fight against all evil, sin, disease, and death, and all the ills
which flesh is heir to ; and to teach men to fight them likewise,
till they conquer them by his might, and by his light ? What
if he reigns, and will reign, till he has put all enemies under his
feet, and he has delivered up the kingdom to God, even the
Father, that God may be all in all? What if the day shall
come, when all the nations of the earth shall thus see Christ's
good works, and glorify his Father and their Father who is in
heaven? and by obeying the Law of their being, and the com
mandment of God, which is life eternal, shall live for ever in
that glory, of which it is written, that a river of water of life
shall proceed out of the throne of God and of the Lamb ; and
the leaves of the trees which grow thereby shall be for the heal
ing of the nations ; and there shall be no more curse, but the
throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in the city of God, and
his servants shall serve him ; and the Lord God shall give them
light ; and they shall reign for ever and ever.
What those words mean I know not, and hardly dare to
think : but as long as those words stand in the Bible, we will
have hope. For God the Father, who willeth that none should
perish, and Jesus the only-begotten Son, who sighed over the
poor man's infirmity in Judea, are the same yesterday, to-day,
and for ever.

SERMON XXVI.
THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA.
(Twelfth Sunday after Trinity, 1856.)

2 Kings xviii. 9 — 12.
And it came to pass in the fourth year of King Hezekiah, which was the
seventh year of Hoshea son of Elah king of Israel, that Shalmaneser,
king of Assyria, came up against Samaria, and besieged it. And at
the end of three years they took it : even in the sixth year of Hezekiah,
that is the ninth year of Hoshea king of Israel, Samaria was taken.
And the king of Assyria did carry away Israel unto Assyria, and put
them in Halah and in Habor by the river of Gozon, and in the cities of
the Medes : because they obeyed not the voice of the Lord their God,
but trangressed his covenant, and all that Moses the servant of the
Lord commanded, and would not hear them, nor do them.
'"PHESE are very simple words : but they are awful words
enough. Awful enough to the poor creatures of whom
they speak. You here, most of you, can hardly guess all that
these words mean. You may thank God that you do not.
That you do not know the horrors of war, and the misery of a
conquered country, in old times.
To lose all they had ever earned ; all that makes life worth
having. To have their homes burnt over their heads, their
crops carried off their fields. To see their women dishonoured,
their old men and children murdered — to be insulted, beaten,
and tortured to make them tell where their money was hidden ;

THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA. 363
and after they and theirs had suffered every unspeakable shame
and misery from the hands of brutal enemies, to be stripped,
bound, and marched away, for hundreds of miles across the
deserts, into the cold and dreary mountains of the north of
Assyria, there to live and die as slaves, and never again to see
their native land. And such a land as it was, and is still : or
rather might be still, if there were men in it worthy the name of
men. For of all countries in the world, that land of Israel is
one of the most rich and beautiful. The climate and the soil
there is such, that two crops can often be grown in the year, of
almost any kind which man may need ; there are rich valleys
well watered, where not only wheat and every grain-crop, but
the olive, and the fig, and the vine, flourish in perfection ; rich
park-like uplands, where sheep and cattle without number may
find pasture ; great forests of timber, fit for every use ; and all
kept cool and fruitful, even beneath that burning eastern sun,,
by the clear streams which flow for ever down from Hermon,
the great snow-mountain ten thousand feet high, which over
looks that pleasant land. There is hardly, travellers say, a
lovelier or richer country upon earth, than the land of Israel,
from Hebron on the south to Hermon on the north ; nor a
country which might have been stronger, and safer, and more
prosperous, if these Jews had been but wise.
It is, so to speak, one great castle, rising most of it two thou
sand feet high, and walled in by God in a way as is seen hardly
in any other land. On the west lies the sea ; on the south and
on the east vast wildernesses of sandy desert ; and on the north,
the mighty mountains of Hermon and Lebanon, which no in
vading army could have crossed, if the Jews had had courage
to keep them out. And that, the noble and divine Law of
Moses would have given them. It would have made them one
free, brave, God-fearing people, at unity with itself; and the
promise of Moses would have been fulfilled — that one of them
should chase a thousand, and no man or nation be able to stand
against them. In David's time, and in Solomon's time also,.

304 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [skkm-
that promise came true ; and that small people of the Jews be
came a very powerful nation, respected and feared by all the
kingdoms round.
But when they fell into idolatry, and forsook the true God,
and his law : all was changed. Idolatry brought sin, and sin
brought bad passions, hatred, division, weakness, ruin.
The first beginning was, the breaking up of the nation into
two; — the kingdom of Judah to the south, the kingdom of
Israel to the north. And with that division came envy, spite,
quarrels ; wars between Israel and Judah, which were but mad
ness. For what could come of those two brother-nations fight
ing against each other, but that both should grow weaker and
weaker, and so fall a prey to some third nation stronger than
them both? The ruin of the kingdom of Israel, of which the
text tells us, arose out of some unnatural quarrel of this kind.
Pekah, the king of Israel, had made friends with the heathen
king of Syria, and got him to join in making war on Judah : and
a fearful war it was ; for the Israelites, according to one account,
killed in that war a hundred and twenty thousand of the Jews,
men of their own blood and language, all Abraham's descendants
as well as they. On which, Ahaz, king of Judah, not to be
behind-hand in folly, sent to the heathen king of Assyria to help
him, just as the kkig of Israel had sent to the king of Damascus.
He had better have been dead than to have done that. For
those terrible Assyrians, who had set their hearts on conquering
the whole east, were standing by, watching all the little king
doms round tearing themselves to pieces by foolish wars, till
they were utterly weak, and the time was ripe for the Assyrians
to pounce upon them. The king of Assyria came. He swept
away all the heathen people of Damascus, and killed their king.
But he did not stop there. In a very few years, he came on
into the land of Israel, besieged Samaria for three years, and
took it, and carried off the whole of the inhabitants of the
country ; and there was an end of that miserable kingdom of
Israel, which had been sinking lower and lower ever since the

xxvi.] THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA. 365
days of Jeroboam. This was the natural outcome of all their
sin and folly, of which we have been reading for the last few
Sundays. Elijah's warnings had been in vain, and Elisha's warnings also.
They liked, at heart, Ahab's and Jezebel's idolatries better than
they did the worship of the true God. And why ? Because, if
they worshipped God, and kept his laws, they must needs have
been more or less good men, upright, just, merciful, cleanly and
chaste livers : while, on the other hand, they might worship
their idols, and nevertheless be as bad as they chose. Indeed,
the very idol-feasts and sacrifices were mixed up with all sorts
of filthy sin, drunkenness and profligacy ; so that it is a shame
even to speak of the things which went on, especially at those
sacrifices to Ashtaroth, the queen of heaven, of which they were
so fond. They choose the worse part, and refused the better ;
and they were filled with the fruit of their own devices, as every
unrepenting sinner surely will be.
But did the Jews of Judea and their king escape, who had
thus brought the king of Assyria down to murder their own
countrymen, and lay that fair land waste ? Not they. A very
few years more, the Assyrians were back again, and overran
Judea itself, laying the country waste with fire and sword, till
nothing was left to them, but the mere city of Jerusalem. And
so they, too, were filled with the fruit of their own devices. In
their madness they had destroyed their brethren, the people of
Israel, who ought to have been a safeguard for them to the
north; now there was nothing and no man to prevent the
Assyrians, or any other invaders, from pouring right down into
their land. Truly says Solomon, ' He that diggeth a pit, shall
fall into it, and he who breaketh a hedge, a serpent shall bite
him.' From that day, Judah became weaker and weaker,
standing all alone. Good king Hezekiah, good king Josiah,
could only stave off her ruin for a few years ; a little while
longer, and her cup was full too, and the Babylonians came
and swept the Jews away into captivity, as the Assyrians had

366 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
swept away Israel, and that fair land lay desolate for many a
year. The king of Assyria, we read, after he had carried away the
people of Israel, brought heathens from Assyria, and settled
them in the Holy Land, instead of the Israelites. But the Lord
sent lions among them, we read; the land, I suppose, lying
waste, the wild beasts increased, and became very dangerous :
so these poor ignorant settlers sent to the king of Assyria, to
beg for a Jewish priest, to teach them, as they said, the manner
of the god of that land, that they might worship him, and not
he terrified by the lions any more. It was a simple, confused
notion of theirs : but it brought a blessing with it ; for the king
of Assyria sent them one of the Jewish priests who had been
carried away from Samaria ; and he came and lived at Beth-el,
and taught them to fear the Lord. So these poor people got
some confused notion of the one true God : but they mixed it
up sadly with their old heathen idolatry, and made gods of their
own, and some of them even burnt their children in the fire, to
Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim, from
which town they had come. And so they went on for several
hundred years, marrying with the remnant of the Israelites who
were left behind, and worshipping idols and the true God at the
same time. Nov* these people are the Samaritans, of whom you
read so often in the New Testament. The Jews, when they came
back, hated and despised the Samaritans, and would not speak
to them, eat with them, trade with them, because they were only
half-blooded Jews, and did not observe Moses' law rightly ; and
so they were left to themselves : but as time went on, they
seemed to have got rid of their old idolatry, and built themselves
a temple on Mount Gerizim, by Samaria, in Jacob's old haunts,
by Jacob's well, and there worshipped they knew not what.
But still they did their best. And their reward came at last
Many a hundred years had passed away. The proud Phari
sees of Jerusalem were still calling them dogs and infidels ;
when there came to that half-heathen city of Samaria such a one

XXVI.] THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA. 367
as never came there before or since ; and yet had been very
near that place, and those poor Samaritans, for a thousand
years. And being wearied with his journey, he sat down upon the
edge of Jacob's well, by Joseph's tomb. The well is still there,
choked with rubbish to this very day ; and Joseph's tomb by it,
all in ruins, among broad fields of corn. And on the edge ol
that well he sat. Along the very road which was before him,
Jeroboam, and Ahab, and many a wicked king of Israel, had
gone in old times, travelling between Shechem and Samaria :
along that road the terrible Assyrians had marched back to
their own land, leading strings of weeping prisoners out of theit
pleasant native land, to slavery and misery in the far North.
He knew it all ; and doubt not that he thought over it all, as
never man thought on earth. Doubt not that his heart yearned
over these poor ignorant Samaritans, and over the sinful woman
who came to draw water at the well. After all, half-heathens
as they were, Jacob's blood was in their veins ; and if not, were
they not still human beings? They were worshipping they
knew not what : but still they were worshipping the best which
they knew.
' Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh,
when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem,
worship the Father. Ye worship ye know1 not what ; we
know what we worship : for salvation is of the Jews. But
the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers
shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth : for the Father
seeketh such to worship him. God is a spirit : and they that
worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. The
woman saith unto him, I know that Messias cometh, which is
called Christ : when he is come, he will tell us all things. Jesus
saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am he  So when
the Samaritans were come unto him, they besought him that he
would tarry with them : and he abode there two days. And
many more believed because of his own word ; and Said unto

368 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy saying : for we
have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the
Christ, the Saviour of the world.'
Oh, my friends, despise no man ; for Christ despises none.
He is no respecter of persons : but in every nation, he that
feareth God and worketh righteousness is accepted with him.
Despise no man ; for by so doing you deny the Father, who has
made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on the earth, and
has appointed them their times, and the bounds of their habita
tion ; if haply they may feel after him, and find him : though he
be not far from any of us ; for in him we live and move and
have our being, and are the offspring of God. For hundreds of
years those poor ignorant Samaritans had felt after him ; in that
foreign land to which the cruel Assyrian conqueror had banished
them : but it was God who had appointed them their habitation
there, and their time also ; and, in due time, they found God :
for he came to them, and found them, and spoke with them face
to face.
Better to have been one of those ignorant Samaritans, than
to have been King Ahab, or King Hoshea, in all their glory,
with all their proud Jewish blood. Better to have been one of
those ignorant Samaritans than one of those conceited Pharisees
at Jerusalem, who, while they were priding themselves on being
Abraham's children, and keeping Moses' law, ended by cruci
fying him who made Abraham, and Moses, and his law, and
them themselves. Better to be the poorest negro slave, if, in
the midst of his ignorance and misery and shame, he believes
in Christ, and works righteousness, than the cleverest and
proudest and freest Englishman, if, in the midst of his great
light, he works the works of darkness, and, while he calls him
self a child of God, lives the sinful life, on which God's curse
lies for ever.
So you who have many advantages, take warning by the fate
of those foolish Jews, who knew a great deal, and yet did not
do it, and so came to shame and ruin. And you who have few

XXVI.] THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA. 369
advantages, take comfort by those poor Samaritans, who knew
a very little, and yet made the best of it, and so at last saw a
great light, after sitting in darkness for so long. Schools, books,
church-going, ordinances of all kinds, they are good. If you
can get them, use them, and thank God for them : but remember,
God does not ask for learning, but for goodness and holiness :
he does not ask for knowledge, but for a right life. And do
not fancy, that because your children have a good education
now, and you had none, that God does not love you as well as
he loves them. His mercy is over all his works ; and the
promises are to you as well as to your children. There is many
a poor soul who never read a book in her life, who is nearer
God than many a great scholar, and fine preacher, and learned
divine. All Christ asks of you is, to receive him when he comes
to you ; and to love, and thank, and admire him, and try to be
like him, because he will make you like him : while for the rest
to whom little is given, of him shall little be required ; and to
him who uses what he has, be it little or much, more shall be
given, and he shall have abundance. For God is no respecter
of persons ; but in every nation, he that feareth God, and worketh
righteousness, is accepted by him.

SERMON XXVII.
THE INVASION OF THE ASSYRIANS.
( Thirteenth Sunday after Trinity, Morning. )

2 Kings xix. 15- 19.
And Hezekiah prayed before the Lord, and said, O Lord God of Israel,
which dwellest between the cherubims, thou art the Lord, even thou
alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth ; thou hast made heaven and earth.
Lord, bow down thine ear, and hear : open, Lord, thine eyes, and see :
and hear the words of Sennacherib, which hath sent him to reproach the
living God. Of a truth, Lord, the kings of Assyria have destroyed the
nations and their lands, and have cast their gods into the fire : for they
were no gods, but the work of men's hands, wood and stone : therefore
they have destroyed them. Now, therefore, O Lord our God, I beseech
thee, save thou us out of his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth
may know that thou art the Lord God, even thou only.
HPHIS noble story, which we read in Church every year,
seems to have had a great hold on the minds of the Jews.
They plainly thought it a very important story. For it is told
three times over in the Bible : first in the Book of Kings, then
in the Book of Chronicles, and again in that of the Prophet
Isaiah. Indeed, many chapters of Isaiah's prophecies speak
altogether of this invasion of the Assyrians and their destruction.
But what has this story to do with us, you may ask ? There
are no miracles in our day. We can expect no angels to fight
for our armies. We must fight for ourselves.

THE INVASION OF THE ASSYRIANS. 371
True, my friends : but the lesson of these old stories, the
moral of them stands good for ever. And I am thankful that
this very story is appointed to be read publicly in church once
a year, to put us in mind of many things, which all men are too
apt to forget.
For instance : to learn one lesson out of many which this
chapter may teach us. We are too apt to think that peace and
prosperity are the only signs of God's favour. That if a nation
be religious, it is certain to thrive and be happy. But it is not
so. We find from history that the times in which nations have
shewn most nobleness, most courage, most righteousness, most
faith in God, have been times of trouble, and danger, and
terror. When nations have been invaded, persecuted, trampled
under foot by tyrants, then all the good which was in them has
again and again shewed itself. Then to the astonishment of
the world they have become greater than themselves, and done
deeds which win them glory for ever. Then they are truly
purged in the fire of affliction, that whatever dross and trash is
in their hearts may be burnt out, and the pure gold left.
So it was with the Jews in Hezekiah's time. So again in the
time of the Maccabees. So with the old Greeks, when the
great Kings of Persia tried to enslave them. So with the old
Romans, when the Carthaginians set upon them. So it was
with us English, three hundred years ago, when for a time the
whole world seemed against us, because we alone were standing
up for the Gospel and the Bible against the Pope of Rome.
Then the king of Spain, who was then as terrible a conqueror
and devourer of nations, as the Assyrians of old, sent against
us the Great Armada. Then was England in greater danger
than she had ever been before, or has been since.
And what came of it ? That that dreadful danger brought
out more faith, more courage, than perhaps has ever been
among us since. That when we seemed weakest we were
strongest. That while all the nations of Europe were looking
On to see us devoured up by those Spaniards, our laws and

372 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
liberties taken from us, the Popish Inquisition set up in
England, and England made a Spanish province, what they did
see was, the people of this little island rising as one man, to
fight for themselves on earth, while the tempests of God fought
for them from heaven ; and all that mighty fleet of the King
of Spain routed and scattered, till not one man in a hundred
ever saw their native country again.
And in England, after that terrible trial had passed over us,
there rose up the best and noblest time which she had ever yet
beheld. Yes, my friends, three hundred years ago we went through
just such a fiery trial as the Jews went through in Hezekiah's
time ; and God grant that we may never forget that lesson.
But what is true of whole nations, is often true also of each
single person ; of you and me.
To almost every man, at least once in his life, comes a time
of trial — what we call a crisis. A time when God purges the
man, and tries him in the fire, and burns up the dross in him,
that the pure sterling gold only may be left.
To some people it comes in the shape of some terrible loss,
or affliction. To others it comes in the shape of some great
temptation. Nay, if we will consider, it comes to us all,
perhaps often, gn that shape. A man is brought to a point
where he must choose between right and wrong. God puts
him where the two roads part. One way turns off to the broad
road, which leads to destruction : the other way turns off to the
narrow road which leads to life. The man would be glad to
go both ways at once, and do right and wrong too : but it so
happens that he cannot Then he would be glad to go neither
way, and stay where he is : but he cannot. He must move on.
He must do something. Perhaps he is asked a question which
he does not wish to answer : but he must. It would be well
worth his while to tell a lie. It would be very safe for him,
profitable for him ; while it would be very dangerous for him
to tell the truth. He might ruin himself once and for all, by

xxvil.] THE INVASION OF THE ASSYRIANS. 373
being an honest man. Now which shall he do ? He would be
glad to do both, glad to do neither : but choose he must ;
speak he must. He must either lie or tell the truth. Then
comes the trial, whether he believes in God and in Christ, or
whether he does not. If he only believes, as too many do
without knowing it, in a dead God, a God far away, he will lie.
If he only believes, as too many do without knowing it, in a
dead Christ, a Christ who bore his sins on the cross eighteen
hundred years ago, but since then has had nothing to do with
him to speak of, as far as he knows — then he will lie. And
that is the God and the Christ which most people believe in :
and therefore when the time of trial comes, they fall away, and
do and say things of which they ought to be ashamed, because
their trust is not in God, but in man.
But if that man believes in the living God, and believes that
he lives, and moves, and has his being in God, he cannot lie.
As it is written, ' he that is born of God, sinneth not, for his
seed remaineth in him, and that wicked one toucheth him not.'
He will say, Whatever happens, I must obey God, and not
man. The Lord is on my side, therefore I will not fear what
man can do to me.
And what is the seed which remains in that man, and keeps
him from playing the coward? Christ himself, the seed and
Son of God. If he believes in the living Christ; if he believes
that Christ is really his master, his teacher, who is watching
over him, training him, from his cradle to his grave ; — if he
believes that Christ is dwelling in him, that whatever wish to
do right he has comes from Christ, whatever sense of honour
and honesty he has comes from Christ; then it will seem to
him a dreadful thing to lie, to play the hypocrite, or the
coward; to sin against his own better feelings. It will be
sinning against Christ himself.
Remember the great Martin Luther, when he stood on one
side, a poor monk standing up for the Bible and the Gospel,
and against him were arrayed the Pope and the Emperor,

374

TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.

cardinals, bishops, and almost all the princes in Europe ; and
his friends wanted him to hold his tongue, or to say Yes and
No at once ; in short, to smooth over the matter in some way.
— What conceit, said many, of one poor monk standing up
against all the world ; and what folly, too ! He would cer
tainly be burnt alive. But Luther could not hold his tongue.
He was afraid enough, no doubt. He disliked being burnt as
much as other men. But he felt he must speak God's truth
then or never. He must bear witness for Christ's free gospel,
against Pope, Emperor, all the devils in hell, if need be, or
else hereafter for ever hold his peace. He must play the
honest man that day, or be a hypocrite and a rogue for ever.
His friends said to him, ' If you go to the Council, Duke
George will have you burnt' He answered, ' If it snowed
Duke Georges nine days together, I must go.' They said, ' If
you go into that town, you will never leave it alive.' He said,
' If there were as many devils in the town as there are tiles on
the houses, I must go.' And he went, Bible in hand, and said,
' Here I stand ; I can do no otherwise. God help me ! ' He
went, and he conquered.
And so it will be with you, my friends, if you will believe in
the living God, and in the living Christ; then, when temptation
comes, you will %e able to stand in the evil day, and having
done all, to stand. And you will feel yourselves better men
from that day forward. You will feel that you have made one
one great step upward ; you will look back upon that time of
temptation and perplexity as the beginning of a new life ; as
a sign to you that Christ is with you, and in you, training you
and shaping your character, till he makes you, at last, somewhat
like himself; somewhat of the stature of a true man ; somewhat
like what he has bidden you to be, 'perfect as your Father in
heaven is perfect'

SERMON XXVIII.
THE TEN LEPERS.
(Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity.)

Luke xvii. 17, 18.
Were there not ten cleansed, but where are the nine ? There are not found
that returned to give glory to God, save this stranger.
~|\JO men, one would have thought, had more reason to
thank God than those nine lepers. Afflicted with a
filthy and tormenting disease, hopelessly incurable, at least in
those days, they were cut off from family and friends, cut off
from all mankind; forced to leave their homes, and wander
away ; forbidden to enter the houses of men, or the churches
of God ; forbidden, for fear of infection, to go near any human
being; keeping no company but that of wretched lepers like
themselves, and forced to get their living by begging; by
standing (as the Gospel says) afar off, and praying the passers-
by to throw them a coin.
In this wretched state, iii which they had been certain of
living and dying miserably, they met the Lord : and suddenly,
instantly, beyond all hope or expectation, they found them
selves cured, restored to their families, their homes, their power
of working, their rights as citizens ; restored to all that makes
life worth having, and that freely, and in a moment. If such a
blessing had come to us, should we have thought any thanks

l76 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
too great ! Would not our whole lives have been too short to
bless God for his great mercy? Should we have gone away,
like those nine, without a word of thanks to God, or even
to the man who had healed us ? What stupidity, hardhearted-
ness, ingratitude of those nine, never to have even thanked the
Lord for their restoration to health and happiness.
Ay, so we think. Yet those nine lepers were men of like
passions with ourselves ; and what they did, we perhaps might
do in their place. It is very humbling to think so : but the
Bible is a humbling book : and, therefore, a wholesome book,
profitable for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righ
teousness. And I am very much afraid that when the Bible tells
us that nine out of ten of those lepers were ungrateful to
God, it tells us that nine out of ten of us are ungrateful
likewise. Ungrateful to God ? I fear so ; and more ungrateful, I fear,
than those ten lepers. For which of the two is better off, the
man who loses a good thing, and then gets it back again ; or
the man who never loses it at all, but enjoys it all his life?
Surely the man who never loses it at all. And which of the
two has more cause to thank God ? Those lepers had been
through a very miserable time ; they had had great affliction ;
and that, the)* might feel, was a set-off against their good
fortune in recovering their health. They had bad years to
balance their good ones. But we — how many of us have had
nothing but good years? Oh consider, consider the history
of the average of us. How we grow up tolerably healthy,
tolerably comfortable, in a free country, under just laws, with
the power of earning our livelihood, and the certainty of keep
ing what we earn. Famine we know nothing of in this happy
land ; war, and the horrors of war, we know nothing of— God
grant we never may. In health, safety and prosperity most of
us grow up ; forced, it is true, to work hard : but that, too, is
a blessing; for what better thing for a man, soul and body,
than to be forced to work hard? In health, safety and

XXVIII.] THE TEN LEPERS. 2>77
prosperity ; leaving children behind us, to prosper as we have
done. And how many of us give God the glory, or Christ the
thanks ?
But if these be our bodily blessings, what are our spiritual
blessings ? Has not God given us his only-begotten son
Jesus Christ ? Has he not baptised us into his Church ? Has
he not forgiven our sins ? Has he not revealed to us that he
is our Father, and we his children ? Has he not given us the
absolutely inestimable blessing of his commandments? Of
knowing what the right thing to be done is, that we may do it
and live for ever ; that treasure of which not only Solomon, but
the wise men of old held, that to know what was right was a
more precious possession than rubies and fine gold, and all the
wealth of Ind ? Has he not given us the hope of a joyful
immortality, of everlasting life after death, not only with
those whom we have loved and lost, but with God himself?
And how many of us give God the glory, and Christ the
thanks? Do we not copy those nine lepers, and just shew
ourselves to the priest ? — Come to church on the Sunday,
because it is the custom ; people expect it of us ; and God,
we understand, expects it too : but where is the gratitude ?
Where is the giving of glory to God for all his goodness?
Which are we most like ? Children of God, looking up to our
Father in heaven, and saying, at every fresh blessing, Father,
I thank thee. Truly thou knowest my necessities before I
ask, and my ignorance in asking? — Or, like the stalled ox,
which eats, and eats, and eats, and never thanks the hand
which feeds him ?
We are too comfortable, I think, at times. We are so much
accustomed to be blest by God, that we take his blessings as
matters of course, and feel them no more than we do the air
we breathe.
The wise man says —
Our torments may by length of time become
Our elements ;

378 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
and I am sure our blessings may. They say that people who
endure continual pain and misery, get at length hardly to feel
it And so, on the other hand, people who have continual
prosperity get at length hardly to feel that. God forgive us !
My friends, when I say this to you, I say it to myself. If I
blame you, I blame myself. If I warn you, I warn myself.
We most of us need warning in these comfortable times ; for I
believe that it is this very unrighteousness of ours which brings
many of our losses and troubles on us. If we are so dull that
we will not know the value of a thing when we have got it,
then God teaches us the value of it by taking it from us. He
teaches us the value of health by making us feel sickness ; he
teaches us the value of wealth by making us feel poverty. I
do not say it is always so. God forbid. There are those who
suffer bitter afflictions, not because they have sinned, but that,
like the poor blind man, the glory of God may be made
manifest in them. There are those too who suffer no sorrow
at all, even though they feel, in their thoughtful moments, that
they deserve it. And miserable enough should we all be, if
God punished us every time we were ungrateful to him. If
he dealt with us after our sins, and rewarded us according to
our iniquities, where should we be this day ?
But still, I cannot but believe that if we do go on in
prosperity, careless and unthankful, we are running into danger;
we are likely to bring down on ourselves some sorrow or
anxiety which will teach us, which at least is meant to teach us
— from whom all good things come; and to know that the
Lord has given, when the Lord has taken away.
God grant that when that lesson is sent to us we may learn
it. Learn it, perhaps, at once, and in a moment, we cannot.
Weak flesh and blood cannot enter into the kingdom of God,
and see that he is ruling us, and all things, in love and justice ;
and our eyes are, as it were, dimmed with our tears, so that we
cannot see God's handwriting upon the wall against us. But
at length, when the first burst of sorrow is past, we may learn

XXVIII.] THE TEN LEPERS. 379
it; and, like righteous Job, justify God; saying, — The Lord
gave, and the Lord hath taken away, blessed be the name of
the Lord. If we do that, and give God the glory, it may be
with us, after all, as it was with Job, when God gave him
back sevenfold for all that he had taken away, wealth and
prosperity, sons and daughters. For God doth not afflict
willingly, nor grieve the children of men out of spite. His
punishments are not revenge, but correction ; and, as a father,
he chastises his children, not to harm, but to bless them.
And God grant that if that day, too, comes — if after sorrow
comes joy, if after storm comes sunshine — we may not forget
God afresh in our prosperity, nor go our ways like those
dull-hearted Jews, after they were cleansed from their leprosy :
but, like the Samaritan, return, and give glory to God, who
gives, and delights in giving; and only takes away, that he
may lift up our souls to him, in whom we live, and move, and
have our being : and so, knowing who we are, and where we
are, may live in God, and by God, and for God, in this life,
and for ever. ^

SERMON XXIX.
PARDON AND PEACE.
( Twenty-first Sunday after Trinity. )

Psalm xxxii. I — 7.
Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.
Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in
whose spirit there is no guile. When I kept silence, my bones waxed
old through my roaring all the day long. For day and night thy hand
was heavy upon me : my moisture is turned into the drought of
summer. I acknowledge my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I
not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord ; and
thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. For this shall every one that is
godly pray unt# thee in a time when thou mayest be found : surely in
the floods of great waters they shall not come nigh unto him. Thou
art my hiding place ; thou shalt preserve me from trouble ; thou shalt
compass me about with songs of deliverance.
HHHE collect for to-day is a very beautiful one. There is
something musical in the sound of the very words ; so
musical, that it is sung as an anthem in many churches. Let
us think a little over it. 'Grant, we beseech thee, merciful
Lord, to thy faithful people pardon and peace ; that they may
be cleansed from all their sins, and serve thee with a quiet mind,
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.' That is a noble
prayer ; and a prayer for each and every one of us, every day.
I say for every day. It is not like the fifty-first psalm, the

PARDON AND PEACE. 381
prayer of a man who has committed some black and dreadful
crime; who fears lest God should take his Holy Spirit from
him, and leave him to remorse and horror ; who feels that he
needs to be utterly changed, and have a new heart created
within him. It is not a prayer of that kind. It is rather the
prayer of a man who is weary with the burden of sinful mortality;
who finds it very hard work to do his duty, even tolerably well ;
who is dissatisfied with himself, and ashamed of himself, not
about one great fault, but about many little faults ; and who
wants to be cleansed from them ; who is tempted to be fretful,
anxious, out of heart, because things go wrong ; and because
he feels it partly his own fault that things go wrong ; and who,
therefore, wants peace, that he may serve God with a quiet mind.
Now then, dear friends, did I not speak truth, when I said,
this is a prayer for every one of us, and for every day ? For
which of us does his duty as he ought ? I take for granted, we
are all trying to do our duty, better or worse : but I take for
granted, too, that the more we try to do our duty, the more
dissatisfied with ourselves we are ; and the more we find we have
sins without number to be cleansed from. For the more we try
to do our duty, the higher notion we get of what our duty is ;
the more we do, the more we feel we ought to do ; and the
more we feel that we leave undone a great many things which
we ought to do, and do a great many things which we ought
not to do, and that there is no health in us : but a great deal of
disease and weakness ; — disease of soul, in the way of conceit,
pride, selfishness, temper, obstinacy ; weakness, in the way of
laziness, fearfulness, and very often of sheer stupidity; we do
not see, or rather will not take the trouble to see, what we ought
to do, and how to do it. And therefore, we must be, or rather
ought to be, dissatisfied with ourselves ; and our consciences
accuse us when we lie down at night, of a hundred petty miser
able mistakes, which we ought to have avoided. We are con
tinually knowing what is right, and doing what is wrong, till we
get deservedly angry with ourselves ; and think at times, that

382 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
God must be deservedly angry with us ; that we art. such poor
paltry creatures that he can only look on us with dislike and
contempt : and even worse ; that, perhaps, he does not care to
see us mend ; that our struggles to do right are of no value in
his eyes : but that he has sternly left us to ourselves, to struggle
through life, right or wrong, as best we may ; and to be punished
at last, for all that we have done amiss.
Such thoughts will cross our minds. They have crossed the
minds of all mankind since the first man's conscience awoke,
and he discovered that he was not a brute animal, by finding in
himself that awful thought, which no brute animal can have — ' I
have done wrong.' And therefore the consciences of men will
cry for pardon, just in proportion as they are worthy of the
name of men, and not merely a superior sort of animals ; and
therefore just in proportion as our souls are alive in us, alive
with the feeling of duty, of justice, of purity, of love, of a just
and orderly God above — just in that proportion shall we be
tormented by the difference between what we are, and what we
ought to be ; and the sense of sin, and the longing for pardon,
will be more keen in us ; and we shall have no rest till the sins
are got rid of, and the pardon sure. That is the price we pay
for having immortal souls. It is a heavy price truly : but it is
well worth the ^paying, if it be only paid aright. If that tor
menting feeling of being continually wrong in this life, ends by
making us continually right for ever in the world to come ; if
Christ be formed in us at last ; if out of our sinful and mortal
manhood a sinless and immortal manhood is born ; — then shall
we, like the mother over her new-born babe, forget our anguish,
for joy that a man is born into the world.
But, again, besides pardon, we want peace. Who does not
know that state of mind in which, perhaps, without any great
reason in reality, one has no peace ? When everything seems
to go wrong with a man. When he suspects everybody to be
against him. When little troubles, which he could bear easily
enough at other times, seem quite intolerable to him. When

xxix.] PARDON AND PEACE. 383
he is troubled with vain regrets about the past — ' Ah, if I had
done this and that ! ' and vain fears for the future, conjuring up
in his mind all sorts of bad luck which may, but most probably
never will, happen ; and yet from off which he cannot turn his
mind. Who does not know this frame of mind ?
True, a great deal of this may depend on ill-health ; and will
pass away as the man's bodily condition gets better. We know,
in the same way, that the strange anxiety which comes over us
in sleepless nights, comes from bodily causes. That is merely
because, the circulation of our blood being quickened, our brain
becomes more active ; and because w'e are lying alone in the
silent darkness, with nothing to listen to or look at, we cannot
turn our attention away from the thoughts which get possession
of us and torment us. That is only bodily ; and yet it may be
very useful to our souls. As we lie awake, our own past lives,
our own past mistakes and sins, and God's past blessings and
mercies, too, may rise up before us with clearness, and teach us
more than a hundred sermons ; and we may find, with David,
that our reins chasten us in the night-season. ' When I am in
heaviness, I will think upon God ; when my heart is vexed, I
will complain. Thou holdest mine eyes waking. ... I have
considered the days of old, and the years that are past. I call
to remembrance my song, and in the night I commune with my
own heart, and search out my spirits. Will the Lord absent
himself for ever, and will he be no more intreated ? Is his
mercy clean gone for ever : and is his promise come utterly to
an end for evermore ? Hath God forgotten to be gracious : and
will he shut up his loving-kindness in displeasure ? And I said
it is mine own infirmity. But I will remember the years of the
right hand of the Most Highest' These sleepless hours taught
the Psalmist somewhat ; and they may teach us likewise. And
so* again, with these sad and fretful frames of mind. Even if
they do partly come from our bodies, they have a real effect,
which cannot be mistaken, on our souls ; and they may have a
good effect on us, if we choose. I believe that we shall find,

384 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
that even if they do come from ill health and weak nerves,
what starts them is— that we are dissatisfied with ourselves.
We feel something wrong, not merely in our bodies, but in our
souls, our characters ; and then we try to lay the blame on the
world around us, and shift it off ourselves ; saying in our hearts,
' I should do very well, if other people, and things about me,
would only let me : ' but the more we try to shift off the blame,
the less peace we have. Nothing mends matters less than
throwing the blame on others. That is plain. Other people
we cannot mend ; they must mend themselves. Circumstances
about us we cannot mend ; God must mend them. So, as long
as we throw the blame on them, we cannot return to a cheerful
and hopeful frame of mind. But the moment we throw the
blame on ourselves, that moment we can have hope, that
moment we can become cheerful again ; for whatsoever else we
cannot mend, we can at least mend ourselves. Now a man
may forget this in health. He may be put out and unhappy for
a while : but when his good spirits return, he does not know
why. Things have not improved ; but, somehow, they do not
affect him as they did before. Now this is not wrong. God
forbid ! In such a world as this, one is glad to see a man rid
of sadness by any means which is not wrong. Better anything
than that a poor soul should fret himself to death.
But it may be very good for a man now and then not to -
forget ; to be kept low, whether by ill health or by any other
cause, till he faces fairly his own state, and finds out honestly
what does fret him and torment him.
And then, I believe, his experience will generally be like
David's, — 'As long as I kept silence, my bones waxed old
through my groaning all the day long.
Think over these words, I beg you. I chose them for my
text, just because they seem to me to contain all that I wish
you to understand. As long as the Psalmist held his peace —
as long as he did not confess his sin to God — all seemed to go
wrong with him. He fretted his very heart away. The

xxix.] PARDON AND PEACE. 385
moment that he m^de a clean breast to God, peace and cheer
fulness came back to him.
This psalm may speak of some really great sin which he had
committed. But that makes all the more strongly for us. For
if he got forgiveness for a great sin, by merely confessing it,
how much more may we hope to be forgiven, for the compara
tively little sins of which I am now speaking ? Surely there is
forgiveness for them. Surely we, Christians, are not worse off
than the old Jews. God forbid ! What does the Bible tell
us ? If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive
us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we
say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his
word is not in us. And again, if we walk in the light; that is,
if we look honestly at our own hearts, and confess honestly to
God what we see wrong there ; then we have fellowship one
with another ; all our frettings and grudgings against our fellow
men pass away ; and the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us
from all sin. God forbid again ! For what is the message of
the Absolution, whether general in the church, or private by
the sick-bed, but this — that there is continual forgiveness for
those who really confess and repent ? God forbid again ! For
what is the message of the Holy Communion, but that we
really are forgiven, really helped by God not to do the like
again ; that the stains and scars of our daily misdoings are
truly healed by God's grace; and power given us to lead a
healthier life, the longer we persevere in the struggle after
God. Therefore, instead of proudly laying the blame of our un-
happiness on our fellow-men, much less on God and his pro
vidence, let us cast ourselves, in every hour of shame or of sad
ness, on the boundless love of him who hateth nothing that he
hath made ; who so loved the world that he spared not his own
Son, but delivered him up for us all. How shall he not with
him freely give us all things ? Let us open our weary hearts to
him who watches with tender interest, as of a father watching
2 B

386 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
the growth of his child, over every struggle of ours from worse
to better; and so we shall have our reward. The more we
trust to the love of God, the more shall we feel his love — feel
that we are pardoned— feel that we are at peace. We may not
grow more cheerful as we grow older ; but we shall grow more
peaceful. Sadder men, it may be ; but wiser men also ; caring
less and less for pleasure ; caring even less and less for mere
happiness : but finding a lasting comfort in the knowledge that
we are doing our life's work not altogether ill, under the smile
of Almighty God ; aware more and more of our own weakness,
and of our own failings : but trusting that God will take the will
for the deed, and forgive us what we have left undone, and ac
cept what we have done, for the sake of Christ, in whom, and
not in our own poor paltry selves, he looks upon us as his
adopted children.
Only let us remember to ask for pardon and to ask for peace,
that we may use them as the collect bids us ; — To ask for
pardon, not merely that we may escape punishment ; not even
to escape punishment at all, if punishment be wholesome for
us, as it often is : but that we may be cleansed from our sins ;
that we may not be left to our own weakness and our own bad
habits, to grow more and more useless, more and more unhappy,
day by day, ]jut that we may be cleansed from them ; and grow
purer, nobler, juster, stronger, more worthy of our place in God's
kingdom, as our years roll by. Let us remember to ask for
peace, not merely to get rid of unpleasant thoughts, or un
pleasant people, or unpleasant circumstances ; and then sit
down and say, Soul, take thine ease, eat and drink, for thou
nast much goods laid up for many years : but let us ask for
peace, that we may serve God with a quiet mind ; that we may
get rid of the impatient, cowardly, discontented, hopeless heart,
which will not let a man go about his business like a man ; and
get, instead of it, by the inspiration of God's Holy Spirit, the
calm, contented, brave, hopeful heart, in the strength of which
a man can work with a will wherever God may put him, even

xxix.] PARDON AND PEACE. 387
amidst vexation, confusion, disappointment, slander, and perse
cution ; and, in his place and calling, serve the Lord, who
served him when he died for him, and who serves him, and all
his people, now and for ever in heaven.
So shall we have real pardon, and real peace. A pardon
which will make us really better ; and a peace which will make
us really more useful. And to be good and to be useful were
the two ends for which God sent us into the world at all.

SERMON XXX
THE CENTRAL SUN.
(Sunday after Ascension, Evening.)

Ephesians iv. 9. 10.
Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the
lower parts of the earth? He that descended is the same also that
ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things.
T^HIS is one of those very deep texts which we are not
-*- meant to think about every day ; only at such seasons as
this, when we have to think of Christ ascending into heaven,
that he might send down his Spirit at Whitsuntide. Of this the
text speaks * and therefore, we may, I hope, think a little of it
to-day, but reverently, and cautiously, like men who know a
very little, and are afraid of saying more than they know.
These deep mysteries about heaven we must always meddle
with very humbly, lest we get out of our depth in haste and
self-conceit. As it is said,
Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
For, if we are not very careful, we shall be apt to mistake the
meaning of Scripture, and make it say what we like, and twist
it to suit our own fancies, and our own ignorance. Therefore
we must never, with texts like this, say positively, ' It must
mean this. It can mean only this.' How can we tell that ?

THE CENTRAL SUN. 389
This world, which we do see, is far too wonderful for us to
understand. How much more wonderful must be the world
which we do not see? How much more wonderful must
heaven be? How can we tell what is there, or what is not
there? We can tell of some things that are not th;re, and
those are sin, evil, disorder, harm of any kind. Heaven is
utterly good. Beyond that, we know nothing. Therefore I
dare not be positive about this text, for fear I should try to ex
plain it according to my own fancies. Wise fathers and divines
have differed very much as to what it means ; how far any one
of them is right, I cannot tell you.
The ancient way of explaining this text was this. People
believed in old times that the earth was flat. Then, they held,
hell was below the earth, or inside it in some way : and the
burning mountains, out of which came fire and smoke, were the
mouths of hell. And when they believed that, it was easy for
them to suppose that St. Paul spoke of Christ's descending into
hell. He went down, says St. Paul, into the lower parts of the
earth. What could those lower parts be, they asked, but the
hell which lay under the earth ?
Now about that we know nothing. St. Paul himself never
says that hell is below the earth. Indeed (and this is a very
noteworthy thing) St. Paul never, in his epistles, mentions in
plain words hell at all; so what St. Paul thought about the
matter, we can never know. Whether by Christ's descending
into the lower parts of the earth, he meant descending into hell,
or merely that our Lord came down on this earth of ours, poor,
humble, and despised, laying his glory by for a while, this we
cannot tell. Some wise men think one thing, some another.
Two of the wisest" and best of the great old fathers of the
Church think that he meant only Christ's death and burial. So
how dare I give a positive opinion, where wiser men than I
differ? But about the other half of the text, which says, that he^
ascended high above all heavens, there is no such difficulty.

390. TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
All agree as to what that means : though, perhaps, in old times
they would have put it in different words.
The old belief was, that as hell was below the flat earth, so
heaven was above it ; and that there were many heavens, seven
heavens, in layers, as it were, one above the other ; and that the
seventh heaven, which was the highest of all, was where God
dwelt. Now, whether St. Paul believed this, we cannot tell.
He speaks of being himself caught up into the third heaven,
and here Christ is spoken of as ascending above all heavens.
My own belief, though I say it very humbly, is, that St. Paul
spoke of these things only as a figure of speech, for the sake of
the ignorance of the people to whom he was writing. They
talked in that way ; and he was forced now and then to talk in
that way, too, to make them understand him. I think that,
when he spoke of being caught up into the third heaven; he did
not mean that he was lifted bodily off the earth into the skies :
but that his soul was raised up and enlightened to understand
high and wonderful heavenly matters, though not the highest
or most wonderful. If he had meant that, he would have said,
that he was caught up into the seventh heaven. We know that
our Lord, in the same way, continually used parables ; because,
as he said, the ignorant people could not understand the
mysteries of the^ kingdom of heaven ; and he had, therefore, to
put them into parables, taken from the common country
matters, and country forms of speech, if by any means he might
make them understand. And so, I suppose, it was with St.
Paul. He had to speak in such a way that he could be under
stood ; and no more.
But when he says that Christ ascended far above all heavens,
we are to believe this — that he ascended to God himself. So
high that he could go no higher; so far that he could go
no farther.
We, now, do not believe that there are seven heavens above
the earth ; and we need not It is no doctrine of the Church,
or of the Creeds. We know that the earth is round, and not

xxx.] THE, CENTRAL SUN. 391
flat; and that the heavens, if by that we' mean the sky, is
neither above it, nor below it, but round it on every side. But
some may say, whither, then, did our Lord ascend ? To what
place did his body go up ? And that is a right question; for
we must always bear in mind that not merely Christ's godhead
but his. manhood, not merely Christ's soul but his body also,
ascended into heaven. If we do not believe that, we do not
hold the Catholic faith. Whither, then, did Christ ascend?
My friends, we know this. That this earth and the planets
move round the sun, which is in the centre of them. We know
this, too ; that all the countless stars which spangle the sky are
really suns likewise, perhaps, with worlds which we cannot see,
moving round them, as we move round the sun. We know,
too, that these fixed stars, as they seem to be, are not really
fixed, but have some regular movements among themselves,
which seem very slow and small to us, from their immense
distance, but which really are very great and fast.
Now all these suns and stars, it is reasonable to believe, most
probably have a centre. There must be order among them ;
and they most probably move round one thing, one place, one
central sun, as it were, which is the very heart of all the worlds,
and the whole universe. Where that place is, or what it is like,
we know not, and cannot know. Only this we may believe,
that it is glorious beyond all that eye hath seen, and ear heard,
or hath entered into the heart of man to conceive. If this
world be beautiful, how beautiful must that world of all worlds
be. If the sun be glorious, how glorious must the sun of all
suns be. If the heaven over us be grand, how grand must that
heaven of heavens be. We will not talk of it ; for we cannot
imagine it : and if we tried to, we should only lower it to our
own low fancies. But is it not reasonable to suppose, that there
God the Father does, perhaps, in some unspeakable way, shew
forth his glory? That there, in the heart of all the worlds,
Cherubim and Seraphim continually adore him, crying day and
night, ' Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth : Heaven and

392 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
earth are full of the majesty of thy glory ! ' before his throne,
from which goes forth light, and power, and life, to all worlds
and all created things.
And is it not reasonable to believe, that there Christ is, in the
bosom of the Father, and at the right hand of God? We know
that those, too, are only figures. That God is a Spirit, every
where and nowhere; and has not hands as we have. But it is
only by such figures that the Bible can make us understand the
truth, that Christ is the highest being in all heavens and worlds ;
equal with God the Father, and sharer of his kingdom, and
power, and glory, God blessed for ever. Amen.
What then does St. Paul mean, when he says, ' That he may
fill all things ? ' I do not know. And I will take care not to
lessen and spoil St. Paul's words, by any ignorant words of my
own. But one thing I know it will mean one day, for St. Paul
says so. That Christ reigns, and will reign, triumphant over
sin, and death, and hell, till he have put all enemies under his
feet, and the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. Then
shall he deliver up the kingdom to God, even the Father ; that
God may be all in all. What that means I do not know. But
this I can say, and you can say. We can pray that God will
finish the number of his elect and hasten his kingdom, that we,
with all that arg departed in the true faith, may have our perfect
consummation and bliss, both in body and soul, in his eternal
kingdom. And this I can say, that it means now, for you and
me ; for Whitsuntide tells me :— that whatever else Christ can
or cannot fill, he can at least fill our hearts, because he is in the
bosom of the Father himself; and therefore from him, as from
the Father, proceeds the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of
life. That Spirit will proceed even to us, if we will have him.
He will fill our hearts with himself; with the Spirit of goodness,
which proceeds out of the heaven of heavens, and out of the
bosom of God himself; with love, peace, longsuffering, gentle
ness, goodness; with truth, honour, duty, earnestness, and all
that is the likeness of Christ and of God. Oh let us pray

xxx.] THE CENTRAL SUN. 393
for that Spirit ; the Spirit of truth, which Christ promised us
when he ascended up into the heaven of heavens, to keep us
sound in our most holy faith ; and the Spirit of goodness, to
give us strength to live the good lives of good Christian men.
And then it will matter little what opinions we hold about
deep things, which the wisest man can never put into words.
And it will matter little, whether what I have been telling you
to-day about the heaven of heavens be exactly true or not ; for
what says St. Paul of such deep matters ? That we know in
part, and prophesy in part ; and that prophecies shall fail, and
knowledge vanish away : but charity, love, and right feeling,
and right doing., which is the very Holy Spirit of God, shall
abide for ever. And if that Spirit be with us, he will guide us
in due time into all truth ; teach us all we need to know, and
enable us to practise all we ought to do. Amen.

SERMON XXXI.
CHRISTMAS PEACE.
(Sunday before Christmas.)

Phil. iv. 4.
Rejoice in the Lord alway : and again I say, Rejoice.
'"THIS is a glorious text, and one fit to be the key-note ol
Christmas-day. If we will take it to heart, it will tell us
how to keep Christmas-day. St. Paul has been speaking of two
good women, who seem to have had some difference ; and he
beseeches them to make up their difference, and be of the same
mind in the Lord. And then he goes on to tell them, and all
Christian people, why they should make up their differences.
And for that reason, I suppose, the Church has chosen it for
the epistle before Christmas-day, on which all men are to make
friends with each other, and rejoice in the Lord. Let your
moderation, he says, be known to all men. The Greek word
signifies forbearance, reasonable dealing, consideration for one
another, readiness to give way, not standing too severely on
one's own rights. Now this is just the temper in which we
ought to meet our friends at Christmas — forbearance. They
may not have always behaved well to us. Be it so. No more
have we to them. Let us, once in the year at least, forget old
grudges. Let us do as we would be done by ; give and forgive ;

CHRISTMAS PEACE.

395

live and let live ; bury our past quarrels, and shake hands over
their graves.
For the Lord is at hand. Close to all of us : watching all we
do, and setting the right value on it. He cannot mistake. He
sees both sides of a matter, and all sides — a thousand sides
which we cannot see. He can judge better than we. Let him
iudge. Why do I say, Let him judge ? He has judged already,
weeks, months ago, as soon as each quarrel happened : and,
perhaps, he found us in the wrong as well as our neighbours ;
and, if so, the least said the soonest mended. Let us forgive
and forget, lest we be neither forgotten nor forgiven.
And, because the Lord is at hand, be anxious about nothing.
The word here is the same as in the Sermon on the Mount. It
means do not fret ; do not terrify yourselves ; for the Lord is
at hand ; he knows what you want : and will he not give it ?
Is not Christmas-day a sign that he will give it— a pledge of his
love ? What did he do on the first Christmas-day ? What did
he shew himself to be on the first Christmas-day ? Now, here
is the root of the whole matter, and a deep root it is ; as deep
as the beginning of all things which are, or ever were, or ever
will be. And yet if we will believe our Bibles, it is a root
which we all may find. What did the angels say the first
Christmas night ? Peace on earth, and goodwill to men. That
is what God proclaimed. That is what he said that he had,
and would give.
Now, says the apostle, if you will believe the latter half of
this same Christmas message, then the first half of it will come
true to you. If you will believe that God's will is a good will
to you, then you will have peace on earth. For believe in
Christmas-day; believe that the Lord is at hand; that he has been
made man for ever and ever ; and that to the Man Christ Jesus
all power is given in heaven and earth : and then, if you want
aught, instead of grudging or grinding your neighbours, ask him.
In everything let your requests be made known unto God : and
then the peace of God will keep your hearts through Christ Jesus.

396 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
You will feel at peace with God through Christ Jesus, because
you have found out that God is at peace with you ; that God is
not against you, but for you ; that God does not hate you, but
love you ; and if God is at peace with you, what cause have
you to be at war with him ? And so the message of Christmas-
day will bring you peace.
You will be at peace with your neighbours, through Christ
Jesus. When you see God stooping to make peace with sinful
men, you will be ashamed to be quarrelling with them. When
you see God full of love, you will be ashamed to keep up
peevishness, grudging, and spite. When you see God's heaven
full of light, you will be ashamed to be dark yourselves ; your
hearts will go out freely to your fellow-creatures ; you will long
to be friends with every one you meet ; and you will find in that
the highest pleasure which you ever felt in life. But mind one
thing — what sort of a peace this peace of God is. It passes all
understanding ; the very loftiest understanding. The cleverest
and most learned men that ever lived could not have found
it — we know they did not find it — by their own cleverness and
learning. No more will you find God's peace, if you seek for
it with your understanding. Thinking will not bring you peace,
think as shrewdly as you may. Reading will not bring it, read
as deeply as you^ may. Some people think otherwise ; that
they can get the peace of God by understanding. If they could
but understand more, their minds would be at rest. So they
weary themselves with reading, and thinking, and arguing,
perhaps trying to understand predestination, election, assurance ;
perhaps trying to understand which is the true Church. What
do they get thereby ? Certainly not the peace of God. They
certainly do not set their minds at rest. They cannot. Books
cannot give a live soul rest. Understanding cannot. Nothing
can give you or me rest, save God himself. The peace is
God's ; and he must give it himself, with his own hand, or we
shall never get it. Go then to God himself. Thou art his
child, as Christmas-day declares : be not afraid to go unto thy

xxxi.] CHRISTMAS PEACE. 397
Father. Pray to him ; tell him what thou wantest : say, Father,
I am not moderate, reasonable, forbearing. I fear I cannot
keep Christmas-day aright, for I have not a peaceful Christmas
spirit in me ; and I know that I shall never get it by thinking,
and reading, and understanding; for it passes all that, and lies far
away beyond it, does peace, in the very essence of thine
undivided, unmoved, absolute, eternal Godhead, which no
change nor decay of this created world, nor sin or folly of men
or devils, can ever alter ; but which abideth for ever what it is,
in perfect rest, and perfect power, and perfect love. O Father,
give me thy peace. Soothe this restless, greedy, fretful soul of
mine, as a mother soothes a sick and feverish child. How
thou wilt do it I do not know. It passes all understanding.
But though the sick child cannot reach the mother, the mother
is at hand, and can reach it. Though the eagle, by flying,
cannot reach the sun, yet the sun is at hand, and can reach all
the earth, and pour its light and warmth over all things. And
thou art more than a mother : thou art the everlasting Father.
Pour thy love over me, that I may love as thou lovest. Thou
art more than the sun : thou art the light and the life of all
things. Pour thy light and thy life over me, that I may see as
thou seest, and live as thou livest, and be at peace with myself
and all the world, as thou art at peace with thyself and all
the world. Again, I say, I know not how; for it passes all
understanding : but I hope that thou wilt do it for me. I trust
that thou wilt do it for me, for I believe the good news of
Christmas-day. I believe that thou art love, and that thy
mercy is over all thy works. I believe the message of Christmas-
day : that thou so lovest the world, that thou hast sent thy
Son to save the world, and me. I know not how ; for that, too,
passes understanding : but I believe that thou wilt do it ; for I
believe that thou art love ; and that thy mercy is over all thy
works, even over me. I believe the message of Christmas-day,
that thy will is peace on earth, even peace to me, restless and
unquiet as I am : and goodwill to men, even to me, the
chief of sinners. ^

SERMON XXXII.
THE LIFE OF THE SPIRIT.
(First Sunday after Christmas.)

Isaiah xxxviii. 16.
O Lord, by these things men live, and in all these things is the life
of my spirit.
HHHESE words are the words of Hezekiah, king of Judah :
-*• and they are true words, words from God. But, if they
are true words, they are true words for every one — for you and
me, for every one here in this church this day : for they do not
say, By these things certain men live, one man here and another
man there ; but all men. Whosoever is really alive, that is,
has life in his spirit, his soul, his heart, the life of a man
and not a beast, the only life which is worthy to be called life,
then that life is kept up in him in the same way that it was kept
up in Hezekiah, and by the same means.
Let us see, then, what things they were which gave Hezekiah's
spirit life. Great joy, great honour, great success, wealth,
health, prosperity and pleasure? Was it by these things that
Hezekiah found men lived ? Not so, but by great sorrow.
'In those days was Hezekiah sick unto death. And Isaiah the
prophet the son of Amos came unto him and said, Thus saith
the Lord, Set thine house in order ; for thou shalt die and not

THE LIFE OF THE SPIRIT.

399

live. Then Hezekiah turned his face towards the wall and
prayed unto the Lord ; and Hezekiah wept sore.'
Trouble upon trouble came on Hezekiah; and that just
when he might have expected a little rest. The Lord had
just delivered Hezekiah and the Jews from a fearful danger,
of which we read in the chapter before. Hezekiah had believed
God's promise by the mouth of Isaiah. He held fast his faith
in God when Sennacherib and his Assyrian army were camping
round Jerusalem ; for God had said, ' I will defend this city to
save it for my own sake and for my servant David's sake.' He
defended his city bravely and nobly, and showed himself a true,
and valiant, and godly king. And perhaps Hezekiah expected
to be rewarded for his faith, and rewarded for having done his
duty : but it was not so. He had to wait, and to endure more.
And now this fresh trouble was come upon him. Isaiah told
him he should die and not live : and he must prepare himself
to meet death.
Hezekiah, you see, was horribly afraid of death. I do not
mean that he was afraid of going to hell, for he does not say
so : but he felt, to use his own words, 'The grave cannot praise
thee, death cannot celebrate thee : they that go down into the
pit cannot hope for thy truth.' And, therefore, death looked
to him an ugly and an evil thing — as it is ; the Lord's enemy,
and his last enemy, the one with which he will have the
longest and sorest fight. He conquered death by rising from
the dead : but nevertheless we die ; and death is an ugly,
fearful, hateful thing in itself, and rightly called the King of
Terrors : for terrible it is to those who do not know that
Christ has conquered it. Hezekiah lived before the Lord
Jesus came into the flesh to bring life and immortality to light,
by rising from the dead ; and, therefore, the life after death was
not brought to light to him, any more than it was to David,
or any other Old Testament Jew. He dreaded it, because he
knew not what would come after death. And, therefore, he
prayed hard not to die. He did not pray altogether in a right

400 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
way : but still he prayed. ' Remember now, O Lord, I beseech
thee, how I have walked before thee in truth and with a
perfect heart, and have done that which was good in thy sight.'
And the Lord heard his prayer. ' Then came the word of the
Lord to Isaiah, saying, Go, and say to Hezekiah, Thus saith
the Lord, I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears,
behold I will add unto thy days fifteen years.'
Then what was the use of God's warning to him? What
was the use of his sickness and his terror, if, after all, his prayer
was heard, and after the Lord had told him, Thou shalt die and
not live — that did not come to pass : but the very contrary
happened, that he lived, and did not die ?
Of what use to him was it ? Of this use at least, that it
taught him that the Lord God would hear the prayers of mortal
men. Oh my friends, is not that worth knowing ? Is not that
worth going through any misery to learn — that the Lord will
hear us ? That he is not a cold, arbitrary tyrant, who goes his
own way, never caring for our cries and tears, too proud to turn
out of his way to hear us : but that he is very pitiful and of
tender mercy, and repenting him of the evil ? Hezekiah did not
pray rightly. He thought himself abetter man than he was. He
said, 'Remember now, O Lord, I beseech thee, how I have
walked before»thee in truth and with a perfect heart, and have
done that which is good in thy sight.' And Hezekiah wept sore.
But he did pray. He went to God, and told his story to him,
and wept sore; and the Lord God heard him, and taught
him that he was not as good as he fancied ; taught him that,
after all, he had nothing to say for himself — no reason to shew
why he should not die. 'What shall I say? He hath both
spoken unto me, and himself hath done it : I shall go softly
all my years in the bitterness of my soul.' And so he felt that,
instead of justifying himself, he must throw himself utterly
on God's love and mercy; that God must undertake for
him. ' O Lord, I am oppressed, crushed — the heart is beaten
out of me. I have nothing to say for myself. Undertake for

xxxii.] THE LIFE OF THE SPIRIT. 401
me. I have nothing to say for myself, but I have plenty to say
of thee. Thou art good and just. Thou wilt not leave my
soul in hell. I can say no more.'
And then he found that the Lord was ready to save him.
That what the Lord wished was, not to kill him, but to recover
him, and make him live — live more really, and fully, and wisely,
and manfully — by making him trust more utterly in God's good
ness, and love, and mercy ; making him more certain that, good
as he thought himself, and perfect in heart, he was full of sins :
and yet that the Lord had cast all these sins of his behind his
back, forgotten and forgiven them, as soon as he had made him
see that all that was good and strong in him came from God,
and all that was evil and weak from himself. And then he says,
' O Lord, by these things men live, and in all these things is the
life of my spirit' God meant all along to receive me, and
make me live. He chastened me, and brought me low, to shew
me that my own faith, my own righteousness, was no reason for
his saving me : but that his own love and mercy was a good
reason for saving me. ' Behold,' he goes on to say, ' for peace
I had great bitterness : but thou hast in love to my soul de
livered it from the pit of corruption : for thou hast cast all my
sins behind thy back.'
And, my dear friends, what Hezekiah saw but dimly, we
ought to see clearly. The blessed news of the Gospel ought to
tell us it clearly. For the blessed Gospel tells us that the same
Lord who chastened and taught, and then saved, Hezekiah,
was made flesh, and born a man of the substance of a mortal
woman ; that he might in his own person bear all our sicknesses
and carry our infirmities ; that he might understand all our
temptations, and be touched with the feeling of our infirmities,
seeing that he himself was tempted in all points likewise, yet
without sin.
Oh hear this, you who have had sorrows in past times. Hear
this, you who expect sorrows in the times to come.
He who made, he who lightens, every man who comes into
2 c

402 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.

the world; he who gave you every right thought and wholesome
feeling that you ever had in your lives' : he counts your tears ;
he knows your sorrows ; he is able and willing to save you to
the uttermost. Therefore do not be afraid of your own afflic
tions. Face them like men. Think over them. Ask him to
help you out of them : or if that is not to be, at least to tell you
what he means by them. Be sure that what he must mean by
them is good to you : a lesson to you, that in some way or other
they are meant to make you wiser, stronger, hardier, more sure
of God's love, more ready to do God's work, whithersoever it
may lead you. Do not be afraid of the dark day of affliction, I
say. It may teach you more than the bright prosperous one.
Many a man can see clearly in the cloudy day, who would be
dazzled in the sunlight. The dull weather, they say, is the best
weather for battle ; and sorrow is the best time for seeing through
and conquering one's own self. Therefore do not be afraid, I
say, of sorrow. All the clouds in the sky cannot move the sun
a foot further off; and all the sorrow in the world cannot move
God any further off. God is there still, where he always was ;
near you, and below you, and above you, and around you ; for
in him you live and move and have your being, and are . the
offspring and children of God. Nay, he is nearer you, if pos
sible, in sorrow, than in joy. He is informing you, and guiding
you with his eye, and, like a father, teaching you the right way
which you should go. He is searching and purging your hearts,
and cleansing you from your secret faults, and teaching you to
know who you are and to know who he is — your Father, the
knowledge of whom is life eternal. By these things, my friends
— by being brought low and made helpless, till ashamed of our
selves, and weary of ourselves, we lift up eyes and heart to God
who made us, like lost children crying after a Father — by these
things, I say, we live, and in all these things is the life of our
spirit.

SERMON XXXIII.
THE UNCHANGEABLE ONE.

Psalm cxix. 89 — 96.
For ever, O Lord, thy word is settled in heaven. Thy faithfulness is unto
all generations : thou hast established the earth, and it abideth. They
continue this day according to thine ordinances : for all are thy servants.
Unless thy law had been my delight, I should then have perished in mine
affliction. I will never forget thy precepts : for with them thou hast
quickened me. I am thine, save me ; for I have sought thy precepts.
The wicked have waited for me to destroy me : but I will consider thy
testimonies. I have seen an end of all perfection ; but thy command
ment is exceeding broad.
THE Psalmist is in great trouble. He does not know whom
to trust, what to expect next, whom to look to. Every
thing seems failing and changing round him. His psalm was
most probably written during the Babylonish captivity, at a time
when all the countries and kingdoms of the east were being de
stroyed by the Chaldean armies.
Then, he says, Be it so. If everything else changes, God
cannot. If everything else fails, God's plans cannot. He can
rest on the thought of God ; of his goodness, his faithfulness,
order, providence. God is governing the world righteously and
orderly. Whatever disorder there is on earth, there is none in
heaven. God's word endures for ever there.
Then he looks on the world round him ; all is well ordered —

404 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
seasons, animals, sun, and stars abide. They continue this day
according to God's ordinances. The unchangeableness of
nature is a comfort to him ; for it is a token of the unchange-
ablenes of God who made it.
Now, I do beg you to think carefully over this verse ; because
it is quite against the very common notion that, because the
earth was cursed for Adam's sake, therefore it is cursed now ;
that because it was said to him, Thorns and thistles shall it
bring forth to thee, therefore that holds good now. It is not
so, my friends ; neither is there, as far as I know, in any part
whatsoever of Scripture, any mention of Adam's curse continu
ing to our day. St. John, in the Revelations, certainly says,
' And there shall be no more curse.' But if you will read the
Revelation, you will find that what he plainly refers to is to the
fearful curses, the plagues, the vials of wrath, as he calls them,-
which were to be poured out on the earth ; and then to cease
when the New Jerusalem came down from heaven.
St. Paul, again, knows nothing about any such curse upon
the earth.. He says that death came into the world by Adam's
sin : but that must be understood only of man, and the world of
man ; and for this simple reason, that we know, without the
possibility of doubt, that animals died in this world just as they
do now, not only thousands, but hundreds of thousands of years
before man appeared on earth.
What St. Paul says of the creation, in one of his most
glorious passages, is this — not that it is cursed, but that it
groans and travails continually in the pangs of labour, trying to
bring forth ; trying to bring forth something better than itself;
to develop, and rise from good to better, and from that to
better still ; till all things become perfect in a way which we
cannot conceive, but which God has ordained before the
foundation of the world.
Besides, as a fact, the earth does not bring forth thorns and
thistles to us, but good grain, and fruitful crops, and an
abundant return for our labour, if we choose to till the ground.

XXXIll.] THE UNCHANGEABLE ONE. 405
And wise men, who study God's works, can find no curse at all
upon the earth, nor sign of a curse, neither in plants nor
beasts, no, nor in the smallest gnat in the air. The more
they look into the wonders of God's world, the more they find
it true that there is order everywhere, beauty everywhere,
fruitfulness everywhere, usefulness everywhere — that all things
continue as at the beginning ; that, as the psalmist says in
another place, God has made them fast for ever and ever, and
given them a law which cannot be broken. And if you will
look at Genesis viii. 21, 22, you will find from the plain words
of Scripture itself, that Adam's curse, whatever it was, was taken
off after the flood, ' And the Lord smelled a sweet savour : and
the Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any
more for maris sake ; for the imagination of man's heart is evil
from his youth ; neither will I again smite any more everything
living, as I have done. While the earth remaineth, seed-time
and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and
day and night shall not cease.'
Therefore, my friends, open your eyes and your hearts freely
to the message which God is sending you, in summer and
winter, in seed-time and in harvest, in sunshine and in storm ;
that God is not a hard God, a revengeful God, a God of curses,
who is extreme to mark what is done amiss, and keepeth his
anger for ever. No : but that he is your Father in heaven,
who hateth nothing that he has made, and whose mercy is over
all his works; who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all
that therein is ; who keepeth truth for ever ; who helpeth them
to right that suffer wrong ; who feedeth the hungry ; a God who
feeds the birds of the air, though they sow not, neither do they
reap, nor gather into barns ; and who clothes the grass of the
field, which toils not, neither doth it spin ; and who will much
much more clothe and feed you, to whom he has given reason,
understanding, and the power of learning his laws, the rules by
which this world of his is made and works, and of turning
them to your own profit in rational and honest labour.

4o6 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
And think, my friends, if the old Psalmist, before Christ
came, could believe all this, and find comfort in it, much more
ought we. Shame to us if we do not. I had almost said, we
deny Christ, if we do not. For who said those last words
concerning the birds of the air, and the grass of the field?
Who told us that we have not merely a Master or a Judge in
heaven, but a Father in heaven ? Who but that very Word of
God, whom the Psalmist saw dimly and afar off? He knew
that the Word of God abode for ever in heaven : but he knew
not, as far as we can tell, that that same Word would conde
scend to be made flesh, and dwell among men that we might
see his glory, full of grace and truth. The old Psalmist knew
that God's word was full of truth, and that gave him comfort in
the wild and sad times in which he lived ; but he did not know
— none of the Old Testament prophets knew, — how full God's
word was of grace also. That he was so full of love, conde
scension, pity, generosity, so full of longing to seek and save all
that was lost, to set right all that was wrong, in one word again,
so full of grace, that he would condescend to be born of the
Virgin Mary, suffer under Pontius Pilate, to be crucified, dead
and buried, that he might become a faithful High Priest for us,
full of understanding, fellow-feeling, pity, love, because he has
been tempted in all things like as we are, yet without sin.
My friends, was not the old Psalmist a Jew, and are not we
Christian men? Then, if the old Psalmist could trust God,
how much more should we ? If he could find comfort in the
thought of God's order, how much more should we ? If he
could find comfort in the thought of his justice, how much
more should we ? If he could find comfort in the thought of
his love, how much more should we ? Yes ; let us be full of
troubles, doubts, sorrows; let times be uncertain, dark, and
dangerous; let strange new truths be discovered, which we
cannot, at first sight, fit into what we know to be true already :
we can still say, ' I will not fear, though the earth be moved,
and the hills be carried into the midst of the sea.' For the

xxxiii.] THE UNCHANGEABLE ONE. 407
word of God abideth for ever in heaven, even Jesus Christ, who
is the Light of the world and the Life of men. To him all
power is given in heaven and earth. He is set on the throne,
judging right, and ministering true judgment among the people.
All things, as the Psalmist says, come to an end. All men's
plans, men's notions, men's systems, men's doctrines, grow old,
wear out, and perish.
The old order changes, giving place to the new :
But God fulfils himself in many ways.
For men are not ruling the world. Christ is ruling the world ;
and his commandment is exceeding broad. His laws are broad
enough for all people, all countries, all ages ; and strangely as
they may seem to work, in the eyes of us short-sighted timorous
human beings, still all is going well, and all will go well ; for
Christ reigns, and will reign, till he has put all enemies under
his feet, and God be all in all.

SERMON XXXIV
EN TOYTfl NIKA.
(Good Friday, i860.)

1 Corinthians i. 23-25.
But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling-block, and unto
the Greeks foolishness ; but unto them which are called, both Jews and
Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. Because the
foolishness of God is wiser than men ; and the weakness of God is
stronger than men.
'"THE foolishness of God ? The weakness of God ? These
are strange words. But they are St. Paul's words, not
mine. If he had not said them first, I should not dare to say
them now.
But what do they mean ? Can God be weak ? Can God
be foolish ? No, says St. Paul. Nothing' less. For so strong
is God, that his very weakness, if he seems weak, is stronger
than all mankind. So wise is God, that his very foolishness, if
he seems foolish, is wiser than all mankind.
Why then talk of the weakness of God, of the foolishness of
God, if he be neither weak nor foolish ? Why use words which
seem blasphemous, if they are not true ?
I do not say these ugly words for myself. St. Paul did not
say these ugly words for himself. But men have said them ; too
many men, and too often. The Jews, who sought after a sign,

EN TOYTfi NIKA. 409

said them in St. Paul's time. The Corinthian Greeks, who
sought after wisdom, said them also. There are men who say
them now. We all are tempted at times to say them in our
hearts. As often as we forget Good Friday, and what Good
Friday means, and what Good Friday brought to all mankind,
we do say them in our hearts ; and charge God — though we
should not like to confess it even to ourselves — with weakness
and with folly.
Now, how is this? Let us consider, first, how it was with
these Jews and Greeks.
Why did the cross of Christ, and the message of Good
Friday, seem to them weakness and folly ? Why did they
answer St. Paul, 'Your Christ cannot be God, or he would
never have allowed himself to be crucified ? '
The Jews required a sign ; a sign from heaven ; a sign of
God's power. Thunder and earthquakes, armies of angels,
taking vengeance on the heathen ; these were the signs of
Christ which they expected. A Christ who came in such awful
glory as that, they would accept, and follow, and look to him
to lead them against the Romans, that they might conquer
them, and all the nations upon earth. And all that St. Paul
gave them, was a sign of Christ's weakness. ' He was despised
and rejected of men ; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with
grief. .... He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows,
yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.
He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his
mouth : he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep
before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth.'
Then said the Jews — This is no Christ for us, this weak,
despised, crucified Christ. Then answered St. Paul — Weak ?
I tell you that what seems to you weakness, is the very power
of God. You Jews wish to conquer all mankind : and behold,
instead, you yourselves are rushing to ruin and destruction :
but what you cannot do, Christ on his cross can do, Weak,
shamed, despised, dying man as he seemed, he is still con-

410 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
queror ; and he will conquer all mankind at last, and draw all
men to himself. Know that what seems to you weakness, is
the very power of God; the power of doing good, and of
suffering all things, that he may do good : and that that will
conquer the world, when riches and glory, and armies, aye, the
very thunder and the earthquake, have failed utterly.
The Greeks, again, sought after wisdom. If St. Paul was
(as he said) the apostle of God, then they expected him to
argue with them on cunning points of philosophy; about
the being of God, the nature of the world and of the soul;
about finite and infinite, cause and effect, being and not being,
and all those dark questions with which they astonished simple
people, and gained power over them, and set up for wise men
and teachers to their own profit and glory, pampering their
own luxury and self-conceit. And all St. Paul gave them,
seemed to them mere foolishness. He could have argued with
these Greeks on those deep matters ; for he was a great scholar,
and a true philosopher, and could speak wisdom among those
who were perfect : but he would not. He determined to know
nothing among them but Jesus Christ, and him crucified ; and
he told them, You disputers of this world, while you are
deceiving simple souls with enticing words of man's wisdom
and philosophy, falsely so called, you are trifling away your own
souls and your hearers' into hell. What you need, and what
they need, is not philosophy, but a new heart and a right spirit.
Sin is your disease ; and you know that it is so, in the depth of
your hearts. Then know this, that God so loved you, sinners
as you are, that he condescended to become mortal man, and
to give himself up to death, even the shameful and horrible
death of the cross, that he might save you from your sins ; and
he that would be saved now, let him deny himself, and take up
his cross and follow him. And to that, those proud Greeks
answered, — That is a tale unworthy of philosophers. The
Cross? It is a death of shame — the death of slaves and
wretches. Tell your tale to slaves, not to us. To give himself

xxxiv.] EN T0YTI2 NIKA. 411
up to the death of the cross is foolishness, and not the
wisdom which we want. Then answered St. Paul and said, —
True. The cross is a slave's and a wretch's death ; and
therefore slaves and wretches will hear me, though you will
not. ' For you see your calling, brethren, how that not many
wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are
called : but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to
confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things
of the world to confound the things which are mighty; and
base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath
God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought
things that are : that no flesh should glory in his presence.'
For the foolishness of God is wiser than all the wisdom of men.
You Greeks, with all your philosophy and your wisdom, have
been trying, for hundreds of years, to find out the laws of
heaven and earth, and to set the world right by them ; and you
have not done it. You have not found out the secrets of
the world. You have not set the world right. You have not
even set your own hearts and lives right. But what your
seeming wisdom cannot do, the seeming foolishness of Christ
on his cross will do. Does it seem to you foolish of him,
to believe that he could save the world, by giving himself up to
a horrible and shameful death ? Does it seem to you foolishness
in me, to preach nothing but him crucified, and to say, Behold
God dying for men? Then know, that what seems to you
foolishness, is the very wisdom of God. That God knows the
secret of touching, convincing, and converting the hearts of
men, though you do not. That God knows how the world is
made, and how to set it right, though you do not. That God
knows the law which keeps all heaven and earth in order,
though you do not ; and that that law is charity, — self-sacrificing
love, which shines out from the cross of Christ. Know, that
when all your arguments and philosophies have failed to teach
men what they ought to do, one earnest penitent look at Christ
upon his cross will teach them. That their hearts will leap up

412 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
in answer, and cry, If this be God, I can believe in him. If this
be God, I can trust him. If this be God, I can obey him.
That one look at Christ upon his cross will make them — what
you could never make them — new men, filled with a new
thought; the thought that God is love, and that he who
dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, and God in him ; and that
the poor slaves and wretches, whom you despise, will look unto
the cross and be saved, and become new men, and lead new
lives, and rise to be saints and martyrs to God and to his Christ,
giving themselves up to torments and death, as Christ did
before them ; and that out of them shall spring that church of
Christ, which shall reign over all the world, when you and your
philosophies have crumbled into dust.
My friends, let us look, earnestly, humbly, and solemnly this
day, at Christ upon his cross. Let us learn that love, the utter
self-sacrificing love which Christ shewed on his cross, is stronger
than all pomp and might, all armies, riches, governments ; aye,
that it is the very power of God, by which all things consist,
which holds together heaven and earth and all that is therein.
Let us learn that love, the utter self-sacrificing love which
Christ shewed on his cross, is wiser than all arguments,
doctrines, philosophies, whether they be true or false ; aye, that
it is the very wisdom of God, by which he convinces and
converts all hearts and souls ; and let us look to the cross, and
see there the wisdom of God, and the power of God, mighty to
save to the uttermost all who come through Christ to him.
And let us remember this, that whenever we fancy ourselves
to be strong and powerful, and think to aggrandize ourselves
at our neighbour's expense, and to crush those who are weaker
than ourselves, then we are forgetting the lesson of Good
Friday; that whenever we fancy that the way to be wise is,
to use our wit and our knowledge for our own glory, and by
them to manage our fellow-men, and make them admire us
and bow down to us, then we forget the lesson of Good Friday.
For whosoever gives himself up to selfish ambition, or to selfish

xxxiv.] EN TOYTfi NIKA. 413
cunning, charges Christ upon his cross with weakness and with
foolishness, and denies the Lord who bought him with his
blood. My friends, I have no more to say. Much more I might
say. For Good Friday has many other meanings, and all the
sermons of a lifetime would not exhaust them all.
But one thing seemed to me fit to be said, and I say it again,
and entreat you to carry it home with you, and live by the light
of it all the year round.
Do you wish to be powerful ? Then look at Christ upon his
cross ; at what seems to men his weakness ; and learn from him
how to be strong. Do you wish to be wise ? Then look at
Christ upon the cross ; and at what seemed to men his folly ;
and learn from him how to be wise. For sooner or later, I
hope and trust, you will find that true, which St. Buonaventura
(wise and strong himself) used to say, — That all the learning in
the world had never taught him so much as the sight of Christ
upon the cross.

SERMON XXXV.
THE ETERNAL MANHOOD.
(First Sunday after Easier.)

John xx. 29.
Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast
believed ; blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.
/~\N the eighth day after the Lord Jesus rose from the dead,
^-^ he appeared a second time to his disciples. On this
day he strengthened St. Thomas's weak faith, by giving him
proof, sensible proof, that he was indeed and really the very
same person who had been crucified, wearing the very same
human nature, the very same man's body.
' Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed.'
You have not seen. You have never beheld with your bodily
eyes, or touched with your bodily hand, as St. Thomas did, the
Lord Jesus Christ. And yet you may be more blessed now,
this day, than St. Thomas was then. We are too apt to fancy,
that, to have seen the Lord with our eyes, to have walked with
him, and talked with him, as the apostles did, was the greatest
honour and blessing which could happen to man. We fancy,
perhaps, at times, that if the Lord Jesus were to come visibly
among us now, we should want nothing more to make us good ;
that we could not help listening to him, obeying him, loving him.
But the Scriptures prove to us that it was not so. The

THE ETERNAL MANHOOD. 415
Scribes and Pharisees saw him and talked with him ; yet they
hated him. Judas Iscariot, yet he betrayed him. Pilate, yet
he condemned him. The word preached profited them nothing,
not being mixed with faith in those who heard him. Jesus
Christ, the Lord of glory, came and preached himself to them ;
declared to them who he was, proved who he was by his mighty
works of love and mercy, and by fulfilling all the prophecies of
Scripture which spoke of him ; and yet they did not believe him,
they hated him, they crucified him ; because they had no faith.
You see, therefore, that something more than seeing him with
our bodily eyes is wanted to make us believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ ; something more than seeing him with our bodily eyes is
wanted to make us blessed. St. Thomas saw him ; St. Thomas
was allowed, by the boundless condescension and mercy of the
Lord Jesus, to put his hand into his side. And yet the Lord
does not say to him, — See how blessed thou art ; see how
honoured thou art, by being allowed to touch me. No ; our
Lord rather rebukes him for requiring such a proof.
There are those who will not believe without seeing ; who
say, I must have proof. What I hear in church is too much for
me to believe without many more reasons than are given for it
all. Many people, for instance, stumble at the stumbling-block
of the cross, and cannot bring themselves to believe that God
would condescend to suffer and to die for men. Others cannot
make up their minds about the resurrection. It seems to them
a strange and impossible thing that Jesus' body should have
risen from the grave and ascended to heaven, and that our
bodies should rise also. That was the great puzzle to the
Grreeks, who thought themselves very learned and cunning, and
were great arguers and disputers about all deep matters in
heaven and earth. When St. Paul preached to them on Mars'
Hill, they heard him patiently enough, till he spoke of Jesus
rising from the dead ; and then they mocked ; laughed at the
notion as absurd. And we find that the Corinthians, even after
they were converted and baptised Christians, were puzzled

416 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
about this same matter. They could not understand how the
dead were raised, and with what body they would come.
With such the Lord is not angry. If they really wish to know
what is true, and to do what is right ; if they really are, as St.
Paul says, ' feeling after the Lord, if haply they may find him ; '
then the Lord will give them light in due time, and shew them
what they ought to believe, and give them the sort of proof
which they want. All such he treats as he did Thomas, when
he said, in his great condescension, ' Reach hither thy finger,
and behold my hands, and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it
into my side, and be not faithless but believing.'
So the Lord sent to those Corinthians the very sort of proof
which they wanted, by the hand of the learned apostle, St. Paul.
They were great observers of the works of nature, of the strange
movement and change, birth and death, which goes on in
beasts, and in plants, and in the clouds, and the rivers, and the
very stones under our feet. And they said, We cannot believe
in the resurrection of the dead, because we see nothing like it
in the world around us. And St. Paul was sent to tell them.
No : you do see something like it. If you will look deeper
into the working of the world around you, you will see that the
rising again of the dead, instead of being an unnatural or an
absurd thing, is the most reasonable and natural thing, the
perfect fulfilment, and crowning wonder of wonderful laws
which are working round you in every seed which you sow ; in
the flesh of beasts and fishes ; in bodies celestial and bodies
terrestrial : and so in that glorious chapter which we read in the
Burial Service, St. Paul tells the Corinthians, who went alto
gether by sense, and reasoning about the things which they
could see and handle, that sense and reasoning were on his
side, on God's side ; and that the mysteries of faith, like the
resurrection of the body, were not contrary to reason, but agreed
with it.
So does the Lord clear up the doubts of his people, in the
way which is best for them. But he does not call them as

xxxv.] THE ETERNAL MANHOOD. 417
blessed as others. There is a higher faith than that. There is
a better part. The same part which Mary chose. The same
faith of which our Lord says, — ' Blessed are they who have not
seen, and yet have believed.' The faith of the heart ; the child
like, undoubting, ready, willing faith, which welcomes the news
of the Lord ; which runs to meet it, and is not astonished at it ;
and, if it ever doubts for a moment, only doubts for very joy
and delight ; and feeling that the news of the gospel is good
news, cannot help feeling now and then that it is too good news
to be true ; shewing its love and its faith in its very hesitation.
This is the childlike heart, whereof it is written, ' Except ye be
converted and become as little children, ye shall in no wise
enter into the kingdom of heaven.'
The hearts of little children ; the hearts which begin by faith
and love toward God himself ; the hearts which know God ; the
hearts to whom God has revealed himself, and taught them,
they know not how, that he is love. They are so sure of God's
goodness, so sure of his power, so sure of his love, his willing
ness to have mercy, and to deliver poor creatures, that they find
nothing strange, nothing difficult, in the mysteries of faith. To
them it is not a thing incredible, that God should have come
down and died upon the cross. When they hear the good
news of him who gave his own life for them, it seems a
natural thing to them, a reasonable thing : not of course a
thing which they could have expected ; but yet not a thing
to doubt of or to be astonished at. For they know that God
is love.
And now some of you may say, Then are we more blessed
than Thomas ? We have not seen, and yet we have believed.
We never doubted. We never wanted any arguments, or
learned books, or special inward assurances. From the moment
that we began to learn our catechisms at school we believed it,
of course, every word of it. Do we not say the Creed every
Sunday ; I believe in — and so forth ? O my friends, do you

41 8 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
believe indeed ? If you do, blessed are you. But are you sure
that you speak truth ?
You may believe it. But do you believe in it ? Have you
faith in it? Do you put your trust in it ? Is your heart in it ?
Is it in your heart? Do you love it, rejoice in it, delight to
think over it ; to look forward to it, to make yourselves ready
and fit for it. Do you believe in it, in short, or do you only
believe it, as you believe that there is an Emperor of China, or
that there is a country called America, or any other matter with
which you have nothing to do, for which you care nothing, and
which would make no difference at all to you, if you found out
to-morrow that it was not so. That is mere dead belief; faith
without works, which is dead, the belief of the brains, not the
faith of the heart and spirit.
Oh, do you really believe the good news of this text, in which
the Son of God himself said to mortal men like ourselves,
' Handle me and see that it is I, indeed ; for a spirit hath not
flesh and bones as ye see me have.' Do you believe that there
is a Man evermore on the right hand of God ? That now as
we speak a man is offering up before the Father his perfect and
all-cleansing sacrifice ? That, in the midst of the throne of
God, is he himself who was born of the Virgin Mary, and
crucified under Pontius Pilate? Do you wish to find out
whether you believe that or not ? Then look at your own
hearts. Look at your own prayers. Do you think of the Lord
Jesus Christ, do you pray to the Lord Jesus Christ, as a man,
very man, born of woman ? Do you pray to him as to one who
can be touched with the feeling of your infirmities, because he
has been tempted in all things like as you are, yet without sin ?
When you are sad, perplexed, do you take all your sorrows and
doubts and troubles to the Lord Jesus, and speak them all out
to him honestly and frankly, however reverently, as a man
speaketh to his friend ? Do you really cast all your care on
him, because you believe that he careth for you ? If you do,

xxxv.] THE ETERNAL MANHOOD. 419
then indeed you believe in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus
Christ ; and you will surely have your reward in a peace of
mind, amid all the chances and changes of this mortal life,
which passes man's understanding. That blessed knowledge
that the Lord knows all, cares for all, condescends to all — That
thought of a loving human face smiling upon your joys, sorrow
ing over your sorrows, watching you, educating you from youth
to manhood, from manhood to the grave, from the grave to
eternities of eternities— Whosoever has felt that, has indeed
found the pearl of great price, for which, if need be, he would
give up all else in earth or heaven.
Or do you say to yourselves at times, I must not think too
much about the Lord Jesus's being man, lest I should forget
that he is God ? Do you shrink from opening your heart to
him ? Do you say within yourself, He is too great, too awful,
to condescend to listen to my little mean troubles and anxieties ?
Besides, how can I expect him to feel for them ; I, a mean, sin
ful man, and he the Almighty God ? How do I know that he
will not despise my meanness and paltriness ? How do I know
that he will not be angry with me ? I must be more reverent to
him, than to trouble him with very petty matters. He was a
man once when he was upon earth : but now that he is ascended
up on high, Very God of Very God, in the glory which he had
with the Father before the worlds were made, I must have more
awful and solemn thoughts about him, and keep at a more
humble distance from him.
Do you ever have such thoughts as those come over you, my
friends, when you are thinking of the Lord Jesus, and praying
to him ? If you do, shall I tell you what to say to them when
they arise in your minds, ' Get thee behind me, Satan.' Get
thee away, thou accusing devil, who art accusing my Lord to
me, and trying to make me fancy him less loving, less conde
scending, less tender, less understanding, than he was when he
wept over the grave of Lazarus. Get thee away, thou lying

420 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
hypocritical devil, who pretendest to be so very humble and
reverent to the godhead of the Lord Jesus, in order that thou
mayest make me forget what his godhead is like, forget what
God's likeness is, forget that it was in his manhood, in his man's
words, his man's thoughts, his man's actions, that he shewed
forth the glory of God, the express image of his person, and ful
filled the blessed words, ' And God said, Let us make man in
our image, after our likeness.' Get thee behind me, Satan. I
believe in the good news of Easter Day, and thou shalt not rob
me of it. I believe that he who died upon the Cross, rose again
the third day, as very and perfect man then and now, as he was
when he bled and groaned on Calvary, and shuddered at the
fear of death, in the garden of Gethsemane. Thou shalt not
make my Lord's incarnation, his birth, his passion, his resurrec
tion, all that he did and suffered in those thirty-three years, of
none effect to me. Thou shalt not take from me the blessed
message of my Bible, that there is a man in heaven in the midst
of the throne of God. Thou shalt not take from me the blessed
message of the Athanasian Creed, that in Christ the manhood
is taken into God. Thou shalt not take from me the blessed
message of Holy Communion, which declares that the very
human flesh and blood of him who died on the Cross is now
eternal in the* heavens, and nourishes my body and soul to
everlasting life. Thou shalt not, under pretence of voluntary
humility and will-worship, tempt me to go and pray to angels
or to saints, or to the Blessed Virgin, because I choose to fancy
them more tender, more loving and condescending, more loving,
more human, than the Lord himself, who gave himself to death
for me. If the Lord God, the Son of the Father, is not ashamed
to be man for ever and ever; I will not be ashamed to think of
him as man ; to pray to him as man ; to believe and be sure that
he can be touched with the feeling of my infirmities ; to entreat
him, by all that he did and suffered as a man, to deliver me
from those temptations which he himself has conquered for

xxxv.] THE ETERNAL MAJMHOOD. 421
himself ; and to cry to him in the smallest, as well as in the
most important matters — ' By the mystery of thy holy incarna
tion ; by thine agony and bloody sweat ; by thy cross and pas
sion ; by thy precious death and burial ; by thy glorious resur
rection and ascension ;' by all which thou hast done, and suf
fered, and conquered, as a man upon this earth of ours, good
Lord, deliver us !

SERMON XXXVI.
THE BATTLE WITHIN.
(Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity, 1858.)

Galatians, v. 16, 17.
This I say then, Walk in the spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the
flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the
flesh : and these are contrary the one to the other : so that ye cannot do
the things that ye would.
T^OES this text seem to any of you difficult to understand ?
It need not be difficult to you ; for it does not speak of
anything which you do not know. It speaks of something
which you have all felt, which goes on in you every day of your
lives. It speafts of something, certainly, which is very curious,
mysterious, difficult to put into words : but what is not curious
and mysterious ? The commonest things are usually the most
curious ? What is more wonderful than the beating of your
heart ; your pulse which beats all day long, without your think
ing of it ?
Just so this battle, this struggle, which St. Paul speaks of in
this text, is going on in us all day long, and yet we hardly think
of it. Now what is this battle ? What are these things which
are fighting continually in your mind and in mine? St. Paul
calls them the flesh and the spirit. 'The flesh, ' he says, 'lusts
against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. ' They pull

THE BATTLE WITHIN.

423

opposite ways. One wants to do one thing, and the other the
other. But if so, one of them must be in the right, and the
other in the wrong. Now, St. Paul says, when these two fall
out with each other, the spirit is in the right, and the flesh in
the wrong. And therefore, the secret of life is, to walk in the
spirit, and so not to fulfil the lusts of the flesh.
But if so, it must be worth our while to find out which is
flesh, and which is spirit in us, that we may know the foolish
part of us from the wise. What the flesh is, we may see by
looking at a dumb beast, which is all flesh, and has no immor
tal soul. It may be very cunning, brave, curiously formed,
beautiful, but one thing you will always see, that a beast does
what it likes, and only what it likes. And this is the mark
of the flesh, that it does what it likes. It is selfish, and self-
indulgent, cares for nothing but itself, and what it can get for
itself. True, you may raise a dumb beast above that, by taming and
training it You may teach a horse or dog to do what it does
not like, and give it a sense of duty, and as it were awaken a
soul in it. That is very wonderful, that we should be able to
do so. It is a sign that man is made in God's likeness. But
I cannot stay to speak of that now. I say our flesh, our
animal nature, is selfish and self-indulgent I do not say,
therefore, that it is bad : God forbid. God made our bodies
and brains, as well as our souls ; and God makes nothing bad.
It is blasphemous to say that he does. No, our bodies as
bodies are good ; the flesh as flesh is good, when it is in
its right place ; and its right place is to be servant, not master.
We are not to walk after the flesh, says St. Paul : but the flesh
is to walk after the spirit — in English, our bodies are to obey
our spirits, our souls. For man has something higher than body
in him. He has a spirit in him; and it is just having this
spirit which makes him a man. For this spirit cares about
higher things than mere gain and comfort. It can feel pity and
mercy, love and generosity, justice and honour ; and when a

424 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
man not only feels them, but obeys them, then he is a true
man — a Christian man : but, on the other hand, if a man does
not ; if he be a man in whom there is no mercy or pity, no
generosity, no benevolence, no justice or honour ; who cares
for nothing and no one but himself, and filling his own stomach
and his own purse, and pleasing his own brute appetites in
some way, what should you say of that man ? You would say,
he is like a brute beast — and you would say right — you would
say just what St. Paul says. St. Paul would say, that man is
fulfilling the lusts of the flesh ; and you and St. Paul would
mean just the same thing. Now, St. Paul says, ' The flesh in
us lusts against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh.' And
what do we gain by the spirit in us lusting against the flesh,
and pulling us the opposite way ? We gain this, St. Paul says,
' that we cannot do the things that we would.'
Does that seem no great gain to you? Let me put it a
little plainer. St. Paul means this, and just this, that you may
not do whatever you like. St. Paul thought it the very best
thing for a man not to be able to do whatever he liked. As
long, St. Paul says, as a man does whatever he likes, he lives
according to the flesh, and is no better than a dumb beast :
but as soon as he begins to live according to the spirit, and
does not do whatever he likes, but restrains himself, and keeps
himself in order, then, and then only, he becomes a true man.
But why not do whatever we like ? Because if we did do
so, we should be certain to do wrong. I do not mean that
you and I here like nothing but what is wrong. God forbid.
I trust the Spirit of God is with our spirits. But I mean
this : — That if you could let a child grow up totally without
any control whatsoever, I believe that before that lad was
twenty-one he would have qualified himself for the gallows
seven times over. Thank God, that cannot happen in
England, because people are better taught, most of them at
least ; and more, we dare not do what we like, for fear of the
law and the policeman.

XXXVI.] THE BATTLE WITHIN. 425
But, if you knew the lives which savages lead, who have
neither law outside them to keep them straight by fear, nor
the Spirit of God within them to keep them straight by duty
and honour, then you would understand what I mean only
too well.
Now St. Paul says, — It is a good thing for a man not to be
able to do what he likes. But there are two ways of keeping
him from it. One is by the law, the other is by the Spirit of
God. The law works on a man from the outside by fear; but
the Spirit of God works in a man by honour, by the sense of
duty, by making him like and love what is right, and making
him see what a beautiful and noble thing right is.
Now St. Paul wants us to restrain ourselves, not from fear
of being punished, but because we like to do right. That is
what he means when he says that we are to be led by the
Spirit, instead of being under the law. It is better to be
afraid of the law than to do wrong : but it is best of all to do
right from the Spirit, and of our own free will.
Am I puzzling you ? I hope not : but, lest I should be,
1 will give you one simple example which ought to make all
clear as to the struggle between a man's flesh and his spirit,
and also as to doing right from the Spirit or from law.
Suppose you were a soldier going into battle. You see
your comrades falling around you, disfigured and cut up ; you
hear their groans and cries ; and you are dreadfully afraid :
and no shame to you. It is the common human instinct of
self-preservation. The bravest men have told me that they
are afraid at first going into action, and that they cannot get
over the feeling. But what part of you is afraid ? Your flesh,
which is afraid of pain, just as a beast is of the whip. Then
your flesh perhaps says, Run away — or at least skulk and hide
— take care of yourself. But next, if you were a coward, the
law would come into your mind, and you would say, But I
dare not run away ; for, if I do, I shall be shot as a deserter,
or broke, and drummed out of the army. So you may go on,

426 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
even though you are a coward : but that is not courage. You
have not conquered your own fear — you have not conquered
yourself — but the law has conquered you.
But, if you are a brave man, as I trust you all are, a higher
spirit than your own speaks to your spirit, and makes you say
to yourself, I dare not run away; but, more, I cannot run
away. I should like to — but I cannot do the things that I
would. It is my duty to go on ; it is right ; it is a point of
honour with me to my country, my regiment, my Queen, my
God, and I must go on.
Then you are walking in the Spirit. You have conquered
yourself, and so are a really brave man. You have obeyed the
Spirit, and you have your reward by feeling inspirited, as
we say ; you can face death with spirit, and fight with spirit.
But the struggle between the Spirit and the flesh is not
ended there. When you got excited, there would probably
come over you the lust of fighting ; you would get angry, get
mad and lose your self-possession.
There is the flesh waking up again, and saying, Be cruel;
kill every one you meet. And to that the Spirit answers, No ;
be reasonable and merciful. Do not fulfil the lusts of the flesh,
and turn yourself into a raging wild beast. Your business is
not to butcher human beings, but to win a battle.
Well ; and even if you have conquered the enemy, you may
not have conquered your worst enemy, which is yourself. For,
after having fought bravely, and done your duty, what would the
flesh say to you ? I am sure it would say it to me. What but
— Boast : talk of your own valiant deeds and successes ; get all
the praise and honour you can; and shew how much finer a
person you are than any of your comrades. But what would
the Spirit say?— and I trust you would all listen to the Spirit.
The Spirit would say, No ; do not boast ; do not lower yourself
into the likeness of a vain peacock : but be just, and be
modest. Give every man his due; try to praise and recom
mend every one whom you can; and trust to God to make

xxxvi.] THE BATTLE WITHIN. 427
your doing your duty as clear as the light, and your brave
actions as the noon-day.
So, you see, all through, a man's flesh might be lusting, and
would be lusting, against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the
flesh ; and see, too, how in each case, the flesh is tempting the
man to be cowardly, brutal, vain, selfish, and wrong in some
way, and the Spirit is striving to make him forget himself, and
think of his comrades and his duty.
Now when a man is led by the Spirit, if he is tempted to do
wrong, he does not say, I will not do this wrong thing, but I
cannot. I cannot do what you want me. I like to hear a
man say that. It is a sign that he feels God's voice in him,
which he must obey, whether he likes or not ; as Joseph said
when he was tempted. Not, I had rather not, or I dare not :
but, How can I do this great wickedness against my master,
who has trusted me, and put everything into my hand, and so,
by being a treacherous traitor, sin against God ?
Now, is this Spirit part of our spirits, or not ? I think we
confess ourselves that it is not. St. Paul says that it is not.
For he says, there is one Spirit — that is, one good Spirit — of
whom he speaks as the Spirit ; and this, he says, is the Spirit
of God, and the Spirit of Christ, and the Spirit which inspires
the spirits of all noble, Christ-like, God-like men.
In this Spirit there is nothing proud, spiteful, cruel ; nothing
selfish, false, and mean; nothing violent, loose, debauched.
But he is an altogether good and noble spirit, whose fruit is
love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,
meekness, temperance. This, he says, is the Spirit of God ;
and this Spirit he gives to those spirits,- — souls, as we call them
now, — who desire it, that they may become righteous with
the righteousness of Christ, and good with the goodness
of God.
And is not this good news ? I say, my friends, if we will
look at it aright, there is no better news, no more inspiriting
news for men like us, mixed up in the battle of life, and often

428 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
pulled downward by our own bad passions, and ashamed of
ourselves more or less, every day of our lives ; — no better news,
I say, than this, that what is good and right in us is not our
own, but God's; that our longings after good, our sense of
duty and honour, kindliness and charity, are not merely our
own likings or fancies : but the voice of God's almighty and
everlasting Spirit. Good news, indeed ! For if God be for us,
who can be against us ? If God's Spirit be with our spirits,
they must surely be stronger than our selfish pleasure-loving
flesh. If God himself be labouring to make us good ; if he be
putting into our hearts good desires ; surely he can enable us
to bring those desires to good effect : and all that is wanted of
us, is to listen to God's voice within, and do the right like men,
whatever pain it may cost us, sure that we, by God's help, shall
win at last in the hardest battle of all battles, the victory over
our own selves.

SERMON XXXVII.
HYPOCRISY. Matthew xvi. 3.
Oh ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky ; but can ye not discern
the signs of the times ?
TT will need, I think, some careful thought thoroughly to
understand this text. Our Lord in it calls the Pharisees
and Sadducees hypocrites ; because, though they could use
their common sense and experience to judge of the weather
they would not use them to judge of the signs of the times ;
of what was going to happen to the Jewish nation.
But how was their conduct hypocritical ? Stupid we might
call it, or unreasonable : but how hypocritical ? That, I
think, we may see better, by considering what the word
hypocrite means.
We mean now, generally, by a hypocrite, a man who pre
tends to be one thing, while he is another ; who pretends to be
pious and good, while he is leading a profligate life in secret ;
who pretends to believe certain doctrines, while at heart he
disbelieves them; a man, in short, who is a scoundrel, and
knows it ; but who does not intend others to know it : who
deceives others, but does not deceive himself.
My friends, such a man is a hypocrite : but there is another
kind of hypocrite, and a more common one by far ; and that

430 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
is, the hypocrite who not only deceives others, but deceives
himself likewise ; the hypocrite who (as one of the wisest
living men puts it) is astonished that you should think him
hypocritical. I do not say which of these two kinds is the worse. My
duty is to judge no man. I only say that there are such
people, and too many of them ; that we ourselves are often in
danger of becoming such hypocrites ; and that this was the
sort of people which the Pharisees for the most part were.
Hypocrites who had not only deceived others, but themselves
also; who thought themselves perfectly right, honest, and
pious ; who were therefore astonished and indignant at Christ's
calling them hypocrites.
How did they get into this strange state of mind ? How
may we get into it ?
Consider first what a hypocrite means. It means strictly
neither more nor less than a play-actor ; one who personates
different characters on the stage. That is the one original
meaning of the word hypocrite.
Now recollect that a man may personate characters, like a
play-actor, and pretend to be what he is not, for two different
objects. He may do it for other people's sake, or for his
own. i. For other people's sake. As the Pharisees did, when
they did all their works to be seen of men ; and therefore,
naturally, gave their attention as much as possible to outward
forms and ceremonies, which could be seen by men.
Now, understand me, before I go a step further, I am not
going to speak against forms and ceremonies. No man less :
and, above all, not against the Church forms and ceremonies,
which have grown up, gradually and naturally, out of the piety,
and experience, and practical common sense of many genera
tions of God's saints. Men must have forms and ceremonies
to put them in mind of the spiritual truths which they cannot
see or handle. Men cannot get on without them ; and those

xxxvu.] HYPOCRISY. 431
who throw away the Church forms have to invent fresh ones,
and less good ones, for themselves.
All, I say, have their forms and ceremonies ; and all are in
danger, as we churchmen are, of making those forms stand
instead of true religion. In the Church or out of the Church,
men are all tempted to have, like the Pharisees, their traditions
of the elders, their little rules as to conduct, over and above
what the Bible and the Prayer-book have commanded ; and all
are tempted to be more shocked if those rules are broken, than
if really wrong and wicked things are done ; and like the
Pharisees of old, to be careful in paying tithe of mint, anise,
and cummin, the commonest garden herbs, and yet forget the
weighty matters of the law, justice, mercy, and judgment. I
have known those who would be really more shocked at seeing
a religious man dance or sing, than at hearing him tell a lie.
But I will give no examples, lest I should set you on judging
others. Or rather, the only example which I will give is that
of these Pharisees, who have become, by our Lord's words
about them, famous to all time, as hypocrites.
Now you must bear in mind that these Pharisees were not
villains and profligates. Many people, feeling, perhaps, how
much of what the Lord had said against the Pharisees would
apply to them, have tried to escape from that ugly thought, by
making out the Pharisees worse men than our Lord does. But
the fact is, that they cannot be proved to be worse than too
many religious people now-a-days. There were adulterers,
secret loose-livers among them. Are there none now-a-days ?
They were covetous. Are no religious professors covetous
now-a-days? They crept into widows' houses, and, for a
pretence made long prayers. Does no one do so now ? There
would, of course, be among them, as there is among all large
religious parties, as there is now, a great deal of inconsistent
and bad conduct. But, on the whole, there is no reason to
suppose that the greater number of them were what we should
call ill-livers. In that terrible twenty-third chapter of St

432 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
Matthew, in which our Lord denounces the sins of the Scribes
and Pharisees, he nowhere accuses them of profligate living;
and the Pharisee of whom he tells us in his parable, who went
into the Temple to pray, no doubt spoke truth when he boasted
of not being as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers.
He trusted in himself that he was righteous. True. But
whatever that means, it means that he thought that he was
righteous, after a fashion, though it proved to be a wrong one.
What our Lord complains of in them is, first, their hardness of
heart ; their pride in themselves, and their contempt for their
fellowmen. Their very name Pharisee meant that. It meant
separate — they were separate from mankind ; a peculiar people ;
who alone knew the law, with whom alone God was pleased :
while the rest of mankind, even of their own countrymen, knew
not the law, and were accursed, and doomed to hell. Ah God,
who are we to cast stones at the Pharisees of old, when this is
the very thing which you may hear said in England from
hundreds of pulpits every Sunday, with the mere difference,
that instead of the word law, men put the word gospel.
For this our Lord denounced them; and next, for their
hypocrisy, their play-acting, the outward show of religion in
which they delighted; trying to dress, and look, and behave
differently from other men ; doing all their good works to be
seen of men; sounding a trumpet before them when they gave
away alms; praying standing at the corners of the streets;
going in long clothing, making broad their phylacteries, the
written texts of Scripture which they sewed to their garments ;
washing perpetually when they came from the market, or any
public place, lest they should have been defiled by the touch
of an unclean thing, or person ; loving the chief seats in their
religious meetings, and the highest places at feasts; and so
forth,. — full of affectation, vanity, and pride.
I could tell you other stories of their ridiculous affectations :
but I shall not They would only make you smile : and we
could not judge them fairly, not being able to make full allow-

X>txvn.] HYPOCRISY. 433

ance for the difference of customs between the Jews and
ourselves. Many of the things which our Lord blames them
for, were not nearly so absurd in Judea of old, as they seem to
us in England now. Indeed, no one but our Lord seems to
have thought them absurd, or seen through the hoUowness and
emptiness of them : — as he perhaps sees through, my friends,
a great deal which is thought very right in England now.
Making allowance for the difference of the country, and of the
times, the Pharisees were perhaps no more affected, for Jews,
than many people are now, for Englishmen. And if it be
answered, that though our religious fashions now-a-days are not
commanded expressly by the Bible or the Prayer Book, yet
they carry out their spirit : — remember, in God's name, that
that was exactly what the Pharisees said, and their excuse for
being righteous above what was written ; and that they could,
and did, quote texts of Scripture for their phylacteries, their
washings, and all their other affectations.
Another reason I have for not dwelling too much on these
affectations ; and it is this. Because a man may be a play-actor
and a self-deceiver in religion, without any of these tricks at all,
and without much of the vanity and pride which cause them.
For recollect that a man may act for his own amusement, as
well as for other people's. Children do so perpetually, and
especially when no one is by to listen to them. They delight
in playing at being this person and that, and in living for a
while in a day-dream. Oh let us take care that we do not do
the same in our religion ! It is but too easy to do so. Too
easy ; and too common. For is it not play-acting, like any
child, to come to this church, and here to feel repentance,
feel forgiveness, feel gratitude, feel reverence; and then
to go out of church and awake as from a dream, and
become our natural selves for the rest of the week, till
Sunday comes round again; comforting ourselves meanwhile
with the fancy that we had been very religious last Sunday,
and intended to be very religious next Sunday likewise?
2 E

434 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
 4 
Would there not be hypocrisy and play-acting in that, my
friends ?
Now, my dear friends, if we give way to this sort of hypocrisy,
we shall get, as too many do, into the habit of living two lives
at once, without knowing it Outside us will be our religious
life of praying, and reading, and talking of good things, and
doing good work (as, thank God, many do whose hearts are not
altogether right with God, or their eyes single in his sight) good
work, which I trust God will not forget in the last day, in spite
of all our inconsistencies. Outside us, I say, will be our
religious life : and inside us our own actual life, our own
natural character, too often very little changed or improved at
all. So by continually playing at religion, we shall deceive
ourselves. We shall make an entirely wrong estimate of the
state of our souls. We shall fancy that this outward religion of
ours is the state of our soul. And then, if any one tells us that
we are play-acting, and hypocrites, we shall be as astonished
and indignant as the Pharisees were of old. We shall make
the same mistake as a man would, who because he always wore
clothes, should fancy at last that his clothes were himself, part
of his own body. So, I say, many deceive themselves, and are
more or less hypocrites to themselves. They do not, in
general, deceive others; they are not, on the whole, hypocrites
to their neighbours. For their neighbours, after a time, see what
they cannot see themselves, that they are play-acting ; that they
are two different people without knowing it : that their religion
is a thing apart from their real character. A hundred signs
shew that. How many there are, for instance, who are, or
seem tolerably earnest about religion, and doing good, as long
as they are actually in church, or actually talking about religion.
But all the rest of their time, what are they doing ? What are
they thinking of? Mere frivolity and empty amusement. Idle
butterflies, pretending to be industrious bees once in the
week. Others again, will be gentle and generous enough about

xxxvn.] HYPOCRISY. 435

i>

everything but religion ; and as soon as they get upon that, will
become fierce, and hard, and narrow at once. Others again
(and this is most common) commit the very same fault as the
Pharisees in the text, who could use their common sense to
discern the signs of the weather, and yet could not use it to
discern the signs of the time, because they were afraid of looking
honestly at the true state of public feeling and conscience, and
at the danger and ruin into which their religion and their party
were sinking. For about all worldly matters, these men will be
as sound-headed and reasonable as they need be : but as soon
as they get on religious matters, they become utterly silly and
unreasonable ; and will talk nonsense, listen to nonsense, and
be satisfied with nonsense, such as they would not endure a
moment if their own worldly interest, or worldly character, were
in question.
But most of all do these poor souls not deceive their
neighbours when a time of temptation comes upon them. For
then, alas ! it comes out too often that they are of those whom
our Lord spoke of, who heard the word gladly, but had no root
in themselves, and in time of temptation fell away. For then,
before the storm of some trying temptation, away goes all the
play-acting religion; and the man's true self rises up from
underneath into ugly life. Up rise, perhaps, pride, and self-will,
and passion ; up rise, perhaps, meanness and love of money ;
up rise, perhaps, cowardice and falsehood ; or up rises foul and
gross sin, causing some horrible scandal to religion, and to the
name of Christ; while fools look on, and, laughing an evil
laugh, cry, — ' These are your high professors. These are your
Pharisees, who were so much better than everybody else.
When they are really tried, it seems they behave no better than
we sinners.'
Oh, these are the things which make a clergyman's heart
truly sad. These are the things which make him long that all
were over ; that Christ would shortly accomplish the number of
his elect, and hasten his kingdom, that we, with all those who

436 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
are departed in the true faith of his holy name, may rest in
peace for ever from sin and sinners.
Not that I mean that some of these very people, in spite of
all their inconsistency, will not be among that number. God
forbid ! How do we know that ? How do we know that they
are one whit worse than we should be in their place? How
do we know, above all, that to have been found out may not
be the very best thing that has happened to them since the
day that they were born ? How do we know that it may not
be God's gracious medicine to enable them to find themselves
out ; to make them see themselves in their true colours ; to
purge them of all their play-acting ; and begin all over again,
crying to God, not with the lips only, but out of the depth
of an honest and a noble shame, as David did of old — Behold
I was shapen in wickedness, conceived in sin, and I have
found it out at last. But thou requirest truth in the inward
parts, in the very root and ground of the heart, and not merely
truth in the head, in the lips, and in the outward behaviour.
Make me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within
me. Thou desirest no sacrifice, else would I give it thee :
but thou delightest not in burnt-offerings. The sacrifice of God
is a broken spirit, as mine is now. A broken and a contrite
heart, ground down by the shame of its own sin, that, O God,
thou wilt not dfispise.
And then — when that prayer has gone up in earnest, and has
been answered by the gift of a clean heart, and of a right spirit,
which desires nothing but to be made clean and made right,
to learn its duty and to do it — then, I say, that man may go
back safely and freely, to such forms and ceremonies, as he has
been accustomed to, and have been consecrated by the piety
and wisdom of his forefathers. For, says David, though forms
and ceremonies, sacrifice and burnt-offering cannot make any
peace with God, yet I am not going to give up forms and
ceremonies, sacrifice and burnt-offerings. No. When my peace
is made, when the broken and the contrite heart has put me in

xxxvii.] HYPOCRISY. 437
my true place again, and my heart is clean, and my spirit right
once more ; then, he says, will God be pleased with my sacri
fices, with my burnt-offerings and oblations ; because they will
be the sacrifice of righteousness, of a righteous man desiring
to shew honour to that God from whom his righteousness
comes, and gratitude to that God to whom he owes his pardon.
And so with us, my friends, if ever we have fallen, and been
pardoned, and risen again to a new, a truer, a more honest, a
more righteous life. Our forms of devotion ought then to
become not a snare and a hypocrisy, but honest outward
signs of the spiritual grace which is within us; as honest and as
rational as the shake of the hand to the friend whom we truly
love, as the bowing of the knee before the Queen for whom we
would gladly die.
O may God give us all grace to seek first the kingdom of
God and his righteousness. To seek first the kingdom of God ;
to work earnestly, each in his place, to do God's will, and to
teach and help others to do it likewise. To seek his righteous
ness, which is the righteousness of the heart and spirit : and
then all other things will be added to us. All outward forms
and ceremonies, ways of speaking, ways of behaving, which are
good and right for us, will come to us as a matter of course ;
growing up in us naturally and honestly, without any affectation
or hypocrisy, and the purity and soberness, the reverence and
earnestness of our outward conversation, will be a pattern of
the purity and soberness, the reverence and earnestness,
which dwells in our hearts by the inspiration of the Holy
Spirit of God.

SERMON XXXVI II.
A PEOPLE PREPARED FOR THE LORD.

Ephesians iii. 3—6.
How that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery (as I wrote
afore in few words, whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my know
ledge in the mystery of Christ), which in other ages was not made known
unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto the holy apostles and
prophets by the Spirit ; that the Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, and of
the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the Gospel.
'""THIS day is the feast of the Epiphany. Epiphany, as many
of you know, means 'shewing,' because on this day the
Lord Jesus Christ was first shewn to the Gentiles ; to the
Gentile wise men who, as you heard in the Gospel, saw his star
in the east, and came to worship him. And the part of Scrip
ture from which I have taken my text, is used for the Epistle
this day, because in it St. Paul explains to us the meaning of the
Epiphany. The meaning of those wise men being shewn our
Lord, and worshipping him, though they were not Jews as
he was, but Gentiles. He says that it means this, that the
Gentiles were fellow-heirs with the Jews, and of the same
body as them, and partakers of God's promise in Christ by the
Gospel. This does not seem so very wonderful to us; and why?
Because we, though we are Gentiles like those wise men, have

A PEOPLE PREPARED FOR THE LORD. 439
lived so long, we and our forefathers before us, in the light
of the Gospel, that we are inclined to take it as a matter of
course ; forgetting what a wonderful, unspeakable, condescen
sion it was of God, not to spare his only begotten Son, but
freely to give him for us. God forgive us ! We are so heaped
with blessings that we neglect them, forget them, take them as
our right, instead of remembering our sins and ungratefulness,
and saying, Thy mercies are new every morning ; it is only
of thy mercies that we are not consumed.
But to St. Paul it was very wonderful news. A mystery,
as he said ; quite a new and astonishing thought, that heathens
had any share in God's love and Christ's salvation.
And so it was to St. Peter. God had to teach it him by that
wonderful vision, in which he saw coming down from heaven all
sorts of animals, and God bade him kill and eat ; and when he
refused, because they were common and unclean, God forbade
him to call anything common or unclean, now that God had
cleansed all things by the precious blood of his dear Son.
Then Peter was bidden to go to the Gentile Roman soldier
Cornelius. And he went, though, he said, he had been used
to think it unlawful for a Jew even to eat with a Gentile. And
when he went, he found, to his astonishment, that God's love
was over that Gentile soldier and his family, because they were
good men, as far as they had light and knowledge, just as much
as if they had been good Jews. And God gave St. Peter a sign
which there was no mistaking, that he really did care for those
Gentile Romans, just as much as if they had been Jews ; for,
as he was preaching Christ to them, the Holy Ghost fell on
them, not after, but before they were baptised. So that St.
Peter, astonished as he was, was forced by his own consience
and reason to say, ' Can any man forbid water, that these should
not be baptised, who have received the Holy Ghost as well as
we' (Jews) ? Then he commanded them to be baptised in the
name of the Lord.
And what was the lesson which God taught St. Peter by this?

440 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.

St Peter himself tells us ; for he opened his mouth and said,
' Of a truth I see that God is no respecter of persons ; but
in every nation, he that feareth God, and worketh righteousness,
is accepted by him.'
Now, my dear friends, this is (as the Lord Jesus Christ tells
us) God's everlasting law, 'That he that hath, to him shall
be given, and he shall have more abundantly; but from him
that hath not, shall be taken away even that which he
seems to have.'
So it was, as I have just shewn you, with Cornelius ; and so
it was with those wise men. They were worshippers (as is
supposed) of the one true God, though in a dim confused way :
but they had learnt enough of what true faith was, and of what
true greatness was, too, not to be staggered and fall into
unbelief, when they saw the King of the Jews, whom they had
come so many hundred miles to see, laid, not in a palace, but
in a manger ; and attended not by princesses and noblewomen,
but by a poor maiden, espoused to a carpenter. Therefore God
bestowed on them that great honour, that they, first of all
the Gentiles, should see the glory and the love of God in
the face of Jesus Christ, his Son.
And so it was with our forefathers, my friends. And I think
that on this Epiphany, we ought to thank God, among all his
other blessings,*for having given us such forefathers, and letting
us be born of that noble stock, to whom he gave the kingdom
of God, after he took it away from the faithless and rebellious
Jews, and afterwards from the false and profligate Greeks and
Romans, to whom the epistles of the apostles were written. I
will tell you what I mean.
When the Lord Jesus came on earth; our forefathers did not
live here in England, but in countries across the sea, in Germany,
Denmark, and Sweden, which did not belong to the Roman
Empire ; for the Romans, who had conquered all the world
beside, could never conquer our forefathers. It was God's
will, that whenever they tried they were beaten back with

XXXVIII.] A PEOPLE PREPARED FOR THE LORD. 441
shame and slaughter ; and. our forefathers, almost alone of all,
remained free men, even as we are at this day. But for that
very reason, the apostles could never come among us to preach
the Gospel to us ; for they could not pass the bounds of the
Roman empire ; and that was so large, that they had enough to
do to preach the Gospel in it ; so that it was not till at least
400 years after the apostles' death, that their successors, zealous
missionaries, priests and bishops, came and preached to our
forefathers ; and when they came, they found us a people pre
pared for the Lord, who heard the word gladly, and turned,
thousands sometimes in one day, from vain idols to serve the
living God, and were baptised into that holy church in which
we now stand. And it has been among us, and the nations
who are our kinsmen, that the light of the gospel has shone
ever since, while all through the East, where the apostles
preached most and earliest, it has died out. So that our Lord's
words have been fulfilled, that many that are last shall be first,
and those that are first shali be last. God grant that it may
not always be so. God grant that his kingdom may return to
its ancient seat at Jerusalem, and that all nations may go up to
the mountain of the Lord's house, in the day of which St. Paul
prophesies, when the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled, and all
Israel shall be saved, when the earth shall be full of the know
ledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea. But it is not so
now ; and cannot be so, as far as we can see, for many a year
to 'come. But in the meanwhile, why were our forefathers — heathens
though they were, and sinners in many things, being truly chil
dren of wrath, fierce, 1 loodthirsty, revengeful, without the grace
of Christ, which is Love and Charity — nevertheless a people
prepared for the Lord ? How was it true of them that to him
that hath shall be given ?
I will tell you. There is an old book, written in Latin by a
heathen gentleman of Rome, who lived in St. Paul's time, and
wrote this book about twenty years after St. Paul's death. It is

442 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [serm.
a little book ; but it is a very precious one : and I think it is
a great mercy of God that, while so many famous old books
have been lost, this little book should have been preserved: for
this Roman gentleman had travelled among our forefathers ;
and when he returned he wrote this book to shame his country
men at Rome. In it he calls us ' Germans ;' but that was
the Roman fashion. By Germans they meant not only the
people who now live in Germany, but the English and the
Danes, and the Swedes, and the Franks, who afterwards con
quered France. In fact he meant our own forefathers. And
he said to the Romans, —
1 Look at these wild Germans. You despise them because
they go half-naked, and cannot read or write, and live in mud
cottages ; while you go in silk and gold, and have all sorts ol
learning, and live in great cities, palaces, and temples, in
worldly pomp and glory. But I tell you,' he said, ' that these
wild Germans are better men than you ; for, while you are
living in sin, m cheating and falsehood, in covetousness, adul
tery, murder, and every horrible iniquity, they are honest,
chaste, truthful ; they honour their fathers and mothers ; they
are obedient and loyal to their kings and their laws; they shew
hospitality to strangers ; they do not commit adultery, steal,
bear false witness, covet their neighbours' goods. And there
fore,' this Roman1 felt (and really it seems as if a spirit of pro
phecy from God had come on him), ' something great and
glorious will come out of these wild Germans, while the
Romans will rot away and perish in their sins.' That was true
enough. We see it true at this day.
For what happened ? That great Roman empire, Babylon
the great, as St. John calls it in the Revelations, perished
miserably and horribly by its own sins ; while our forefathers
rose and conquered it all, and live and thrive till this day. But
it is curious that they never throve really, though they made
great conquests, and did many wonderful deeds, till they became
Christians : but as soon as they became Christians, they began

xxxvin.j A PEOPLE PREPARED FOR THE LORD. 443
to thrive at once, and settled down, and became that great
family of nations, and kingdom pf God, which we call Christen
dom; England, France, Spain, Italy, Germany, Sweden, and
the other countries of Christian Europe ; which God has so
prospered for his Son Jesus Christ's sake, in spite of many sins
and shortcomings, with wealth and numbers, skill, and learning,
and strength, that now the empire of the whole world depends
upon these few small Christian nations, which in our Lord's
time were only tribes of heathen savages : so that here again
our Lord's great parable was fulfilled.
The gospel seed which the apostle sowed in those rich,
luxurious, clever, learned, Romans, was like the seed which fell
on thorny ground ; and the cares and pleasures of this life, and
the deceitfulness or riches, sprang up, and choked the word,
and it remained unfruitful. But the gospel seed which was
sown among our poor, wild, simple, ignorant forefathers, was
the seed which fell on an honest and good heart, and took
root, and brought forth fruit, some thirty, some fifty, and
some one hundred fold. Epiphany came late to us — not for
three hundred years after our Lord's birth : but, when it came,
the light which it brought remained with us, and lights us even
now from our cradle to our grave : and so again was fulfilled the
Scripture, which says, that God chooses the weak things of this
world to confound the strong; the foolish to confound the wise;
yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought the things
which are, that no flesh should glory in his presence.
That no flesh should glory in his presence. For mind, my
friends, our business is not to be high-minded but to fear. And
we English are too apt to be high-minded now. We pride our
selves on our English character, English cleverness, English
courage, English wealth. My friends, be not high-minded but
fear. We have no right to pride ourselves on being English
men, if we do the very things which our forefathers were
ashamed to do even when they were heathens. They honoured
their fathers and mothers. Do we? They were loyal and

444 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
obedient to law. Are we ? They were chaste and clean livers :
ddultery was seldom heard of among them ; and, when it was,
they punished it in the most fearful way : while what astonished
that old Roman gentleman, of whom I spoke, most of all, was
the pure and respectable lives of the young men and women.
Is it so now-a-days among us, my friends? They were honest,
too, and just in all their dealings. Are we ? They were true
to their word ; no men on earth more true. Are we ? They
hated covetousness and overreaching. Do we ? They were
generous, open-handed, hospitable. Are we ? My friends,
this was the old English spirit, which God accepted in our fore
fathers. Is it in us now ? We must not pride ourselves on it,
unless we have it. Nay, more, what is it but a shame to us, if,
while our forefathers were good heathens, we are bad Christians?
They had but a small spark, a dim ray, as it were, of the light
which lighteth every man who comes into the world : but they
were more faithful to that little than many are now, who live in
the full sunshine of God's gospel, in the free dispensation of
God's spirit, with Christ's sacraments, Christ's Churches, means
of grace and hopes of glory, of which they never dreamed.
May they not rise up against some of us in the day of judgment,
and condemn us, and say, — ' Are you our children ? Do you
boast of knowing God better than we did, while you did things
which we dared not do ? We knew that God hated such sins, and
therefore we kept from them. You should know that better
than we ; for you had seen God's horror of sin in the death of
his own Son Jesus Christ ; and yet you went on committing
the very sins which crucified the Lord of Glory.'
My friends, I speak sober earnest. God grant that our old
heathen forefathers may not rise up against us in the day of
judgment, and condemn us. Let us turn to the Lord this day
with all our hearts, and come to this holy table, confessing all
our sins and unfaithfulness, and backslidings, that we may get
there cleansing from his most precious blood, strength from
his most precious bo'ly, life from his life, and spirit from his

xxxvm.] A PEOPLE PREPARED FOR THE LORD. 445
spirit ; that so we may go away to lead new lives, following the
commandments of God, and living up to our great light and
knowledge, at least as well as our forefathers lived up to their
little light And so we shall really keep the feast of Epiphany
in spirit and in truth : for Epiphany means the shewing of
Jesus Christ to us Gentiles ; and the way to prove that Jesus
Christ has been shewn to us, and that we have seen his glory,
the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace
and truth, is to keep his commandments, and live lives
like his.

SERMON XXXIX
THE WRATH OF LOVE.

Psalm cviu 6.
Then they cried unto the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them out
of their distresses.
T F I were asked to give a reason why I believed the Old
Testament to be an inspired and divine book, as well as
the New, I could not do better, I think, than to lay my hand
on this 107th psalm, and say, — This is my reason for believ
ing the Old Testament to be inspired. I have hundreds of
others : but this one is enough — this one psalm. It contains
an account of God's dealings with men, such as the world never
heard before, arfti very seldom since, save from a very few men,
who really saw what the Bible meant, and honestly followed its
teaching. It gives a notion of the justice of God, and an ex
planation of the chances and changes of this mortal life, such
as you will find nowhere else save in the Bible, and in the
books of Christian men who have been taught by the Bible.
The man who wrote that psalm knew so much more than other
men, that he must have been indeed inspired by the Spirit of
Truth, and the Holy Ghost of God.
And, I should say, I have come to this opinion mainly by
comparing this psalm with the writings of heathens, even the
wisest and the best of them. For the heathens, like all men,

THE WRATH OF LOVE.

447

used to have their troubles, and to ask themselves, Who has
sent this trouble ? And why has he sent it ? And their answers
remain to us in their writings, some worse, some better, some very
foolish, some tolerably wise. But when one compares the
heathen writings with this psalm, or with any psalms or pas
sages of the Old Testament which talk of God's dealings with
man, then we shall be altogether astonished at the superiority
of the Bible. The Bible will seem to us quite infinitely wiser
than heathen books, on this matter, as on others — so much
more simple, and yet so much more deep ; so much more
rational also, and so much more true : agreeing so much more
with the facts which we see happen round us : agreeing so much
more with our own reason, experience, inward conscience,
about what is just and unjust : — that we shall begin to see as
much difference between heathen books and the Old Testament,
as there is between the dim dawn of morning, and the full blaze
of noonday light.
One of the earliest heathen notions why troubles came was,
it seems, that the gods were offended with men, because they
had not shown them due honour, flattered them enough, or
offered sacrifices enough to them : or else they fancied that the
gods envied men : grudged their prosperity, did not like to
see them too happy.
That dark and base notion gradually faded away, as men got
higher notions of right and wrong, and of the gods, as the
judges and avengers of wrong. Then they began to think these
troubles were punishments for doing wrong. The Gods, or
God, punished sin ; inflicting so much pain for so much sin,
very much as the heathens are apt to punish their criminals
still, and as Christian nations used to punish theirs, namely,
with shameful and horrible tortures ; before they began to find
out that the end of punishment is not~to_Jotment, but to
reform, the criminal, wherever it is possible.
But then the thought would come— Why, after all, should
God, if he be just and merciful, punish my sin by pain and

448 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. [SERM.
misery ? How can it profit God, how can it please God, to give
me pain ? Because it satisfies his justice ? How can it do that ?
It would not satisfy mine. Suppose my child, or even my dog,
disobeyed me, would it satisfy my sense of justice to beat him ?
It might satisfy my passion :' but God has no passions. It
would be base, blasphemous to fancy that he takes pleasure
in hurting me, as I take pleasure in beating my dog when I lose
my temper with it. God forbid ! The old prophets saw that,
and cried — ' Plave I any pleasure in the death of him, saith the
Lord, and not rather that he should turn from his wickedness,
and live ? '
Then, naturally, the thought would come into the mind of a
wise and serious man — I punish my child, or my dog, and God
punishes me. May he not punish me for the same reason that
I punish them ? I punish them to correct them and make them
better. Surely God punishes me, to correct me, and make me
better. I punish my child, because I love him, and wish him
good. God punishes me because he loves me and desires that
I may be a partaker of his holiness.
And as soon as that blessed thought had risen up in any man's
mind, by the inspiration of God's Ploly Spirit, all the world
would begin to look bright and clear and full of hope. This
earth, with all its sorrows and sufferings, would look no longer
to him as God's^prison house, where poor sinners sat tortured
and wailing, fast bound in misery and iron, till they should pay
the uttermost farthing, which they never could pay. No. It
would look to him as God's school-house, God's reformatory, in
which he is training and chastening and correcting the souls of
men, that he may deliver them from the ruin and misery which
sin brings on them, both the original sin which is born in them
and the actual sin which they commit. Then God appears to
him a gracious and merciful father. He can see a blessed
meaning and a wholesome use in all human suffering ; and he
can break out, as the Psalmist does in this glorious psalm, into
praise and thanksgiving, and call on mankind to give thanks

XXXIX.] THE WRATH OF LOVE. 449
to the Lord ; for he is gracious, and his mercy endureth for
ever. In every kind of human suffering, I say, he sees now a mean
ing and a use.
First, he takes, it seems, his own countrymen, the Jews,
coming back from Babylon into their own country after the
seventy years' captivity. They had been punished for their sins.
But for what purpose ? That they might know (as Ezekiel
said), that God was the Lord. And when they cried unto him
in their trouble, he delivered them out of their distress.
Then he goes on to those who have brought themselves into
poverty and shame, and sit fast bound in misery and iron. It
is their own fault. They have brought it on themselves by
rebelling against the word of the Lord, and lightly regarding the
counsel of the Most Highest. But God does not hate them.
God is not going to leave them to the net which they have-
spread for their own feet. When they cry unto the Lord in
their troubles, he delivers them out of their distress. God him
self, by strange and unexpected ways, will deliver them from
their darkness of ignorance and sin, and from the danger and
misery which they have brought upon themselves.
Then he goes on to those who have injured their health by
their own folly, till their soul abhors all manner of food, and
they are even hard at death's door. Neither does God hate
them, They, too, are in God's school-house. And when they
cry to the Lord in their trouble, he will deliver them, too, out
of their distress, and send his word, and heal them, and save
them from destruction.
Then he goes on to men who are exposed to danger, and
terror, and death in their lawful calling ; and his instance is the
seamen — those who go on to the sea in ships, and occupy their
business in great waters.
The storms come up, they know not when or how : but they
are not the sport of a blind chance ; they are not the victims of
the wrath of God. „ The wild sea, too, is his school-house, where
2 F

450 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS., [serm.
they are to see the works of the Lord, and his wonders in
the deep ; and so, by strange dangers and strange deliverances,
learn, as I have seen many a seaman learn, a courage and
endurance, a faith, a resignation, which puts us comfortable
landsmen to shame.
Then he goes on to even a deeper matter — to those terrible
changes in nature, so common in the East, in which whole dis
tricts, by earthquake or drought, are rendered worthless and
barren. They too, he says, are God's lessons, though sharp
ones enough. ' He turneth the rivers into a wilderness, and the
water-springs into dry ground ; a fruitful land into barrenness, for
the wickedness of them that dwell therein. Again, he , turneth
the wilderness into a standing water, and dry ground into water-
springs. And there he maketh the hungry to dwell, that they
may prepare a city for habitation ; and sow the fields, and plant
vineyards, which may yield fruits of increase.'
Lastly, he goes on to political changes, which bring a whole
nation low, into oppression and misery. ' They are minished
and brought low through oppression, affliction and sorrow. He
poureth contempt upon princes, and causeth them to wander in
the wilderness, where there is no way. Yet setteth he the poor
on high from affliction, and maketh him families like a flock.
The righteous shall see it, and rejoice : and all iniquity shall
stop her mouth. *Whoso is wise, and will observe these things,
even they shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord.'
And so, in all the changes of this mortal life, he sees no real
chance, no real change, but the orderly education of a just and
loving Father, whose mercy endureth for ever ; who chastens
men as a father chastens his children, for their profit, that they
may be partakers of his holiness, in which alone is life and joy,
health and wealth.
Surely, here is a Gospel, and good news ; — news so good, that
it turns what seems to the superstitious the worst of news, into
the very best. For it seems at first sight the worst of news,
that which the ninth Article tells .us, that our original sin, in

xxxix.] THE WRATH OF LOVE. 45 r
every person born into this world, deserves God's wrath and
damnation. And so it would be the worst of news, if God were
merely a judge, inflicting so much pain and misery for so much
sin, without any wish to mend us and save us. But if we re
member only the blessed message of this psalm ; if we will re
member that God is our Father ; that God is educating us ; that
God hath neither parts nor passions ; and that, therefore, God's
wrath is not different or contrary to his love, but that God's
wrath is his love in another shape, punishing men just because
he loves men ; — then the ninth Article will bring us the very
best of news. We shall see that it is the best thing that can
possibly befall us, that our sin deserves God's wrath and damna
tion ; and that it would have been the worst thing which could
possibly have befallen us, if our sin had not deserved God's
wrath and damnation. For if our sin had not deserved God's
anger, then he would not have been angry with it ; and then he
would have left it alone, instead of condemning it, and dooming
it to everlasting destruction as he has done ; and then, if our sin
had been left alone, we should have been left alone to sin and
sin on, growing continually more wicked, till our sin became
our ruin. But now God hates our sin, and loves us ; and there
fore he desires above all things to deliver us from sin, and burn
our sin up in his unquenchable fire, that we ourselves may not
be burned up therein. For if our sins live, we shall surely die :
but if our sins die, then, and then only, shall we live.
Do these words seem strange to some of you ? I doubt not
that they will : but if they do, that will be only a fresh proof to
me, that the Bible is inspired by the Holy Ghost. Yes, nothing
shews me how wide, how deep, how wise, how heavenly the
Bible is, as to see how far average Christians are behind the
Bible in their way of thinking ; how the salvation which it offers
is too free for them, the love which it proclaims too wide for
them, the God whom it reveals too good for them : so that they
shrink from taking the Bible and trusting the Bible, in its ful
ness ; and are perpetually falling back on heathen notions — the

452 TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS.
very old heathen notions from which this psalm delivers us —
concerning what God's anger means, and what God's punish
ment means ; because they are afraid of taking the words of
Scripture literally and fully, and believing honestly the blessed
news, that God is Love.
They try to make God's ways as their ways, and God's
thoughts as their thoughts. But do not you do so. Receive
the Bible in its fulness. Believe that it tells you infinitely more
of God's character and dealings, than you can ever tell your
selves; that God's ways are not as your ways, nor God's thoughts
as your thoughts, even at their best : but that God's ways are
always wider and deeper than yours, were you the most learned
of men ; God's thoughts are always more loving and just than
yours, were you the most holy of men , and that when you have
learned all that you can learn, or that any man can learn, out
of the Bible, there will be still left behind treasures beside,
which you have not yet found out. For the riches of Christ are
unsearchable ; like the depth of the riches of the wisdom and '
knowledge of God, whose only-begotten son, and perfect like
ness, he is ; and the man who reads the Scripture with a single
eye, and an humble heart, will see that the more he finds in the
Bible, the more he has yet to find ; and that if he studied it to
all eternity, he would have fresh and fresh cause for ever to cry
with the Psalmist, 'Oh give thanks to the Lord; for he is
gracious, and his mercy endureth for ever ! '

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