saw in the death of the Prince of Life the reason for the deepest confession and liveliest gratitude, he cries, Here is the finger of God, here is the irrevocable dogma, here is the supernatural portent, here is the sacrifice and the sacrament, here is the grandest tradition, here is the substance of the oldest creed; here is all that my spirit searches after, or can ever want.' But from another quarter, both in the Apostle's time, and also in ours, comes the Greek. Here is the man whose danger is to despise all form, and hate all ceremony. He does not ask for a creed, but a reason. He does not seek a sign, but he yearns with a mighty, morbid, mad hunger after' wisdom.' Sacraments will not melt his emotions nor help his faith. Whatever he believes must in some form take the colour and shape of his own mind. What has the Apostle to say to the wisdom of this world, that by itself has come so often to nothing? He has the same proposal to make, he still preaches Christ and Him crucified. At first that which was to the Jew a "stumbling-block" is to him a "folly;" but see, the Greek of Paul's time and of every successive age has looked more deeply at this truth. He is not terrified by the portent, he does not notice the supernatural darkness, nor the rending of the graves; he is not much moved by the wondrous preparation made in far-off millenniums for the accomplishment of this unique fact; but he sees that the Incarnation of God, the absolute union and reconciliation of the Divine and the human, the dream of his own religions and

the aim of his philosophies, is more clearly realized in the life and death of the Nazarene than in all that he had ever imagined before. Christ is "made of God to him wisdom and righteousness." He is thenceforth to him not only the "power of God, but the wisdom of God." He finds a deeper satisfaction to his intellect than logic can ever present to him. The truth of God and man, of sin and suffering, of life and death, are revealed to him; and he is at peace, and like a little child, he enters into the kingdom of heaven. The Jew and Greek of St. Paul's day meet before the cross. 'Come,' says the Hebrew of Hebrews to the sinner of the Gentiles, Come, brother; thou who wert afar off, art made nigh by the blood of Jesus. "He is our peace, who has made both of us one, and hath broken down the wall of partition between us." Let thee and me clasp hands before the cross, for we two have access by one Spirit unto the Father.' And the Greek responds, 'I verily am no more stranger or foreigner, but a fellow-heir and of the same body, and partaker of Divine promise.' There is now neither Jew nor Greek; they are both one in Christ Jesus. In like manner if the Jew and Greek of these days will look on and up to the great uniting principle of holy life and truth in the person and sacrifice of the Christ, they will clasp inseparable hands, and antedate the harmonies of heaven.

(2) Christ Jesus is the mediating power between the masculine and feminine mind. Christ is the wellspring of the strong motives to right action and of

the deepest passions of holy love. As the mountaintorrent may leap with wild pomp and energy from the same water-shed from which by a quieter transit other and a gentle stream may wind its way to the great ocean, "reflecting far and fairy-like from high the immortal lights which live along the sky," so too from the same fountain of deep emotions and great purposes varied lives may flow. As the two streams of water mingle at length, to do ever after a united work, so the two classes of mind, when they learn the lesson that from the one Christ they both derive their life and hope, then, "like friends once parted, grown single hearted," their love begins to abound, They cease to misconceive and misunderstand each other, they present the diversity which can only proceed from inner unity; each is ever giving to and each receiving from the other, the distinction between them is lost, and both are one in Christ Jesus. The gentler spirit says, "Grace be with all those who love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity;" and manly courage whispers to womanly trust, He that endureth to the end shall be saved. O rest in the Lord, and while I fight the battle, do thou wait patiently for Him!'

(3) The bond and free are more truly one in Christ Jesus than in any other thought or relation whatso

ever.

The common dependence on the infinite mercy of God in Christ, if really felt, is the true counteraction of all pride. Christ has not destroyed the relation

F

ships of human life. He has sanctified them. When men are consciously journeying in one narrow path, they cannot be far from each other. The slave lifts up his fetters, and he finds that he is the Lord's free man. The free man is bold to acknowledge himself the Lord's slave. The child hears the patriarch cry, "Lord, have mercy upon me!" and the rich man joins the poor man, and the peasant the prince, to plead for the same mercy. At the table of the Lord, the "body broken" is given to all alike. The same provision is made for priest and people, for pastor and flock, for philosopher and little child; and all confess their equal and utter nothingness in the presence of the Saviour. So that in Christ Jesus it is possible, it is theoretically true, that all are one. This is at least the sublime possibility. This is the mode of the answer to the Saviour's prayer. Deep down behind the external differences, there is a luxury for all true Christian minds in the thought of the common unity. The holy life has many forms. The life of God takes many names. Let not Judah vex Ephraim; let not Jew exclude Greek from his fellowship; let not the servant toiling with the talent despise him that watches and stands and waits; let not the rich man glory in his riches, nor the wise man in his wisdom, but let each glory in the Lord. And so let Christ become all and in all.

SERMON IV.

THE GREAT PARADOX.

MATTHEW XI. 25, 26.

At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in Thy sight.

THESE very exact expressions of our Divine Master have been applied to circumstances and to characters, and even to classes of opinion, with which they have no concern whatever. Ignorant men have argued from them that sound knowledge is utterly incompatible with the child-like spirit, that information which modifies the reception of certain statements, or demands a new interpretation of them, is thereby inconsistent with real faith, and virtually undermines the moral conditions of all higher knowledge. Men who have been plunging into the depths of Christian metaphysics, and have held to be true the most difficult if not the least comprehensible doctrines of Christian and Catholic theology, have claimed for themselves the character of child-likeness; have called themselves "babes in Christ," and have refused