they may be able to have fellowship with Him and with each other, as these are not the evils and dangers of one particular time and place, but of all times and of all places, there is need for the preacher to speak the same words which were spoken in the days that are gone. His work is a very great and terrible one, he ought to devote to it all the powers and knowledge that God has given him. And yet he should think as St. Paul thought, who brought so much greater powers and so much wider knowledge to His service, that the best preaching is only a simple testimony of what God is; that by itself it is mere foolishness; that it becomes mighty because God takes it as His instrument to save men from ignorance and hatred of Him. Holding it to be God's work not His, the preacher casts down his weak silly sentences without fear, yea with undoubting confidence, believing that if he speaks truly, the truth will make itself manifest hereafter, if not now; that if he speaks lies, the lies will be scattered as all lies must be and shall be at last. He cannot give the least heed to those who tell him that what he is speaking is too deep, too hard for poor folks to take in who have had no schooling. He knows in his

inmost soul that it is too deep, too hard for him till he is brought to feel himself on the level of the most foolish. He knows it is too hard for him, till his conceit is brought down, till he confesses himself a sinner like all other sinners before God. He knows that God is educating other people as He has educated him, by making them know that they are nothing in themselves and so by obliging them to seek for everything in Him.

And therefore it is, brethren, that our preaching, if it is not a wicked mockery when it goes out of our lips, if it is not merely like sounding brass and tinkling cymbal in your ears, must lead you to worship. We may please you or we may frighten you, by excellency of speech or words of man's wisdom. But if we declare to you a gospel, it must be a gospel of God and concerning God, it must seek to destroy the barriers which are between you and God. We must announce the glad tidings that God calls men to cast down every burden, the burden of their sorrows, the burden of their sins, the burden of their own selves, the burden of their families and their country, of the Church and of the whole world, before Him whose Son

C

has borne all burthens. We must proclaim the glad tidings to those who feel repentance the most difficult of all duties, that God is the giver of repentance, that He turns round the heart to Him, that He will do this for us each day and each hour. We must proclaim the glad tidings, that by believing in Christ, the Righteous and Holy and Loving, those who are unrighteous and unholy and unloving may clothe themselves with His nature, may become like Him. We must proclaim the glad tidings to those who complain that their own little frets and quarrels and jealousies are more important to them than the sorrows of their brethren, than all which affects their country and mankind, that God who cares for all, desires to make us care for all; that He, if we yield ourselves to His Spirit, will cure us of our frivolities and hardheartedness, and of whatever else our consciences tell us is base and evil in His sight. We are to proclaim the good news to the harlot and to the sot, that God will deliver them out of the lusts and the temptations that are destroying them, and will give them His Own pure and holy Nature.

Thus you see that to whatever direction

our words turn, to whomsoever they are addressed, they are a call to worship. I do not mean that they are a call to worship here in this Church more than in the family, than in the daily walk, than in the shop, than at the loom. They are a call to seek the Father of our Spirits, Him in whom we live and move and have our being, every-where, to look upon every place as the witness of His presence, upon every adversity as asserting a need for His help, upon every perplexity as a motive for seeking His counsel, upon every sin as forcing us to fly for deliverance to His righteousness. The blessing of worshipping in Churches is that it is a common worship; that all say "We have erred and strayed" together, that all say "Our Father" together. The blessing of praying in Churches is that it convicts us of our narrow partial feelings, of our wandering attention, of our poor and selfish desires; that it rebukes us for them; that it points to God's Truth and Love as the inheritance and exceeding great reward which we should seek after together, which we should hold out to our neighbours as theirs, that we may strive for it more earnestly ourselves. But when we have learnt

that this is the prize of our high calling, when we have thoroughly believed that God is over all, nigh unto all that call upon Him, we need not fear if He should exclude us from Churches, or fix us on sick beds, or send us to distant lands where His ordinances are withheld. These will be methods of His discipline to make us know Him better and worship Him better, to make us dissatisfied with even His most precious gifts, seeing we are intended to find our rest, not in them, but in Him.

For everything that is done in these Temples made with hands is but a sign and preparation for something higher that is to be.

We listen to preaching that the Voice of Christ the Divine Word may penetrate, not into our ears, but into our hearts. We remember the Conversion of St. Paul and his life on earth, that we may be prepared for fellowship with him and with the spirits of just men made perfect, who fed upon his

his gospel upon earth.

words and proclaimed Earthly weddings are

pledges of that perfect union which shall be for husbands and wives, and for all who are bidden to the Supper of the Lamb. The worship here is the preparation for that Worship which shall