the strongest impression upon his mind, and the most carried him away. But it takes the concurrent report of these four men to represent that vast work of architecture.

Is it so with a man-built cathedral? and shall it not be so with the mighty God who is from eternity to eternity? Is there any man that can take the reed of his understanding and lay it along the line of God's latitude and longitude as if he were measurable as a city? Is there any man who can cast his plummet into the depths of the Infinite, and say, "I have sounded God to the bottom"? Is there any man that has an imagination by which he can fly so high that he can say, "I have reached the point above which God is not"? Is there any man who "by searching can find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection"? Each man learns a little, and learns that which he is most susceptible of learning. Each man has that conception of God which he is capable of receiving. This is added to the common stock. And it is these concurrent differences, these harmonious separations, that make the symphony of knowledge. We do not want unison: we want harmony. Harmony is made by different parts, and not by the repetition of the same sounds and tones.

And if at death we lose all these imperfect conceptions, they are not therefore to be despised; for we shall gain them again in a more glorious state. Was not your childhood good for anything to you? Do you remember what you thought of when you were a boy? I do. When the old base drum went boom, boom, booming, on the distant village green, I stood, (imprisoned by the picket fence, not daring to go out for fear of the rod,) and tears ran down my cheeks, I did not know why, and vague pictures presented themselves to my mind, and the air was full of noises swelling about me. And I remember how I felt when once in a while I saw the flash of the red uniform. Now I have become a man, and put away childish things, and I will not run to the door though ten thousand men are going by in uniform and procession. And yet, I do not count my childhood experience as having been contemptible by any manner of means. I recollect very well sitting on the steps of the kitchen door, (when father and mother were gone to meeting and the girls. had gone out on a visit,) and listening to the frogs, and crying, I knew not why, until the wished-for people were at home again; and I had some heart-sense of the loves and wants of the household. But what was that compared with the educated idea of the rich interblendings and gradations and variations of the domestic loves that have come upon the pallet of my heart since that time? And yet, does the wealth of this conception cast out and despise that early experience?

The apostle says, "Now we see through a glass darkly, then face to face." "When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things." Speaking of the whole round of men's experience in this estate, he says, "As long as you live in this world you will see the brightest truths and the clearest outlines as through a glass darkly." But does that put what you do know to shame? No; it is real knowledge, as much as any. It is fragmentary, but it is the beginning of knowledge. It is only a part. It is seen, not too much, but too dimly. And when you die, and go to heaven, let no man say, "Your earthly knowledge is all perished." No; we shall trace again the lines which here we traced but feebly. There will glow the everlasting light; and all the impressions which here were but seminal, there will be in full blosom and fruit. And all those truths which we saw, and saw in the twilight-shall we not see them yet more gloriously, because the twilight is swallowed up in everlasting day? We shall not have occasion to despise our earthly thoughts and yearnings, and knowledges and longings, but we shall improve them, and with them and beyond them go on forever and forever with the Lord.

How blessed it is to begin this life upon earth! How poor are they who are without God and without hope in this world! They are the richest men who are laying up the brightest, the clearest, and the most helpful and noble conceptions of God. If you would increase treasure, "grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." That way lies manhood. That way lies joy. That way lies everlasting blessedness.

PRAYER BEFORE THE SERMON.

O LORD our God, in all the earth there is no name like thy name. In all the earth there is no heart like thine. There is no love and no welcome such as thou dost grant. Not the earth itself is so open to our footsteps, to go every whither, as thou art to our hearts' desire; for we are invited to come back, to enter in, and to dwell in thee. Or, if we be weak, and unable to find thee, thou dost seek and save us. Nor, if we be humble, though we be cast into the extremity of life, wilt thou disdain us. With the humble and the contrite thou dost delight to dwell. We rejoice that thou art thus welcoming to thee those that can rise and find thee, helping their infirmity. And we rejoice that thou dost not alone accept those who come, but that thou art abroad by thy Word and by thy Spirit, awaking those that sleep, giving life to those that are dead, healing those that are sick, and by all influences drawing souls back to God, their Source and their Head.

We give thanks to thee for all thy mercies to us in days gone by. How many there are we can not tell. More than the leaves in summer, more than the stars at night, shining in our darkness they have illumined our way, they have filled us with comfort and with blessedness, and thy thoughts are yet unfulfilled.

All the purposes of thy soul are fruitful of good to us. What time we are able to accept it, thou art waiting for us to be loved. Thou art waiting for us to be able to appreciate and to

enter into the fellowship and fruition of thy nature. As we wait for our children, taking care of them until they come up to us, so art thou waiting for us, longing to bless in over-measure, while doing exceeding abundantly more than we ask or think. And when at last, in the other and better land, our eyes are cleansed, and we have come to the measure of the stature of perfect men in Christ Jesus, we shall see how, on every side, unappreciated good, unappropriated mercies lay strewn thick as blossoms in the summer. We rejoice in this fullness of thy nature, in this royal generosity, in this outflowing, overpouring abundance of thy thoughts and thy deeds of goodness. What are we, that we should withstand thy nature? What are our fears, that they should fend off these precious promises? What is guilt, what is remorse, and what are all our humiliations and self-renunciations, that they should take us away from thee, when it is because we are weak that thou dost desire us to come, and because we are wicked that thou dost desire to forgive us, and to establish us again in righteousness? Why should we keep away from thee by reason of sickness, when it is thine office to be Physician to our souls? Why, because we are selfish and empty of love, should we not come to the summer of love?

O our Father! we beseech of thee that we may cease to look upon ourselves for reasons either of dissuasion or of persuasion. May we look upon our God. May we be won by thy goodness, by thy gentleness, by thy loving mercy to us. And, we pray thee, as thou dost accept most generously and abundantly the feeblest endeavor, the smallest advances, in the fewest things even; as thou art he that will not break the bruised reed nor quench the smoking flax until thou dost bring forth judgment unto victory, we pray thee that they who are consciously environed on every side, and who are yet striving for some things good, may have courage given them, and hope, not as good, but because God is merciful and gracious. And may thy goodness in forgiving and bearing with them make them ashamed of their ingratitude. May it make them ashamed of the evidences which they heap up before thee of their indifference and disobedience, of their godless lives and conversation. May we all be ashamed. Grant us not that shame which takes us from thee, but that shame which brings us to thee.

We beseech of thee that thou wilt grant us from day to day, out of our experience of thee, more and more to grow in grace; and, growing in grace, may we grow in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

And we pray thee, grant thy blessing especially upon all that are gathered together in this place to-day. May those who have come from darkness, and sadness, and who are weary and heavyladen, find indeed that they have come to the right place. O thou that hast made thy yoke easy and thy burden light, grant, we pray thee, to fulfill to them to-day the promise of strength, that as their day is their strength shall be. Grant, we pray thee, that they may be glad that there is one place where burdens, touched of God, may roll away; where the low-lying clouds are pierced by faith; where men may see beyond their hovel, and beyond their poverty, and beyond their cares and tearful days, the bright and unclouded future.

Help those that can find nothing to comfort them in this world to see to-day how great is the store and bounty of that goodness which is laid up for them in heaven. And we beseech of thee that those who are tried with pains, with burdens, with daily cares, who are weary exceedingly, who have seemed to lose the ambition of life, for whom there is nothing but the rude and daily rougher path to the grave, who have no more hope, who have no longer the bright expectations of youth, and all of whose visions are as a shattered mirror-we beseech of thee that they may remember and know that there is a rest which remaineth, for the people of God. Friends depart, health goes, treasures fly away, honor is as a bubble, and life itself grows dim as the autumnal forests which shed the glory of their leaves; all things are passing; but there remaineth a rest that no storm can disturb, that nothing can dissipate or take away. Oh! that the comfort and foresight of this might cheer those whose way of life is sad!

We beseech of thee, O Lord! if there be those here that mourn over privileges lost, opportunities gone-who see themselves grown up to man's estate uncultured and undeveloped-and who are filled at times with anguish that they should bear such souls, which might have been beautiful-we beseech of thee that they by faith in the love of Christ may feel that they shall grow again. In a fairer clime, transplanted into the garden of the Lord, and under the sweet dew of heavenly influence, they yet shall know beauty who are not comely now; and they shall come to fruit who have borne nothing here; and may they look forward to find in the land that is to come, all that they have missed in the land that now is.

We beseech of thee, O Lord our God! that thou wilt bless those who are consciously stained with sin, and whose hearts are the empire of guilt. All those who have been companions of remorse, who rise up and lie down with fear as their twin companion-oh! grant to them such a sense of thy forgiving love, and so cleanse their hearts, their affections, their imaginations, and their faith, that, though they are sinful, they may at the cross find all their burdens dropping and all their fears flying. There, at the cross, where the world has been comforted through so many weary ages, may they find peace.

We ask of thee that thou wilt bless parents who are carrying their little ones in their arms, with weakness of body, and with faintness of heart, by reason of inexperience, in a sense of the greatness of the way in which their children must travel. And as they look upon the world, and see the snares and temptations which beset those little ones, O Lord God! hear their prayer. Bless their children, and bless them. Teach them how to teach their little ones, and to bring them up in the way in which they should go, that when they are old they may not depart from it.

We pray that thou wilt grant a blessing to rest upon all those who are teachers in our Sunday-schools and in our Bible-classes, and all those who go forth on the Lord's day, or through the week, to carry the tidings of salvation to the outcast or neglected.

Remember all who are seeking, in the household or in their several avocations of life, to be witnesses for Christ, by word or by deed. And we pray that thou wilt grant that their faith may be increased, and that they may see, from day to day, that it is not in vain that they believe in the Lord.

Bless, we pray thee, all that would desire to be remembered here. Accept the thanksgiving of grateful hearts. Accept the silent thoughts of consecration that would come up. Accept the sighs and tears of those that weep. Accept the yearnings of absent ones whose thoughts are flying hitherward to-day. And grant that if our songs may not roll through the wide space and reach their ears, we may yet meet them, as they and we stand by faith in the presence of God. Jesus, spread abroad thine hands upon thy great host to-day, and say to all thy people, Peace be with you. And grant, we pray thee, that the Gospel may have free course to run and be glorified in this land. Build up the waste places. Grant that there may be found means and men for the education of the ignorant. Establish in the ways of justice this great people. Purify our laws. Cleanse our institutions. Give us pure and upright magistrates. And grant that this whole nation, taught of God, may shine in the beauty of a true religion. Let thy kingdom come everywhere, and let the earth be filled with thy glory.

These things we ask for Christ's sake. Amen.

CONTENTMENT IN ALL THINGS.

SUNDAY MORNING, NOVEMBER 8, 1868.

Nov 15.1868 115th

I

"I HAVE learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content. know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: everywhere and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need."-PHIL. iv., 11, 12.

THERE was never a pupil that graduated at any university with such a diploma as that. There never was penned such a record of any attainment, whether of the most eminent scholarship, or whether of genius or taste. Nowhere has there ever been set forth such a picture of the result of training and education.

There is hidden in the human soul an unsuspected power by which it is able to control all the circumstances of its condition to the purposes both of profit and of pleasure. Man is not superior to his circumstances as a matter of fact; but man is created with plenary power to be superior to his circumstances. A man is educated just in the proportion in which by his soul-power he controls the conditions of his life; and a man is uneducated just in the proportion in which he is controlled by his conditions, and his soul is what his circumstances will let it be. Only single persons, hitherto, have disclosed this power in any eminent degree. The race live in the lower moods of the mind, partake of its feebleness, and are subject to the bondages which belong to it. The nearer you get to material development, the nearer you get to absolute physical law; and that is bondage. The further you get from matter, and the more you live by those powers that are most ethereal, the further are you from material law, and the larger is your liberty. The lower races not only, but the great mass of all races of men, always live in bondage to physical law and to material and social conditions. The pain or pleasure of the human mind is dependent upon external conditions to

LESSON: Philippians iii. HYMNS (Plymouth Collection): Nos. 551, 249, “Shining Shore."