continually setting up himself to be a God. Each is seizing the judgment-throne of the universe. We know that it is so. And from this throne we must come down. We must confess that we are not gods; not able to pronounce on the condition of our fellows, needing forgiveness every day from our Father, and from each other, permitted to dispense what He sends us. The lesson is a simple one. Yet every other is contained in it. If we do, in very deed, come to the light, our deeds may be made manifest; if we asked to be judged-if we ask our Father in Heaven to make us His ministers and not His rivals-we shall be able to enter into the wonderful precept that follows (v. 38): Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.' They had been told before that they were 'to do good and lend, hoping for nothing again.' How is it that we are encouraged to hope here that if we give it shall be given to us? The two passages explain each other; experience confirms them both. Only the man who gives, hoping for nothing again, who gives freely without calculation out of the fulness of his heart, ever can find his love returned to him. He may win hatred as well as love; but love does come in measures that he never could dream of. We see it every day; and every day, perhaps, we may be disappointed at finding some favours which we thought were well laid out bringing back no recompense. They were bestowed with the hope of something again.

Yes, friends; most truly are these the unchangeable Laws of the Kingdom of Heaven. That which we measure is measured to us again; selfishness for

selfishness, love for love. It may not be clear to us now that it is. We shall be sure of it one day-in that day which shall shew Him who spoke this discourse to be indeed the King of kings and Lord of lords. For, as His next words tell us, this has been the great inversion of order: The blind have been leading the blind; the disciples have been setting themselves above their Master.' We have been laying down our own maxims and codes of morality. Each one has been saying to his brother, 'Brother, let me pull out the mote out of thine eye.' We have had such a clear discernment of those motes! And all the while none of us has been aware of the beam in his own eye. And how can any of us become aware of it; how can we escape the charge of hypocrisy which our consciences own to be so well deserved? Only if there is a King and Judge over us who detects the beam; who makes us feel that it is there; who Himself undertakes to cast it out. To that point we must always return. We may boast of this morality as something to glorify saints. We may call it 'delicious,' as a modern French critic calls it. Only, when it actually confronts us, as the word of a King who is speaking to us, and convicting us of our departures from it-only then shall we discover that it is for sinners, not saints; that it is terrible, not delicious. But only then shall we know what the blessedness is of being claimed as children of this Kingdom; only then shall we begin to apprehend the glory of which we are inheritors. For we then shall understand that there is a selfish evil nature in every man, let him call himself Churchman or man of the world, believer or unbeliever, which cannot bring forth good fruit-which is utterly damnable; and that there is a Divine root

of humanity, a Son of Man, whence all the good in Churchman or man of the world, in believer or unbeliever, springs-whence nothing but good can spring. If we exalt ourselves upon our privileges as Christians or saints, the King will say to us, 'Why call ye me Lord, and do not the things which I say?' If we submit to His Spirit we may bring forth now the fruits of good works which are to His glory; we may look for the day when every Law of His Kingdom shall be fulfilled, when all shall know Him from the least to the greatest. And Churches, in the sense of their own nothingness, may seek after the foundation which God has laid, and which will endure the shock of all winds and waves. And Churches which rest upon their own decrees and traditions and holiness will be like the man who without a foundation built an house upon the earth, against which the stream did beat vehemently, and immediately it fell; and the ruin of that house was great.'

LECTURE XI.

THE KING CALLING FORTH THE FAITH OF HIS

SUBJECTS.

And he said to the woman, Thy faith hath saved thee. Go in peace.-ST. LUKE vii. 50.

THE Epiphany, or Manifestation of Christ to the wise men who came from the East, is the introduction to a number of Epiphanies or Manifestations which are commemorated in the Epistles and Gospels for these Sundays. All the acts of Christ upon earth-though there are other aspects of them to which our minds are directed at other seasons-may be most fittingly contemplated under this aspect. I shall, I think, be doing my best to illustrate the different topics which are brought before us in the 7th chapter of St. Luke, if I trace this thread through them all. I have chosen the last verse of the chapter as my text, not only for its own sake, but because it bears upon all the previous manifestations of which the Evangelist has been speaking.

They were addressed not to the eye but to the faith of those who received them. That is the characteristic of an Epiphany in the sense in which the Church uses it. The wise men have been asking the stars to tell them if there is any King of men, any one mightier over human hearts than the lights which shine in the firmament can be. They are led to Bethlehem. They

see only a child lying in a cradle. A glory within that child reveals itself not to their sight, but to their spirits. A circle of legends forms itself about this story. The glory becomes an outward, visible glory. The craving for wonders is gratified by imaginations of what these magicians may have been, and what must have convinced them that the King was there. The passages which we read on Wednesday from Isaiah and St. Paul drew away our thoughts from an incident to the universal principle which it illustrates and embodies. The Gospel of the Kingdom of Heaven to the nations can only be described as the arising and shining of a light upon the consciences and hearts of those who were sitting in darkness. God revealed to those consciences and hearts their true King. A Church rises up to bear witness of His Name and of His dominion to the human race.

(1) The first story which comes before us in this chapter is in direct connection with the illumination to the Gentile sages. The hero of it, indeed, is not a sage. He is a simple Roman centurion; one who had been bred in the camp; one whose experiences had been all derived from the camp. He is a man under authority. He has soldiers under him. He says to one, Go, and he goeth; to another, Come, and he cometh; to his servant, Do this, and he doeth it.' facts these; what could they be worth?

Very obvious

What could

they have to do with his acknowledgment of Jesus as One who could heal his servant, even if He only spoke a word? These simple lessons about obedience and authority-about the might of words spoken by a weak man in governing a number of strong menhad been of quite unspeakable worth to this Roman. They had been, in the strictest sense, a Divine education to him. They had prepared him to believe that