to pray when his friend is with him. How many a crime has been consummated solely because of vicious weakness unconsciously made plastic by the voiceless power of stronger wickedness! Among the pure and good, the base and impure inspire a shuddering repulsion, such as the presence of Judas Iscariot seems to have inspired in the heart of St. John; but among the many who are but weakly bad, the contagion of stronger wickedness has an assimilating force. How many might say with the guilty king

"Hadst not thou been by,

A fellow by the hand of nature sealed,
Quoted, and signed, to do a deed of shame,
This murther had not come into my mind.

Hadst thou but shook thy head, or made a pause,

Or turned an eye of doubt upon my face,

As bid me tell my tale in express words,

Deep shame had struck me dumb, made me break off,

I "Das übermannt mich so mehr,

Dass wo er [Mephistopheles] nur mag zu uns treten,

Mein ich sogar ich liebte dich nicht mehr.

Auch wenn er da ist, könnt' ich nimmer beten,

Und das frisst mir ins Herz hinein.”

-GOETHE, Faust.

And those thy fears might have wrought fears in me;

But thou didst understand me by my signs,

And didst in signs again parley with sin;

Yea, without stop, didst let thy heart consent,

And consequently thy rude hand to act,

The deed which both our tongues held vile to name.'

" I

And so, when bad men are not yet hardened in wickedness they can be won over by the good, but, when they are, they hate and persecute the good whose mere silent lives rebuke them. It was thus that Sodom hated Lot. It was thus that the Ephesians expelled Hermodorus because he was virtuous. It was thus that the Athenians ostracised Aristides because he was just. "The honourable and religious gentleman," said a slave-holding member of parliament, speaking of Wilberforce in the House of Commons; and he was properly scathed in reply with the lightnings of that good man's eloquence. But the epithet spoke volumes for the silent, the unconscious, the inevitable influence, the silent, the unconscious

King John, act. iv. sc. 2.

2 Diog. Laert. ix. 2; Cic. Tusc. Disp. v. 36.

rebuke of vice, and protest for holiness which springs from the ordinary life of every true and righteous man. And mark that when the bad, hating the good, sneer them out of court, repress them by violence, madden the blind multitude against them with dark lies, poison them as Socrates was poisoned, banish them as Epictetus was banished, burn them as Savonarola was burned, execrate them as Whitefield was execrated, do not think that then the good have failed. "Even in their ashes live their wonted fires;" their voices even from the grave sound in the thunder's mouth; their dead hands pull down the strongholds of their enemies, and tyrants tremble at their ghosts. What was the end of Jesus? Between two murderers He hung in agony upon His cross, amid the howlings alike of secular, and of religious, hate; and, before three centuries were over, that gibbet of torture and of infamy sat upon the sceptres and shone in the crowns of kings.

9. Be this much then, dear brethren, our

lesson to-day. frivolous, greedy, grasping creatures?—the mere "hungers, thirsts, fevers, appetites," moneymakers and money-investors of the world?— creeping about amid the low noises of the mist, and caring only to clutch such husks as we may find? Are we this (and alas! it would describe too many lives!)—or are we noble enough to enter into the meaning of the sigh of Jesus, and share His pure and divine compassion for the world? Well, if so, we must also enter into the spirit of His life. And the very first condition of doing that is sincerity;-a sincerity which can only be shown in the whole-hearted effort after personal innocence, after personal holiness. It is to this point that my whole appeal, and my whole argument, has tended. If we would do as Jesus did, we must be His servants. If we would help to heal the evils of the world, we must ourselves be free from them. If we would tend the plague-stricken, there must not be the plague in our own hearts. We must be consistent, and give proofs of our consistency.

Are we mere base, sensual,

It was in vain for Seneca to declaim against luxury in villas which excited the envy of an emperor; or against greed with millions out at extortionate usury. Such declamations sound hollow; such appeals ring false. He who would help others, must not only show the way, but lead the way.

If, for instance, we would heal the woes inflicted by Intemperance, let us beware that we are not perishing by permitted things.' We shall not reclaim others from excess by going ourselves to the utmost verge of indulgence; nor is it the boon companion who as a rule will rescue the drunkard from his fall.

Again, if we would fain heal the horrible evils. caused by Sensuality—its inward rottennessits pervading corruption-its burning intensity -its hardened selfishness-its stealthy contamination then we must be pure in life; and we must pray more and more, and strive more and more, to be pure in heart. Blessed and happy is he who can show in his own life that the

I "Perimus licitis;" motto of Sir Matthew Hale.