The Present Truth, Vol. 10 (1894)

January 4, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Temptations are steps, by which we go either down or up. The devil means that we shall go down by them, but God means that we shall go up. For "tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, and experience hope." Rom. v. 3, 4. It lies with us to determine which it shall be.

"Self-Righteousness" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Self-Righteousness.-We read in Luke xviii. 9, that Christ spake a parable unto "certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others." This always follows trusting in self: distrust of all that is not of self's ways. There is nothing so high that self cannot look down upon it with disdain. When Lucifer turned his admiration upon self, upon his beauty and brightness (Ezek. xxviii. 17), in that first thought of self was hid the iniquity of his final presumption in heaven, when he said, "I will exalt my throne above the stars of God. . . I will be like the Most High." Isa. xiv. 13, 14.

"Proving a Thing by the Bible" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Proving a Thing by the Bible.-"You can prove anything from the Bible." This assertion, so often heard, is utterly false, since the Bible is truth (John xvii. 17), and only truth can be proved by truth. But it is true that you can persuade people's minds to almost any doctrine, or at least make it appear plausible, by using the Bible. But whose minds-the minds of those who know God's word? Ah, that is the point! You can prove (?) anything from the Bible to the person who does not know what the Bible says,-the person who reads it carelessly, hurriedly, and mechanically, or does not read it at all; the person who depends upon his own powers of intellect to distinguish between religious truth and error. "Spiritual things are spiritually discerned." No matter what we are intellectually; we must have spiritual discernment. Then we will "be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness." Eph. iv. 14.

"'Things to Come'" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

"Things to Come".-Many people who rejoice in the Lord now, because of the knowledge of His love, allow their joy to be clouded by the fear of what may come in the future. The trouble is they do not know the perfect love of God, because "perfect love casteth out fear." "There is no fear in love." But God has given us positive assurance, so that we may learn what His love is. The Apostle Paul, full of the Holy Spirit, gave utterance to these words: "For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Rom. viii. 38, 39. The present is all that we can ever have, for when the future comes to us it is present. And God has assured us that nothing can come that will turn His love away from us. "The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, I have loved thee with an everlasting love; therefore with loving kindness have by drawn thee." Jer. xxxi. 3.

"Our Need" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

The real problem in the world is how to get rid of sin. Everybody knows this away down in the heart. It is not information that we need; it is help. When Christ found the impotent man at the pool of Bethesda, no amount of talk about his condition and how he came there would have availed, nor discussion about what he ought to do. The man was helpless, and could do nothing, and knew it. Christ gave him what he lacked,-strength and life. This was Christ's way. The scribes and doctors of the law followed Him about discussing technicalities, and reasoning among themselves; but those who wanted help received it.

We to-day, of ourselves, are just where the impotent man was; helpless, unable to separate ourselves from the sin that holds us. Therefore Christ "gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us." We need that true sorrow and repentance for sin which shall make us long for this deliverance; but we have not to reproach

2

and condemn ourselves in the vain effort to work repentance so deep that God will pity us. God's love and pity are already upon the sinner, and in Christ is provided the repentance to all who will look to Him; for "Him hath God exalted with His right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins." We need strength, and "to them that have no might He increaseth strength," "according to His glorious power." New life, also, we need, and He came that we might have life, and that "more abundantly." "God shall supply all your need according to His riches and glory by Christ Jesus."

"Power of a Look" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Power of a Look.-When Christ was in the judgment hall, the night before His crucifixion, Peter denied Him with cursing and swearing, saying, "I know not the man." Then "the Lord turned and looked upon Peter," and Peter remembered the word of the Lord, that He should deny Him thrice, "and Peter went out, and wept bitterly." That look converted Peter. Fifty days later Peter stood up before the multitude and boldly preached Jesus. He charged the death of Jesus upon the people, yet with such love and tenderness that they were converted. The threats of the rulers were not able to cause him to waver in the least. What could have made so marvellous a change in so short a time? Nothing but the look of the Lord. We may be sure that Peter never forgot that look. During that fifty days he had been living in the light of that look; and all his life long the knowledge of the love that was conveyed to him by it, must have been to him an inspiration. What the Lord did for Peter, He will do for us. He says, "To this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at My word." Isa. lxvi. 2. "Turn us again, O Lord God of hosts, cause Thy face to shine; and we shall be saved." Ps. lxxx. 19.

"Visible Prayers" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Visible Prayers.-David prayed to the Lord, "Let my prayer be set forth before Thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice." Ps. cxli. 2. This has reference to the morning and evening worship of the sanctuary when incense was offered while all the people were praying without. See Ex. xxx. 7, 8; Luke i. 9, 10. In the book of Revelation we read that an angel came to the altar in heaven "having a golden censer; and there was given unto him much incense, that he should add it unto the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, went up before God, out of the angel's hand." Rev. vii. 3, 4. Still more emphatic is the statement that "the four and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints." Rev. v. 8. From these things we may know that prayer is offered in faith, and there is no other real prayer, are not empty sounds before the Lord, but that they come before Him in visible form. They appeal not to His ears only, but to His eyes as well. This is an additional proof that He gives to us that He will not forget to answer them. He has them continually before Him.

"How to Understand" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Although the Bible contains "the deep things of God," and the statement of mysteries that even angels look upon with wonder, it is one of the easiest books to understand, if one proceeds in the right way. Jesus said that the things that are hidden from the wise and prudent are revealed unto babes, and that every one who receives the kingdom of God, must receive it as a little child. That is sufficient to show that the Bible is not a difficult book.

The thing necessary to the understanding of the Scriptures is simple faith. "By faith we understand." We cannot reason ourselves into an understanding of the Scriptures; we must believe them if we would understand them. Faith makes us know. It is actual knowledge, not fancy, that we get by faith.

There are certain texts in the Bible that the beginner cannot understand. Peter says that Paul's writings contain "some things hard to be understood." What shall we do with them?-Do just what a little child would do,-leave them alone, and begin with something more simple.

There are many texts that consist of plain, simple statements that anybody can grasp. Believe them; meditate on them; take them for the good that there is in them for you. As you do this, you will see more and more in them. But more than this, you will find yourself growing into a knowledge of those difficult portions, for one Spirit is in the whole book.

Let it be a fixed rule never to argue with a text of Scripture. It is the same as arguing with God. If you cannot see any light in it, don't begin to find fault with it. Don't say, "I can't see how this can be, when such and such a text says," etc. when you do that, you are building up a barrier between you and the Scriptures, that will effectively shut you out from an understanding of them. Have patience; be content to wait. Faith and patience are inseparably connected, and it is only to faith that the righteousness of God is revealed.

Don't think that you can force your way into the inner sanctuary of God's revelation. You cannot pound the word of God to pieces, and even if you could, the pieces would still be impenetrable. But steady faith will cause the difficulties to melt away, and you will find in due time that, instead of an iceberg, you have in every word of God, pure, clear, flowing, sparkling, life-giving water.

"Ruinous Competition" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Ruinous Competition.-The history of nations for the present day is getting to be little more than a record of competition in the line of producing the best and most numerous instruments of destruction. England is agitated by the talk of some alarmists (who may or may not have good ground for their assertions) concerning the condition of the British navy; and France, observing this, is making preparations for a corresponding increase in her navy, in case any decided steps in this direction are taken by England. Already voices are being raised in this country in depredation of what can only result in a ruinous competition without any advantage to either side, but this argument will probably have as little effect upon naval expenditure as it has had upon the outlay for standing armies. If no nation of Europe had to-day either a standing army or a navy, each would be just as well off as the other, and all would be vastly better off than they are.

How much better it is to trust in the arm of the Almighty for protection, than to go into bankruptcy and ruin trying to defend yourself! But the wisdom of the world will never learn this. That wisdom believes that "God helps the heavy battalions"; and so standing armies and big navies will be increased, and ruinous taxation will get more ruinous, until at last it will be seen that God helps and saves those who simply put their trust in Him, and that against His decrees all the navies and heavy battalions in the world are as chaff before the whirlwind.

"Empty Words and Powerful Words" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

In the Revision, the sense of the first part of Eph. v. 6, is given thus: "Let no man deceive you with empty words." Everybody knows what it is to have words spoken to them, mere platitudes, which come with a hollow sound that makes it plainly apparent that the heart and soul of the speaker are not in them. And talk of spiritual things, the words of man, coming only from the man, must be empty, and as sounding brass and clanging cymbal.

The words of God are not so. The angel said to Mary, "No word from God shall be void of power." There is no emptiness here. The man who knows one word, as indeed the word of God, knows the power of God. Man is to live, "by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." This is the encouragement to the person who awakens to the fact that he has neglected the study of the Bible, and knows so very little of it. While we seek to become acquainted with God more and more by His word, every word that we do know has for us life and power and salvation.

Then in working for the salvation of others we have but to open these words of God, so that they may be seen to be full of grace and truth. "The opening of Thy words giveth light." The light is not exhausted with a first burst of glory, as the Spirit opens to us the word; but in every one is stored up the everlasting power and life of God; for "God is light," and it is His own life shining out upon us.

"The Lord's Temptation" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

There is one most precious statement in the account that Luke gives of the Lord's temptation in the wilderness. It is this, "And when the devil had ended all the temptation, he departed from Him for a season." Luke iv. 13. Christ was tempted for our sakes. "For in that He Himself hath suffered being tempted, He is able to succour them that are tempted." Heb. ii. 18. How can He succour us in our temptation?-By putting His mind in us, as the Apostle Paul in Phil. ii. 5 exhorts us to let Him do. "Forasmuch then as Christ has suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind; for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin; that he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God." 1 Peter iv. 1, 2. Whoever therefore is armed with the mind with which Christ resisted temptation, suffers with Him; and he conquers with Him also. Satan will tempt us fiercely, but we have the comforting thought that when we resist with the mind of Christ, he will leave us for a season. He will in time return to the attack, hoping to find us off our guard; but for a time we may be left entirely alone with the Lord, to gather fresh strength for another struggle. The devil will flee from us, when we resist him steadfastly in the faith; but Christ has promised that He will never leave us nor forsake us. With His abiding presence we need not fear the fiercest attack of the adversary.

"What Is Heathenism?" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

There is a wide difference between the popular idea of what constitutes heathenism, and the Bible idea. In truth, the heathen is one who does not know God; and the knowledge of God means more than an assent to the fact of His existence. His name is not only I AM, but I AM THAT I AM. To know Him truly is to know Him as He is, as Creator and Saviour and Redeemer. This knowledge is an experience. To know Him is "life eternal."

The Jews professed to be the only ones who knew God, and yet "because they knew Him not," they crucified the Lord. And the Gospel was received among the Gentiles, despised as heathen, more readily than among those who considered themselves God's chosen. God has made of one blood all nations, and He is "not far from every one of us"-just as near to the untutored savage who is feeling after Him in the darkness, as to the man whose life has been lived under more favourable circumstances. When that great company is gathered into Zion from every nation and tongue and tribe, it will be seen that race distinctions and natural advantages have counted for nothing in the Gospel of grace.

We think of these things as we read of wars waged against uncivilised races, and of armed exploring parties, conducting their operations in the interests of commercial companies. It is popularly supposed that Maxim guns and powder and shot are essential to the African traveller. But during all the years that explorers have been fighting their way through the African interior, missionaries have been quietly carrying the Gospel of peace to the natives, finding no use for weapons other than the word, and no need of other protection than the presence of God.

During this century commercial greed, always relentless as death, has presented to races of lesser civilisation one of the darkest sides of human nature exhibited since the fall of man. The fact that "heathen" peoples were involved has apparently taken away all restraint. The popular mind seems, unconsciously, perhaps, to minimise the iniquity of an act if it concerns some far-away pagan.

Often those are called heathen, who distinguish them from professed Christians, have rebuked high and hollow professions by showing a keener sense of justice than those who represented so-called Christendom. For instance, the Chinese fought two wars as their protest against the introduction of British opium. With the crude arms which they had to oppose against modern artillery, the struggle was but a massacre, and they yielded. Yet when pressed to legalise the traffic which they could not prevent, and when offered the assistance of the British Government to collect revenue from it, the Chinese High Commissioner said:-

It would indeed be for the advantage of the revenue; but we should thus certainly put a value on riches and slight men's lives.

The Emperor's answer was:-

It is true, I cannot prevent the introduction of the flowing poison; gain-seeking corrupt men will, for profit and sensuality, defeat my wishes; but nothing will induce me to derive a revenue from the vice and misery of my people.

Which was the darker paganism, that of the East or West? This incident shows what is being continually shown in other things, namely, that all that passes for modern culture and progress, even with an outward acknowledgement of God, has in it nothing that makes for righteousness. Every unrenewed heart has in it all the works of the flesh, and the moment we make a distinction between the "heathen" sinner and the "Christian" sinner, we come within the rebuke of the apostle, "Therefore thou art inexcusable, oh man, whosoever thou art that judgest; for wherein thou judgest another thou condemnest thyself, for thou that judgest doest the same things."

The essence of heathenism is the worship of self, putting the creature before the Creator. So with us in all our natural lives, we have put self before God, our own ways before His ways. All alike have been tainted with sin, which is but self and the worship of self. Therefore Christ died for all men, that He might take this self and give His own self, His

4

own Life, instead. This Gospel is what every natural heart needs, whether in Africa, or Asia, or Britain. This alone is the "power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth;" and the time is near at hand when all who do not already know that power as a living and real experience will have an opportunity to accept it. The evil one is not always to shut out from men's vision the manifestations of a power mightier than His own. All signs show that the day of the Lord is near and hasteth greatly, and of this time the prophet says, "The Lord hath made bare His holy arm in the eyes of all the nations; and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God."

"Conflicting Voices" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Many persons are troubled to know how to decide what is the truth, when there are so many voices, each claiming to be the truth, yet all disagreeing. It need not be difficult; Christ gave a sure rule by which we may know the truth, and avoid being deceived. He said, "My teaching is not Mine, but His that sent Me. If any man willeth to do His will, he shall know of the teaching, whether it be of God, or whether I speak from Myself." John vii. 16, 17.

This of itself is sufficient. God is anxious to have men saved. Therefore He has made the way of salvation very plain. He has provided that no one who is earnestly seeking after truth in order that he may serve God, shall be deceived. Let the reader stop to think, and he will remember that those who have such difficulty in deciding what the truth is, are those who are seeking some excuse for their rejection of it. They wish to continue in their own way, and they ease their conscience by persuading themselves that their way is as likely to be right as any other, since there are so many different voices.

Following the text above quoted, is another statement of how we may know the truth: "He that speaketh from himself seeketh the glory of Him that sent Him, the same is true, and there is no unrighteousness in Him." This was said with reference to Christ, but it applies to every one whom Christ has sent. The false teacher seeks his own glory. We may sometimes detect that desire in the subtle flattery that he gives to some. Self will in some way be prominent in everything. But the teacher who is sent by the Lord has only the Lord's message to deliver. Self does not appear at all.

Again, Jesus said to the unbelieving Jews, "I know you, that ye receive Me not; if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive." John v. 42, 43. This is similar to the first text quoted. "If any man willeth to do His will, he shall know of the teaching." The reason given why the Jews could not receive Christ, who spoke the name of the Father, is that they had not the love of God in them. They did not wish to do the will of God, and therefore it was impossible for them to understand. The sceptic Hobbs once said that if the proposition that the sum of the squares of the two sides of a right-angled triangle equal the square of the hypotenuse, were opposed to men's self-interests, or their right to rule, there would not be anybody able to understand it. Some would say, "It maybe so," but they would not be able to make a clear demonstration of it, or to see it when demonstrated by others. A willingness to receive the truth is the essential thing to knowing the truth; and the blessed thing is, that whoever is willing and anxious to know the truth, cannot be deceived.

But some people are so timid, so fearful of being led astray, that they hesitate about accepting what they really know to be the truth. There is no doubt in their minds that a certain thing is the truth, but they do not know what may be involved in it. They fear that it will lead them farther than they wish to go, and so they hold back. In this we see an unwillingness to receive the truth. It makes no difference that they may be perfectly willing to accept what they now see; the fact that they fear what it may lead them to, shows that they are not really in love with the truth, since no truth can ever lead one into error.

Now what is the result of such a course? Just what we might expect, namely, that they will before long greedily accept some palpable error. He who rejects the voice of God, will readily accept a false voice. Strong delusion, that they should believe a lie, comes only on those who receive not the love of the truth. 2 Thess. ii.10-12. It is not the love of some single truth, that will save men from deception, but the love of the truth. He who rejects the truth, must necessarily believe a lie; for there is nothing else but falsehood left for him to believe. And he who does not love the truth, and the whole truth, no matter what the consequences may be, is necessarily shut up to loving a lie. The only safeguard against deception,-against being led astray by voices that are not the voice of God,-is to accept unhesitatingly the voice that is unmistakably the voice of God.

"Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on Him, If ye continue in My word, then are ye My disciples indeed; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." "I am the good Shepherd, and know My sheep, and am known of Mine."

"What Is the Papacy?" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

The expression "the papacy" naturally brings to mind the Pope of Rome, with his cardinals, bishops, and priests, the Vatican, the Inquisition, and various other institutions connected with the machinery of the papal system. But the real papacy is not a set of men holding the titles of pope and cardinal and priest; is not the institutions which these men and their supporters have planted in Italy and throughout the world; it is not the false doctrines of Catholicism; nor is it all three of these together. It is a system of principles,-of false principles,-carried out to the full limit of their evil capacity. It is false worship developed to its most baleful degree of perfection. Before there were any popes or bishops or cardinals, or before most if not all of the false doctrines which Rome teaches had arisen, "the mystery of iniquity doth [did] already work." Before papal institutions had been established or the papal machinery had been put in operation, the principles were working which culminated in the revelation of "the man of sin," the "son perdition."

What the real essence of this system is may be seen from the following words of the Apostle Paul, taken from his second letter to the Thessalonians: "Let no man deceive you by any means; for that day [the day of the Lord] shall not come except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition, who opposeth and exalteth HIMSELF above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God." 2 Thess. ii. 3, 4. The Revised Version reads, "setting himself forth as God." It is the exaltation of self; it is putting self in the

5

place of God. Develop this principle to the full limit, and the result will be the papacy every time.

And this principle is naturally inherent in every man. Every individual has within him a tendency to put self in the place of God. This tendency most naturally finds expression in efforts to supply the power to make himself do what is right. He makes vows, and resolves to live righteously; next he makes laws to compel himself to be righteous; and finally he inflicts penances upon himself as a last resort, to change himself, as it were, in the pathway of obedience to the Divine will. This is the principle that works in paganism,-the principle that leads men to throw themselves under the wheels of Juggernaut, to crawl on hands and knees for scores of miles to the Ganges, or shrines of their gods, and to inflict upon themselves various other tortures. With it is coupled the equally false idea that such things serve in some way to appease the wrath of God.

The papacy goes a step farther than this and thereby reaches a far more baleful position. It extends the principle to the doctrine that a man should not only make laws and inflict penalties for the spiritual guidance of himself, but for other people as well; that he should not only exercise power to regulate his own conscience, but the consciences of his fellows! And thus we have the Pope of Rome, sitting as God in the temple of God, and assuming authority to command all men under sin; to shut up heaven to all, or to release from "purgatory," or to absolve souls from the penalties of all laws; to regulate, in short, the consciences and the worship of the whole world! This is the principle of putting self in the place of God, carried out to its full extent.

And what should be borne in mind in connection with all this is that this principle of self-exaltation is not confined in its operation to any certain kind or class of men, but is a principle which has a natural hold upon all, a hold which can only be loosed by the power of the Gospel of God. And hence it is just as possible to have popes among Protestants as among Catholics. Indeed it is certain that there are many popes in the Protestant world to-day,-not visibly and ostensibly such, but men which nevertheless put themselves, or allow others to put them, in the place of God, so that people seek to them instead of to God to learn what is right. The principle is the same in both, and the results are bound to be as evil in the one case as in the other.

Let every man beware how he puts himself in a position, or allows himself to be put, where he stands in the place of God. "If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God." It could be not God's voice that is heard, and God's power that is felt, through him,-if, in other words, he calls attention not to God but to himself, lifts up himself and not Christ before the multitude, then, although not a pope in name, he is actuated by the same principle that works in popery, and is bringing upon himself a share in its condemnation.

"'By Their Fruits'" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

"Ye shall know them by their fruits," said the Saviour, in the sermon on the mount. Whom shall we know by their fruits? and what shall we know of them? These are questions that are worth attention.

The common idea is that in these words the Saviour gave a test of character; that He has given us all a rule which we are to go about applying to everybody we meet, and measuring them up, and deciding on their fitness or unfitness for heaven, or at least of their worthiness to be received in the fellowship with people so good as we are. Then again, they are taken as applying to one's own self, as if each individual were required to be continually taking an inventory of his own good and bad deeds, so as to be able to tell at any moment just how high or how low he stands in the Christian scale. All this is but another illustration of the common practice of taking an expression out of its connection, and giving to it an arbitrary interpretation; of putting a meaning upon a text, instead of drawing the meaning out. Let us read the text in its connection.

"Beware of false prophets which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits." Matt. vii. 15, 16.

Notice in the first place, that this text says nothing about judging ourselves. Those whom we are to know by their fruits are others besides ourselves.

Bear in mind, also, that this is spoken only of a certain class-"false prophets"-and not of people in general. Neither does it tell us that we are to judge the character even of this class; and we are never warranted in assuming that the Scriptures mean what they do not say.

How are we to act towards these false prophets?-Beware of them. Why?-Because if we heed them we shall certainly be led astray. What is the work of a prophet?-It is to teach, to instruct. The work of a false prophet, therefore, is to teach false doctrines; and we are commanded to cease to hear the instruction that causeth to err from the words of knowledge. Prov. xix. 27.

But how are we to know the false teachers from the true?-The text last referred to gives us the clue. "Cease, my son, to hear the instruction that causeth to err from the words of knowledge." "Go from the presence of a foolish man, when thou perceivest not in him the lips of knowledge." Prov. xiv. 7. We are to prove the teachers by their teaching. "To law and the testimony if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." Isa. viii. 20. "He whom God hath sent, speaketh the words of God." John iii. 34. "If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God." 1 Peter iv. 11. This is how we are to know the teachers, whether they are of God.

Some one will say, "What is the use, then, of having teachers? I thought that teachers were for the purpose of telling us what is true and what is false; if we cannot depend on them, but have to decide for ourselves, why can we not get along without them?" Teachers are indeed necessary, but they are not to take the place of God to us. Christ is the light of the world, and He Himself is the only light to light every man that cometh into the world. He says, "If ye continue in My word, then are ye My disciples indeed; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." John viii. 31, 32. The promise of the new covenant is, "They shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord; for they shall all know Me, from the least to the greatest." Heb. viii. 11. The reason for this is found in the words of Christ, "It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and have learned of the Father, cometh unto Me." John vi. 45.

Christ is the truth. John xiv. 6. No man can know truth, except as he knows Christ. And Christ must be revealed in and to us by the Father.

6

See Gal. i. 15, 16; Col. i. 27. When we know Him indeed, we know the truth. That is, we know truth; we can tell the difference between truth and error. Then we are to go on, "being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God." Col. i. 10. We are to "grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." 2 Peter iii. 18.

The word of God, like God Himself, is unfathomable. The more we learn of it, the more there is for us to learn. There is, and will be to all eternity, something new for us to learn, even in that with which we already are committed. The work of the true teacher is to open the words of God to the people. He is to lead them to the words of life, that they may drink from the same fountain from which he has drunk. Our part is to have such communion with the Lord that when a thing is presented to us we may know at once whether it is truth or error. We are to know how to distinguish between the voice of the Good Shepherd and the voices of strangers.

So we find that the fruits of the false prophets, by which we are to know-not judge-them to be false prophets, are their teachings. And each one, instead of depending on some minister to tell him what the Scriptures mean, is to have such a knowledge of the truth in Jesus, that he can for himself decide as to the correctness of the minister's teaching. Thus no man can throw his responsibility upon another. Let everyone take heed that he does not reject truth. As for judging anybody, that is to be left to the one Judge-the Lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy.

"The Sin of Covetousness" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

The tenth commandment reads thus: "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbour's." Ex. xx. 17. It is generally summed up, in the Scriptures, in the comprehensive prohibition, "Thou shalt not covet."

This commandment, more than any other, shows the spiritual nature of law of God. All the other commandments may be violated openly, as well as in the heart, so that men may see the sin; but the violation of this commandment can be detected by no one but God. When the sin of stealing is committed, we may know that it has been preceded by covetousness; but no man can know that the tenth commandment has been violated until the sin of covetousness results in the open violation of some other commandments.

From this we may learn the folly of the idea that it can ever rest with men to enforce the law of God. The law of God is not kept while the tenth commandment is broken; but no power on earth can tell when it is broken or when it is kept. "The law is spiritual," and eludes the grasp of earthly rulers.

But this is not all. That which is true of the tenth commandment is true of them all, for the tenth contains all the rest. The first commandment forbids idolatry. Now read two verses: "Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, and covetousness, which is idolatry." Col. iii. 5. "For this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God." Eph. v. 5. Thus we see that law of God is a perfect circle, ending just where it begins. The violation of the tenth precept is the violation of the first; and this means the violation of all the others, because to reject God is to reject His whole law.

Very emphatic testimony to the comprehensive nature of the tenth commandment is given by the Apostle Paul, in Rom. vii. 7: "What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law; for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet."

Here the last commandment is put for whole law. It was the tenth commandment that convicted the apostle of sin. As a Pharisee he had from his childhood been a strict observer of the law, so far as it concerned outward actions. He could appeal to all the Jews, who knew his life from his youth, with no fear that they could convict him of any wrong doing. But "the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man look on the outwardeth appearance, but the Lord looketh upon the heart" (1 Sam. xvi. 7), and so when Christ was revealed in Paul, he found that he had never kept a single precept of the law. Evil desire had been in his heart, although unknown to him; and that made the things that he had counted gain, nothing but loss.

Lust, or unlawful desire, precedes every open sin. "Every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lusts, and enticed. Then when lust conceiveth it bringeth forth sin; and sin when it is finished, bringeth earth death." James i. 14, 15. The lust of the flesh, when denied, is not sin; but as soon as it is cherished it becomes sin, for "the thought of foolishness is sin." Prov. xxiv. 9.

And so it is that the violation of the tenth commandment lies at the bottom of the transgression of every other commandment. The law in plain terms forbids covetousness, or evil desires; so that in every case the plain letter of the law is violated before anything is ever done that men can see and recognise as sin. Well might the Psalmist exclaim and pray, "Who can understand his errors? Cleanse Thou me from secret faults." Ps. xix. 12. And may every heart echo this language. Only the life of Christ can cleanse from all unrighteousness.

"No Difference" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

The very great differences that we see among men, in the matter of education, refinement, and all those things that give men standing in the world, are by many thought to be so great that nothing can ever effect any change. Persons at the two extremes are almost thought to belong to different orders of beings; and to many it seems almost impossible that even the Gospel can ever lift men up from the lowest depths, to a level with favoured mortals.

But what after all makes this difference? Only the circumstances of birth, and a few years of training. The difference in birth does not count for much; for the son of the most cultured nobleman, if brought up from earliest infancy with the children of the slums, would differ from them in no respect. So that the only difference is that which arises from a difference in advantages.

As to the matter of birth, that may easily be settled; for all must be born again, before they can into the kingdom of heaven. The noblest as well as the most despised, must alike be born from above; and when they have experienced this new birth, from the Lord, they will be of one family. All will be of equally "high birth." "Ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus." "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female; for ye are all one in Christ Jesus." Gal. iii. 26, 28.

7

Then their association and fellowship is alike "with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ." Everybody knows that a man from the lowest ranks of society, even from barbarism would, by a few years of proper education, and association with educated and truly refined people, become educated, and transformed in his manners. What, then, may not be accomplished by association on terms of equality with Christ, in whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge?

The children of savages have been taken and educated under Christian influences, so that in the course of a few years no one could possibly detect by their language nor their manners that they had not had advantages of birth equal to the children of the most highly civilised. Suppose that we should see those same ones after they have been in glory for a few thousand years, associating with Christ and the angels, how much effect would be seen of these distinctions which are made so much of by men of this world? If there should be any difference, it would doubtless be that the one with the fewest earthly advantages might occupy the highest place.

God looks at men from the side of eternity, and not with man's narrow view. Knowing that their hearts are all fashioned alike (Ps. xxxiii. 13-15); that there is no difference, because "all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God" (Rom. iii. 23), God puts no difference between men in the matter of salvation, purifying the hearts all alike by faith. Acts xv. 8, 9.

"Where is boasting? It is excluded." Rom. iii. 27. "For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called; but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; and base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to naught things that are; that no flesh should glory in His presence." 1 Cor. i. 26-29.

The Gospel brings hope to the poor and despised. "I am poor and needy, yet the Lord thinketh upon me." "I was brought low, and He helped me." "He hath showed strength with His arm; He hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree." Luke i. 51, 52. "Thus saith the Lord, Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches; but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth Me, that I am the Lord which exercise loving-kindness, judgment, and righteousness, in the earth; for in these things I delight." Jer. ix. 23, 24.

"The Power that Keeps" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

In that wonderful chapter, the fortieth of Isaiah, we have a most vivid representation of the power of God, and the greatness of His creation. Take, for instance, the fifteenth verse: "Behold, the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance; behold, He taketh up the isles as a very little thing." More literal and more forcible is the rendering in the margin of the Revised Version, "The isles are as the fine dust that is lifted up." That is, the islands are no greater to God than the fine dust is to us; more than this, they are no greater to God than the dust, because with God there is no such thing as comparison; nothing is hard for Him. Darkness and light are both alike to Him; great and small have no difference between them in His sight. The greatest thing in our eyes is as easy for Him as that which seems to us easy.

What an idea of the immensity of the universe is given by that expression, "Behold, the isles are as the fine dust that is lifted up." All the islands of the sea are no greater, in comparison to the universe of God, than the fine dust that every breeze lifts up is to the whole earth. Truly, "the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods. In His hand are the deep places of the earth; the strength of the hills is His also. The sea is His, and He made it; and His hands formed the dry land. O come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord our Maker. For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture, and the sheep of His hand." Ps. xcv. 3-7.

But this is not all. Our minds are directed to another evidence of His greatness. "Lift up your eyes on high, and see who hath created these, that bringeth out their host by number; He calleth them all by name; by the greatness of His might and for that He is strong in power, not one faileth." Verse 26. With the natural eye innumerable stars can be seen; the telescope reveals innumerable others, but even the most powerful telescope reveals only an exceedingly small fraction of the number of stars. Photography, however, enlarges our ideas. By exposing plates for several hours, the light is accumulated so that stars too distant to be discovered even by the telescope, record their existence. In a photograph of a very small section of the heavens in which no stars could be seen, many thousands were revealed. If our camera were placed on the most distant of the stars, we doubtless should have the same thing repeated. Millions upon millions in number are the stars of heaven; yet God calls them all by name, because He made them; and the word of His power keeps them from falling. They hang upon His word. Well might the psalmist exclaim, "O Lord, how manifold are Thy works; in wisdom hast Thou made them all."

All this shows the power of God; for the Lord by the Apostle Paul assures us that ever since the creation of the world, the invisible things of God, namely, His eternal power and Divinity, are clearly seen through the things that He has made. Rom. i. 20. It is because He is great in power that none of the host of heaven fall from their places. They do not collide, because His hand guides them in their various orbits.

With this view of the power and wisdom of God, how forcible are the words that follow: "Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, Israel, My way is hid from the Lord, and my judgment is passed away from my God? Hast thou not known? Hast thou not heard? The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary; there is no searching of His understanding. He giveth power to the faint, and to him that hath no might He increaseth strength." No one need fear that he is in danger of being forgotten by the God to whom the names of the infinite number of worlds are as familiar as the names of children are to their parents. The stars are God's flock, which He guards and we are His flock also. That is one point of encouragement. The other is that all this power is for the use of the man who is in need. The Gospel is the power of God unto salvation. The power by which God

8

is able to keep the soul from falling, is the power by which He keeps the host of heaven in their proper places.

"By the word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of His mouth." Ps. xxxiii. 6. By that same word they are kept. See 2 Peter iii. 5-7. And this is the word of the Gospel which is preached unto us. 1 Peter i. 25. Therefore we may know that all the power of the universe is pledged for the redemption of those who believe God. The existence of the universe depends upon the fulfillment of God's promises to us; for the same word that brings the promises to us, is the word that upholds all things; and if that word were broken, everything would return to chaos, and vanish from existence. And this comfort is for the poorest and the weakest and most sinful; for God's word would be broken just as surely if it failed to the least, as if it failed with the greatest. So the existence of the stars in the heavens is a pledge to even the weakest soul, that God has not forgotten His promises, and that every prayer of faith will be answered. Thus it is that God's people in the last days, when troubles thicken, and wicked men and persecutors become more rampant, are directed to "look up." Strength comes from looking up.

Therefore, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to His abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away, preserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time."

"Fighting Machines" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

In a recent issue of the Chronicle appears a report which the Italian Minister of War made to his government on the present strength of "Italy's fighting machine," showing that at the present time that nation is capable of putting into the field in the emergency of war 1,000,000 trained men, as compared with 791,00 three years ago; also that the War Department has 1,625,000 repeating rifles and is manufacturing more at the rate of 11,000 a month. The report gives numerous other details respecting improvements and artillery, fortifications, etc.

This of course does not compare with the military showing that might be made by Germany, France, or Russia, but it is not this showing, in itself, that constitutes the significant feature of the present military situation in Europe. What furnishes the most serious food for reflection is the fact that the nations of Europe are fast turning themselves into a huge fighting machine, in which their energies and resources are almost wholly absorbed. Italy is trembling on the verge of complete bankruptcy, and straining every nerve to the point of collapse, in the endeavour to keep her fighting machine growing; and her allies are not far behind her. Never before did the world behold the spectacle of her greatest nations turned into huge machines of war and destruction; surrounded by the glories of her highest civilisation, and yet becoming bankrupt in order to perfect that which sweeps the marks of civilisation to the earth!

With the help of Germany, Italy has been tided over her present difficulties so that the ship of State has barely enough water under her to keep her from getting hopelessly aground; but the relief is only temporary. The public here is waiting for the sound that will indicate that under the intense strain something has parted or broken down in the complicated machinery of the "triple alliance," and that war is again to desolate the fields of Europe. It is simply a choice between war and social revolution induced by unendurable taxation. The two storm clouds are looming up on the horizon, and it is only a question of which is approaching most rapidly. It is not improbable that both may discharge their deadly contents at the same time.

But while statesmen are perplexing themselves over the solution of these things, and looking with failing hearts into the future, the question for us is, What does the situation import with regard to the day of the world in which we live? What momentous period of time have we now reached. "What of the night? watchman, what of the night?" The prophetic answer is, "The nations were angry, and Thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead that they should be judged, and that thou shouldest give reward unto Thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them that fear Thy name, small and great; and shouldest destroy them which destroy the earth." Rev. xi. 18.

Shall we search the prophetic word, to know where we stand and what are the things that are coming? or shall we accept the silence of "dumb dogs," that "cannot bark," as evidence that nothing is impending, and that all things are to continue as they were from the foundation of the world? Isa. lvi. 10; 2 Peter iii. 4.

"'For Your Sakes'" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Time would fail us to tell of the interesting and marvellous things to be learned from the beautiful birds. You must keep your eyes open and study them for yourself. But more than all else there is one thing that we would have you remember when you see them seeking their tiny but cosy homes:-

Jesus, the King of kings, the glory of heaven, and the One who made the earth and all of these wonderful things, came down to this earth once and was so poor that He did not have so good a home as the little birds. He Himself said, "The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man hath not where to lay His head."

Why was He so poor when He had been so ruch?

We read again: "Though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might be rich."

"Birds" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

"Behold the fowls of the air; . . . your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?" Matt. vi. 26.

In the country, in the city, on dry land, or on the ocean, wherever we go we find our feathered friends-the birds. What a quiet, lonely place earth would be without them! They fill the air with music, the trees with life and beauty, and our hearts with joy and gladness.

There are two kinds of birds, flying birds, and running birds. Those that fly very far and swiftly have the largest and strongest wings. One bird that has very long wings can fly so fast that it is called the "Swift." The humming-bird, the smallest bird that lives, can move from one place to another as quickly as a flash of light or a glance of the eye. The ostrich is the largest and strongest of all birds, but his wings are small and he cannot fly. Because he needs to run so much his legs are long and strong, and his bones are nearly as solid as those of a horse, while the bones of most of the flying birds are full little air-cells that make them very light.

Did you ever stop to think why we see so many more birds in summer than in winter? When it is about time for the cold weather to begin many of them gather into companies and fly off south across sea and land to a warmer country. Then when the snow melts and the warm spring-time comes, back come our little friends as bright and happy as ever. A Swift has been known to come back to the very same spot every year for seven years. The pretty swallows and martins often do the same.

Look at the feathery clothing of the birds. What can be more light, more dainty, and more beautiful? One bird has a jaunty cap on his little head, another a ruff round his neck, still another a white puff about his legs. One wears a soft inner garment of delicate down, and an overcoat of hair, another waddles along in greased coat, caring neither for rain nor a plunge in the brook. This little fellow still wears his baby clothes, while that one looks as proud in his new suit as a boy does in his first trousers; for birds get new suits once in a while as well as you. The Bird of Paradise is dressed very handsomely, and is more careful of its clothes than some children, for it will not allow a speck of dirt to get on them.

How busy they are! These are holding a grand concert. Those are having some kind of meeting. Yonder we see them fishing, hunting, butchering or diving. Here and there a few are mining, hammering, weaving, sewing, making beds, plastering, or building houses. We notice that many are getting dinner, or talking, whistling, chattering, or warbling. One is tolling a bell so loud that it can be heard three miles away (its cry sounds like a bell tolling). Another is carrying real letters for his master, and still another is barking like the dog, mewing like the cat, and trying to make every sound that he hears anyone else make.

If you wonder how they can do so many different things, just look at their skilful tools. Those that need to wade in the water have stilts, those that swim have paddles, those that get their food out of the mud beneath the water have feelers and strainers in their bills, and those that eat soft food have spoons. The woodpecker has a drill and a worm-puller; the Kiwi-kiwi a staff, the humming-birds insect catchers, long, straight, curved, or double-curved, to fit the flowers in which they find the insects. The hawfinches have broad seed-crushers, the Cross Bills nut-catchers, the Tailor Bird a sharp, slender bill for a needle, the owls night eyes. The Jungle Fowl has great feet for shovels, and the Jacana very long, slender toes for water that enable him to walk on shoes, floating leaves. The longer you study them the more you will see that each bird has been given just the tools that he needs.

What wonderful houses they build! and in what strange places we sometimes find them! They generally have but one room, but that of the Paradise Whidah bird has two, one for the sitting-room and one for the nursery; and the Sociable Weavers weave great hotels out of flat reeds and grasses, with thatched roofs, which sometimes have as many as three hundred and twenty rooms, each containing a separate family of birds. The Golden Eagle has a neighbouring ledge of rock for his larder or pantry, where he keeps the food that he has brought until it is needed. The Jungle Fowl shovels up a mound or oven, sometimes fifteen feet high and sixty feet round, in which to keep its eggs warm. The Tailor Bird with its long bill and little feet makes thread out of cotton and sews the edges of two leaves together and then puts his nest in the little pocket he has thus made. The Oriole hangs in his nest from the branches of a tree and sews it together with horse hairs or strings. The Kingfisher makes his nest of fishbones, and the Esculent Swallow makes a nest that is thought to be very good to eat! The nest of the humming-bird is hung like a tiny cradle to a twig and it rocks back and forth with every breeze. What a cozy home with its silky walls and downy bed!

Birds kill so many insects, worms, mice, flies, snakes, etc., that they are a great help to the farmer and gardener. Their feathers make good beds and pillows, and the eggs of some are good for food. One ostrich egg is as large as twenty-four hen's eggs, and the shell is so strong that it is used to carry water in. See if you can think of anything else for which birds are useful.

The same One who made the water

14

animals of which we learned last week, made these wonderful birds. And he made them on the same day that he made the water animals. Can you tell, now, when the birds began to live, and who made them? This same wise, loving Being who made and clothed and gave tools to the birds, teaches them how to use their tools, and He scatters their food over the earth for them to gather. He says that He does not forget one little sparrow, and therefore we need not fear that He will forget us, for we are worth more than many sparrows. Let us always think of this precious promise when we look at the little birds.

1. Did you ever live in the country?

2. Did you ever travel on the ocean?

3. What friends do we find wherever we go?

4. What kind of place would this earth be if there were no birds? Why?

5. How many kinds of birds are there?-Flying birds and running birds.

6. Name two birds that can fly very fast.

7. Name one that cannot fly.

8. Why can the Swift fly better than the ostrich?

9. What is the smallest bird that lives? The largest?

10. What kind of bones do the flying birds have? Why?

11. Why do we see so many more birds in summer than in winter?

12. Who guides them over sea and land every year to the same spot where they were reared?

13. What kind of clothing do birds wear?

14. What may little boys and girls learn from the Bird of Paradise?

15. What strange things do some birds do?

16. What birds can be taught to carry letters?-Carrier Pigeons.

17. What wonderful thing can the Parrot do? The Mocking Bird? The Tailor Bird?

18. Tell about some of the tools that birds have.

19. In what kind of houses do they live?

20. Where do we find these nests?

21. Who builds them?

22. Out of what are they made?

23. What are birds good for?

24. Who made these wonderful creatures? Gen. i. 20-23.

25. When? How? Gen. ii. 19.

26. Who gave them their tools and taught them how to use them?

27. Who covers the earth with food for them to gather? Matt. vi. 26.

28. Then need we fear that He will forget to care for us?

29. Why not? Matt. vi. 26; x. 29-31.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

-Mr. Gladstone completed his eighty-fourth year on Dec. 20.

-An attempt was made recently to blow up a wedding party with dynamite in America, a dozen persons being injured.

-Thirty-six old soldiers recently died in St. Petersburg from the effects of eating putrid fish which had been served at a banquet in the Winter Palace.

-Two insurgent Riff chiefs have been handed over by the Sultan's brother to the Spanish commander at Melilla, who had them placed on a cruiser to be conveyed to Tangier.

-Rioting is reported from Pontymister, in Wales, where the steelworkers are on strike against a reduction in wages. Several men have been injured in a conflict with the police.

-Grave anxiety is entertained as to the safety of the small British force under Captain Wilson, which went in pursuit of Lobengula. Nothing has been heard of the party, and Mr. Rhodes telegraphs that he fears the worst.

-The trial of seventeen prisoners arrested in connection with the riots at Aigues Mortes in August last, has been begun at Angoul?me. Public feeling in Rome is very high on the subject, and if the prisoners are acquitted anti-French demonstrations are expected.

-A fearful gale which recently raged at sea, severely tested the sea-going qualities of the new ironclad resolution, which was well-nigh overwhelmed in the Bay of Biscay. She shipped tons of water, lost a man overboard, and returned to Queenstown in a sadly battered condition.

-There have been further serious disturbances in Sicily, the mob in two places coming into collision with gendarmes and troops. In both instances firearms were used by the troops, and several persons were wounded. More troops have been sent to the island.

-Anarchist scares and outrages have been so numerous throughout Europe for a fortnight past that much space would be required to enumerate them in detail. In France and Spain fresh evidences of anarchist plots are continually coming to light, while their political kinsmen, the Socialists, are causing much trouble to the police in the large centres.

-Severe fighting has taken place recently between the opposing forces in Brazil, and it is evident that the war is rapidly drawing to a crisis. The probability of victory seems still to be on the side of the insurgents. Meanwhile business at Rio de Janeiro is entirely prostrated, and yellow fever has broken out, from which many are said to be dying.

-Telegraphic advices from Massowah state that severe fighting has taken place between the Italian troops, numbering about 1,500, and a force of dervishes 10,000 strong. The fight which lasted over two hours, resulted in the decisive defeat of the dervishes, who broke and fled. The dervish loss is estimated at about 1,000; the Italians had three officers and 100 men killed.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

A German investigator has been trying the effect of tobacco smoke upon different animals, and finds it is not obnoxious to some of them. The goat, for instance, seemed to enjoy the experiment. It is difficult to see what encouragement this is to yield to smokers, or to non-smokers who are forced to inhale the fumes of the burning weed. The goat is proverbially perverted in his taste and careless of his diet.

An item of news from France is that M. Jules Simon, is agitating the question of a ten years "truce of God" among the European nations, and a compact that none shall fight for ten years. The difficulty is that the spirit of fight is in the natural heart. The "course of this world" is according to the "prince of this world," and he was "a murderer from the beginning." "There was war in heaven" itself as soon as Satan began his own work, and his last act is to gather the nations "together to battle," against the Lord. Back of all the rulers and statesmen and political schemers, the seat of "wars and fightings" is in the lust of the unrenewed heart. This is beyond the reach of political reformers.

The excise officers recently visited the cellar of a publican in Spitalfields, and found that about one-ninth of the contents of a barrel, supposed to be ale, was water. Accordingly he was held to answer for the inferior quality of his goods. He pleaded guilty, with an explanation, and was fined ?30. In this case the alteration was a positive benefit, although the man did it dishonestly; but the law knows no exceptions, it is bound to see that people get just what they think they are buying, even though it be nothing but poisonous trash. And really it does seem as though a man is deserving of severe punishment for selling to people God's free gift, and, worse than all, adulterating it with his vile beer.

The English Churchman deplores the fact that "members of the sacerdotal party" still continue "to monopolise the chief positions in the Church of England." It cites several instances of the appointment of pronounced Ritualists to the most valuable "livings," and closes its protest with the statement:-

"Mr. Gladstone, too, has once more shown his antipathy to Protestantism by presenting to the living of Lutterworth the Rev. Canon Alderson, whose sympathies are decidedly with the counter-Reformation movement. It might have been hoped that even the present Prime Minister would have hesitated to inflict this insult upon the memory of John Wycliffe.

It does seem incongruous, and a long step backward to see a Romanist in the pulpit of the great "reformer before the Reformation;" but it simply shows which way things are drifting.

The growth of militarism among the eighteen governments of Europe is sufficiently illustrated by the following figures. In 1869 the European armies on a peace footing numbered 2,195,000 men. In 1892 the number had risen to 3,747,600. In 1869 the war footing amounted to 6,958,000 men. Last year the men available for an immediate destruction reached the portentous number of 21,800,500. Of course we have to pay very heavily for such insane wickedness. In the interval between 1869 and 1892 the annual cost of the armies and navies of Europe rose from ?116,732,583 to ?203,050,000. And at the later date the National Debts, which are almost exclusively the results of militarism, reached the bewildering sum of ?4,689,014,000.-Methodist Times.

The American Sabbath Union has just held its annual meeting, at which the General Secretary said:-

The weekly rest-day will be saved only through organised effort, national in scope, wisely directed and conscientiously supported. The Sabbath is the one chief pillar of the Republic; and every consideration of citizenship, humanity and religion urges us to encourage the national movement.

Of course by "Sabbath," the speaker meant Sunday, since the American "Sabbath" Union is hardly opposed to the Sabbath. But it is easy to see the punishment that will be meted out to Sunday workers, when the statement in the above paragraph becomes the prevailing idea. If Sunday is regarded as "the one chief pillar of the Republic," then of course those who disregard Sunday must be regarded as plotters against the government, and the punishment allotted to traitors will be given them.

Under the heading, "The Growing Uneasiness of Nations," the Christian Commonwealth, of December 21, has the following, which gives a fair idea of the state of men's minds at this time. And this is but the beginning. What will the end be?

Public observers are beginning to show sincere anxiety as the year draws to its close, in view of the evident restlessness of Continental nations. The feeling of European uneasiness is becoming daily more manifest. Critics of international conditions ascribe this ominous fall in the barometer to the great increase of Russian naval force in the Mediterranean. Everybody now couples Russia and France when allusions are made to possible trouble ahead, and when we consider the uncertainty of the Triple Alliance it becomes clear that there is abundant cause for solicitude. If Russia and France are strong in the Mediterranean, they at once threaten our access to Egypt and India. Our naval authorities are being goaded by alarmists to undertake a colossal augmentation of our fleets, seeing that the road to our Eastern Empire must be defended at any cost. All sorts of wild and random propositions are being made by busy theorists.

"Sunday Work by Episcopal Permission" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Sunday Work by Episcopal Permission.-A correspondent of the Church Times writes sympathetically of the simple life of the peasantry in certain portions of the Swiss mountains, where the tide of civilisation has not rushed in to make the people sordid and grasping. We read:-

At Saas Fee they are building themselves a new church, and have collected all the stones, sand, etc., for it. The first Sunday I was here I walked over there, and found men and women and little boys all hard it work, with their deep baskets on their backs, digging out the foundations. They had special leave from the bishop to work on Sundays.

This illustrates the Catholic idea of Sunday-keeping. It is simply a church ordinance, and may be suspended by church authorities. In England formerly, it was not infrequent that bishops of the Church of England gave permission at special times for the prosecution of secular labour on the Sunday. As it was an institution of the church, there was no reason why church authority should not direct in its observance. With the Sabbath of the Lord, however, it is vastly different. His blessing is upon it, and His presence in it to give rest of soul to those who believe, and no one on earth can come between the believer and his Lord, who says, "It is a sign between Me and you."

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

What a world of strength and comfort there is in the thought that God speaks to us with a "still small voice,"-that all the works of nature are the results of a small whisper. Since God whispers to us, He must be very near to us, and so He is. This suggests close communion with Him, in the closet, and about our daily tasks. It means that we must be listening, or we shall fail to catch the sound of His voice, although if we do listen we may hear it amid the loudest din of earth. Blessed is he who can say, "Speak, Lord, for Thy servant heareth."

"Getting Rid of Self" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Getting rid of self.-It is quite generally recognised that "self" is the great thing that stands in the way of Christian progress, and that it must be denied and put away. Accordingly we hear people express the determination to get rid of self, so that the Lord may have a complete possession. But too many forget that they themselves cannot put away self. For it is obvious that when self attempts to put self away, self will remain all the time. Self is sin, and only Christ can put away sin. He hath appeared to "put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself." Heb. ix. 26. "He gave Himself for our sins that He might deliver us from this present evil world." Gal. i. 4. Only the power by which He "emptied Himself," can empty us of self. Let us rejoice that He is abundantly able to do it, and simply yield ourselves to Him, that He may work His own will in us.

"Not Discouraged" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Not Discouraged.-Of Christ it is said, "He shall not fail or be discouraged, till He have set judgment in the earth." Isa. xlii. 4. He will set judgment in the earth, not as an abstract thing, but by putting righteousness into human hearts. That means in my heart, if I will let Him. He has undertaken my case, and knows all about me. He knows more of the evil of my heart than I have ever dreamed of. And yet He is not discouraged. Surely if Christ with all His knowledge of the sinfulness of my heart, and of the weakness of the flesh, is not discouraged, I have every reason to be of good courage, knowing that He who has begun a good work in me will perfect it against the day of His coming.

"Come to the Fountain" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

"Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price." Isa. lv. 1.

This is an invitation to come and drink of the water of life. We do not have to wait till we reach the Paradise of God before we experience the refreshment of this longed-for draught. In the last chapter of revelation the invitation is again given: "And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." Rev. xxii. 17. Whosoever desires this water of life, may come and take it now.

The water of life has been dispensed to mortals just as freely as the bread of life. Without bread and water, a person could not live. Neither can he live spiritually without the bread and water of life. The Israelites drank of this water in the wilderness; "for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ." 1 Cor. x. 4. Christ offered the same water to the woman at the well in Samaria, and also said, "Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water, springing up into everlasting life." John iv. 14.

The Psalmist declares that with God is the fountain of life. Ps. xxxvi. 9. God is "the fountain of living waters." Jer. ii. 13. The river of life that flows through the midst of Paradise, proceeds "out of the throne of God and of the Lamb." Rev. xxii. 1. Wherever God dwells, there is the fountain of life. And thus when Christ dwells in the heart by faith, there is in that individual "a well of water, springing up into everlasting life."

God is in His word; and therefore His word contains the water of life. Jesus said, "My flesh is meat indeed, and My blood is strength indeed;" and He explained His meaning by adding, "It is the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing; the words that I speak unto you, they are Spirit and they are life." John vi. 63. To the tempter in the wilderness He said, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." If man can live by the word of God, there must be in it the water of life.

The invitation given in the fifty-fifth of Isaiah offers us wine and milk. This is what the thirsty soul obtains when he heeds the invitation and comes "to the waters." But Peter declares the milk to be the word. "As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby." 1 Pet. ii. 2. Milk is that which nourishes, and wine is that which revives and cheers. And this is just what the word of God does to the one who receives it.

18

"Wherefore," says the prophet, "do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labour for that which satisfieth not? hearken diligently unto Me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness." How can this be realised? The prophet explains: "Incline your ear, and come unto Me; hear, and your soul shall live; and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David." Isa. lv. 2, 3.

God's word is the water of life, and whosoever will may come. It is free to all. Drink of that fountain, and you will realise that a river of living water flows through the desert, imparting to all who will take of it, everlasting life.

"The Knowledge of God" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

The Knowledge of God.-"Hereby shall we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him, whereinsoever our heart condemn us; because God is greater than our hearts, and knoweth all things." 1 John iii. 19, 20. How will the fact that God is greater than our hearts, and knoweth all things assure our hearts before Him, when consciousness of sin would naturally cause our hearts to condemn us?-Because of the assurance from God that "by His knowledge shall My righteous Servant justify many," or, as better expressed in the margin of the Revision, "Make many righteous." Isa. liii. 11. Grace and peace are multiplied to us "through the knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord." 2 Peter i. 2. Therefore we are exhorted to "grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ."

"Insulting God" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Insulting God.-This is what many professed Christians do, who would be shocked at the bare suggestion. Moreover they are not ashamed to do it to His face. Let us illustrate. Suppose I had an acquaintance to whom I would say on almost every occasion when we met, "I find it very difficult to believe what you say to me; I wish you would help me to believe what you say." That would not be complementary, to say the least; but the man might be so forbearing as to repeat his statements and promises. He might even go so far with me as to take a solemn oath that his words were true. Nevertheless I continue to say to him, "It is so difficult to believe you." And then when I meet with friends I speak of this one, and tell them how hard it is for me to believe him. Would not such conduct be justly called an insult to the man? Would what I say have a tendency to give others confidence in him? Everybody can see that such language would be the same as saying to others, "Be very cautious in your dealing with that man; look out for him, and do not trust him too much, or you may be deceived." Now that is just the way thousands of professed Christians treat God. It is an insult to God, and a disgrace to the cause of Christ, for any professed Christian to talk about lack of faith. They do not treat God with the ordinary courtesy that they would show a neighbour. Who can expect to see sinners converted to God, when those who profess to be acquainted with Him talk and act as though He were not to be trusted?

"Turning over a New Leaf" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

It is well to turn over a new leaf, as we are in the habit of essaying to do at this time of the year. But let it be remembered that this is something that must be done in wisdom. The important thing about turning over a new leaf is not the time of the year, but the manner in which it is done.

Sensible men of all classes have long recognised the folly of attempting to produce a perpetual motion,-or a machine which will create its own power. But the same men are constantly trying to make this idea practical in the moral life. They are constantly trying to get some power of themselves to make themselves do better; and that is nothing else than an attempt to create the power that they lack. But this is just as impossible as it is to create power for a perpetual motion. The principle is the same. And when one can be done, then we may expect to see the other.

God alone has power to create. If man could create power, he could make himself equal with God by simply creating enough power. But no man can furnish himself with any more moral strength than he already has. This is what he tries to do, but he cannot do it. He finds that he has not power enough in himself to live right, so he thinks the matter over and makes a resolve that he will live right,-as if that could create the power that he lacks. He does not stop to reflect that if he has not strength to do right, he has not strength to keep a resolve to do right; since the same strength is necessary for one as for the other. He fails; but still the ignis fatuus of some new strength that he can almost reach floats before him and lures him on through repeated failures, till he is ready to give up in despair.

This is the trouble very often with turning over a new leaf. We turn it over, but do not get anything more than we had before. It was human nature before; it is human nature now. It was human strength and wisdom before; it is nothing more than that now. And therefore we can only reasonably expect the same result.

We must have more strength; and the only way to get it is to have it put into us. For strength we must look to God. He has an abundance for all our needs, and is willing and more than willing to give it freely. He will give it if we will let Him. And the first step toward this is to lose all confidence in self. This is always a characteristic of the children of faith. "We are the circumcision," says Paul, "which worship God in the Spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh." Phil. iii. 3. When we failed, we trusted in the flesh,-in our own strength. But as soon as we cease to have confidence in it, we cease to trust in it. Then we look to God and trust alone in Him. We turn over a new leaf, not from self to self, but from self to Christ. And that leaf must always remain pure and spotless.

We must look to Christ until we cease to know self. We must reckon ourselves to "be dead indeed unto sin" (Rom. vi. 11), which means to be dead to self,-the carnal nature, the "old man," and then in the hour of temptation look to God, being yielded unto Him, and believe that He will strengthen us to continue dead unto self, but alive unto Him. Thus the channel is open through which God can fill us with His power, and thus supply the strength that we have not.

"The Purpose of Blessings" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

That which very often stands in the way of our receiving the blessing of God, is our failure to comprehend the purpose for which His blessings are given. If we would search out and know this as He has revealed it in His word, and would ask with that purpose in view, our petitions to God would not so often ascend in vain. And until we do so, we cannot ask according to His will.

God's blessing comes through the gift of His Spirit; and His Spirit is given us in order that we may do more and better work in His cause. The Lord never sends His Spirit to an individual merely to make that individual feel happy and enjoy himself, or to

19

gratify his curiosity. The Lord never gives His Spirit to be appropriated by self; for then self alone would be glorified. In every recorded instance of the pouring out of the Holy Spirit, it was to fit the recipients for labour.

The Lord said to Moses, "See, I have called by name Bezaleel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah; and I have filled him with the Spirit of God, in wisdom, and in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship. . . . And I, behold, I have given with him Aholiab, the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan; and in the hearts of all that are wise hearted I have put wisdom, that they may make all that I have commanded thee." Ex. xxxi. 2-6. No matter what the work may be, we need to be qualified for it by the reception of His Spirit.

As soon as Christ was anointed, "with the Holy Ghost and with power," He began His ministry, and "went about doing good." And when the wonderful outpouring of the Spirit took place on the day of Pentecost, there were converted the same day three thousand men.

It will not do, then, to have merely ourselves in view when we ask God for His blessing. We must have in view His glory, in the accomplishment of His work. We must ask with an expectation of being at once sent out in the harvest field; and until we do ask for that purpose, and not for our gratification, it will never come. We must bear in mind that the great thing now, and while this world lasts, is the accomplishment of God's work. This, and not our pleasure and convenience, is the matter of pressing moment; for we will have all eternity to feel happy in after we have entered into the joy of our Lord.

"Wisdom from the Spirit" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

Wisdom from the Spirit.-In Nehemiah ix. 20 we read this statement of God's dealing with Israel: "Thou gavest also Thy good Spirit to instruct them." More strictly literal would be the rendering, "to cause them to act wisely." The Jewish rendering is, "to make them intelligent." This is the word of the Spirit of God: to make the possessor "of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord." The Spirit of the Lord gives intelligence in regard to all the affairs of life, since the whole life of the Christian is to be one of serving God. The Lord says: "Turn you at My reproof; behold, I will pour out My Spirit upon you, I will make known My words unto you." Prov. i. 23. "For the commandment is a lamp; and the law is light; and reproofs of instruction are the way of life." Prov. vi. 23. What folly, then, to think to understand the Bible without the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is poured out into the hearts of all who have a will to obey the Lord; the Spirit leads into all the truth, only for the purpose that it may all be obeyed. And this obedience gives "subtilty to the simple, to the young man knowledge and discretion" in all things; for "a good understanding have all they that do His commandments." Ps. cxi. 10. So Moses said to Israel, concerning the commandments of God, "Keep therefore and do them; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, which shall hear all these statutes, and say, Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people." Deut. iv. 6.

"What Is Protestantism?" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

The name "Protestant" is derived from the protest of the German princes, which was read at the Diet of Spires, in 1529. The word therefore originated with the Reformation, and the principles of Protestantism are the principles of the Reformation.

It is a mistake to suppose that Protestant is simply a negation, or that it means any particular set of dogmas. Protestantism is not a statement of what Luther believed, not of the doctrines that were held by Wycliffe, or Zwingle, or Melancthon, or any other reformer. But it does consist of the principles which prompted all the real reformers that have ever lived. Let us note that principle, as exhibited by a few of the reformers, beginning with Wycliffe, who was in many respects the greatest of them all.

Of the principles that were common in the days of Wycliffe, and in which all the clergy had to be experts, Wylie ("History of Protestantism," Book 2, chapter 1) says:-

Philosophy then lay in guesses rather than facts. Whatever could be known from having been put before man in the facts of nature, or the doctrines of revelation, was deemed not worth further investigation. It was too humble an occupation, to observe and deduce. In the pride of his genius, man turned away from a field lying at his feet, and plunged boldly into a region where, having no data to guide him, and no ground for solid footing, he could learn really nothing. From this region of vague speculation, the explorer brought back only the images of his own creating, and, drawing up these fancies as facts, he passed them off as knowledge.

Wycliffe turned from this mass of rubbish to find in the Bible the only true wisdom, so that among the "heresies" which the Catholic Church found in his writings is this, that "wise men leave that as impertinent, which is not plainly expressed in Scripture." He held that "if there be any truth, it is in the Scripture, and there is no truth to be found in the schools that may not be found in more excellence in the Bible." And he also taught that "Christ wished his law to be observed willingly, freely, that in such obedience men might find happiness. Hence he appointed no civil punishment to be inflicted on transgressors of his commandments, but left them to a punishment more severe, that would come after the day of judgment."

To those who fear that in some of his teaching he was going too far, Wycliffe said:-

We do not sincerely believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, or we should abide by the authority of his word, especially of the evangelists, as of greater weight than every other. It is the will of the Holy Spirit that the books of the Old and New Law should be read and studied, as the one sufficient source of instruction; and that men should not be taken up with other books, which, true as they may be, and even containing Scripture truth, are not to be confided in without caution and limitation.

The fact that he translated the whole Bible into the language of the common people, shows that in the Bible and the Bible alone was Wycliffe's hope of any real reformation.

Coming down to the days of Tyndale, we find him speaking thus in regard to false clergy of his day:-

A thousand books had they lever to be put forth against their abominable doings and doctrines, than that the Scriptures should come to light. For as long as they may keep that down, they will so darken the right way with their mist of sophistry, and so tangle them that either rebuke or despise their abominations, with arguments of philosophy, and with worldly similitudes, and apparent reasons of natural wisdom, and with wrestling the Scriptures unto their own purpose, clean contrary unto the process, order, and meaning of the text; and so delude them in descanting upon it with allegories; and amaze them, expounding it in many senses before the unlearned lay people (when it hath but one literal sense, whose light the owls cannot abide) that though thou feel in thine heart, and art sure, how that all is false that they say, yet couldst thou not solve their subtle riddles.

Which thing only moved me to translate the New Testament. Because I perceived by experience how that it was impossible to establish the lay people in any truth, except the Scriptures were plainly laid before their eyes in their mother tongue.

Luther's whole work was based upon the Bible. It was the Bible that he found chained in the monastery at Erfurt, that turned him from darkness to light, and was the beginning of the Reformation to Germany. The Bible was at that time chained in

20

every sense of the word, for the common people could not get at it, and even if they could, they could not read it, because it existed only in an unknown tongue. But Luther unchained it, for he translated it into the simple language of everyday life, so that every peasant could read it.

In the controversy over the mass, Luther, although opposed to that ceremony, deprecated force, and said: "It is by the word that we must fight, by the word must we overthrow and destroy what has been set up by violence. It will not make use of force against the superstitious and unbelieving." "The mass is a bad thing; God is opposed to it; it ought to be abolished; and I would that throughout the whole world it were replaced by the supper of the Gospel. But let no one be torn from it by force. We must leave the matter in God's hands. His word must act and not we. And why so? You will ask. Because I do not hold men's hearts in my hand, as the potter holds the clay. We have a right to speak; we have not the right to act. Let us preach; the rest belongs to God." "Our first object must be to win men's hearts; and for that purpose we must preach the Gospel. To-day the word will fall in one heart, to-morrow into another, and it will operate in such a manner that each one will withdraw from the mass and abandon it. God does more by His word alone than you and I and all the world by our united strength."-D'Aubigne's History of the Reformation, book 9, chapter 3.

It matters not that Luther was not always consistent with these principles. There has been scarcely a single reformer in the world, who continued a reformer as long as he had. But these are the principles which made all the Reformation that there ever was. They were summed up in the following manner in the protest at Spires:-

Seeing. . . that there is no sure doctrine but such as is conformable to the word of God, that the Lord forbids the teaching of any other doctrine, that each text of the Holy Scripture ought to be explained by other and clearer texts, that the Holy Book is in all things necessary for the Christian, easy of understanding, and calculated to scatter the darkness, we are resolved, with the grace of God, to maintain the pure and exclusive preaching of His Holy Word, such as is contained in the Biblical books of the Old and New Testaments, whither abiding anything therein that may be contrary to it. This word is the only truth; it is the sure rule of all doctrines and of all life, and can never fail or deceive us. He who builds on this foundation shall stand against all the powers of hell, whilst all the human vanities that are set up against it shall fall before the face of God.

Thus it is that we cannot go to the writings of any man or any company of men to find out what Protestantism is. The reformers were but fallible mortals, and did not know all of the Scriptures. Custom had a strong hold on the best of them, so that they were persuaded by long habit that many things which they allowed were really according to the Scripture. True Protestantism is simply the truth of the Bible, without the addition of any man's opinion. Therefore to be a Protestant is not to believe just what Luther or any other reformer believed, but to hold to the Bible; and the Bible is explained by the Holy Spirit, as the sole guide in life. He who does contrary to this, is not a Protestant, no matter by what name he is called.

January 10, 1894

"'As Free as a Bird'" The Present Truth 10, 1.

E. J. Waggoner

The Lord Jesus Christ began His earthly ministry by reading in the synagogue at Nazareth the following words from Isaiah: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He hath anointed Me to preach the Gospel to the poor; He hath sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord." Luke iv. 18, 19. And then He said to the congregation, "This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears."

Turning to the place from which Christ read, we find these words: "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me; because the Lord hath anointed Me to preach good tidings unto the meek; He hath sent Me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and the opening of the prison to them that are bound." Isa. lxi. 1.

The Hebrew term which in Isaiah is rendered, "the opening of the prison," has the general signification of "opening," and is applied to the opening of the eyes of the blind, and the ears of the deaf. Accordingly the Saviour gave it this double application, in reading it, so that in Luke we have instead of the one statement, "the opening of the prison to them that are bound" the two statements, "recovering of sight to the blind," and, "to set at liberty them that are bruised."

The whole import of the text therefore is that Christ came to give freedom in every sense of the word. It is charged with the idea of liberty, and that to an extent that few realise. We shall be amply repaid for a few moments closer study of it, and for many hours of meditation upon it afterwards.

The word "liberty," in the statement, in Isa. lxi. 1, that Christ was anointed "to proclaim liberty to the captives," is from a Hebrew word, the primary signification of which is "a swallow." This noun is derived from a verb which signifies "to fly in a circle, to wheel in flight," like a bird in the air. From this it is easy to see how the word came to signify "freedom" and "liberty."

We learn, therefore, that the Bible idea of liberty is best represented by the graceful flight of a swallow through the air. We often use the figure, "as free as a bird," and that exactly expresses the liberty wherewith Christ makes us free. Is it not a glorious thing? What a sense of freedom thrills the soul at the very thought of it!

Sin is bondage. Jesus said, "Verily, verily I say unto you, Every one that committeth sin is the bondservant of sin." John viii. 34. Not only is the sinner in bondage, but he is in prison. The Apostle Paul says, "The Scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. But before faith came we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed." Gal. iii. 22, 23. The word "concluded" means, literally, "shut up together." All sinners are in bondage, shut up together in prison, condemned to hard labour.

The end of sin is death. James i. 15. Consequently the sinner is not only shut up in prison, condemned to hard, unprofitable labour, but he has the fear of death continually before him. It is from this that Christ delivers us. See Heb. ii. 14, 15. So we read in Ps. cii. 19, 20, "For He hath looked down from the height of His sanctuary; from heaven did the Lord behold the earth; to hear the groaning of the prisoner, to loose those that are appointed to death." Christ says, "If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed." John viii. 36.

"Free indeed." With the knowledge already gained from Isa. lxi. 1, we can easily grasp the fulness of that freedom. Imagine a bird that has been caught, and shut up in a cage. It longs for freedom, but the cruel bars make that impossible. Someone comes along and opens the door. The bird sees the opening, but has so often been deceived in his attempts to gain his

36

liberty, that he hesitates. He hops down finds that his prison is really open, trembles a moment for very joy at the thought of liberty, then spreads his wings and wheels through the air with such rapture as can be known only by one who has been a captive. "Free indeed." As free as a bird.

This is the liberty wherewith Christ frees the captive of sin. The Psalmist had that experience, for he said "Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers, the snare is broken, and we are escaped." Ps. cxxiv. 7. And this is the experience of every one who truly and without reserve accepts Christ.

But it is the truth that gives this freedom; for Christ says, "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." John viii. 32. He is the truth, and His word is truth. The Psalmist says, "Thy righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and Thy law is the truth." Ps cxix. 142. And he also says, "I will walk at liberty, for I seek Thy precepts." Ps. cxix. 45. As we learn from the margin, this is literally, "I will walk in a broad place, for I seek Thy precepts;" and this fits with what we learn in verse 96: "I have seen an end of all perfection; but Thy commandment is exceeding broad." The commandments of God form an exceedingly broad place in which all may walk who seek them. They are the truth, and it is the truth that gives freedom.

"The law is spiritual." Rom. vii. 14. That is, the law is the nature of God, for "the Lord is that Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." 2 Cor. Iii. 17. Because the Spirit of the Lord God was in Christ, He could proclaim liberty to the captives of sin. So we read the words of one who had been a captive slave, "sold under sin:" "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." Rom. Viii. 1, 2.

The law of God was, and is, in the heart of Christ. Ps. xl. 8. Out of the heart are the issues of life (Prov. iv. 23); therefore the life of Christ is the law of God. When men attempt to keep the law in their own strength, they invariably get into bondage, just as surely as though they wilfully broke it. The only difference is that in the latter case they are willing slaves, while in the former they are unwilling slaves. In Christ alone the perfect righteousness of the law is found, and therefore His life is "the perfect law of liberty," into which we are exhorted continually to look. James i. 25; Heb. xii. 2. The law that shuts up to certain death the man who is out of Christ, becomes life and liberty to the man who is in Christ.

We have seen that the "commandment is exceeding broad." How broad?-Just as broad as the life of God. Therefore the liberty, or the "broad place" in which one can walk who seeks the law of God, is the breadth of God's mind, which comprehends the universe. This is "the glorious liberty of the children of God." "His commandments are not grievous," but on the contrary are life and liberty to all who accept them "as the truth is in Jesus." God has not given us the spirit of bondage, but has called us to the liberty which He Himself enjoys; for if we believe His word we are His sons,-"heirs of God, and joint heirs with Jesus Christ."

Only the Spirit of God can give such liberty as this. No man can give it, and no earthly power can take it away. We have seen that no man can get it by his own efforts to keep the law of God. The greatest human efforts can result in nothing but bondage. Therefore when civil governments enact laws requiring men to follow a certain religious custom, they are simply forging fetters for them; because religion by law means a religion of purely human power. It is not the man who tries to do right, that is free, but the man who actually does right. But no man does the truth, except the one whose works are wrought in him by God Himself.

The liberty which Christ gives is liberty of the soul. It is liberty from the bondage of sin. That, and that alone is real religious liberty. It is found nowhere but in the religion of Jesus Christ. The man who has that liberty is free even in a prison cell. The slave who has it is infinitely more at liberty than his cruel master, even though he be a king. Who is there who does not want liberty that is something more than a name?

And now one more word of encouragement to the slave of sin, who is heart sick because of his bondage, and is discouraged through the failure of repeated attempts to escape. Freedom is yours, if you will but take it. Read again the words of Christ, which are living words to-day:-

"The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me; because the Lord hath anointed Me to preach good tidings unto the meek; He hath sent Me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and the opening of the prison to them that are bound; to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord." Isa. lx. 1, 2.

What is that?-Liberty has already been proclaimed. Your prison doors are already open, and you have only to believe it, and to walk out, continually believing it. Christ is to-day proclaiming liberty to you, for He has broken the snare, and loosed your bonds. Ps. cxvi. 16. He tells you that He has opened this prison door, so that you may walk at liberty, if you will only walk by faith in Him. It is faith that opens the door to the one who is shut up in sin. Believe His word, declare yourself free in His name, and then by humble faith stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free. Then will you know the blessedness of the assurance:-

"They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; they shall walk, and not faint." Isa. xl. 31.

January 11, 1894

"Dare You Trust Him?" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

Righteousness is its own reward; for righteousness is life, the life of Christ; and he who has this knows that he has all things that are needful. Therefore the Lord says, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow," or "be not therefore anxious for the morrow." Living only one day at a time, we know that He who is from eternity will be living on the morrow and in days still future, and His life is ours, and the care that is over the grass of the field and the fowls of the air is over us all.

At the beginning of the Christian life we count the cost. We forsake all, give up everything; and then, having lost our own life, we have His. There is therefore no more anxiety, and nothing for us but to follow Christ withersoever His voice may lead us. He never yet let anyone out into the wilderness to perish. There may be the path to the wilderness, seemingly impenetrable, but "when the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst, I the Lord will hear them, I the God of Israel will not forsake them. I will open rivers in high places, and fountains in the midst of the valleys; I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water." Isa. xli. 17, 18.

All we need is to know what the Lord says, and we turn to obey Him and follow His leading, knowing that He takes the responsibility of fulfilling His own promises. The man who steps out in faith, believing God, and not as an experiment to find out if the Lord really means what He says, will always find that "the way of the righteous is made plain." Prov. xv. 19. We are so apt to take counsel with our fears and our own resources, and forget the Lord our Maker, "that hath stretched forth the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth."

Some men are afraid to be strictly honest in business, for fear they will fail in these days of keen and unscrupulous competition. Others fear they may come to want, and dare not walk out on the bare promise of God when some duty is newly brought to their mind in the word. If they could but plan the future, and see clearly the way out they would not hesitate. But have we more confidence in our own plans and ability than in the Lord's? He has planned a way out from the beginning to the end. He is the Way, and the man who has Christ as a living Presence knows that he has more than all the world can afford. Israel in the wilderness limited the Lord's power in their behalf by unbelief, and yet He cared for every detail of their necessities. The Lord says by Moses, "Yet in this thing ye did not believe the Lord your God, who went in the way before you, to search you out a place to pitch your tents in, in fire by night, to show you by what way ye should go, and in a cloud by day." Deut. i. 33.

In this busy world men are every day putting confidence in their own ability and efforts to make their way, forgetting that they are dependent upon God for the natural life and strength which they are daily using. And even those who profess to believe the Lord are often thrown into doubt and perplexity when the path of right and duty interferes with previously formed business relations, just as though the Lord is not able to make up to them all that is vital to life and godliness if they trust Him. The Lord warned the Israelites against being tempted to disobey Him in the busy harvestime. He said, "Six days shalt thou work, but on the seventh day thou shalt rest: in earing time and in harvest thou shalt rest." Ex. xxxiv. 21. No pressure of circumstances can shut the real believer away from obedience to God's word. The blessing of God in Sabbath-keeping is worth more than all the riches of the Orient, because it has in it all that Christ is to men. So it is in every duty and privilege. Not an anxious thought need be given to temporal necessities. "Your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of these things."

21

In days when Israel dwelt in the land of Canaan they were commanded to let the land rest every seventh year, and the Lord said, "And if ye shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year? behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase; then I will command My blessing upon you in the sixth year, and it shall bring forth fruit for three years." Lev. xxv. 20, 21.

Sometimes the Lord comes to men plainly revealing some duty which seems to involve their whole life work. Perhaps the labour and capital representing many years must all be left if the call of duty is responded to. Many have this to face when they come to consider the question of true Sabbath keeping, and in various ways the test may come. Whatever it may be, and however it may come, we have only to remember God's promises and power. The King of Judah had once hired an army of Israel to help him, when the word of the Lord came saying he should not let Israel go with him to the battle. "And Amaziah said to the man of God, But what shall we do for the hundred talents which I have given to the army of Israel? And the man of God answered, The Lord is able to give thee much more than this." 2 Chron. xxv. 9.

God is able to make all things to abound unto His children, and He will withhold no good thing. Therefore He says, "Receive My instruction, and not silver; and knowledge rather than choice gold. For wisdom is better than rubies; and all the things that may be desired are not to be compared to it." Prov. viii. 10, 11.

"Though I have friends so many,
Love, and gold, and health,
If I have not Thee, my Saviour
Hold I any wealth?"

"One Voice" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

One Voice.-The Jews professed to believe the writings of Moses, but they did not. Christ said to them: "For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed Me: for he wrote of Me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe My words?" The man who rejects one word from God really rejects the whole; for it is the same voice throughout.

This is illustrated in the progress of so-called Biblical criticism. The critics began with the Old Testament, and the writings of Moses. Then Isaiah and the other prophets, and the Psalms were disposed of, higher criticism deciding what portions should be received. Now the critics deal with the words of Christ in the New Testament in the same manner. This is as Christ said, "If ye believed not his [Moses'] writings, how shall ye believe My words?" Christ spake by Moses and the prophets as verily as by His own lips. It is the same voice, the same tone, and the same Gospel,-"Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever."

"The Power of the Spirit" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

Just before the Lord ascended to heaven, He said to His disciples, "Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you; and ye shall be witnesses unto Me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost parts of the earth." Acts i. 8.

This promise is to us as well as to those who heard His voice as He uttered it; for every one who knows the Lord is to be a witness for Him, and nothing can be done without the power of the Holy Spirit. God has promised the Spirit to all who desire it; that is, to all who are willing to receive, or to undergo, all that is involved in the receiving of the Spirit.

The marginal reading of the text above quoted is, "Ye shall receive the power of the Holy Ghost coming upon you." The question is, How is this power to be received? What are we to expect and pray for? One thing may be definitely answered, and that is that the Spirit will not come to any man in the way which he may have marked out. For the thoughts of God and the power of God are not after the model of man's mind.

When the word of the Lord found Elijah in the wilderness, as he fled from Jezebel, it said to him: "Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the Lord. And, behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the Lord; but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake; but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire; but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice. And it was so, when Elijah heard it that he wrapped his face in his mantle, and went out, and stood in the entering in of the cave. And, behold, there came a voice unto him, and said, What doest thou here, Elijah?" 1 Kings xix. 11-13.

But for the express declaration to the contrary, we should have said that the Lord was in the wind and the earthquake. It is natural for man to suppose that nothing less than a hurricane could reveal the power of God; but from the above we learn that God shows his power in more quiet ways. It was a voice, "a still, small voice," that revealed the Lord to Elijah. So it will be with us.

God says to us: "Be still, and know that I am God." Ps. xlvi. 10. It is "in quietness and confidence" that our strength lies; in returning and rest we find salvation. We must be silent before the Lord, or else we shall miss the still, small voice which alone reveals Him to the soul. God can thunder with a terrible voice, but we could not understand that; so He reveals Himself to us in a whisper. That conveys intelligible sound to our understanding, whereas the thunder would only startle and terrify us. So we read, "Lo these are but the outskirts of His ways; but how small a whisper do we hear of Him! But the thunder of His power who can understand?" Job xxvi. 14.

Jesus was on the sea of Galilee with His disciples, when "there arose a great tempest in the sea, insomuch that the ship was covered with the waves." The disciples in their terror appealed to the Master. "And He arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm." Matt. vii. 24; Luke viii. 39. Who that reads this ever imagines that Jesus lifted His voice above the roar of the tempest, in order to calm it? We cannot imagine such a thing. Only the weak man, conscious of his weakness, raises his voice in giving commands. The loud tone is used for the purpose of trying to conceal the lack of real power. The man who has authority, and who knows that he has the power to back up his commands, uses a low tone. Jesus always spoke as one that had authority; so that in stilling the tempest we find the same "still, small voice" which Elijah heard.

This still, small voice is the same voice by which the universe was created. "By the word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of His mouth." Ps. xxxiii. 6. Was it necessary for God to utter His voice in thunder, in order to bring the worlds into existence? Certainly not; an order from the commander of an army, given in a whisper is just as effective in setting troops in motion as though

22

shouted at the top of his voice. So with the King of the universe; the simple breathing from the Lord was sufficient to create all the worlds. The still, small voice that spoke to Elijah, was the voice that created. And it is the same word of power that now upholds all things (Heb. i. 3), because, as before noted, it is only a small whisper that we hear of Him in all the works,-the "parts of His ways,"-that we know anything about.

Most of the great manifestations of the power of God in the earth, are silent and unseen. We know that the power is there, only by the results. Think of the thousands of millions of tons of water that the sun is constantly lifting up from the earth to the clouds, to send down again in dew and rain. Not a sound is heard throughout all; but man cannot pump a cup full without much noise. The power manifested in plant growth is beyond all human conception, yet there is no sound. A plant may in its growth rend a rock asunder, yet it is all done silently, and unseen. The heavens declare the glory of God, yet they ring no bells, and blow no trumpets. God's work is so mighty that the results speak; advertisement would belittle it.

But the word by which the heavens were made, and by which they are upheld, and by which all the operations of nature are carried on, is the word of the Gospel which is preached unto us. The words of the Lord are Spirit and life. The word of God is living and powerful (Heb. iv. 12), and it works effectually in all who believe in it. 1 Thess. ii. 13. The Saviour breathed on the disciples, saying, "Receive ye the Holy Ghost." John xx. 22. It was the same breathing by which the worlds were made, and by which they are upheld. The power of the Spirit, therefore, is creative power, and that is in the word of the Lord. And so we may know that the power of the Holy Ghost, which Christ promised to His followers, comes only through His word.

God speaks to us in His word. The word of God is the sword of the Spirit. Eph. vi. 17. It is the Spirit that reproved sin (John xvi. 7, 8), and it does it by the law; for "the law is spiritual" (Rom. vii. 14), and "by the law is the knowledge of sin." Rom. iii. 20. The first thing, therefore, that the Spirit does when it comes, it is to convict of sin. If the reproof is accepted, and the sin is acknowledged, then the Spirit's power is manifested in taking the sin away. It convinces of righteousness. If the reproof is rejected, then of course the Spirit is resisted, and its power will not be given to that person. As the reproofs which the Spirit gives through the word are heeded, the word abides within, and the life is shaped by it. Such an one is then led by the Spirit. As a result of thus heeding reproof, the Spirit is poured out (Prov. i. 23), and of course its power is manifested in those upon whom it is poured.

Thus it will appear that it is utter folly and mockery to pray for the pouring out of the Spirit of God, while we are holding off any reproof, or cherishing any sin pointed out by the word of God. The office of the Spirit is to lead into all truth, and therefore to pray for its outpouring means to yield ourselves without reserve to every commandment of God. If we do this, God will give us His Spirit without measure. It will not be given simply for our pleasure, but it is given that we may be witnesses to the Lord. The pouring out of the Spirit makes known the words of God, so that we may make known to the world those words of power.

But all this will be without boasting or ostentation, although it will be the mightiest manifestation of power ever known among men. The Lord says: "Behold My Servant, whom I uphold; Mine Elect, in whom My soul delighteth; I have put only My Spirit upon Him; He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause His voice to be heard in the street. A bruised reed shall He not break, and the smoking flax shall He not quench." Isa. xlii. 1-3. That is the way the Lord works by the Spirit. He shall bring forth judgment unto truth, working with such power that the nations will be amazed, yet with such gentleness that even the reed that is bruised will not be broken, and the wick that is but dimly burning will not be extinguished. It will not be the power of the tempest, but the power of the sunlight and of plant growth.

The power that the Spirit gives, therefore, is the power that works throughout all creation. It is the power of God's word, and is manifested only in those who are fully yielded to that word. God says, "As the snow cometh down, and the rain from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater; so shall My word be that goeth forth out of My mouth." Isa. lv. 10, 11. The Spirit is also likened to water; it is "poured out" as the rain. See Isa. xliv. 3. The power of the Spirit in man will therefore be the power that is put in operation when the rain falls on the earth. Who will yield to that blessed influence? "For the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth for herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God." Heb. vi. 7. As the earth brings forth fruit, so we are to bring forth righteousness. Isa. lxi. 11. Therefore "it is time to seek the Lord, till He come and rain righteousness upon you."

"Hypnotism and True Liberty" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

A striking illustration of the way in which Satan works on the minds of men may be drawn from the workings of mesmerism, or hypnotism. In fact it is more than illustration, it is a sample of the working itself; for it is a well-known fact that the person who yields himself as a "subject" weakens his will just to the extent that He indulges in it. And anything that tends to make a man subject to another is only of the devil. A writer in Cassell's Saturday Journal gives an account of his experience as a subject. First he was instructed to yield his will completely, and directly the operator had full possession of the mental and physical impulses.

When the professor moved, I felt compelled to follow and imitate those movements. Onlookers assured me afterwards that I watched him as earnestly as though my life depended upon keeping him in sight. This he explained by saying aloud that an invisible wire had been established between our two selves; when he commanded I must obey, without consulting my own will. Practically, I had no will, said he; his own had subjugated mine entirely. He was the magnet and I the needle. To myself everything was real and sober enough. I saw nothing ridiculous in the situation. Thus, when he beckoned, I followed; when He waved his hands before my face, saying confidently, "You cannot utter your name. Try!" lo, I found I could make no sound! He lifted an arm, and I was straightway impelled to do likewise. "You cannot drop that arm!" said he; and for the life of me I could not. He next restored my voice-merely by telling me that it was restored-and bade me sing. I did so without hesitation-a thing I could never have done in ordinary circumstances. Then he handed me a glass, remarking that it contained wine. I drank the liquor, and can honestly affirm that it looked and tasted exactly as wine would have done-albeit I subsequently learned that I had imbibed unadulterated salt and water!

The subject had lost his own individuality

23

and was simply a tool of another.

It is the same with the sinner. Having yielded to sin, he walks "according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience." Eph. ii. 2. For "know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness." Rom. vi. 16. Just as the hypnotic operator suggests impulses to the subject, Satan insinuates his suggestions, and makes the subject believe that the bitterest draught is sweet, and while a veritable slave, that he has liberty. Thus it is that men do the work of the devil and "know not what they do."

But there is this feature that gives a refuge of hope, sure and steadfast. God did not leave man to himself when he by his own choice became a subject of sin. God said, "I will put enmity between thee [the serpent] and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed," and as this consciousness of the thralldom of sin and a longing for freedom in the inmost soul of every man leads him, though in the depths of sin, to wish for deliverance, the Gospel proclaims a Deliverer. The apostle describes this stage in the soul's experience when he tells how he longed to be free but found a power within him "warring against" the law of his mind, and bringing him "into captivity to the law of sin." He was under the control of Satan, powerless to control his impulses, and cried out, "O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from this body of death?" No effort of his could do it, but by faith alone in the Gospel he answered his question. "I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord." Christ came to proclaim liberty to the captives. Even the physically dead can hear the voice of God and live, and the captives of Satan's art hear the voice and find in the power of that voice something which breaks the spell of sin, and lets the oppressed go free.

Then the man who yields his will to God becomes again a captive and a tool. "Yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God." Rom. vi. 13. "It is God that worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure." Phil. ii. 13. Even every thought is brought "into captivity" "to the obedience of Christ." 2 Cor. x. 5. This captivity is unto righteousness, to be sure, but in another respect it is the very opposite of the devil's bondservice. Every time we yield to him, the power of the will is weakened. But God never invades the freedom of the will. His service energises and quickens every faculty, and only in His service is the will perfectly free and unfettered. At every step it is free to choose. Satan promises men freedom while he himself is a servant of corruption. The Lord asks us to become His slaves, and in subjection to Him we find the only true freedom, the very liberty of God; for whom the Son makes free "shall be free indeed." And as Satan worked wickedness by us before, so now with greater power the Lord works righteousness by us; "because greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world." 1 John iv. 4.

"The Nature of God's Commandment" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

"If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar; for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, that he who loveth God love his brother also." 1 John iv. 20, 21. A little consideration of this text will give a very clear idea of the nature of the commandments of God. Let us first ask a few questions about it.

Does the text teach that whosoever loves God is thereby laid under obligations to love his brother also? that if a man loves God, and does not love his brother also, he will be punished for violation of law?-Manifestly not, from the very statement of the text, that a man cannot love God without loving his brother. "He that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, cannot love God whom he hath not seen." Since a man cannot love God if he does not also have love for his brother, or neighbour, it is evident that the text does not mean that there is a special law enacted for those who love God, requiring them to love their brethren.

Love comes from God. "Everyone that loveth is begotten of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love." Therefore whoever loves God must of necessity love his brother also. He must love all men, for God's love is without respect of persons. And this shows that men cannot, as is now quite commonly thought, learn to love God by first loving their fellow-men. Love to God is first. Jesus said, "The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord; and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength; this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." Mark xii. 29-31.

No man can love his neighbour unless he loves God, because love is of God; and nobody can love God without loving his brother. Love is one. It cannot be forced, for the use of force is sure death to love. It must flow spontaneously. Yet we have the statement, "This commandment have we from Him, that he who loveth God love his brother also." The thing therefore that we are to learn from this is that the commandment of God is something far different from the commandments of men. Human laws are wholly a matter of force; but God's commandment is that we should love one another, and that cannot be a matter of force.

The law of God is love. "For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not grievous." 1 John v. 3. "For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: Thou shall love thy neighbour as thyself." Gal. v. 14. "Owe no man anything, but to love one another; for he that loveth another

24

hath fulfilled the law." "Love worketh no ill to his neighbour; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law." Rom. xiii. 8, 10. When God spoke His law, it was because "He loved the people." Deut. xxxiii. 2, 3.

It is clear from the Scriptures that the law of God is love, even the love of God. But God Himself is love. He does not merely have love, but love is the very life of God. Therefore the law of God is His life. And this brings us to the words of Jesus: "For I have not spoken of Myself; but the Father which sent Me, He gave Me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak. And I know that His commandment is life everlasting; whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said unto Me, so I speak." John xii. 49, 50. The commandment of God is life eternal, and to know God is life eternal (John xvii. 3), showing that the commandment of God is His own life. We know one only as we know his life. So we know God only by knowing His life, and His life is eternal life; but His commandment is life eternal, because His commandment is His life. In other words, the life of God is the law for man.

"No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him." John i. 18. God set forth His Son, in whom was His own life, in order that we might know what the law is. In Christ we have the real, living law.

We read that out of the heart are the issues of life. Now Christ said of Himself, "Lo, I come; in the volume of the book it is written of Me. I delight to do Thy will, O My God; yea, Thy law is within My heart." Ps. xl. 7, 8. Therefore the life which issued from Christ was the law of God; and as He lived by the Father (John vi. 57), we see again the law of God is His life.

In Christ "all fulness" dwells, even "all the fulness of the Godhead bodily." The Apostle Paul wrote thus of his prayer: "I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God." Eph. iii. 14-19.

This is an inspired prayer, and therefore we know that it is the will of God that its request should be granted. If we but allow Christ to dwell in our hearts, He will bring in all His fulness, which is all the fulness of God. From our hearts will issue the same life that issued from the heart of Christ on earth, even the life of God. And so we shall find that His commandment is not grievous, because it is not an arbitrary requirement laid on us, but our very life. It is not something which we are to do by our own strength, but which, if we allow it, will work itself out in us.

How will this life be manifested in us? Just as it was in Christ when He was on earth; for He is the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever. When tempted to idolatry, He replied, "It is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve." Matt. iv. 10. Therefore the one in whom is the life of Christ, cannot be an idolater.

When the parents of Jesus found Him in the temple, asking and answering the questions of the doctors, He was not impatient of control, although He was so wonderfully wise, far exceeding them in that respect; but "He went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them." Luke ii. 51. Therefore the one in whom is the real law of God, in the form of the life of Christ, will honour his father and his mother, as required in the fifth commandment; and He will not find it burdensome to do so.

Jesus said, "To this end was I born, and for this purpose came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth." John xviii. 36. He "did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth." 1 Peter ii. 22. Therefore those in whom He dwells will not only tell the truth, but they will love the truth. They will love the truth so much that they will never seek to parry its force, nor to evade any portion of the truth of God's word.

The tenth commandment says, "Thou shalt not covet." So far was Christ from coveting, that He freely gave up everything that was His own. And so those in whom He dwells will not find it a grievous matter to be content with such things as they have.

Christ kept the Sabbath, even the seventh day of the week, and no other. His life was God's life, and the life of God is the law for men; therefore those who live solely by Him will also keep the Sabbath day. They will not consider this a burdensome thing, but will delight in it, even as Christ delighted to do the will of God. Those who delight in the Sabbath, also delight themselves in the Lord (Isa. lviii. 13, 14), this showing again that the law of God, including the fourth commandment, is the life of God. To delight in the law, is to delight in the life of the Lord.

Let us therefore say to Christ as He stands at the door and knocks, "Come in, Thou that comest in the name of the Lord." Let Him come in with all the Divine fulness, to live in us His own blessed will. It will be different from anything that we have ever before done, "for My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts." Isa. lv. 8, 9. The desire of man is to rise, and here is elevation indeed. The life of God will lift the one who accepts it from earth to heaven.

"In the Pond" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

When our eyes are once opened to behold the wonders round us, we shall be surprised to find the most commonplace little pond turned into a veritable school of learning with teachers innumerable.

There are the newts with beautiful "crimson-stained and undulating

27

crests," and eyes "gleaming like fiery topaz," with their curious habits and strange, baby ways.

Swarms of water-beetles may be seen, the most interesting, perhaps, a "living, diving bell" with wondrous swimming-legs and set of strongest suckers.

Then there are the whirlwig beetles with their water telescopes; each one has four eyes, two above and two below-two to see below the water and two to see above it, each eye, of course, being composed of many little eyes.

Numberless water-boatmen float on their backs and row themselves along with their oar-like legs.

The curious larv? of of the dragon-fly "propels himself forward by squirting water backward, having within him a 'direct action' propeller." See! How the dragon-fly eats. His mouth opens four ways at once!

May flies, many species of caddis, and swarms upon swarms of the larv? of gnats and other flies are found there besides aquatic crustacean almost without number, and hundreds of other creatures fully as interesting as these.

"Insects" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

"Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise." Prov. vi. 6.

By reading the above verse, we find that God wishes people to study even the little insects. Although some are so small that most people never notice them, they can teach us many useful lessons; they are all wonderful, and many are really very beautiful.

If you notice carefully, you will see that there are two kinds of insects, those having jaws or mouths, like the ants, bees, beetles, and grasshoppers; and those having sucking-tubes, like the butterflies, moths, flies, and mosquitoes. A full-grown insect always has six jointed legs, and two horns or feelers. They have a row of breathing tubes along their sides, and most of their bones, instead of being on the inside of their bodies, are on the outside, like a soldier's armour, to keep them from getting hurt.

No kind ever had a better or more beautiful armour than the Tiger Beetle, or Sparkler. Its suit is light but strong, allows the insect to move in any direction, and yet covers every part of its body; it shines with more then steely brightness, and looks as though it were trimmed with gold, and dotted with sparkling stones. This beetle even folds up its wings when not in use, and lays them carefully away in a stout little case on its back.

How delicate and beautiful are the wings of insects! Look at the common fly. Its wings are so thin and clear that you can see through them, and yet they are so ribbed, like a leaf, that they are quite strong. If you move them in the sunlight you see all the colours of the rainbow dancing over them. The most beautiful of all insects are the butterflies and moths. And yet these things of beauty were once but creeping caterpillars! Then let us not despise one little creature that God has made; it may not appear beautiful to us, and we may not know that it is good for anything, but we may be sure that it is, or God would not have made it. The more we study about them, the more we wonder and admire.

The eyes of insects are very wonderful. They are often smaller than the hole made by a tiny pin, and yet they are really often composed of thousands of little eyes or facets. Some ants have about fifty, the dragon-fly 12,000, and some beetles and butterflies as many as 25,000, while the common house-fly has two eyes, each made up of 2,000 little eyes. It is thus enabled to see in almost all directions at once.

The tiniest insects have tools as perfect as those belonging to the larger creatures that God has made. The little breathing holes along the sides of the fly have fine sieves to keep out dust. The bottom of its foot has two strong hooks and some small suckers with which the fly can hold on the wall and even walk on the ceiling. The saw-fly has a saw and glue, and one kind of bee has a boring tool and a cutting instrument with which it can cut leaves to fit its nest as well as you could with the scissors. The mosquito has a pump, the earwigs, pincers, and the baby glowworm has a brush with which to keep itself clean. The honey bee has a honey bag, and the fire-fly carries a lantern under his wings; the wasp has a paper mill, and the silk worm a spinning machine.

Although so small, insects are very useful. The Burying Beetles bury in the ground every dead bird, mouse, or small reptile that they find, and thus keep them from making the air impure. Lady-birds kill the plant lice that get on our flowers and plants. The bright reds and pretty pinks in pink, water paints, wool, and silk, are made from the dried bodies of the Cochineal Insects. The Lac Insects give out a reddish brown substance that is used in making sealing wax, varnish, and cement. And who has not seen, yes, and eaten, the many little six-sided rooms full of sweet honey, made by the busy bees? When you put on your shining ribbons and silk clothing, do you ever stop to think of the little worms that worked hours and hours in spinning those silken threads? A silk worm hands itself by its hind feet and, for seventy-two hours, spins away until it has a fine unbroken thread of silk eleven miles longs wound round its body!

It is no wonder that God thinks that sluggards (lazy persons) might learn something by watching the ants. The farming ants of western Texas clear a piece of land four or five feet wide round their city, take away all plants, stones, and rubbish, sow a certain kind of grass, tend it carefully, keep it free from weeds, and when ripe carry the seeds to their nests. If the seeds are found too damp, they are carried out, laid in the sunshine until dry enough, and housed again. In South America, the Leaf-cutting Ants build nests about two feet high and often forty feet across; and in one instance it was found that they had dug a well one foot across and thirty feet deep, so that they might have water. The White Ant often builds its houses sixteen or seventeen feet high, and, although hollowed out into many rooms, it is strong enough to hold up heavy cattle. There are many other things which you must find out for yourself.

What wonderful insects, wonderful birds, and wonderful water-animals! And they were all made on one day! No wonder that the One who is kind-hearted, powerful, and wise enough to do that is named "Wonderful." Isa. ix. 6. Let us show Him how much we thank Him, by treating every creature that He has made with gentleness and kindness, and by learning the lessons that He would have us learn from them.

1. Do you like to work?

2. What does God say that lazy people should do? Prov. vi. 6.

3. Why does He wish them to watch the ant?

4. Can you think of some other little creature that is always very busy?

30

5. Where does it find the honey that it gathers?

6. In what does it carry it?

7. Where does it store it?-In little six-sided rooms that it makes itself.

8. How can it do such fine work in the dark?-It uses its feelers.

9. Do you think of anything that you can learn from the bee?

10. What strange thing is done by the Burying Beetles?

11. Name some other things for which insects are useful?

12. Out of what do wasps make their nests?-Some use clay, others use paper, while others use hard white shiny cardboard.

13. Where do they get their paper and cardboard?-They make it out of fine bits of wood.

14. What can a fly do that you cannot do?

15. How does he manage to walk on the ceiling without falling off?

16. Name some of the strange tools that insects have.

17. What kind of clothing do insects wear?

18. Which are the most beautiful of all insects?

19. Then should we despise the caterpillar and other insects that do not at first appear beautiful or useful? Why not?

20. How do insects breathe?

21. How many kinds are there?-Two: those having jaws, and those having sucking tubes.

22. How long would it take a man to make one of these smallest insects?

23. How long was God in making all the insects, all the birds, and all the water animals.

24. What new name have we learned by which He is called?-"Wonderful."

25. Do you not think that a good name for Him?

26. How can we show Him that we thank Him for His great goodness in placing around us these wonderful creatures?

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

-It is reported that a Ministerial crisis has occurred in Servia.

-Central European time has been adopted throughout Denmark.

-A midwinter international exhibition has been opened at San Francisco.

-The influenza is very severe in the Crimea among all classes of the population.

-The wheat harvest in the Argentine Republic is expected to yield over 72,250,000 bushels.

-The grounds of the World's Fair at Chicago have been restored to the possession of the public.

-A Washington telegram states that last year's revenue deficiency will amount to $37,000,000.

-About 500 dockers have already been engaged to work at Manchester in connection with the new ship canal.

-There is a prospect that the difficulty between Ecuador and Peru will be settled by the intervention of the Pope.

-The opening of the Manchester Canal has given an impetus to a scheme for connecting Birmingham with the sea.

-The Bristol Town Council have decided, by 88 votes to 19, not to open the City Museum and Free Libraries on Sundays.

-Cholera has broken out in several boarding schools in St. Petersburg. There are about thirty fresh cases and fifteen deaths daily.

-Twenty-nine million letters passed through the General. Post Office in London at Christmas, compared with 32,000,000 last year.

-The known murders in America in twelve months numbered 6,790. In five years 1,042 supposed murderers have been lynched.

-An attempt is being made to reopen the Maybrick case, evidence in favour of Mrs. Maybrick having, it is stated, been discovered.

-Public indignation in Italy at the acquittal of the Aigues Mortes rioters was testified at Genoa and Turin by anti-French demonstrations.

-Great distress prevails among the population in the district of Apulia, in Southern Italy, owing to the dearth of money and the scarcity of work.

-A serious fire occurred at Toledo, Ohio, on Jan. 3, the Chamber of Commerce and other buildings being destroyed. The loss is estimated at $1,000,000.

-The present visit to Rome of Dr. Zerr, Roman Catholic bishop of Tiraspol, is expected to lead to the re-establishment of diplomatic relations between Russia and the Vatican.

-The epidemic of cholera in Teneriffe is rapidly subsiding. A thousand deaths have occurred in that island since the outbreak, an enormous proportion to so small a community.

-Owing to the continued hard treatment meted out to the Stundists, large numbers of them have left the province of Kieff, and have settled in a colony in the province of Ekaterinoslav.

-The German Emperor is having a new crown constructed for himself, and has made a bid for the enormous diamond recently brought to England from the Cape.

-Naples is greatly exalted over a painting of the Virgin, which is said to have miraculously appeared on one of the windows of a building under the control of the priests.

-Nothing has yet been heard from the party under Captain Wilson who went in pursuit of Lobengula some weeks since, and the general opinion is that it was surrounded and annihilated by the Matabela.

-The Japanese government is showing its antipathy to foreigners by passing laws forbidding all Japanese to hold land or do business in their own name for foreigners living outside certain "foreign settlements."

-A preliminary announcement issued by the Russian Public Treasury states that the toted revenue from Jan. 1, 1898, to Oct. 1 last, amounted to 778,615,000 roubles; the total expenditure for the same months was 708,997,000 roubles.

-The London Fire Brigade received about 5000 calls during the year, against 4,449 in 1892. Over 1,000 of the calls proved to be false, although the magistrates have the power of inflicting a fine of ?20 for midi timely tampering with the fire alarms.

-Parcels can now be sent to Greece by parcel post, both our Brindisi and via Marseilles. Parcels are also now accepted by the Post Office authorities for transmission to Persia at the following rates: For the first pound, 4s. 4d.; for each additional pound or fraction of a pound 8d.

-Advices from Paris state that 2,000 search warrants were issued on Jan. 1, in the provinces, which resulted in the seizure of some papers which are acted to prove that a real union exists among the Anarchists in the different parts of France. The preparations for Vaillant's trial are being hastened.

-Further rioting is reported from Trapani, in Sicily, where two petards were exploded by the mob, but without causing much damage. At Gibellina, in the same province, the police magistrate was killed in a scuffle. More troops have been called out for service in Sicily, and the garrison of the island will be brought up to 40,000 men.

-According to telegrams from the Cameroons, there has been a serious mutiny of native soldiers in the service of the Germans, who, to the number of sixty, together with forty armed women, provided themselves with rifles, cannon, and ammunition, and attacked the loyal garrison, as well as the factories, including those belonging to the English traders. The mutineers were at first successful, but were eventually put to flight.

-The eastern portion of Siberia is said to be experiencing a veritable Chinese invasion. A telegram from Vladivostock states that bands of Chinese robbers are pillaging on the outskirts of that town and along the Ussuri railway, now in course of construction. The chief of the fifth section of the line telegraphs that the Chinese are openly threatening an attack, owing to which the Cossacks and workmen are in a state of panic.

-The Russian Government continues to take systematic measures for the expulsion of the Jews from Russia, by enacting laws restricting to a very small minimum the number of Jews allowed in various avenues of trade and learning. The educational status of the Russian people is indicated by the statement that of 14,000,000 Russian children between the ages of seven and fourteen only 4,000,000 receive education of any kind.

-It is announced from Odessa that in several important provinces in Russia, the drink traffic is henceforth to be under the control and supervision of the State. "Curatoriums" will be instituted, the members of which will be the leading officials of the province, whose duties it will be to take measures for the extirpation of drunkenness among the people, and maintain a sharp supervision over the officials connected with the sale of drink.

-Three Vienna tourists lost their lives on the Alps at Christmas. The last survivor cut the rope which held them together, to rid himself of his two dead comrades. Another party ascended the Alps with the intention of greeting the New Year at the summit of Gnifetti. Being overtaken by a storm, they were forced to pass the night on the glacier. One was frozen to death, and four others were carried down next day in a dangerous condition.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

At the recent annual meeting of Wesley's Chapel Mission, the chair was occupied by a Member of Parliament, who in the course of his address said: "The Church must pronounce itself emphatically on the side of temperance, social purity, and against gambling." A sadder and more humiliating confession could not be made. Think what is implied in such a statement. It is nothing less than that the world cannot tell how the church stands on such questions, unless it makes a formal declaration of its principles. No one was ever at a loss to know how Christ stood in regard to sin, yet He never issued a confession of faith, nor a formal declaration of principles. The power of the Church of Christ is in living, and not in declarations and resolutions.

The Catholic Times, under the heading, "Catholic Influence in America," calls attention to the almost universal celebration of Christmas as "a fact which shows how successfully Catholic thought and Catholic sentiment has permeated American public life." It notes the former disregard of the day, quoting a law was enacted against the celebration of Christmas, in the colony of Massachusetts, and then says: "At the present day nowhere in the world is the Christmas festival observed more generally and with a true sense of its real significance than in the place where it was thus legislated against. The cold Puritanism of New England has been thoroughly leavened with Catholic sentiment." Every recognition of Christmas by professed Protestants is justly regarded by Rome as a tribute to her influence, and in the almost universal observance of Sunday by professed Protestants she sees the hope of return of her ancient supremacy.

One of the missionaries of the Siam Presbyterian Mission, who is said to be "a superior linguist," has found himself unable to accept the idea of the inerrancy of Scripture, and the American Board of Foreign Missions has accepted his resignation. The Evangelist says: "If, as the action of the board seems to indicate, such men who are not qualified to be missionaries, to whom can the church look to do its work?" We cannot answer this question, but we know to whom Christ can look to do His work. It will be to those who implicitly believe His word. He is not so hard up for labourers that He must accept men who do not believe the Bible, even though they be good linguists; for He can take believing fishermen and make them able to speak to all men in their own tongue. But of what use is it for a man to know many languages, if he has not the word of God to give in any of them?

The news comes from Sierra Leone that a body of French troops fired upon a British force, with the result that four British officers and twenty-six native soldiers were killed. It is claimed that the French fired by mistake, supposing that they were attacking a hostile tribe against which both French and English were proceeding.

Commenting on the above, an evening paper supposes that the English officers recognised the character of the opposing force, and restrained their men from firing. If it had been otherwise, it says, "the situation might be a less troublesome one, for if the French and English losses had been equal, and the mistake mutual, we might shake hands with a good heart, and make the best of it." Quite so, for then there would have been no international complications, and sixty human lives lost is so small a matter that it need not be given a second thought. Such is the shocking indifference to human life that we see everywhere displayed. "In the last days perilous time shall come; for men shall be lovers of their own selves." Love of self makes men indifferent to the welfare of others. Only the love of God produces compassion and regard for others.

"Christ's Life" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

Christ's Life.-One of the incongruities of the Christmas services which have met the eyes of some newspaper readers, was the spectacle of a preacher, "wearing the magnificent cape of cloth of gold and a jewelled mitre, and holding the crozier, or pastoral staff," preaching from the text, "I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." Such display illy comports with the life of Jesus. But we have not to look to Catholic pulpits alone to see what Christ would not do. He would not lose patience and speak the sharp or thoughtless word, nor slam a door, nor gossip about His neighbours. There are many things common to most lives every day, which show that it is the old self and not Christ that is living.

"Casting the First Stone" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

Casting the First Stone.-"He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone." Thus Christ spoke to the scribes and Pharisees when they brought to Him the woman taken in adultery; and thus would He say to-day to all attempts of men to punish for sin. And this clearly shows that it is wholly outside the province of the civil authority, or of any authority that men possess, to inflict penalties for the transgression of law of God. God never leaves it for sinners to punish for sin. The Apostle Paul exclaims, "Is God unrighteous, who taketh vengeance? God forbid; for then how shall God judge the world?" Rom. iii. 5, 6. Judgment and condemnation, and its execution, must be in righteousness; and therefore it can never be done by sinners. For all sinners are equally worthy of death. And he who assumes authority to cast a stone at the sinner, thereby claims to be without sin.

"The Nature of Greed" The Present Truth 10, 2.

E. J. Waggoner

The Nature of Greed.-Press dispatches announce that the war in South Africa is ended, and the conquest of Matabeleland is complete. Mr. Rhodes has returned to Cape Town, and in reply to an address of welcome stated that the prospectors in Matabeleland are much pleased with the outlook. The Chartered Company have averted a threatened bankruptcy, and their stock is booming. Captain Wilson and his company, to be sure, are yet to be heard from, while a score or more of other whites have been killed or wounded, with several thousand of the natives; but after all the cost, according to Mr. Rhodes, is but trifling. He is reported as saying that "there never would be on record a campaign conducted with such a small expenditure of money and human life." Several thousand lives have been sacrificed, several thousand souls lost, for whom Christ died, but the success of the great financial speculation is assured! Such is the nature of greed.

January 18, 1894

"Learning and Knowing" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

Learning and Knowing.-The Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy of some who were "ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth." 2 Tim. iii. 7. There is a difference between learning and knowing. A great many things may be learned, but only truth can be known. God has made man upright, but "they have sought out many inventions." Evil and error are taught upon every hand. But what we learn by faith, we know. This is the best, the simplest, and the most satisfactory way of learning. What God says, is so; and then it only needs our belief of the same for us to know it. In the Christian life, believing is knowing and having.

"Be Strong" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

Be Strong.-"Finally, My brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might." But how can one who is weak be strong? In the eleventh of Hebrews we are told of some who "out of weakness were made strong," and this by faith. If you believe God means what He says when He says to you, "Be strong," the strength comes in the command. The prophet Daniel in vision saw the Lord who talked with him, and he says, "straightway there remained no strength in me." Then the word came, "Fear not; peace be unto thee, be strong, yea, be strong. And when he had spoken unto me, I was strengthened, and said, Let My Lord speak; for Thou hast strengthened me." It is to you and to-day that God says, "Be strong in the Lord." He is able to perform His will in those who do not resist Him when He speaks.

"Thy Strength" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

Thy Strength.-Here is a word for those who fear that the strength which the Lord has given them may forsake them at some trying moment: "Thy God hath commanded thy strength." Ps. lxviii. 28. When God made the worlds, "He commanded, and it stood fast," and to-day they stand by the same word. "Thou hast a little strength;" rejoice in that, and pray, "Strengthen, O God, that which Thou hast wrought for us." "As thy days, so shall thy strength be,"-not a "little strength" merely, but thou shalt be "strengthened with all might;" "for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength."

"To Men, not to Angels" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

To Men, not to Angels.-It was to men, and not the angels, that Christ said, "Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature." Christ took not on Him the nature of angels, but He took the nature of man. Consequently only men can be sharers with Him in the work of saving souls. The angels are sent forth to minister to all who are heirs of salvation, but to men alone is committed the ministry of reconciliation. The Lord sent an angel to Cornelius, but it was only to direct him to send for Peter, who should tell him what to do. What an exalted privilege this is, to be workers together with God! Only those can engage in it, who have felt the power of sin, and the power of salvation.

"Pursued by Mercy" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

Pursued by Mercy.-In that most familiar of psalms, the twenty-third, we read, "Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life." The Hebrew word rendered "follow," properly means, "to run after, to follow eagerly, to pursue." We associate the word "follow" with the idea of lagging along behind; but the inspired song is that goodness and mercy shall pursue us, they will run after us. His goodness and power are in His word, and "His word runneth very swiftly." We are prone to think only of the fact that Satan goes about, like a roaring lion, seeking to destroy us, forgetting that God sends His goodness and mercy also after us, and that they are able to deliver us. "The Lord will command His lovingkindness in the daytime, and in the night His song shall be with me."

"A Question of Yielding" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

The worldling cannot see how believing the word of the Lord can make any actual difference in the life of the individual. The idea that a wicked man can be made righteous, and work that which is right by faith, seems to such an one preposterous. The cross of Christ is foolishness to the worldly wise, but it is nevertheless the very power of God.

Believing God is yielding to Him implicitly. Let us take a feeble illustration of what yielding will do, from the experience of those who are so thoughtless as to yield their wills into the hands of one having the powers of hypnotism. The subject is told that he cannot speak, and he cannot. He is told to sing, and the will of the operator uses the voice. And so it acts in everything, limited only by the power of the man directing. The secret of the matter is that the subject is fully yielded, and the will of another is working instead of his own.

Now the man who believes the Lord yields himself into the hands of the Lord, and the power of God works in him just in the measure that his will is yielded up. And the power of God is creative power; so that it is not simply a directing of what exists, but bringing forth of new power, of the new

34

heart and the new life. Unless a person yields, he can never know that believing God makes any difference. And the reason why the sinner does not yield, and will not believe, is because he fears there really is a power in believing which will take from him some ways of self in which he wishes to indulge. But the man who yields to God wholly, with no reserve for self, knows that faith alone brings to him life that is not of himself, that works in him that which is not of his own doing. Read the eleventh chapter of Hebrews, and see the effect that believing God has on the life. If you do not know that God's power is working in you day by day, be assured that you are not believing, not yielding.

"What We Shall Be" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

"Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be; but we know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is." 1 John iii. 2.

What we shall be is not of so much importance to us now as what we are. And the difference between what we are and what we shall be is not so great as we are prone to think; because we do not now realise what we are. "Now are we the sons of God;" and in the kingdom of glory we will still be sons of God. "When He shall appear we shall be like Him;" but even now, "as He is, so are we in this world." 1 John iv. 17.

We are now essentially what we shall be; but what we shall be "doth not yet appear." When we are reproached for the name of Christ, the Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon us. 1 Peter iv. 14. Glory indescribable is there, and power in proportion to the glory; but they are not seen. It is all with us, it rests upon us; but "it doth not yet appear." It will be visible in the world to come, but no more real than it is now.

This world is not the place for the sons of God to appear in glory; for Christ Himself manifested His glory only in the mount of transfiguration before Peter and James and John, and then charged them that they should tell no man till after He were risen from the dead. We are here to live by faith and not by sight. And when He shall appear, then shall we also appear with Him in glory. Col. iii. 3, 4.

"The sufferings of this present time," says Paul, "are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us." It is in us now, for the Spirit of glory is there; but it is not manifest now, the Spirit is not now revealed in glory, but in the fruits of grace. The sons of God must now wait till the final separation between the wicked and the righteous, when the former shall have been gathered out and cast into a furnace of fire (Matt. xiii. 42), and "then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father."

"Imitators of God" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

"Be ye therefore followers of God," says the apostle in Eph. v. 1, or, as the Revision has it, "imitators" of God. Literally, we are to mimic God, to act like Him.

There is but one place where we can look to see what this involves. In the life of Jesus Christ is revealed what God is in human flesh, and what He does. Christ went about doing good, and always triumphed in the conflict with sin. This was the life of God in the flesh, and in weak human flesh; for Christ said, "I can of Mine own self do nothing," but "the Father that dwelleth in Me, He doeth the works."

If we are to imitate God, we also must have His life and power in us. And this is the promise, "If a man love Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and make Our abode with Him." This is the presence and power of the Comforter, the Holy Spirit promised to the believer, and not as a transient help, but to abide in us. But the sword of the Spirit, the instrument by which it works, is the word; therefore we are to feed continually upon the word of God and find in that His abiding presence. "If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you," says Christ, then the will of the Father shall be done in us. By the promises of the word we become partakers of the Divine nature, and it is Divine power alone by which we can "imitate" God. That power must be operated by God Himself, wholly independent of ourselves either in the willingness or the doing, we only giving consent that it shall work in us.

The kingdom of God is "as if a man should cast seed into the ground," "and the seed should spring and grow up; he knoweth not how. For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself." Mark iv. 26, 28. The word rendered "of herself," is interesting to note, it is the same from which we have the word "automatic." Therefore the earth is said to bring forth automatically, the spring of the power being not of the earth, but working spontaneously in it and through it. It is the life that springs from the seed.

The meaning of the parable is well known. The seed is the word of God, the soil is the human heart. We take the word of God within the heart, and there it works automatically. We are familiar with the working of an automaton, as a wax figure, for instance, by the power of a concealed mechanism which moves head or limbs in imitation of life. Just so the word of God in the heart of the believer is a power working by him automatically. Not that the believer is simply a machine, but in this case the automaton is an intelligent one, having the power of choice, willing to be acted upon, and yielding to the power within. And the spring of the power is not a mechanism, but the Divine life in the word. The working of this life will be the working of God's life, and the man who is willing to have his own life effaced, and to be controlled wholly by the life of the word, will know daily that the apostle enjoins no impossible things when he says, "Be ye, therefore, imitators of God."

"Knowing the Certainty" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

The beginning of the book of Luke is on this wise: "Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us, even as they delivered them unto us, which from the beginning were eyewitnesses, and ministers of the word; it seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding

35

of all things from the very first, to write unto thee in order, most excellent Theophilus, that thou mightest know the certainty of those things, wherein thou hast been instructed."

In the Revised Version the third verse is slightly different, thus: "It seemed good to me also, having traced the course of all things accurately from the first, to write unto thee," etc.

It is most certain that Luke himself was not an eyewitness of all the things which he narrates, for He begins back before the birth of John the Baptist, and relates the story of his birth, as well as that of Jesus. He also tells the details of the temptation in the wilderness, of the transfiguration, and of many other things which occurred when he could not have been present. Therefore his "perfect understanding of all things from the very first," was not through personal acquaintance with the events as they occurred.

If we take the reading of the Revision-"having traced the course of all things accurately from the first"-to mean that he had compared and sifted the different accounts, then we throw discredit upon his narrative; for how could Theophilus or we ourselves have the certainty of our knowledge increased by the narrative of one who himself received it second hand?

What shall we do, then? Shall we doubt the accuracy of the Gospel of Luke? Not by any means. We shall take the most consistent course, namely, to believe that he received his knowledge by inspiration of the Holy Spirit, which is really what he himself claims.

It is a fact, which the one who reads only English can verify by consulting Young's Analytical Concordance, that the Greek word which is rendered in the common version by, "from the very first," and in the Revision by, "from the first," may properly be rendered, as it often is, by the words, "from above." In the following texts the words italicised are from the same word that is used in Luke i. 3. The reader will see that in these cases no other rendering would be admissible.

"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above." James i. 17.

"This wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish." James iii. 15.

"But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy." James iii. 17.

"Jesus answered, Thou couldest have no power at all against Me, except it were given thee from above." John xix. 11.

"Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." John iii. 3.

"Marvel not that I said unto you, Ye must be born again." John iii. 8.

In the last two texts the marginal reading is "from above," the same as in the others.

It is true that the word which is thus rendered occurs in one case in the Bible, where it must mean, "from the beginning," namely in Acts xxvi. 5; but the texts above quoted are sufficient to show that "from above" is a perfectly proper rendering. There is nothing whatever to forbid its being so rendered in Luke i. 3, thus: "It seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from above, to write unto thee in order, most excellent Theophilus, that thou mightest know the certainty of those things wherein thou hast been instructed."

This is not only allowable, but is the only really consistent rendering. It is only from above that one can receive "perfect understanding" of anything, and especially of such things as Luke narrates; and it is only by wisdom "from above" that we can have certain knowledge of the truth of those things. Luke simply states the fact that he wrote by inspiration of the Spirit, which alone can make us "know the certainty" of those things which we believe.

"Man's Way and God's Way" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

The case of Naaman, the Syrian, affords a good illustration of that natural perversity of the human heart which prevents many people from realising the blessing of God.

Naaman was captain of the armies of Syria, and a great man, but was a leper. In this respect he was like many who live to-day. Sin is a leprosy no less real than the loathsome disease which afflicted the body of Naaman. It is the leprosy of the soul. Of how many may it be said, as it was of Naaman, "Great, but a leper!" His leprosy was a complete offset to his greatness.

The king of Syria heard that there was a power in Israel to heal disease above that possessed by man, and sent Naaman to the king of Israel to be healed of his malady. And Elisha the prophet sent to the king, and said, "Let him come now to me, and he shall know that there is a prophet in Israel."

"So Naaman came with his horses and with his chariot, and stood at the door of the house of Elisha. And Elisha sent a messenger unto him, saying, Go and wash in Jordan seven times, and thy flesh shall come again to thee,

37

and thou shalt be clean. But Naaman was wroth, and went away, and said, Behold, I thought, He will surely come out to me, and stand, and call on the name of the Lord his God, and strike his hand over the place, and recover the leper." 2 Kings v. 9-11.

Naaman had the plan by which the Lord was to heal him all laid out in his own mind, and because the Lord did not purpose to manifest His power in that way, he went away in a rage. And so it is with people to-day. They want the Lord to work for them, but they have the plan by which He is to work all arranged in their own minds, and they ask the Lord to work and then watch to see some manifestation of the nature which they have marked out. They want God to work for them in their way. And when something comes from the Lord which is not in their way at all, although perhaps a direct answer to their prayers, they turn away and will not have it. "Are not Abana and Pharpar," said Naaman, "rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? may I not wash in them and be clean?" If he was to be cleansed by washing, he knew a better way of doing it than the Lord had proposed! And just so with us. Our own way seems a great deal better in our eyes than God's way. But God says His ways are as much higher than our ways as the heavens are higher than the earth.

But Naaman's servants came to him, and said, "My father, if the prophet had bid thee do some great thing, wouldest thou not have done it? how much rather then when he saith to thee, Wash, and be clean?" Men are continually seeking to be cleansed of their soul leprosy by doing some great thing. This is the way it should be by the wisdom of man. It is a fundamental idea of all false religions. By doing some great thing,-going on some weary pilgrimage, enduring long fasts and other bodily afflictions, saying so many thousand prayers, or in some other way exercising his powers of mind or body to their utmost limit-he can so command himself to God that he will receive from Him what he desires. But when man has done something that he thinks is great, and the glory is his own and not the Lord's; and as God cannot work for the glory of man, his elaborate and laborious plan can only utterly fail.

God's plan, God's message, is, "Wash, and be clean." It is so simple that all can do it,-so simple that the glory of the result must all be given to God. There is a fountain open for sin and uncleaness, and the most leprous soul that will wash in that fountain will be cleansed. The word of the Lord is, "Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be read like crimson, they shall be as wool." Isa. i. 18.

To wash in that fountain is to believe the word of the Lord. "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." 1 John i. 9. Who can be simple enough to believe God? Naaman believed and washed in Jordan, and was cleansed. So will all be cleansed who are willing to give up their own way, and take God's way instead.

"The Evidence of Faith" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

"Whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world; and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith." 1 John v. 4.

Faith is "the evidence of things not seen." Heb. xi. 1. By faith we know that which is true in the things that pertain to our salvation, but which we cannot perceive by our natural senses. It constitutes an avenue through which we receive the most important information, which could not come to us by any means over which we have control.

No one can overcome the world and gain eternal life, save he that is born of God. And no one can know that he is born of God except by faith. Without the evidence which faith supplies, we should be without power to withstand the forces of evil.

Faith is the point at which Satan makes his attack. He caused our first parents to fall by getting them to doubt God's word. He presented before Eve appearances which made his story plausible. He, a serpent, had eaten of the forbidden tree, and had, he said, acquired great wisdom and the power of speech; and therefore it was not true that in the day one ate of it he would surely die. He succeeded with Eve, and he has tried the same tactics with great success upon her descendants. Faith is the connecting link between the soul and God; and when that is broken by doubt, the individual is in Satan's power.

God has said that "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God." 1 John v. 1. This is true, because God has spoken it; and upon His word, faith rests. And it is just here that the devil makes his attack. Upon this point he thought to overcome the Saviour of the world. When Christ had been in the wilderness and had fasted forty days, the tempter came and said to Him, "If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread." This was in effect saying to Him, You are not the Son of God; if you are, do something to prove it. And what was the evidence that the Saviour had that He was the Son of God? He had to come to earth and been born a babe in Bethlehem, and we are told that He grew up and developed in mind and physical stature like any other baby that has come into the world. He had been made in all things like unto His brethren in mortal flesh. Heb. ii. 17. There was no outward evidence, nothing that the natural senses could grasp, that He was indeed the Christ. Isaiah had prophesied of Him, "He hath no form nor comeliness" (Isa. liii. 2); and when Peter said to Him, "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God," Jesus answered, "Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but My Father which is in heaven." The Jews looked for a deliverer who would show in his outward appearance that he was of Divine origin, and they did not find him. And when Jesus was alone in the wilderness, at the end of His long fast, weak and emaciated, there was certainly nothing about Him to afford any outward evidence whatever of His Divinity. Under such circumstances it was that the tempter said to Him, "If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread;" and the temptation to Christ to doubt, and to do something to prove to Himself that He was indeed the Son of God, must have been very strong. But if He had done as Satan suggested, He would have manifested a lack of faith. He stood just where we must then,-upon the evidence of faith. God said, "Thou art My beloved Son;" and to have done something to prove to Himself that this was true, would have been doubting God.

As the tempter came to Christ, so he comes to us. God has said, "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God." But the tempter says, You are not born of God; the appearances are all against it. Look at the sins that you have committed! If you are the son of God, what is your evidence? And just as Christ resisted Satan, so must we resist him; not by essaying to do something or to produce some tangible proof that we are sons of God, but by resting upon the evidence

38

of faith, which grasps the word of God.

And faith brings further evidence of our Divine relationship; for when Christ said to the tempter, after the latter had sought to induce Him to worship him, "Get thee hence," the devil had no power to withstand His word; and he left Him, and angels came and ministered unto Him. His faith gained the victory; and so will it be with us. "Whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world," and when we get the victory over the world by faith, it is an evidence of our sonship which the tempter cannot question. "Resist the devil"-resist him "steadfast in the faith"-"and he will flee from you." "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ"-that is, "confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh"-"is born of God," and "Whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world; and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?"

"True Religion" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

True religion consists in knowing God; not in learnring theology, but in becoming acquainted with Him who is our Creator and Redeemer. One difference between theology and true religion is that the former goes a certain distance and then comes to a stop, while the latter goes on eternally. A person can learn all there is to theology (though it is most unfortunate for anyone to do so, since the less one knows of theology the better), but no one, either now or hereafter, can know all there is to learn about God.

One of the erroneous ideas which prevails in the religious world to-day, is that Christianity is designed only to take a person out of the pathway of destruction and set him in the pathway of life, so that he may escape the fate which will overcome the wicked. People do not generally see much more in Christianity than the attainment of a state of conversion, in which the individual has only to guard himself against "falling from a grace." The individual is to learn a certain amount and arrive at a certain place, and there stop.

Theologians have devised and carried out their systems of theology to a certain point, and then imagine that the only essential thing remaining was to defend the doctrines they had "established" against their opponents; though they are not to be blamed for coming to a stop, since no man can devise a system of religious belief that will not sadly need defending before he has gone very far in the process. But to come to a stop in the study of God as He has revealed Himself to man in His word, or to think that what men have learned about God is all there is to be learned, is a great mistake.

The realm which the word of God opens to men, in the revelation of the nature and attributes of the Creator, is an infinite one, and as yet the mind of man has scarcely crossed its threshold. Through all eternity the saved will explore that realm, and will ever find new wonders to call forth their praise and admiration.

None of the creatures of God, not even the angels of heaven, have ever yet reached a place where there was no more for them to learn about Him. They have never yet come to the line which marks the limit of the knowledge of God, beyond which there is nothing more and from which their lives would be but a monotonous looking back upon things they had known before. There is no such line for them to reach. Through all the ages since the creation of man, God has been revealing His wisdom and His mercy not only to man, but to all created intelligences.

The riches of the wisdom and love of God are unsearchable. The Apostle Paul writes, "Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; and to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ; to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord." Eph. iii. 8-11. In God's dealings with fallen man, all the sinless intelligences above have been deeply interested as spectators and as participants in His work, and have been continually adding to their own knowledge of Him.

Nor will the process stop when man has been brought back to the state from which he fell, and placed once more in the long-lost Paradise. For Paul tells us that God "hath raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus; that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace, in His kindness toward us through Christ Jesus." Eph. ii. 6, 7. Redemption-the "mystery of godliness," will be the theme of study throughout eternity, and it will never be exhausted; for it is the manifestation of power and love and wisdom which are infinite.

Realising, then, that there is a boundless field open before us in the knowledge of God through His word, upon which we may freely enter, let us not halt, but "follow on to know the Lord," whose "goings forth are prepared as the morning." Then our pathway will be a continual dawn of the light of the wisdom and love and majesty of our God.

"Sacramentarianism Dominant" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

The constant and rapid growth of the High Church party in the Church of England in recent years must surely have convinced most Protestants in that church of the hopelessness of relying on a legal establishment to keep out the spirit and practice of popery. Until they tried it and found themselves discomfited at every step, many apparently thought that by appeal to the law Ritualistic innovations might be kept down. But while the "throne of wickedness" "frameth mischief by statute," righteousness, which is true Protestantism, can never be framed by human statute. It is established by the word of God alone, by faith in that word. And the only bond that unites believers is the Spirit, which guides into the truth of the word. So now the Church of England, which was bound about by all possible statutory provisions to insure uniformity, is being rented in twain, and the Ritualistic or Romanising wing is getting the upper hand. In the January New Review, Mr. Augustine Birrell says:-

It would be inaccurate to assert that the "Evangelical" party has disappeared like the Broad Church party, but this may be safely said, that there is but a remnant left of it, and that remnant is in a very bad state of health. . . . I do not believe that anybody who thought the subject worthy of his attention could, after examining it, come to any other conclusion than that the system of belief, commonly called Sacramentarianism is the prevailing and rapidly extending faith and practice of the clergy of the Establishment.

"Worth How Much?" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

Worth How Much?-It is very common to hear a man's worth estimated at so many thousand pounds. We read that one man died worth fifty thousand pounds, and of another that he is worth two hundred thousand pounds. What is meant is that man possessed so many thousand pounds. If it were true that they were actually "worth" no more, they were poor indeed.

39

Jesus of Nazareth had no place that He could call His own, in which to lay His head, yet He was worth more than all the world combined. His riches are described as unsearchable. And He gave Himself for us,-for each one of us,-in order that, having Him, we might be worth as much as He. "For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might be rich." In Christ we are made overcomers, and "he that overcometh shall inherit all things." Rev. xxi. 7. Let all, therefore, beware how they despise the poor of this earth. The poorest man on earth, if he has Christ, is worth more than can be expressed in figures; and if he has not Christ, there is still the possibility of his gaining "eternal riches."

"Self-Defence" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

Self-Defence.-There are many professed Christians who, while they would not countenance a wilful attack upon another, think that it is perfectly right to go to almost any lengths of violence to self-defence. There need be no doubt about this matter, for both the words and the example of Christ are very plain. "Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow in His steps; who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth; who, when He was reviled, reviled not again, when He suffered, He threatened not; but committed Himself to Him that judgeth righteously." 1 Peter ii. 21-23. "But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil; but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also." Matt. v. 39, 40. Christ "emptied Himself," and represented only the Father, who dwelt in Him. If we likewise have given up self to Him, we shall have no occasion for self-defence, for self will be dead. Therefore it is an impossibility for Christians to engage in any war, even of self-defence. And this principle also applies to verbal self-defence,-the disposition always to set one's self right before others. Love of self, and lack of confidence in God, and unwillingness to wait for Him to give us righteous judgment, are at the bottom of all kinds of self-defence.

"Great Things" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

God only can do great things. The powers that set themselves in array against Him often boast great things, and essay to do great things, but in the end their efforts are made to look very small in comparison with the work of the Lord. Thus it has always been at every climax of a long contest between the powers of light and of darkness. The agencies of evil have begun their work and carried it forward as far as they could by all the means in their power, and for a time have drawn the attention of the people to it; but after they have reached their utmost limit, God has gone so far beyond them in the manifestation of His power, that they have had to stand ashamed and confounded in the midst of their fallen glory.

This is what the world is about to see to-day. A climax is here-the last great climax in the battle between the forces of God and of Satan. The combat is hourly deepening. The law of God has been made void by the commandments and traditions of men; and when this time is reached the prophetic words of the psalmist apply, "It is time for Thee, Lord, to work." And God will work, to vindicate His name in the earth, and all the world will see His power and glory.

But meanwhile the forces of evil, in pious guise, will magnify their power and do great things in the endeavour to lead the people to trust in them, and to terrify all that would oppose them. But to those who trust in the Lord and look to Him, He sends the word, "Be not afraid." "The Lord hath spoken good concerning Israel;" and they need have no fear of the "great multitude," which with all the machinery of human governments and human laws, are arrayed against them. The Lord through the prophet Joel says to His people, "I will remove far off from you the northern army, and will drive him into a land barren and desolate, with his face toward the east sea, and his hinder part toward the utmost sea, and his stink shall come up, and his ill savour shall come up, because [Hebrew] he hath magnified himself to do great things. Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice; for the Lord will do great things." Joel ii. 20, 21. And when the Lord does great things all the world will know it, and the great things which the enemy has magnified himself to do will fade into insignificance.

There is a power on earth which magnifies itself above God. It is a spiritual power, and its development dates back to the days of the Apostle Paul. Paul had much to say concerning this power to the churches among which he laboured. While at Miletus, on his way to Jerusalem (See Acts xx.), he sent for the elders of the church at Ephesus and warned them of the development of this apostasy in the church, and how that "grievous wolves" and perverse teachers would come in and make havoc among the flock. And to the Thessalonians also he said that before the day of Christ there should come "a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things?" 1 Thess. ii. 3-5. Doubtless he did not warn these two churches alone, but all those for which he laboured.

What power is this which magnifies itself above God? From the text already quoted we note that it is a power represented by one who "as God, sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God." There is but one person to whom this language will apply, and that one is he who styles himself "viceregent of the Son of God" and claims to stand at the head of the church, to be infallible, and bids all people look to him

40

for salvation. But Christ is the Head of the church (Eph. i. 22; v. 23), and bids all people look unto Him and be saved. Isa. xlv. 22. He puts himself therefore in the place of Christ. It hardly need be said that this can apply only to the pope of Rome.

There is still more emphatic testimony in the book of the prophecy of Daniel. In the vision recorded in the seventh chapter, the prophet saw "four great beasts" rise out of the sea, which the angel explained to him represented four kings, or kingdoms (see verses 17, 23). Upon the head of the fourth beast, which had ten horns, He saw another "little horn" rise up, before which three others were plucked up by the roots, and this horn had "eyes like the eyes of a man, and a mouth speaking great things" (Verses 7, 8). In verse twenty this horn is mentioned again as a "horn that had eyes, and a mouth that spake very great things;" and the prophet saw (verse 21) that "the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them." He was told also by the angel that this horn should arise after the first ten and should be diverse from them, and should subdue three kings. "And he shall speak great words against the Most High, and shall wear out the saints of the Most High, and think to change times and laws." Verses 24, 25. This language has unmistakable reference to the papacy, which put to death from fifty to one hundred millions of martyrs during the Dark Ages, and of which the chief representative is the pope, who wears on his head a triple crown as a memorial of the fact that the papacy was established by the overthrow of three kingdoms which stood in its way.

The greatness of God is shown by the power of His word. "By the word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all the host of them by the breath of His mouth. . . . For He spake, and it was; He commanded, and it stood fast." Ps. xxxiii. 6, 9. And the Psalmist also says, "Thou hast magnified Thy word above all Thy name." Ps. cxxxviii. 2. But the papacy assumes the authority to change God's word. That law which He spake with His own voice from the flaming, quaking summit of Mt. Sinai, while the whole earth shook, and the Israelites removed in terror afar off, the papacy has thought to change, according to the prediction of Dan. vii. 25. She has stricken out the second commandment, which forbids the worship of images, and made the fourth commandment to apply to the first day of the week instead of the seventh. The papacy boasts of having changed the Sabbath to Sunday, as a mark of her authority. Of course no power can make any real change in the law of God, but this power has made people think she has changed it; and by claiming the authority to change this word of God, which is magnified above all His name, she has magnified herself above God.

This is the power which magnifies itself to do great things. The papacy is rapidly extending her influence throughout the world. Her spirit is rapidly permeating the world and the professed church. And when this takes place, the forces of the world and of the worldly churches will be arrayed against the saints, and this great army will magnify itself to do great things. And then the Most High God will arise and say, I will do great things.

This time is at hand. God will manifest Himself through His people, and the world will see great things. And now, when the great controversy is about to close, He will magnify His name more wonderfully than ever before, not even excepting the time when He led ancient Israel out of Egypt; but the prophet says, "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that it shall no more be said, The Lord liveth, that brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt; but, The Lord liveth, that brought up the children of Israel from the land of the north, and from all the lands whither he had driven them." Jer. xvi. 14, 15. The second redemption and gathering of Israel (the true Israel) will be with a greater manifestation of God's power than was the first.

The Psalmist speaks of this in the one hundred and twenty-sixth Pslam. "When the Lord turned again the captivity of Zion, we were like them that dream. Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with singing; then said they among the heathen, The Lord hath done great things for them. The Lord hath done great things for us, whereof we are glad." The heathen are all those who know not God; and when the Lord with His omnipotent power delivers His people from all their enemies, the heathen will know and say that the Lord hath done great things for them.

And this time is at hand. Those who honour God He will honour. Those who honour God are those who believe Him, who humbly take Him at His word. They are those who observe His Sabbath and keep His commandments, by having Christ in their hearts by faith. And when the Lord arises to vindicate His name these will say, "O give thanks unto the Lord, for He is good; for His mercy endureth for ever. . . . To Him who alone doeth great wonders; for His mercy endureth for ever." Ps. cxxxvi. 1-4.

"'Blasphemed Among the Gentiles'" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

The Apostle Paul, addressing what was known as "the church" of his day, wrote: "Behold, thou art called a Jew, and restest in the law, and makest thy boast of God, and knowest His will, and approvest the things that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law; and art confident that thou thyself art a guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, which hast the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law. Thou therefore which teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal? Thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege? Thou that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law dishonourest thou God? For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you, as it is written." Rom. ii. 17-24.

An the illustration of the blaspheming of the name of God among the heathen, on account of the doings of professed Christians, is given in a letter to the New York Independent, from Rev. J. L. Dearing, missionary of the American Baptist Missionary Union, in Yokohama, Japan. Here is the letter, which speaks for itself:-

"The Buddhist representatives from Japan who were in attendance at the Parliament of Religions have returned, and their reports are interesting as showing what effect the great convention really had upon the representatives of the various religions there assembled, and as also showing what the second-hand effect is upon the people who listen to the reports brought back. Soon after the return of the Buddhist orators and representative men, a public meeting was called under the auspices of the Buddhist Young Men's Association, in Yokohama, an organisation copied after the Y.M.C.A. Some seven hundred people were gathered in one of the largest theatres in town, and from ten o'clock in the morning till about seven at night continuous

41

addresses were given by one after another, recounting the reception they had received, and the impression the meetings had made upon them.

"The two chief speakers were Bourin Yatsubuchi and Shaku Soyen. The former is a priest of Kamakura, and a graduate of the college of which Mr. Fukuzawa is the head in Tokio, a man well versed in modern learning, and a scholar of no mean ability. He was one of the speakers at the Parliament in Chicago. Shaku Soyen, also one of the speakers at Chicago, is a great scholar, and is regarded as the most talented priest in Kiushiu. Some eight others occupied some time in giving their impressions. Among the statements that were made by the priests were the following:-

'When we received the invitation to attend the Parliament of Religions, our Buddhist organisations would not send us as representatives of the sect. The great majority believed that it was a shrewd move on the part of Christians to get us there and then hold us up to ridicule or try to convert us. We accordingly went as individuals. But it was a wonderful surprise which awaited us. Our ideas were all mistaken. The Parliament was called because the Western nations have come to realise the weakness and folly of Christianity, and they really wished to hear from us of our religion, and to learn what the best religion is. There is no better place in the world to propagate the teachings of Buddhism than in America. During the meetings one very wealthy man from New York became a convert to Buddhism, and was initiated into its rites. He is a man of great influence, and his conversion may be said to mean more than the conversion of ten thousand ordinary men, so we may say truthfully that we made ten thousand converts at that meeting. Christianity is merely an adornment of society in America. It is deeply believed in by very few. The great majority of Christians drink and commit various gross sins, and live very dissolute lives, although it is a very common belief and serves as a social adornment. Its lack of power proves its weakness. The meetings showed the great superiority of Buddhism over Christianity, and the mere fact of calling the meetings showed that the Americans and other Western peoples had lost their faith in Christianity and were ready to accept the teachings of our superior religion.'

"These remarks and more like them were received with great applause by the enthusiastic audience. They will be thoroughly believed by the masses of the people, for whose benefit meetings are to be held here and there throughout Japan to spread these interesting reports. The educated classes, as a rule, know too much to believe such statements, but the effect upon the lower classes will be to strengthen the power of Buddhism and to neutralise the influence of missionaries and native Christians.

"Said an earnest, intelligent young Japanese Christian man: 'How could American Christians make so great a mistake as to hold such a meeting and injure Christianity as the influence of those meetings will do in Japan?'"

"The New Earth" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

Glorious thought! we have something better to look forward to than life on this old worn-out, sin-cursed earth. Patience a little longer; a few more trials, a few more tears, and a few more temptations, and a few more victories, and the earth that has waxed old like a garment, as a vesture shall be changed. Ps. cii. 26.

The day of the Lord will come in the which the old heavens, with all the poisonous vapours and chilling winds, shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat; the old earth also with all its works of sin shall be burned up. "Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness." 2 Peter iii. 9, 10, 13. "As the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before Me saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain." Isa. lxv. 22. "For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth." Isa. lxv. 17.

The new earth will be as real as this old earth, but it will be filled with righteousness instead of sin, blessing instead of cursing, and life instead of death. And there will be no more danger of sin; for Satan and all his followers, root and branch, perish together and are burned to ashes in the fire that cleanses and purifies the earth. Rev. xx. 7-15; Mal. iv. 1-3.

"And I John saw the Holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven. . . . And heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be

44

their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain; for the former things are passed away." Rev. xxi. 1-4; Zech. xiv. 4-9.

"And it shall come to pass that from one new moon to another and from one Sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before Me, saith the Lord." Isa. lxvi. 22, 23.

"And they shall build houses and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them." Isa. lxv. 21. "And they shall build the old wastes, they shall raise up the former desolations, and they shall prepare the waste cities, and the desolations of many generations." Isa. lxi. 4.

"The desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose." Isa. xxxv. 1. "Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree." Isa. lv. 13. "And there shall be no more curse." Rev. xxii. 3.

"The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion, and the fatling together and a little child shall lead them. And the cow shall eat straw like the ox. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." Isa. xi. 6-9.

Notice the real things that are to be upon the new earth. There will be blossoms, straw, trees, vineyards, fruit, animals, houses, and cities, people, little children, and a place of worship. The New Jerusalem with its golden streets, mansions of glory, Garden of Eden, river of life, and throne of God will come down at the end of the thousand years, with the angels and Adam and Abraham and Noah, and Moses and all the rest of God's children. But the best of all, God Himself will be there and the Lamb will be the light thereof. The same God who in the beginning created the earth and all its perfection and beauty, the same God who came to this earth in His Son and became poor that we might be rich, who suffered and was tempted that He might be able to help us when we are tempted, and who died that we might live,-this same God and Saviour will dwell on the new earth and His children will see Him face to face in all His glory, and listen to the music of His living voice.

Oh, the joy of being accounted a child of God! If we are His children now, we shall be His children then.

"Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God!"

"Beasts and Creeping Things" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

"A little child shall lead them; . . . . they shall not hurt nor destroy." Isa. xi. 6, 9.

On the plains, in the desert, among the cliffs of the mountains, along winding rivers and silvery lakes, swinging from lofty tree-tops, burrowing in the ground, creeping through the grass, and hiding 'neath the leaves, we find creatures, living creatures, so many and so wonderful that we are led to exclaim, "O Lord, how manifold (many) are Thy works! In wisdom hast Thou made them all!" Ps. civ. 24.

Each animal is fitted by the all-wise Creator to do just those things that it needs to do. Esquimaux dogs, foxes, bears, and many other animals have a warm coat for winter and a cooler coat for summer; the Arctic fox has even fur slippers for the bottom of its feet. Some of the animals in hot countries do not have any hair or fur, but have skins so thick that a common bullet cannot go through them. The silken fur of the Water Shrew is better than a rubber coat to keep out the water when the animal is swimming, and although the mole is a great digger, none of the earth can stick to its glossy coat. As the Honey Weasel lives mostly on honey and the young of the honey bee, it has a thick, loose skin through which the bees cannot sting. The Hedgehog has a coat of sharp springy spines to protect it when it throws itself down from high walls or meets an enemy.

Dogs and cats and tigers cannot use knives and forks, as we do, in eating their food, but their sharp teeth and claws do as well. The teeth of the rat, mouse, and rabbit, are repaired or mended, as fast as they wear out. And the teeth of the Asiatic Elephant grow up as fast as they are worn away. When the whole tooth is worn out, it falls from the jaw and a new one comes in its place. The Elephant's long trunk serves for hands, a pump, and many other things. The Mole has shovels, the Oared Shrew oars, the Hedgehog and Porcupine an armour, and the Kangaroo a cradle in which to carry its babies. The Spider Monkey uses its tail to hook food out of places too small for its hand. The Ant-eater has an insect catcher, the Musk Rat a perfume sac, the cow four food pouches, the camel a water bottle, and cushions for its breast and knees and feet, and even pussy has cushions on her feet. Find out, if you can, how they use all of these strange things.

Some animals have very odd habits. The bear, squirrel, wood-chuck, field mouse, and other animals sleep nearly all the winter with little or nothing to eat! But in this wintry sleep breathing is almost entirely stopped, and the blood circulates very slowly. This is why we see so few animals in the winter. Frogs, toads, spiders, bees, and many of the birds do this. The Mole has a very curious habit of working three hours and then resting three. The Brush-tailed Bettony fastens its tail around a bundle of grass and hops away with it to its nest. The opossum, when attacked falls down and pretends to be dead till its enemy leaves. The hippopotamus carries its young on its back. The monkeys take hold of one another's tails and make living bridges across streams. The beaver cuts down trees, builds houses and dams, and plasters them with mud.

As you put on your warm clothes, do you ever stop to think where they come from? Some of them are made from the woolly coat of the sheep, the hair of the camel or Cashmere Goat, or the fur of the beaver or brown rat! Even the skins of young goats are made into gloves called kid gloves. The buffalo robe is the skin of a bison, and carriage robes and rugs are sometimes made of the shaggy coats of bears and wolves. We get ivory from the elephant. Polecats' hairs are used for artists' brushes. Hogs' bristles are also used for brushes, and their hide is made into leather for saddles. The otter can be taught to catch fish for its master, the Shepherd Dog to tend sheep, the St. Bernard Dog to find lost and freezing travellers, the Reindeer and Esquimaux Dog to take the place of horses in cold countries, the ox to plough, and the noble horse to be the companion and servant of man. The cow gives us milk, butter, glue, leather for our shoes and carriage and harness, and hair for plastering. Even the despised rat saves the lives of thousands of people in our large cities by eating the decaying things in the sewers.

The more you study and think about the animals the more you will see to admire, and to thank God for. For it was God, who, on the sixth day, made "the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and everything that creepeth after their kind; and God saw that it was good." Gen. i. 25. Oh, to have seen them then! Not a poor, sickly, or cross animal among them all! Not one that would hurt or kill, for then none lived on flesh, but upon the green herb which God gave them for their meat. Gen. i. 30. They all were more tame and friendly than your dog or kitten.

Now, many animals are wild and so fierce that we would be afraid to meet them outside of a cage. But God has made a wonderful promise. He says that by-and-by the beasts will all be as good and friendly as they were at first,-so friendly that a little child can lead them. Listen, here is His promise:-

"The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together; the lion shall eat straw like the ox. . . . They shall not hurt nor destroy." Isa. xi. 6, 7, 9.

In other parts of the Bible we learn that this will be after He has made the earth all new again and destroyed every evil thing. Where will you be? Will you be among the evil things that will be destroyed, or among the happy children who will live on the beautiful new earth with Jesus, and who will lead the friendly lion and the bear? If you would be with Jesus then, you must live to please Him now. If you are cross and rude to your parents, and cruel to God's birds and animals

46

now, He could not trust you to live with them in the perfect new earth. Jesus invites you to be there, but He cannot take you unless you here learn to be kind and gentle and good.

1. What animals do you have at your home?

2. Name some other places in which we find animals.

3. Which is the strongest beast? Prov. xxx. 30.

4. Which is the tallest?-The Giraffe is the tallest of all earthly dwellers; it is from 18-20 feet high. As it feeds upon the leaves of trees it has long legs and a very long neck, and a tongue so formed that it can be lengthened or shortened or wrapped round one leaf. It can make this tongue so small at the tip that it can pass into the pipe of a common pocket key.

5. Name some creeping things. Lev. xi. 20, 30.

6. What kind of clothing do part of the animals have in cold weather? In warm?

7. What kind do some have that live in hot countries.

8. Name a few of the wonderful tools that beasts have.

9. Why do we not see so many animals in winter as in summer?

10. What strange thing does the Opossum do? The Monkeys? The Beaver?

11. Would we be so comfortable and happy if there were no animals? Why not?

12. Who made all of these wonderful creatures, and fitted them with just the right kind of clothing and tools?

13. Then which is greater, the creatures or the Creator?

14. Suppose we should think more of them than of Him, or should worship them, as some do, how would He feel?

15. Or suppose we should treat them cruelly, would He be pleased?

16. To whom do they all belong? Ps. l. 10.

17. Then have we any right to be cruel to them?

18. When we enjoy their companionship, and see how wonderfully they are made, what should it lead us to do? To thank and praise the wise, good Father who made them.

19. When did He make them?

20. Were they then just as they are now?

21. Which do you enjoy most, wild animals or tame animals?

22. What precious promise has God made about them? Isa. xi. 6, 7, 9.

23. When will that be?

24. Only what kind of children will He permit to lead the animals on the new earth?

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

-M. Charles Dupuy has been re-elected President of the French Chamber of Deputies.

-The Russian budget shows an increase of receipts over expenditures to the amount of 10,000,000 roubles.

-Not only have females obtained the franchise in New Zealand, but a lady has been appointed mayor of one of its seaport towns.

-The Emperor of Germany has just completed his 35th year, and is about to celebrate the 25tgh anniversary of his entry into the army.

-A bush fire on Table Mountain, South Africa, has done enormous damage to property and damaged the water supply of Cape Town.

-The Belfast barque Cooleen, has been wrecked near Ballycotton in a heavy gale, resulting in the drowning of the captain and nine of the crew.

-Honduras is being overrun by the allied forces of Honduras insurgents and of Nicaragua. The Honduran government forces have sustained several defenses, and a number of towns have been captured.

-During the thick fog on the night of Jan. 6 the Sunderland steamer Ashford collided in the Channel with a vessel unknown, which is supposed to have sunk; one of the crew of the Ashford is missing.

-A Boston (Mass.) telegram announces that the Globe Theatre in that town has been destroyed by fire, while adjoining buildings have sustained considerable damage. The loss is estimated at 1,000,000 dollars.

-The disturbances in Sicily are lessening, but riots continue to recur in South Italy and Rome. In a police search made in Rome on Jan. 8, 10,000 revolutionary manifestoes were seized, besides other compromising documents.

-A Bill imposing a tax on tobacco was introduced into the German Reichstag, its object being to raise funds for meeting the increased expenditure entailed by the new Army Bill.

-The Central Board of the Evangelical Union in Berlin has issued a long address strongly protesting against the readmission into Germany of the Jesuits, who are described as the enemies of the Fatherland and of the Protestant faith.

-After Matabeleland comes Zambesialand. Mr. Archibald R. Colquhoun has delivered an address before a meeting of members of the London Chamber of Commerce, on "Zambesia: Its Capabilities for Commercial Expansion and Development.

-The Manchester Ship Canal has exceeded expectation. During the first week twenty-nine vessels were berthed in the docks, and there was considerable passenger traffic. The first cargo of cotton carried to Manchester by the new waterway was delivered amidst great rejoicings.

-A Republican manifesto has been issued by Senor Ruiz Zorilla, the Spanish Republican agitator. In this he announces the early advent of the Republic in Spain, and at the same time declares that the Republicans will make war without quarter against the Anarchists.

-The trial of Vaillant, the perpetrator of the bomb outrage in the French Chamber of Deputies, took place in Paris Jan. 10, and resulted in a verdict of guilty on all counts of the indictment, without extenuating circumstances. The prisoner was accordingly sentenced to death.

-The Porte has decided that all foreign representatives, without distinction, shall have the right to hoist their respective flags on f?te days. This decision will put an end to the discussions in which the Consular body in Turkey has from time to time had to engage with the local authorities.

-Miss Kate Marsden has arrived at St. Petersburg, and is preparing to start afresh for the leper colony. Queen Victoria is stated to have provided Miss Marsden with an autograph letter, asking all persons to whom she may apply during the journey to furnish her with all the assistance in their power.

-In order the better to stamp out Stundism in the provinces of Kieff, Volhynia, and Pdolia, M. Skvortsoff, an official of the "Holy" Synod, has been attached to Count Ignatieff's Chancery, whose duty it will be to carry out the various repressive measures recently enacted against these unfortunate "heretics."

-For over eighty years it has been customary for the priests in Russia on Christmas Day to anathematize the French for their invasion of Russia in 1812. The traditional prayer was omitted this Christmas for the first time, owing to the recent demonstrations of friendship for Russia on the part of France.

-The Berlin Municipal Council have decided to extend the existing system of night refuges for the homeless, and to grant admission to these establishments during the day. It was also decided to increase the number of warming halls. Soup is now being distributed to the necessitous every morning and evening.

-A telegram received in Paris from Rio de Janeiro announced the resignation of Marshal Peixoto, but the Brazilian Minister in Paris gave a formal denial to the report. A Reuter's telegram from Buenos Ayres states that the Marshal is fortifying the coast. The inhabitants of Rio de Janeiro are in a state of great apprehension over an expected attack upon the city. A decisive battle is expected shortly.

-It is reported that Lobengula has arrived on the banks of the Zamesi with 2,000 well-armed young warriors. Fresh bodies of Matabele are reported to be massing with hostile intentions, and fifteen of the Bechuanaland police have been killed near Inyati. Evidence is coming to light of the intention of the Chartered Company to make slaves of the Matabele to work the mines of Matabeleland.

-A fire, supposed to have been incendiary, broke out at the World's Fair grounds at Chicago, Jan. 8, and continued for several hours, doing great damage to some of the large buildings, and destroying the Peristyle and Music Hall. The exhibits in the Liberal Arts building were considerably damaged, and parties employed to remove them improved the opportunity to steal articles to the value of many thousands of dollars.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

The annual appeal supplement of the Charity Record shows eighty-seven hospitals and charitable societies furnishing homes and aid to the homeless and suffering in London. It is stated that no other city in the world comes up to London, when the conditions of the poor are compared, among whom three million pounds are spent annually. This would go much further in relieving the situation were it not for the eight thousand public-houses in London into which a steady stream of millions is being poured from the pockets of the people.

In the House of Commons a few evenings ago, Mr. Gladstone was asked by a member "whether, before embarking on new and costly naval expenditure, the Government could see its way to open up communication with other European powers with a view to national disarmament." The Premier replied that the question was one of "great importance and value," and referred to some steps once taken in that direction with his full concurrence, as showing his friendliness to the project, but said, "I am very doubtful whether the present occasion is one when such representations could be advantageously made."

In this reply Mr. Gladstone shows his knowledge of the situation. It is absolutely certain that no nation on earth would at present think of such a thing as disarmament, however politely they might receive the proposition. But the time is not far off when such a proposition will be made and accepted. "Many nations," according to the "sure word of prophecy," will think that, through their exaltation of the church the kingdom of God has been set up on earth, and will propose to transform their instruments of war into farming implements, saying, "Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more." See the whole of the second chapter of Isaiah. But "when they shall say, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape." 1 Thess. v. 3. Then will begin the reign of the Prince of peace, over those who have already chosen the way of peace, and have allowed the peace of God to rule in their hearts.

The Roman Catholic mission in Uganda is circulating Bibles, and this is the reason, or rather the apology for it, in the words of the bishop: "After much hesitation, I have concluded that it is necessary for us also to print the New Testament, which to Protestants are spreading everywhere. The chief reason is that we cannot prevent our people from reading it. We are, therefore, preparing an edition with notes drawn from the holy Fathers." This will be better than none at all, for not even notes from the "Fathers" can wholly obscure the meaning of the Scriptures, if the full text is but given. Some souls will reject the chaff, and retain the wheat.

It is stated on good authority that the Bible heads the list of books sold in Italy. "Signor Sonzogno, editor of the Secolo newspaper, has recently sent out from his press in Milan an illustrated family Bible, bearing the imprimatur of the Pope. The enterprise has met with wonderful success, not only in the large cities, but in the towns and villages, and among the clergy as well as the laity." The first edition of 50,000 copies was speedily exhausted. If Paul rejoiced when Christ was preached, even though some preached Him from envy and strife (Phil. i. 15-18), we may rejoice at this circulation of the Bible, even though cumbered with such notes and comments as would lead the Pope of Rome the sanction it.

It is stated that the Roman pontiff has offered to be arbitrator in the territorial dispute between Ecuador and Peru. And this same pontiff claims to be the "vicar of Christ," who when one said to Him on a certain occasion, "Master, speak to my brother that he divide the inheritance with me," replied, "Man, who made Me a judge or a divider over you?" Luke xiv. 11, 12. Christ, unlike His pretended "vicar," never said anything that could be taken as an act of interference in any of the disputes which pertain to the exercise of political or civil power; and those who profess to be His followers should imitate His example.

"I Am with You" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

I am with You.-To His disciples Jesus said, "Lo, I am with you, alway, even unto the end of the world." But the question often arises, What shows that He is with us? and it receives various answers. Some say, The number of our converts shows it. Others say, Our zeal and works show it. But those who trust in these or other outward signs as an evidence of God's presence, are deceived. Christ's word is enough,-"I am with you." Those who come up in the Judgment day pointing to their numerous converts and their wonderful works, will hear the voice of their professed Master say to them, "I never knew you." Those who who do not take Christ at His word, cannot have Him with them. Faith constitutes the simplest and best evidence of spiritual truths that can be had. Let us look to Christ for our evidence, and not to external signs.

"The Turning Point" The Present Truth 10, 3.

E. J. Waggoner

The Turning Point.-Who has not had the experience of resolving again and again to turn away from some evil habit, and yet finding the thing asserting itself just the same? The resolution was no stronger than we were, and was of no force against the evil. Putting confidence in the resolution led to the neglect which Daniel confessed in his prayer, "Yet made we not our prayer before the Lord our God, that we might turn from our iniquities." The turning point is reached when we have learned our helplessness by turning and resolving, and have put up the petition, "Turn Thou us unto Thee, O Lord, and we shall be turned." Lam. iii. 21. The Lord does not reserve the blessing until we have put away iniquity. He blesses that it may be put away. "Unto you first God, having raised up His Son Jesus, sent Him to bless you, turning away every one of you from his iniquities." Acts iii. 26.

January 25, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

It is quite natural to wish that we had lived in Judea or Galilee in the days when Christ was there. We wish that we could have seen Him, and have listened to His teaching, and could have talked with Him. That we should have doubted His word never enters our heads. We are sure that under such circumstances we should have implicitly believed in Him.

There is a way by which we may tell whether we would or not. If we fully believe Him now, we should doubtless have believed Him if we had lived then. If we at all doubt His word now, we should most certainly have disbelieved Him if we had seen Him in the days of His ministry on earth.

Let it not be forgotten that not by any means all the people who saw Jesus believed that He was the Son of God. In fact, believers were very few. Indeed, at the very last, after His resurrection, and just before His ascension, "some doubted." And these were of the brethren, and not of the scoffing priests and scribes. The greater number of the people who saw Jesus, did not see in Him anything more than a common man. There was nothing in His personal appearance to indicate that He was more than an ordinary labouring man.

The prophet Isaiah said: "Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground; He hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him. He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and we hid as it were our faces from Him; He was despised, and we esteemed Him not." Isa. liii. 1-3.

On one occasion Jesus asked His disciples who people said that He was. They answered, "Some say that Thou art John the Baptist; some say, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets." "He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am? And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona; for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but My Father which is in heaven." Matt. xvi. 13-17.

Peter had been with Jesus a long time, yet he had no means of knowing that He was the Christ, except by revelation of the Spirit of God. Those who had a mind to do the will of God, knew Christ and His teaching; others did not. The disciples in Judea and Galilee had exactly the same chance to know Christ as the Son of God that we have, and no more. God has given to us the Holy Spirit as a guide, as well as to them. Through the testimony of the Spirit we may know and believe Christ; and no one has ever had any other evidence. The Apostle John wrote in order that we might have the same fellowship that he had, who had seen and handled and talked with Christ in the flesh.

It is a most pleasant thought, that we have an equal chance with those who followed Jesus on earth. He has promised to dwell with us, and we may talk with Him. To be sure, we cannot see Him; but that makes no difference, for those who saw Him on earth, saw nothing with the natural eyes but an ordinary man. So we are not to know Christ after the flesh, for "the flesh profiteth nothing." But, knowing by the Spirit, we may rejoice in Him, "with joy unspeakable, and full of glory." "What think ye of Christ?"

"'Highly Favoured'" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

When the angel Gabriel came to the virgin Mary, to announce to her that she should be the mother of Jesus, he said, "Hail, thou that are highly favoured, the Lord is with thee." Luke i. 28. Who would not be glad of such a salutation as that? Well, the blessedness of it is that these words are addressed to us,-to each one who reads these lines. We need not give them all away to the virgin Mary. Let us see if this is not so.

Favour is grace. Both words, as they are found in the English New Testament, are from the same Greek word. The margin of the Revised Version has, as an equivalent for "highly favoured," "endued with a grace."

Now let us not forget that the grace or favour of God is not bestowed upon us because of our goodness, but to save us. The grace of God bringeth salvation. "All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace." Rom. iii. 23, 24. It was while we were dead in trespasses and sins, that the great love of God was shown in saving us by His grace. See Eph. ii. 4-8. "For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another. But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His

50

mercy He saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; which he poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Saviour; that being justified by His grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life." Titus iii. 3-7.

And so it is true of us, that we are highly favoured. God has "blessed us with all spiritual blessings" in Christ. Eph. i. 3. We turn again to the margin of Luke i. 28, and find the reading "graciously accepted." The angel said, "Hail, thou that art graciously accepted." That is true of us, for we read that God "made us accepted in the beloved,"-endued us with grace. Eph. i. 6. The Lord says to us, "O Israel, return to the Lord thy God, for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity. Take with you words, and turn to the Lord; say unto Him, Take away all iniquity, and receive us graciously." Hosea xiv. 12.

Thus we learn that our finding favour with God, or being graciously accepted by Him, is not because of our righteousness. He accepts us in order that He may give us good. God has highly favoured each one of us, in common with all mankind. There are thousands of people who would think themselves the most highly favoured mortals on earth, if Queen Victoria should take special notice of them, and especially if she should make them her special personal care. But God has done that very thing to each one of us. We are favoured with His own personal presence and protection. Happy are they who have, through faith in His word, come to a consciousness of the fact, so that they can say that they have found favour.

No Special Favourites.-In spite of the scriptures quoted in the preceding article, or rather, through ignorance of them, we are prone to think that Mary was highly favoured because she was sinless. If that were true, then there would be no message to me in the angel's word to her. But "all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God," and this includes Mary as well as me.

What a subtle scheme of the devil's to undermine the faith and hope of sinners, is that dogma of the immaculate conception of the virgin Mary. It takes all the hope and joy for many thousands of people, out of that angelic message. How glad I am to know that that dogma is a doctrine of the devil, and that, sinner as I am, God has graciously accepted me as He did Mary.

It is natural for people to feel somewhat bitter towards those who are partial in their dealing, or whom they suspect of being so. Therefore people who did not know the Lord any better than to suppose that He has His special favourites, feel rebellious toward Him, and stubbornly repel His advances. They think that He is altogether such an one as themselves.

"God is no respecter of persons." Acts x. 34. He does not choose out a few persons, and shower favours upon them, and turn a cold shoulder to others, as not being in that exclusive "set." All such action on the part of men is utterly opposed to the wisdom from above, which is "without partiality." James iii. 17. There is no partiality with God. He is willing and anxious to do for every man all that He has ever done for any man, yea, all that He does for His only begotten Son.

"'How Shall This Be?'" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

When the angel said to Mary that she should bring forth a son, even Jesus, she asked, "How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?" It was not a question of unbelief; she did not doubt but that it would be done, but she wished to know how it was to be brought about, so that she might know what was expected of her in the matter. The angel replied, "The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee; therefore that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." Luke i. 35.

Here again we find ourselves on common ground with Mary. Jesus said to His disciples, including us, "Behold I send the promise of My Father upon you." Luke xxiv. 49. This was the promise to pour out His Spirit upon all flesh. The Spirit is the power of the Highest, and Jesus told them to wait in Jerusalem for it, or until they were endued with power from on high. He tells us also that God will give the Holy Spirit to as many as ask Him. Luke xi. 13.

The Holy Ghost came on Mary with power, in order that she might bring forth Jesus. The Spirit comes upon us in order that its fruit may be seen in us, namely, "Love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance." Gal. v. 22, 23. The power by which all these graces are to be developed, and their opposites repressed, is the power by which Jesus was born of the virgin Mary.

But what could she do to bring the event about, or to help it along?-Just nothing, but submit. She could not do anything to bring it about, but she could have stopped it altogether, by not being willing to submit. Her part was willingly to yield to the power.

Notice that this power by which Jesus was born of the virgin Mary, and by which Christ is to be formed in us the hope of glory, is the same power by which the work of creation was wrought. "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light; and there was light." Gen. i. 1-3.

The creation was effected by the Spirit and word of God. By that same power was Christ begotten of the virgin. Mary said, "Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to Thy word." Luke i. 38. All she had to do was to be willing for the word of the Lord to accomplish its purpose, and to be fulfilled. So with us; yielding to the word of God, will result in its truths being brought forth in our lives. Whoever yields without reserve to every word that he finds in the Bible, being perfectly willing that every precept and requirement shall be fulfilled in him, will have wrought in him a work equal to that of creating the heavens and the earth.

"For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." Eph. ii. 10.

"Another Man" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

There is something exceedingly comforting in the thought of receiving the power of the Holy Spirit; and no wonder, for the Spirit is the Comforter. But the great comfort of it is shown in the result, as illustrated in one typical case. When Samuel had anointed Saul king over Israel, he said to him:

"Thou shalt meet a company of prophets coming down from the high place with a psaltery, and a tabret, and a pipe, and a harp, before them; and they shall prophesy; and the Spirit of the Lord will come upon thee, and thou shalt prophesy with them, and shalt be turned into another man." 1 Sam. x. 5, 6.

What a wonderfully pleasant thought, that the Spirit turns the one who yields to its presence into another man.

51

The old man is sinful. We are carnal by nature. We have done many wicked deeds, because sin was our very nature. The memory of those sins have often appalled us, as the knowledge of the sinful nature, whence they came, has often been to us a grief and shame. Past misdeeds which we could not wipe out, had been held up before us by Satan to discourage us, and thus to give him greater power over our sinful nature.

But now the glorious news comes to us that by yielding to the Spirit of God, we may be turned into other persons. That "new man" is "created in righteousness and true holiness." Eph. iv. 24. It takes the place of "the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts." This new man is "renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created him" (Col. iii. 10); and this renewing takes place "day by day." 2 Cor. iv. 16.

We yield, and the transformation is effected. We continue to yield, and renewing continually takes place. And now the devil comes to us again with his old tricks. He presents the long list of sins, but they do not appal us anymore. We can say to him, "You have made a mistake; the man who used to live here, and who committed those sins, is dead, and I have no connection with him, and therefore cannot be called on to settle his accounts." There is no more a "fearful looking for of judgment," for we shall not come into judgment, having passed from death unto life. John v. 24.

The devil tries his old temptations, through the lusts of the flesh, but again he is baffled. He used to have no difficulty in leading us astray, but now he has another man to deal with, and to his astonishment he finds that his purposes fail. There is no condemnation to us, because we walk in the Spirit.

This new man has never sinned, because it is "created in righteousness and true holiness," and kept eternally new. How often we have wished that we might get rid of ourselves. We may. The word comes to was, "Put off the old man, with his deeds," and with the word comes the power to put him off. And the new man cannot sin, because it is the very image of God. So that our part day by day may be to declare from the heart with the Apostle Paul:-

"For I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God. I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Gal. ii. 19, 20.

"Dying and Living" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

"And there were certain Greeks among them that came up to worship at the feast: the same came therefore to Philip. . . . and desired him, saying, Sir, we would see Jesus. Philip cometh and telleth Andrew; and again Andrew and Philip tell Jesus. And Jesus answered them, saying, The hour is come, that the Son of man should be glorified. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." John xii. 20-24.

By the reading of these words we are reminded of a similar statement made by the Apostle Paul, in reply to a foolish question about the resurrection. "But some man will say, How are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come? Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die." 1 Cor. xv. 35, 36. It is said that except a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die it abideth alone, but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. Is that true?

Here is a principle of natural history that is not found in pagan philosophy. It can be found only in the Bible: for it is contrary to the natural supposition. We have been apt, in reading it, to put a sort of mental interpretation upon it. "Of course," we have thought, "it does not really die; for if it should actually die that would be the end of it." Thus our carnal understanding takes the heart out of the Scriptures, by explaining them away.

But the word says that if the corn of wheat die, it bringeth forth fruit. "That which thou sowest is not quickened except it die." We know that there is no power in any creature to perpetuate its own existence. Whence then must the life of everything come? We read in Job xii. 10 that in God's hand is the life, or soul, of every living thing.

Now we have seen it demonstrated that a corn of wheat put in the ground will bring forth much fruit. We have seen hundreds of grains, from one single corn of wheat. This is a fact that all know. Taking the Scriptures as the guide in natural philosophy, we know that death must have preceded the fruit bearing. Did the grain die and then bring itself to life again? Life is there plainly enough, as shown by the green blade and the ripening ear. And we demonstrate that there is life in it by taking it and eating it. When we are so weak with hunger that we are half dead, and cannot work, we eat of the grain, and our spirits are revived.

There is life there; but that grain had to die before the life came. Where did that life come from? The whole thing is involved in this question. Does the grain come to life?-No; because "that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other grain; but God giveth it a body as it hath pleased Him, and to every seed his own body." 1 Cor. xv. 37, 38. The apostle is here speaking of the resurrection. We read that sometime all that are in the graves will stand on the earth again. They had actually died, and they could not bring themselves to life. What brings them to life?-The word of God. They hear the voice of the Son of God. "For the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth." John v. 28, 29. The life that will be manifested in those who are now turned to dust is not anything that is in that dust. The life comes from God. The whole process is stated in the thirty-seventh of Ezekiel, where the Lord speaks, and bone comes to bone, and again He speaks, and flesh and sinews come, and then at His command breath comes into the bodies, and they live.

The resurrection of the body is illustrated by the grain, in the verses read from Corinthians. This means that the man who dies has no life in him, and no power in him to bring himself to life again. Life will be manifested there, because God puts it into him, just as he puts life into the seed that dies.

In the first chapter of Genesis we read that God said, "Let the earth bring forth grass," etc. here we see that all life comes directly from God. In His word is life and He has given to every seed a body as it hath pleased Him. It has troubled many minds to see how God had to do with every little thing in the world, that He was personally concerned with all things; but the joy of life is the recognition of the fact that God is concerned with every little thing, and that His life pervades all things.

Christ said, the kingdom of God is "

52

as if a man should cast seed into the ground, . . . and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself," or automatically, as "of herself" signifies. The word of God being in it implies growth, and the growth of the kingdom,-of the Gospel-is just like the growth of a plant. But the plant growth, we have seen, illustrates the resurrection.

OUR LIFE

Is there any difference between the final resurrection life, and the life of Christ in men now? Not a particle; for in order to live with Christ we are to know the power of His resurrection (Phil. iii. 10); we are to pass from death unto life. 1 John iii. 14. Every man out of Christ is dead in trespasses and sins. But not every man recognises this. Before man can partake of the life of Christ, therefore, he must reckon himself dead. And he who will reckon himself dead will live. "If we be dead with Him, we shall also live with Him." 2 Tim. ii. 11. It is the same life that is given, and as in plant life death must precede the giving of it.

THE GLORY OF GOD

In the Psalms we read: "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth His handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge. There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard. Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In them hath He set a tabernacle for the sun. . . . His going forth is from the end of the heaven, and his circuit unto the ends of it; and there is nothing hid from the heat thereof. The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes." Ps. xix. 1-8.

The immediate source of all the heat and light, and so of all the life, to this earth is the sun. "There is nothing hid from the heat thereof." The shaded soil, shut away from the light and heat of the sun is barren. Christ says of Himself, "I am the Light of the world." The glory of God is actual, the visible light. Men who have seen that glory in abundant measure, as Paul in the road to Damascus, have been blinded by it. When the Lord comes at the second advent the wicked are destroyed with the brightness of His glory. 2 Thess. ii. 8. So we read of the New Jerusalem that it has no need of the sun to shine in it: "for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof." Rev. xxi. 23. God says of Himself that He is a "Sun and Shield," and Christ is the "Sun of Righteousness."

CHRIST THE LIGHT

Going back to the beginning we find that in Christ all things were created, and in Him all things consists. When He made the sun He made it a light-bearer and clothed it with light. But the sun did not originate light. The light came from God before the sun was created. He said, "Let there be light," And it came from Himself by His word. Then all the light that shines upon the earth comes directly from God. Not simply that He owns the light, but it is of and from Himself. He puts His own light in the sun. There is, of course, only a portion of His glory there-as much as the world can endure. "The heavens declare the glory of God."

In the sixtieth of Isaiah the Lord says, "Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee." The chapter begins in the present condition of the earth, and ends in the new earth. In the beginning darkness covers the earth, and in the end light covers all. The light which He says, "is come" is the same as that in which the nations of them that are saved shall walk in the New Jerusalem; for "the glory of the Lord did lighten it," and the word here in Isaiah is, "the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee." His glory is the light that has come. If we will receive it now, it is the same light. But the light of God has always been shining; for God "lighteth every man that cometh into the world." John i. 9. And His light is His life. "In Him was life; and the life was the light of men." John i. 4. The terms light and life are interchangeable. Light is life. Therefore we get light from the Scriptures only when we get His life.

THE LIGHT OF LAW

In the nineteenth psalm, which we have quoted, the Psalmist goes right on from talking of the light of the sun and of the firmament to the perfection in the law. But there is no break in the thought. "The commandment is a lamp, and the law is light." Prov. vi. 23. "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." Ps. cxix. 130. Now we have not taken this to mean a real light. We have thought of it as some sort of an effect upon the intellect. But the Bible says "the commandment is a lamp, and the law is light." Now if we believe and know that the law of God is the light of God, then we must know that the law of God is an actual light, such as the eye can appreciate. The light of the Lord is simply the manifestation of His life; and His life is the law; for in the life of Christ we find the law of God. "Out of the hearts are the issues of life." Prov. iv. 23. Christ says, "Thy law is within My heart." Ps. xl. 8. So the life of Christ was the law, and His life was the light of men. Christ lived the law before men, and it was said, "The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up." Matt. iv. 16. "I am the light of the world," says Christ; "he that followeth Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." John vii. i 12. The commandment is light, and the Word is a light to our path.

GOSPEL LIGHT

Of the heavens the Psalmist says, "There is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard." Psa. xix. 3. The speech or words come from the heavens. Whose words? The words of God, assuredly. In the tenth of Romans Paul quotes this verse, and says that the heavens are proclaiming the Gospel. And the proclaiming of the Gospel is the proclaiming of the glory of God. Rev. xiv. 6, 7. When the angels came to announce the Gospel to the shepherds, they proclaimed "Glory to God in the highest." He who receives the Gospel is receiving the glory of God, that God may be glorified. "The heavens declare the glory of God," and Paul says that their words have gone out to all, preaching the Gospel. Is there any difference between the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the law in Christ? No; for the Gospel proclaims life in Christ, and in Him was the law dwelling in all its fulness. Therefore the proclamation of the Gospel is the proclamation of "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus," making free from death. Rom. viii. 2.

The heavens, then, are preaching the Gospel. The Gospel is God's glory; His glory is His righteousness.

53

Righteousness is shown by the law. The law of God is indeed His righteousness. Then the heavens declare His righteousness, His law. So the Lord has put His law and His Gospel, His light, in the heavens. And he who will recognise the glory of the heavens as the living light of the living God, with gratitude and thankfulness, to him it will be righteousness. The man who is constantly-momentarily-thanking God for the light of the sun, and His glory in the heavens and the things that He has made, will not be sinning.

The recognition of the fact induces thankfulness. Only when men were not thankful they fell into sin. "Because that when they knew God they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful. . . . Their foolish heart was darkened." Rom. i. 21. We can glorify God by recognising that the glory of the sun is the glory of God, and so of all His works. So if we continually recognise the light as coming from God, and thank Him for it, and the same with the air we breathe and the food we eat, every conscious moment recognising that He is our life, and that He gives us life in the sunshine, and air, and food, our life will be to the glory of God, the law of God will be manifested in our life.

CHANGED BY THE GLORY

Thus we see how the Psalmist can go on from the glory of the firmament to the law of God. "The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul." In the sunlight we recognise God's glory, and in that is the law of God. While we are beholding the glory of God, we are "changed into the same image." As we have seen, it is only a portion of the glory that we see in the heavens and the works of God. Christ was the brightness of the Father's glory. If He had appeared on earth in all the brightness of that glory it would have destroyed all. Therefore He veiled His glory in the flesh, and yet He was constantly manifesting forth the glory in His works. Of His first miracle it is said, "This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth His glory." John ii. 11. His works were works of graciousness and helpfulness. God's glory is to help and to save.

And when we recognise God's glory in the heavens,-all is placed there that the eyes can endure,-and are thankful to God in that recognition, and take it as His life, yielding ourselves to Him that He may do His will in us, He will live in us the same life that He lives in Himself. This must be so or else He would deny Himself. As we are yielding to Him, looking at His glory, that glory is working in us. This is the law of Christian growth. Really is there any difference between natural law and moral law? The law of plant growth is the life of God. This makes it grow. The law of our life is the life of God. It is the law for every created thing. The same law works in everything the purposes of God for that thing. It is the same life in all creation working God's purposes for that created thing.

"The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul." How God has put Himself on all creation! and when we recognise His life it works peace and joy. The plant is the offspring of the life of God. God works in every plant just what He will. He giveth to every seed his own body. The fruit tree, for example, bears beautiful flowers, but the flower is not the ultimate end of the plant. The fruit is to be produced. God could have made the plant bear fruit without a sign of a flower. What is the flower? It is the beauty of the plant. God delights in beauty, in the variety of form and diversity and blending of colour. And since the life of the plant is the life of the Lord, the beauty of the flower is the "beauty of the Lord." It is some of the beauty of the Lord's life revealed to us in the plant. The Psalmist prays, "Let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us; and establish Thou the work of our hands upon us." Ps. xc. 17. The beauty of the Lord is shown in what He works in the believer. "He will beautify the meek with salvation."

It is not simply joy, theoretically, that we get in this, but there is life in it. There are hard things for some of us to meet. We have burdens to bear, and crosses to endure. Our whole flesh is opposed to God. "The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary the one to the other." Gal. v. 17. We are coming close to the end, face to face with the coming of the Lord, and eternity. The flesh cannot go there, and we will not go there either if we cling to the flesh. We cannot take it with us. Before the Lord comes, when we will be delivered from this earthly tabernacle, and be clothed upon with the house from heaven, we must have crucified the flesh. That is a practical, everyday work. Paul doesn't say, "I was crucified with Christ," but "I am crucified with Christ." There was a constant crucifixion, and constantly a springing up of life. "The water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." John iv. 14. Paul sought that He might "know Him, and the power of His resurrection." Phil. iii. 10. We must make this a practical thing now.

LIVING THE LIFE

We know this, that as we breathe we are taking in the life of God. As our eyes greet the sunlight, it is the light of His life. As we eat the food He gives, it is His life in it that gives the strength. So all the life we live, we live by God. "In Him we live and move and have our being," said Paul. The life is the light, and the light lightens every man that cometh into the world. So the life of Christ is the life of every living soul.

Some one may say, How can I get the life of God? How can the connection be made? How often have we wished that we might get hold of that life in some way. Now the news comes that we have that life, only hitherto we have refused to recognise it. We have perverted it, and have used it to think and speak and do what God would not do. "We have turned every one to his own way," we have used God's life in doing it. Now we must say continually, "The Lord is my light," He is my life, recognising Him in everything. "In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct by paths." Prov. iii. 6. This life is already here. All we have to do is to acknowledge it.

With this we can understand what the Psalmist meant when he said that the Lord had brought him out of the miry clay, and set his feet upon a rock and put a new song in his mouth. Ps. xl. A temptation comes to us. Whose life have we? God's life. We will simply say, The life is Thine, live it in Thine own way. It is not the old life that is meeting the sin, but God's. Cannot God work victory in us? He can if He can live in us. But this He does all the time, He gives us life, breath, food; and in the air, and sunlight, and food, and all His works, God has meant to teach all creation how He is able to live in men. If we submit to Him He will work in us the perfection of His life, and actually as He is, so will we be in this world. 1 John iv.

54

This solves the question of the evangelisation of the world. "Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee." Isa. lx. 1. What is the glory?-His life, His law. What is the light that is come? The life of Christ. What will be the next thing? "Gentiles shall come to the light, and kings to the brightness of the rising."

The life is here, for the light is come. Take it. Rejoice in it; and while we are recognising it, we are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, and we thus become the light of the world. The world will see it and recognise the light of the Lord, just as the scribes and rulers recognised that Peter and John had been with Jesus. Do not let one soul dare to lift up the voice to proclaim the truth until he knows he has the life of God. And then when He says Go, what will be carried? The life and the light. Men were convinced by Christ because there was power in His words, and if we go thus, the words we speak will be like the oracles of God, and with the power of God's life. So that we, wicked and sinful as we are, may speak with the same authority, the same convincing power that Christ spoke. Then life will be carried to men. Men may reject it, but they will be forced to acknowledge, as the Jews did, that there is power there.

This is the power of the Gospel Message. The light has come to enlighten the world. The power from on high is ours and we can speak the life and shed the very light of God to the world if we will but yield to it.

"'The Lord Is with Thee'" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

These were the words the angel Gabriel used in his greeting to Mary. Could he say the same to us? He could, for the Lord has said it. "Lo, I am with you all way, even unto the end of the world." Long before the angel appeared to Mary, the Lord had said, "Fear thou not; for I am with thee; be not dismayed, for I am thy God; I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of My righteousness." Isa. xli. 10. So we may be sure that the Lord is with us now and always. He says, "I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee." Heb. xiii. 5.

The birth of Jesus of the virgin Mary, was in fulfillment of a prophecy, referred to in Matt. i. 23. It said, "A virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us." Jesus, then, is "God with us." So that the very words to Mary, "God is with thee," are the assurance to us that the Lord is with us. The Lord was with her, in order that He might be with us. If we believe the words of the angel, as addressed to Mary, we must believe that they mean us as well.

"Power in Religion" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

The leading characteristic of the true religion-the religion of Jesus Christ-is power; not the power of man, but the power of God. "I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ," wrote the Apostle Paul, "for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth." Rom. i. 16.

There are many religions in the world, some of which have an immense following and great wealth of church property, and a strong backing of State laws, but neither one nor all of these stamp any religion as the true religion. That only is the true religion which has "the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth." And because it has the power of God, it is certain that it cannot be any religion which asks or accepts the power of man. It will never be found in alliance with the State.

The same apostle wrote to Timothy that in "the last days," when "perilous times" were come, men would be found "having the form of godliness, but denying the power thereof." Not merely a few men are specified, but men in general. It is this general hypocrisy that brings the "perilous times." The Saviour also said of the last days that "because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold." There will be, in other words, a cold, formal, worldly church,-the "form of godliness," but not the power. "From such," says the apostle, "turn away."

And certainly no Christian would wish to do otherwise. Every sincere follower of Christ would wish to turn from that which is mere form to that which is living and real. What the Christian wants is "the power of God unto salvation." That is his very life. And this power is not withdrawn from the world. Though men in general have but a form of godliness, the true Gospel is still sounding, and is still within the reach of all men. No one is obliged to go on a long and perilous and toilsome journey in order to find the Gospel. We have not to say, "Who shall ascend into heaven (that is, to bring Christ down from above)? or, Who shall descend into the deep (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead)?" in order to realise the power of God unto salvation. No; for "the word is nigh thee, even in the mouth and in thy heart; that is, the word of faith which we preach; that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." Rom. x. 6-9.

Men look to the wrong source for this power unto salvation. They look to the church; but in this day the church-that is, the numerous, wealthy, influential, and conspicuous body of professed believers-has it not. They have, as the apostle states, the "form of godliness"-no lack of pomp and ceremony-but where is "the power of God unto salvation"? It is denied; for by not knowing it, not manifesting it in their lives, professed Christians deny this power, just as Peter denied his Lord by saying, I know Him not. They say in effect to the world, There is no such power to be had.

And there is nothing mysterious about this, for the Gospel is "the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth." But when there is so much of the preaching of the gospel of doubt,-the "higher criticism," the "errancy of the Scriptures," and other forms of disguised infidelity-it is no wonder that men are not led to believe. It is no wonder, when the power of man is so much sought after and counts for so much with the church, that men's minds are not directed to the power of God.

The "power of God unto salvation," is not the power of man. Let this distinction always be clearly recognised. It has nothing to do with human wisdom, eloquence, magnificence, or influence. It has nothing to do with wealth or numbers. This independence of the power of God, this disconnection from all that pertains to the power of man, is clearly and prominently set forth all through the records of Scripture; and if men would but search the Scriptures they would see it. God is not dependent for the manifestation of His power, upon anything that pertains to the power of man. Through all the recorded instances of the manifestation of the power of God, there runs this implied declaration, "It is nothing with Thee to help, whether with many, or with them that have no power." 2

55

Chron. xiv. 11. And Paul declares that "not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called; but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, and God hath chosen the weak things to confound the things which are mighty; . . that no flesh should glory in His presence." 1 Cor. i. 26-29. The apostle declares that his preaching among them was "not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power."

It need not therefore be thought strange if where man's wisdom and eloquence abound, and wealth, numbers, and influence impress the beholder with the pomp and power of man, the power of God unto salvation should be absent. God's strength is manifest in man's weakness; otherwise man will take the glory to himself. 2 Cor. xii. 9. God manifests His power through man, but never in such a way as to call attention to man. Where God works, the human instrument is covered by His hand, and He alone is exalted in the eyes of all beholders.

AN ILLUSTRATION

No man ever did a greater work than John the Baptist. John's work was to prepare the way for the advent of the Messiah. The angel which announced his birth to Zacharias said, "He shall be great in the sight of the Lord, and shall drink neither wine nor strong drink; and he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother's womb. And many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God. And he shall go before Him in the spirit and power of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord." Luke i. 14-17. And the Saviour's testimony of John was, "Among them that are born of women, there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist." Matt. xi. 11.

John's work was done in the wilderness of Judea. He carried with him no mark of earthly greatness. His raiment was of camel's hair, and his food was locusts and wild honey. But he stirred the country mightily, and multitudes came to him from all sides and were baptized in Jordan, confessing their sins. Mark i. 5.

Who and what was John? This was the question raised by the Jews at Jerusalem, and they sent priests and Levites to him, who asked him if he were the Prophet foretold by Moses. John told them he was not the Christ, neither Elias, nor the Prophet. "Then said they unto him, Who art thou? that we may give an answer to them that sent us. What sayest thou of thyself? He said, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias." John i. 20-23. That was all; but that was enough. No greater man than John ever lived, yet he himself was nothing. Those who came to him found only "the voice of one crying in the wilderness;" not John's voice, but the voice foretold by the prophet Isaiah, and that was the voice of God. The message that John gave was the message of God, and his words were the words of God. This was the secret of John's greatness, and of the power that attended his work. It was simply the power that attends the voice of God.

ALL ON A LEVEL

John's message was directly against everything that savoured of the greatness and power of man. This is shown in the words of the prophet Isaiah, to which John made reference. The prophecy declares, "Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low; and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain. And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together; for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it." Isa. xl. 3-5.

In the work of John the fulfilment of this prophecy was clearly seen. All, high and low, came to him and were baptized together, confessing their sins. Before him all stood upon a level. To the scribes and Pharisees, those in exalted positions, he said, "O generation of vipers! who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?" They, like the poorest and meanest, were told to bring forth "fruits meet for repentance." And those who flattered themselves over their descent from Abraham were told, "God is able of the stones to raise the children unto Abraham." Thus was every mountain and hill brought low, and every valley exalted, and every rough and crooked place made straight. This was the kind of work needed to prepare people for the Lord.

This is exactly what the language of the voice declares. "The voice said, Cry. And he said, What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth; because the Spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it; surely the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth; but the word of our God shall stand for ever." Isa. xl. 6-8.

And this is the message for to-day, to "make ready a people prepared for the Lord." All flesh, high and low, rich and poor, mighty and weak, is grass, and all the goodness of them is as the flower of the field. It will all wither alike and fade away; therefore no flesh can glory before the Lord.

"But the word of our God shall stand for ever." The word is the great thing; man and all his glory and power are nothing. Here is the secret of power in religion. That religion which has the word of the Lord has power, even "the power of God unto salvation, to every one that believeth." He that believeth must believe the word of the Lord. The word of man is nothing; the word of God is spirit and life (John vi. 63); it is filled with creative power. Therefore let all men turn to the word of Lord. Let them turn away from a "form of godliness" merely, which those have who deny the power thereof, that is, who do not manifest it; and let them turn to the power of the word, which is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth. That word is the sure foundation; and he who stands on that, and that alone, will never be moved by all the tempest which may burst upon him. Matt. vii. 24, 25.

"The Right Defence" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

A religious journal says: "No church is so fenced and guarded against error as that established in this land, and the increasing prevalence of false teaching within its pale is therefore the more deplorable and astounding."

True it is that the Church of England, to which reference is here made, is as thoroughly "fenced and guarded against error" as she well could be by any means devised by man. She is the established church; she is guarded (?) by the laws of the land, she is fenced in with litanies and prayer books, forms and ceremonies, which have all the strength and venerableness that lapse of time can impart to them; and yet through these petrified ramparts, so long trusted to keep out error, "false teaching" is continually and rapidly forcing its way, until the church organs, looking helplessly on, have begun to

56

bewail it as both "deplorable" and "astounding."

What is the trouble? Ah, the Church's defence is not the right one. When the situation is understood, it will be seen that it is not at all astounding. The sure defence-the only reliable one-against all false teaching is the word of the Lord. "To the law and to the testimony; if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." Isa. viii. 20. God has prepared the true defence for the Church; but the Church is trusting in the defence prepared by man. The true defence is a living one, and not a dead one composed of petrified ceremonies and forms of worship. It is the Lord round about her like a wall of fire. Zech. ii. 5. This is the Church's true defence, and all the defence that she needs.

But God says, "Is not My word like as a fire, and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces." Jer. xxiii. 29. Yes; His word is a wall of fire; for He is in it. It "is quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." Heb. iv. 12. Then let the word, full of the life and power of God, be freely proclaimed, and let it take the place of the round of dead forms. The "sword of the Spirit" will do its work; the hammer will break the rocks of error in pieces; and the strongholds of error will be pulled down, with all "imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God." 2 Cor. x. 4, 5.

"In the Image of God" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

"And God said, Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness." Gen. i. 26. "So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him." Verse 27.

In this respect man was different from all the other creatures that God had made to live upon the earth. To him alone was given the exalted privilege of being the son of God, made in His own likeness, and partaking of His Divine nature, and of His wisdom and glory.

We read that he was made but "a little lower than the angels," and was "crowned with glory and honour" (Ps. xiii. 6); in the "image and glory of God" (1 Cor. xi. 7); "after the similitude of God" (Jas. iii. 9), or "likeness of God" (Revised Version); and that he was made "upright" (Eccles. xi. 29), thus partaking also of the character of God. Dan. ix. 7.

Oh, to have seen him then, as he came fresh from the hand of his Maker! His looks, his actions, his words, all proclaimed that he was the very image of God. No trouble then to tell to whom he belonged or who was his Father, for His image was plainly seen.

But look at the ravages of sin! What is man now? He is dwarfed and weak and filled with the seeds of pain and death. His glory is gone, his wisdom is corrupted, and his nature is sinful. He is no longer the free son of God, but is the bond-slave of Satan. The image of God is well-nigh effaced. He who was once a fit companion for God and angels has sunk too low to be able to bear even the sight of their purity and glory. From the soul of his feet even unto his head there is no soundness in him, but wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores. Isa. i. 5.

But, "behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us!" He who has denied his sonship, and sold himself for nought, and allowed his Maker's image to be defaced until scarcely a trace of the likeness of God remains,-He may again become the son of God, and partake of His Divine nature and be stamped with His image! John i. 12; 2 Peter i. 4.

He may have his knowledge renewed after the image of Him that created him (Col. iii. 10), and be transformed by the renewing of his mind. Rom. xii. 2. He may have a new heart given him (Eze. xxxvi. 26); and a right spirit renewed within him (Ps. li. 10); and be cleansed from all unrighteousness (1 John i. 9); and clothed in the righteousness of God. Isa. lxi. 10. He may be created anew (Eph. ii. 10; iv. 24), and become an entirely new creature (2 Cor. v. 17) now, all but his vile body, and when Jesus comes even that vile body will be changed and fashioned like unto His glorious body (Phil. iii. 21); then he can again shine forth in the glory of the Father (Matt. xiii. 43), and as the stars for ever and ever. Dan. xii. 3.

How can this wondrous transformation be wrought? And how many can have a share in it? "Whosoever will" is the answer sent forth from God, and "To as many as received Him [Jesus] to them gave He power to become the sons of God."

Christ's life in human flesh and death upon the cross redeemed us and made it possible for Him to live in our hearts by faith. Eph. iii. 17. Jesus Christ is the perfect "image of the invisible God." Col. i. 15. Therefore when we receive Jesus into our hearts we receive the image of God.

The more we yield ourselves to Him, the deeper and deeper grows His image. The more we think upon Him and view His loveliness and glory, the more we "are changed into the same image from glory to glory." 2 Cor. iii. 18.

Is this glorious transformation taking place in you and me?

"A Living Temple" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

"A wonderful house have I,
That God has made for me,
With windows to see the sky,
And keepers strong and free.
The door has a tuneful harp,
A mill to grind my bread,
And there is a golden bowl,
A beautiful silver thread."

How often we have read or sung these words, and been led to exclaimed, Yes, "It is He that hath made us, and not we ourselves," "I am fearfully and wonderfully made." But how often have we fully realised why God has given us this wonderful house?

Why did God create you and me? Why has He placed us upon this earth? He Himself tells us in 1 Cor. iii. 16, 17: "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are." Again in 1 Cor. vi. 19 we read, "What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?" In Isa. xliii. 7 we read, "I have created him for My glory," and in Job xxxiii. 4, "The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life;" plainer still, in Job xxvii. 3, "All the while my breath is in me, and the Spirit of God is in my nostrils."

When man was created, God breathed into him the "breath of life,"-some of His own life, His own Spirit. 'Tis true He did the same for the beasts, for we read that man and beasts "have all one breath" (Eccl. iii. 19), but the Spirit was intended to do more for man than for the beast, for we read that only the man that "understandeth not" is like the beasts that perish. Ps. xlix. 20. He that understands not is he that does not recognise this life as coming from God, and does not honour Him with it, for we read in Job xxviii. 28, "The fear of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil is understanding."

But when man recognises God's life in him and also the fact that his body is its temple, and allows it to live its own way in him, it works righteousness in him, even the righteousness of God. And righteousness is life, and the never-changing, eternal life of Christ. When such an one lies down in death, he does not perish as the beasts do, but he merely sleeps in Jesus. His eternal life is untouched, and unharmed, for "his spirit returns to God who gave it," his "life is hid with Christ in God" until the resurrection morn when it will be restored to him. This is the reason for those words in 1 John v. 12: "He that hath the Son hath life, and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." The one who does not recognise God's life in him and allow it to control him in everything, resists its purifying and life-giving power and thus brings eternal death upon himself instead of eternal life. He therefore shall "not see life." John iii. 6.

Now we read in Mal. iii. 1, 2, "Behold, I will send My messenger, and he shall prepare the way before Me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to His temple. . . . But who may abide the day of His coming? and who shall stand when He appeareth? for He is like a refiner's fire, and like fullers' soap."

"The night is far spent, the day is at hand!" oh, in what condition will He find your heart temple and mine? Will He say to us as He did to the priests in Jerusalem,-"My house shall be called the house of prayer;

60

but ye have made it a den of thieves"? Is our body "the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird?" Is it a temple in ruins, with the lamps extinct, the altar overturned, the mercy seat displaced by a throne for the prince of darkness, the fragrant incense exchanged for a stench, and the order and purity for confusion and filth?

God forbid! Let us speedily "sanctify the Lord God in our hearts." Let us recognise our high calling in Christ Jesus and allow His life which is in us to indeed make us holy temples for the Holy Ghost.

"Health" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

Think of the curious set of winding passages in your ear,-some full of air, others of liquid, with their membrances stretched across them like parchment curtains. Study about the hammer and the anvil and the piano-like strings that help to carry the sounds into the innermost chambers of your soul, and see if you do not find something to thank God for.

Have you ever stopped to think about the perfectly fitting and self-adjustable curtain that protects your eye? It draws up suddenly when the light is too bright for your eye, and opens wide when the light is too dim.

Notice how perfectly your skin is fitted to your body. Lay your hand down flat and see the little folds of skin that are arranged around your knuckles in order to give room for your fingers to bend.

Do you know the effects of alcohol and tobacco on your heart and brain?

"Man" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

"Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth." Eccl. xii. 1.

This great wonder-ball of earth and water and rocks upon which we live, and which is carpeted with green, and so full of life, was not always here. We have learned that long ago, on the first day, the God of heaven made the heavens and the earth by His word. He just spoke and they were. "And God said, Let there be light and there was light." On the second day, He spoke, and the firmament with its air and clouds and blue sky was made. On the third day, God said, Let the waters be gathered together, and let the dry land appear, and let the earth bring forth grass, and herbs, and trees; "and it was so." On the fourth day, He set the sun, moon, and stars in the firmament and made them His light-bearers for the earth. On the fifth day, at His word, the air swarmed with merry birds, and the waters with creatures both great and small. On the sixth day, He formed all beasts and cattle and creeping things. How beautiful, how glorious the earth must have looked! For "God saw everything that He had made, and, behold, it was very good."

But what is home without a father or mother and the friends we hold so dear? The house may be a palace, the carpets velvet, the mirrors set in gold, and the gardens full of flowers and pots, but if that is all, how empty it seems! It needs someone who can think and use it and feel grateful for all of these things. So with the newly created earth on the sixth day. It was a home more beautiful than words can tell, but it lacked one thing yet,-some one to live in the home who could enjoy it and understand its worth, and who could praise and glorify the bountiful Giver. That is just why God made the earth. He says that He created it not in vain, He formed it to be lived upon by good people. Isa. xlv. 18.

Therefore "God said, Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness; and let them have dominion [or become king] over, the fish of the sea, and the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth." Gen. i. 26. "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life;" and man lived. And that is the reason that we live, for when God first created that first man He made it possible for us to live; and He gives us our breath and strength every day. He is therefore our Father and Creator as well as his, and we read in the Bible, "It is He [God] that hath made us, and not we ourselves." Ps. c. 3.

On the sixth day, when God first created man, he, like all the other things that God had made, was good. He was taller, stronger, more beautiful, and better in every way, than men now are. The glow of perfect health was on his cheek, and the joys of perfect life in his heart. We shall learn in another lesson how it is man's own fault that the earth now is full of sickness and sorrow, wickedness and death.

Man was the noblest and the best of all the creatures that God had made. Even now, although so cursed by sin, we see many things for which to thank and praise God. The more you study about the wonderful thinking machine and telegraph office in your head, about the little chords, called nerves, running to all parts of your body like telegraph wires; the more you learn about the music box in your throat, the mill for grinding in your mouth, and the pump that forces blood through all your body; the more you stop to think that God made these wonderfully jointed bones, that perfectly fitting skin and useful tongue, those well protected eyes and ears, and those helpful hands and nimble feet; the more you notice and think about these things the more you will feel like saying, "I will praise Thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made." Ps. cxxxix. 14.

Do not think that you must wait till you are grown to love and praise God for all His goodness. It may be too late then; do it now! Think about Him and His works every day, and love and try to please Him. This is what He says to you in Eccl. xii. 1: "Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth."

1. Of all the balls that you ever saw, which is the largest and most wonderful?

2. Who made this great earth-ball upon which we live?

3. Out of what did He make it?

4. What covered it at first?

5. How do you think it looked when man first saw it?

6. For whom had God prepared this beautiful home? Why?

7. On what day was man, the noblest and best of all the creatures, made? Gen. i. 26-31.

8. Out of what did God form him? And how did He make him live? Gen. ii. 7.

9. Who only has this power to make things live?

10. Name some of the ways in which man is better than other creatures that live upon the earth.

11. Since God has made us to know more than the beasts, what does He expect us to do?-To act as though we knew more. If He had wanted us to act like beasts He would have made us beasts.

12. When boys and girls need to be either driven, or tied up and held back, or watched all the time, to keep them from going and doing wrong, and when they kick and bite, are stubborn, and run away, like what beasts are they acting?

13. What does God say about this? Ps. xxxii. 9.

14. Although man knows so much more than the beasts, what does he know when compared with God? Isa. lv. 9.

15. Who gave us our minds and all our skill and wisdom? Who gives us strength to do everything that we do?

16. Then instead of being proud and praising ourselves when we do anything, whom should we praise?

17. Do you need to wait till you grow up to love and praise your Creator?

18. What does He say that you should do now! Eccl. xii. 1.

19. Why does He want you to do it now while you are young?

20. Was man at first just as he is now?

21. Whose fault is it that the earth is now full of sickness and sorrow, wickedness and death?

22. When God placed men upon the earth over what did He tell him to be the ruler or king? Gen. i. 28; Ps. xiii. 4-9.

"Health" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

Observe the different ways in which you can move your head. What a wonderfully jointed hinge connects it with the rest of the body!

Are you acquainted with the workings of the wonderful music box in your throat?

What are your muscles good for?

What harm is there in wearing tight clothing?

What command do we find in 1 Cor. ix. 31?

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

-The vine-growers of Belgium purpose establishing markets in London for the cheap sale of grapes.

-Chicago is said to be infested with criminals and tramps to such an extent as to produce almost a reign of terror.

-A severe earthquake shock occurred at Yamagata, in Japan, on Christmas eve, doing considerable damage to property.

-Japan has a population of about 41,089,940, in 7,817,570 families, of whom 20,752,886 were males and 20,837,574 females.

-The steamer Allonby, belonging to Cardiff, has foundered off the Saints in the Bay of Biscay. Eleven of the crew were drowned.

-The situation in Servia is described as very serious owing to the differences existing between the King and Radical party now in office.

-The number of coins struck at the Mint last year was, gold (sovereigns and half-sovereigns), 11,397,502; silver, 45,484,451; bronze, 20,948,527.

-According to the latest intelligence from the Shereefian Court, the Sultan is organising an army to be dispatched against the insurgent Riff tribes.

-Fighting has again broken out in Uganda between the Protestants and the Mohammedans, a number on each side having been killed. There has been a new partition of territory in that country.

-In Paris, the situation in Sicily and in Italy generally, is regarded as of the most critical character, some papers apparently being under the impression that the proclamation of a Republic is possible.

-Terrible distress is reported to exist among the labouring classes of Cadiz and hands of unemployed have been going about the town and the neighbouring villages, pillaging shops and farmhouses.

-The New York State Court of Appeals at Albany (N.Y.) has decided that foreign corporations can legally buy and sail real estate in that State. This decision affects property to the value of $25,000,000.

-Ships entirely laden with cotton have reached the port of Manchester. For the passage of the canal one vessel paid tolls amounting to ?216. One of the earliest consignments was an Egyptian mummy 1,000 years old.

-Advices from St. Petersburg state that certain revelations in connection with the raids on French

-Anarchists have led to numerous arrests in Russia. The documents indicate some criminal attempt upon the Imperial family.

-A distinct commercial improvement generally throughout the United States is reported. Statements from all points agree that the tide has perceptibly turned in the direction of expansion in all channels of industry.

-A Paris paper has printed a letter from Bangkok, stating that the Siamese in evacuating the left bank of the Mekong pillaged and burned all the villages, and carried off the inhabitants as prisoners to the opposite side of the river.

-According to advices from Honolulu, Queen Liliuokalani is liable to die of heart disease at any moment. Visitors are prohibited, and every precaution is taken to prevent excitement. Threats against the Queen's life have greatly added to her trouble.

-Reports have come from different quarters of serious disturbance at the Cameroons. The situation appears to become more serious each day, and the Europeans have abandoned their factories owing to the inability of the German authorities to protect them.

-According to a telegram from Ottawa the Canadian Government will entertain the proposal for a fast Atlantic steamship service on the basis of the actual subsidy of ?150,000, and will ask Parliament for the necessary authority. The statutory offer at present is ?100,000.

-A body of about 9,000 Sofas was defeated on Dec. 28 at Gala, in Tonkia, by a detachment of frontier police, consisting of forty men with some native auxiliaries, under the command of Sub-inspector Taylor. Two hundred and fifty of the Sofas were killed, including the Chief Porrekery, their commander.

-Telegrams to hand from Havana report a railway disaster to an express from Matanzas eight miles from Cumanayagua, where it was run into by a heavy freight train, several ears being completely demolished. It was found that thirteen persons were already dead, four more succumbed while being attended by the doctors, and nine others were seriously injured.

-A dispatch from Escalon, in Mexico, states that a disastrous fire, believed to be the result of incendiarism, has occurred at a mining camp in Sierra Mojada. The flames spread with terrible rapidity among the wooden cabins occupied by the miners, and twenty-one men, with several women and children, lost their lives in the conflagration.

-The steel work of the great tower for London at Wembley Park now rises to a height of 150 feet, and it may be completed in the coming spring. London is also to be provided with a gigantic wheel and towers, after the model of the Chicago marvel. The wheel is to be 300 feet high, and have attached to its circumference forty passenger carriages, each to held forty persons.

-Telegrams from Brazil report that several encounters have taken place between the insurgents and loyalists, in which both sides suffered defeats. In a naval engagement near Nictheroy the insurgent vessels were forced to retire with heavy lose, and while an insurgent force was retreating from Bage it was routed, with a loss of 400 killed. In other engagements, however, the insurgents were victorious.

The steamer City of Peking, which has arrived at San Francisco from Hong Kong, brings the details of a disastrous fire that occurred at the large temple in the city of Ningpo on Dec. 8, and resulted in the destruction of the temple and the death of 300 women and children. It appears that while the animal theatrical performance in honour of the gods was being given in the temple a boy threw a lighted cigarette into a heap of straw. In an instant the building was ablaze, with the terrible results mentioned.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

When the angel of God foretold to Zacharias the birth of John the Baptist, Zacharias said, "Whereby shall I know this? for I am an old man, and my wife well stricken in years." Luke i. 18. He did not believe the message, and yet, as we learn from verse 13, he had been praying for the very thing that was promised him. Thus it is with many people: they ask blessings of the Lord, and when His word assures them of those blessings, they refuse to believe. Let every soul believe that whenever he asks according to the will of God he receives.

Even the newly settled and agricultural countries are feeling the Depression and distress of the times. The despatch from the great wheat-growing district of Canada, Manitoba, says, "Never in our history have we experienced such a critical time. Men's hearts fail them, and many are in want." "Men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth," were the words of Christ descriptive of the last days. It is time for men to lift up their heads and look up, taking hold of something more stable and secure than earthly possessions.

A London daily newspaper remarks:-

Our ancestors were so sure of many dogmas and doctrines that they tortured or killed the men and women who did not agree with them. Our Puritans, exiled for conscience' sake, repeated the process across the seas, and persecuted their Dissenters exactly as they had been worried by Churchmen in the old home. In those days it seems impossible for anybody to believe anything without burning somebody for not believing it; it was in that epoch the necessary proof of earnestness.

But no man ever yet condemned another for not accepting Christ as He really is; for he who knows of a surety that Jesus is the Christ has apprehended the spirit of the truth which Jesus uttered in John xii. 47: "If any man hear My words, and believe not, I judge him not." It is only when men set up ways of their own that they usurp the place of judge.

"Fear" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

Fear.-The confession of a tight-rope walker to Sir Benjamin Ward Richardson is that there is "nothing so catching as fear." He says that expressions of fear by on-lookers are most dangerous to one's nerve and presence of mind, and adds: "No man in peril ever, by his own wise efforts, rises out of fear."

Christians may learn a lesson from this. Expressions of doubt and fear are disastrous. Fear is catching. If you are afraid, you will make somebody else afraid. And if you think of fear, fear will come. But you cannot cure yourself of fear. The love of God alone can cast out fear. If you trust in that alone you will not be afraid. Isa. xii. 2. "There is no fear in love."

"It Stands Sure" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

It Stands Sure.-An Oxford professor has decided that the Lord's Supper was not instituted by Christ, and that the account in the Gospels of such institution is an interpolation. This he concludes because the record reads right on without a break, when these accounts are dropped out! If, after the manner of composite photography, we could make the composite "higher critic," we should doubtless find that the entire record between the lives of the Bible might be dropped out without great loss. No wonder many are exclaiming, "If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?" But the word of God to the righteous is, "Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure."

"Who Shall Separate Us?" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

Who Shall Separate Us?-It surely betrays a misconception when men speak of looking to Parliament for "the protection of our faith and liberties as by law established." If it could be established by law, it could be overthrown by law. Faith is the victory that hath overcome the world. What then should we look to man or any combination of men to preserve the faith? No power on earth can help us to acquire or keep it, and none can take the faith in Jesus from us. Neither death, nor life, nor principalities, "nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Look to Him alone.

"The Difference" The Present Truth 10, 4.

E. J. Waggoner

The Difference.-The Echo has the following comment on the death of the company of English troopers in the Matabele campaign: "We cannot but regret the fate of these young Englishmen, though we could have wished that they had died in a noble cause. They were killed in fight by those whom they were pursuing an order to slay, yet the telegrams declare that they were 'massacred.' A massacre is the indiscriminate slaughter of human beings, especially without authority or necessity. Such a term is altogether out of place when applied to men who have invaded a country for the express purpose of despoiling its inhabitants of their lands. When we mow down naked Africans by thousands with Maxim guns, that is a battle; when the natives turn in desperation and kill thirty-four Englishmen, that is a massacre."

February 1, 1894

"Abounding Grace" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

Abounding Grace.-By the abundance of the air which God has given to surround us we may know how freely the Lord has given us His Spirit; and as we draw in the breath of life so easily, we may know how easily we may drink in the Spirit of God, which is the water of life.

"Learning" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

Learning.-When we come to the point of giving ourselves to the Lord as freely as He has given Himself to us, and taking Him for all He is to us, it will not be difficult for us to learn. The Lord can flash into our minds in half a minute more than we can learn by groping along with intellectual effort for months.

"Power of Elijah" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

Power of Elijah.-The angel Gabriel said of John the Baptist: "Many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God. And he shall go before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord." Luke i. 16, 17. When we think of the power of Elijah our minds rest on the wonderful miracles that were wrought by him. He shut up and opened heaven, brought down fire, divided the waters of the river, and raised the dead. John "did no miracle," yet all the power that Elijah had was manifested in him. In what way?-In the word that he preached. The power of God is not always shown in what are commonly called miracles. He who has the word of God dwelling in him, has the miracle by which alone all miracles were ever performed.

"Joy in Creation" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

Joy in Creation.-When the Lord laid the foundations of the earth, "the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy." Job xxxviii. 7. What was their joy? There was creation. Whenever a sinner is converted "there is joy in the presence of the angels of God." Luke xv. 10. It is a creation. The marvel of the new creation causes all heaven to shout for joy.

"Presumption" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

Presumption.-There are very many professed Christians who think it would be presumption for them to say, "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Yet they have no hesitation in saying that they are trying to live righteously, so that they may be fit representatives of Christ. They who think it would be a presumption to allow Christ to live His own life in them by faith, are presumptuous enough to attempt to live His life for Him!

"God Not Limited" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

God Not Limited.-In a review of the past year, we read: "Whatever God may or may not have done for us this past year, He has certainly done all that He could be expected to do in view of the material with which He has to work." If the thought here suggested were true, namely, that God is limited in His work by the material at His hand, it would be most discouraging; for He will never have any better material of which to make saints than He now has. It is to the glory of God that He can do great things with the poorest and most unpromising material. "Base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to naught things that are." 1 Cor. i. 28. Nothing is too hard for Him, for He is the Creator. If we are but willing, and continually willing, He can and will take us at our lowest state, and make us "to the praise of the glory of His grace."

"Giving and Taking" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

The grace of God is manifested in giving. "God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son." "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?" Rom. viii. 32. "This is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life. And this life is in His Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." 1 John v. 11, 12.

As Christ has given Himself for us and to us, so must we give ourselves to Him. He has bought us with His own blood, so that we are not our own (1 Peter i. 18, 19; 1 Cor. vi. 19, 20); yet He will not seize His own, but waits for us to deliver up to Him that which He has purchased. We are to acknowledge the purchase, and give ourselves to Him. He "gave Himself for our sins," and so He has bought them; therefore we are to give Him our sins, and let Him do as He will with them.

Now there are many professors who grasp only one side of the truth of the Gospel. They accept the matter of giving, but not of taking. They give themselves to the Lord, but they do not believe that He takes them; and so they can never say for certain that they are the Lord's. They believe that

66

Christ gave Himself for them, but they do not take Him; and so they never dare say that He is theirs. This is one reason why there are so many half-hearted Christians. It is a most unsatisfactory state in which to be.

Let everybody who gives himself to the Lord, know for a certainty that He is the Lord's. "Know ye not that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey?" The minute we yield ourselves to the Lord, we are His. We are, indeed, His before, without knowing it, but when we yield, we must know and declare that we are His.

There are many people who do conscientiously give up their sinful ways to the Lord. They are sincere in their consecration, and yet they do not have the peace that they need; their sins seem to come back to them, or rather to remain in full force. Why is this? It is simply because they do not take Jesus in place of their own sinful ways. They are willing and anxious to give themselves to the Lord, but they are afraid to claim Jesus as theirs. They think that it would be presumptuous to do so. And so since they do not take anything in the place of self, self stays.

"The Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst, Come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." Rev. xxii. 17. We must take as freely as the Lord gives. To refuse to take, is virtually to say that He has not given. To take sparingly, is to imply that He gives grudgingly.

The Psalmist says, by inspiration, "What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits toward me? I will take the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the Lord." Ps. cxvi. 12, 13. How are we to pay the Lord for all that He has done for us? By taking of His nature. He loves to give. He is the soul of generosity and benevolence. He gives unselfishly. He asks nothing for Himself, for although He asks us to give ourselves to Him, He gets nothing, for we are nothing. His joy is in giving. He is never so happy as when we take freely of His gracious gift. When we take freely, we honour Him, because it shows that we believe Him to be just what He is.

God has done much for me, therefore I will discharge of my obligation to Him taking more. But that increased gift brings increased obligation, which I can discharge only by taking more. But I soon find that I am under infinite obligation to Him, and nothing will suffice but that I must take His infinite gift. And still grace does "much more abound." What a wonderful Giver!

Therefore "unto Him that is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen."

"Two and Two Make Four" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

We must believe as we go, if we would make progress in Bible study, learning of the Lord experimentally. Suppose we come to such a text as this, "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." Gal. ii. 20. Suppose we do not believe it; so that we dare not say from the heart it is so to us. Shall we say, "Never mind, we will go on studying the other thing; we cannot quite take this text now, but there are others which we can take." Let us see how this will work.

Two and two make four. Suppose I do not believe it; you cannot make me believe that it is so. Well, never mind; we will go on through the arithmetic. This is only a little thing, only one point; I do not see why you will not let me go on into multiplication, and fractions, and cube root. What is the difference if I do not believe in it? How much progress would I make, disbelieving this one thing? Just none at all. The whole progress in mathematics depends on that one point.

Suppose it could be demonstrated that two and two do not make four. It would overturn all mathematical calculations. If I do not believe that two and two make four it is just the same to me as though it were not so. I cannot believe anything that is based upon that. My disbelief of the fact does not affect its truth, so far as I am concerned two and two would not make four. My study of mathematics would be a confused jargon.

Suppose I am willing to go so far as to say that two and two make five; but I cannot get down to four. Now we will go on with our study of mathematics on that basis. Can we not ignore that little point, and still get good out of the mathematical study? Would not the discipline of the mind in the study be just as great if we went at it on the basis of two and two making five? The mind that got its discipline from the study of mathematics on that basis would be all wrong. It would be worse than no mind at all. Whoever put confidence in it, would be deceived and deluded.

So it is with this or any other text in reading the Bible into practical experience. There is no place for argument about it. "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." It is a simple lesson. By believing it we know it is so, and this we must know in order to go on in the knowledge of the Lord, and of His Word.

"Comfort in Conviction" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

"It is expedient for you that I go away; for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. And when He is come, He will reprove the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment." John xvi. 7, 8. The first thing that the Holy Spirit does in the way of comforting is to convict of sin. But does the Holy Spirit condemn? Christ said, "I came not to condemn the world." There is a difference between conviction and condemnation, and in the recognition of this difference we get the Lord. Many suppose that when the Lord reproves, it is a sign of His anger against us.

Conviction is showing a man that he is guilty. Condemnation is the putting of the sentence upon him. We are all already under condemnation, because of transgression. Now the Lord comes to us and convicts us by His Spirit, but when He has brought us to that place where we are convicted and acknowledge the fact that we have sinned and are worthy of death, just there the Lord comes in and takes away the condemnation. He carries us to that point, and then the sentence is remitted.

God describes Himself as the "Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that

67

we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God." 2 Cor. i. 3, 4. He comforts us by showing us sin. The comfort of God's reproof lies in the fact that the very thing which causes the conviction is the righteousness which is given to take away the sin for which we are convicted.

Now what is the purpose of the comfort which Lord gives us? That we may be able to comfort any who are in trouble. God gives us His Spirit in order that we may be able to minister the same to others. So before we can be of any use in proclaiming the message of the Gospel to others, we must receive this comfort in the conviction of sin.

Here is the line between condemnation and justification. We may hold back and pass into condemnation, or we may yield and have no condemnation. If when the conviction comes we accept it, and the righteousness which brings the reproof, then there is no condemnation. But "this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil." John iii. 19. When the Holy Spirit comes the light is come. It is shining into our hearts to make us see where we have been making mistakes and failing. Many things which we thought virtues we find to be vices. Our defence was trust in ourselves, and the fear that we thought was modesty and goodness we find it is simply self-love and sensitiveness, and the fear of what somebody might say. We thought it was an evidence of our humility, when it was pride.

This is an evidence that "thy light is come." Now if we cling to self, that light will be condemnation and become darkness, "and if the light which is in you be darkness, how great is that darkness!" We had been in darkness all the time because the light which was shining had not been received. Now if the light shines and we allow it to become darkness, we are worse off than before. But yielding to it, we who sometimes were darkness become "light in the Lord." Eph. v. 8.

"A Store of Merit" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

In Roman Catholic theology, the works of some-called saints-have been more than was required and these supererogatory works constitute a store of merit from which the church draws for those who have been deficient, to release from purgatory or grant indulgences. Of course such a doctrine could originate only with those who expected to earn salvation by their good works. This being the case, the man who could do an exceptional amount of goodness, more than others who are earning eternal life, would have more merit than is really required.

To fear God and keep His commandments is the whole duty of man. Anyone who can do more than this does more than is required. But it took nothing less than the Divine life of Christ to meet the demands of the law. Unless one has more than this to give, he can do more than is required. The law of God is His own way, His own character, and therefore the Lord requires of us nothing less than His own perfection and goodness.

Further, only one who is good can do good works. "There is none good but one, that is God." Matt. xix. 17. Then we can work not the slightest good. "Not by works of righteousness which we have done," thank the Lord, "but according to His mercy He saved us." Titus iii. 5.

There is a store of merit, of good works for those who are deficient-and all have "come short of the glory of God." Christ of God is made unto us, first of all, wisdom, and righteousness-right doing. Not works stored up by mortal men have we to draw upon, but by faith in Him we have the treasures of His merits counted unto us for righteousness. Our works are wrought in Him. "Oh how great is Thy goodness, which Thou hast laid upon them that fear Thee; which Thou hast wrought for them that trust in Thee before the sons of men!" Ps. xxx. 19. Wrought for us, but also wrought in us by His own power.

"Raised from the Dead" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

The miracle of the resurrection lies at the very foundation of the Christian's hope. There would be no hope for any man were it not for the resurrection of Christ. The Apostle Paul makes this point very clear in his epistle to the Corinthians. "I delivered unto you," he writes, "that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures." "Now if Christ be preached that He rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen; and if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. . . . ye are yet in your sins. Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept." 1 Cor. xv. 3, 4, 12-20.

It would have accomplished nothing for us that Jesus Christ should have died for our sins and been buried, if the work had stopped there. With that alone to look to, we would only be plunged deeper into the darkness and despair of our mortality. But the record does not end in the gloom of the sepulchre, but in the glory of triumph. Christ "was delivered for our offences," but He "was raised again for our justification." Rom. iv. 25.

The resurrection was a most glorious demonstration, before all the universe, of the success of the plan of redemption. It was the crowning manifestation of the power of God in the flesh. It told Satan in unmistakable language that all his work must fail, and his kingdom come to an end. It was an unmistakable assurance of the power of God to put life and righteousness into one who was dead in sin. And what it was then, it is to-day.

Jesus Christ was "declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead." Rom. i. 4. In the same way do we become the sons of God. We are begotten again, Peter tells us, "unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." "Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever." 1 Peter i. 3, 23. And Paul said, that he counted all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, and had suffered the loss of all things, that he might "know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death;" if by any means he "might attain unto the resurrection of the dead." Phil. iii. 8-11. And he also prayed for us, that the eyes of our understanding might be enlightened and we might know "What is the exceeding greatness of His power to usward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power, which He wrought in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead, and set Him at His own right hand in the heavenly places." Eph. i. 18-20.

In times past, before we believed the word of salvation, we walked "according to the prince of the power of the air, the Spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience." But now it is said to us, "And you hath He quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins." For "God who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were

68

dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ (by grace ye are saved); and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." Eph. ii. 1-6.

We can now say with Paul, "I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Gal ii. 20. "We are buried with Him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection." Rom. vi. 4, 5.

And this resurrection from the dead is our assurance and the ground of our hope, because it is a triumphant demonstration of the power of God to give life and righteousness to one dead in trespasses and sins. Jesus Christ died as a sinner. "He was numbered with the transgressors." God "made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him." 2 Cor. v. 21. "He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all." Isa. liii. 5, 6.

Because our sin was put upon Him, He was cut off from the favour of God; and when upon the cross He cried out, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" it was no fanciful utterance. God had forsaken Him. He had hidden His face from Him. In that last dreadful hour spent in Gethsemane, Christ passed without the pale of the mercy and favour of God; and it was this that caused His sufferings. He felt what the wicked will feel at the last day when they, because of sin, experience the wrath of God.

Christ went where men will never be compelled to go. We shall never have to experience the dreadful certainty that God has forsaken us. Christ stood in that place in order that we might never have to go there. If we are ever there, it will be entirely our own work

Satan had the power of death. Heb. ii. 14. And when Christ, as a sinner, passed into death, he hoped to be able to keep Him in his power. But his hopes were vain. God, by His glory, raised up Christ from the dead, and He came forth from the tomb a Conqueror, taking with Him the keys of death and hell. Rev. i. 18. That demonstrated the triumphant success of the plan of salvation,-that plan which is based on the power of God to give new life to the one who is dead in sins. The devil then knew that his work to defeat that plan had failed, and that his kingdom must come to an end.

And therefore God can judge the world in righteousness by Jesus Christ. For we read that "He hath appointed a day in the which He will judge the world in righteousness by that Man whom He hath ordained, whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised Him from the dead." Acts xvii. 31. What He did in Christ He can do in all; for Christ was made a man like ourselves. Heb. ii. 17. And therefore God can require all men to be righteous, and judge them by that standard.

To-day, that word of power by which Christ was raised up from the dead, is sounding in the earth, and whosoever will hear and believe in it will know the power of His resurrection. "Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead; and Christ shall give thee light." Eph. v. 14. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and they that hear shall live. For as the Father hath life in Himself," and "as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them, even so the Son quickeneth whom He will." John v. 21, 24-26.

"Religion and Business" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

Religion and Business.-The idea of a distinction between religion and business is a great mistake. Every man is brought into the world for the purpose of serving God. That is his business. Time is given him in order that He may prepare for eternity. To do that is of far more importance than everything else. Men who make religion a matter merely of church relationship, do not know what Christianity is. Nowhere is true religion more productive of results upon unbelievers than in business. God never puts a person in any place, even for a moment, where he cannot serve Him. Religion is man's business, always; "business," in the worldly sense of the term, is only an incident. "Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you." "Whether therefore ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God."

"Infidelity: Worshipping Self" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

Suppose I say that I believe the word of God; but here is a text that I cannot believe. Yet this text is a part of what is declared to be the word of God. If I doubt this, how am I to determine that any other portion is the word of God? If reason determines it, I am simply worshipping the result of my own reason, and this is idolatry. Therefore if I do not believe that this is the word of God, do I really believe that any other word is the word of God? No; for it is all the same word.

If I think I believe another portion, then it is only my reason in which I believe. I can understand one portion, and what I can understand I will believe. Is not that a denial of God? It is saying that there is no being in this universe greater than I am; that I will not believe anything greater than my comprehension! If I believe one portion because it looks reasonable, and doubt another because it doesn't look reasonable, then reason is the god of my life, and I am sitting in judgment on God. I am virtually saying that there is nothing of God that is greater than my reason.

Then my faith in the word of God is shown by my faith in any one text of that word. If I do not believe that word, I do not believe any of it. I may think I believe something else, but in that which I think I believe, I am simply putting myself in the place of God, and worshipping myself. I am putting my understanding in the place of God's, and what I think is God is only myself. This is a fact.

This sort of thing is very common in the world, among professors of Christianity. One believes a text because it looks reasonable, and he can understand it, but that other cannot see. And yet he thinks he is not an infidel. "See what a large portion I do believe:" and yet he cannot go beyond the range of his reason. That is to say that there is no God in the universe who can speak words beyond the range of his reason. His reason is held to be equal to God's, and even above it; because he sits in judgment on what

69

God says. This is putting self above God. So, let us state it again; when we thought we believed the Bible, and noted a portion of it, and thought we believed in God, who was the god we were really worshipping, thinking it was the true God? Only self. That is the Papacy, pure and simple.

"Whom Shall We Hear?" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

"Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and they that hear shall live." John v. 24, 25.

The voice which we are to hear is always the voice of the Son of God. Only that voice will give life; only they that hear that voice shall live. If man speaks, he is to be but the mouthpiece; the voice is to be God's. "If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God." 1 Peter iv. 11. If anyone speaks with his own voice, him we are not to hear.

Some of the Samaritans believed on Christ because of what was told them by the woman whom Christ met at the well. But "many more believed because of His own words; and said unto the woman, Now we believe; not because of thy saying, but we have heard Him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world." Their faith rested on the true foundation,-Christ's word. No belief that does not rest on this will be enduring.

When many of Christ's disciples turned from Him because they could not receive His sayings, and Jesus had asked the twelve if they also would go way, Peter said, "Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that Thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God." There was none other than Christ who had the words of eternal life; there is none other now. And those who hear His words, believe and are sure that He is the Son of God. They have a knowledge that is possessed by none others.

Jesus said, "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them and they follow Me." John x. 27. When the true Shepherd "putteth forth His own sheep, He goeth before them, and the sheep follow Him; for they know His voice. And a stranger will they not follow, but will flee from him; for they know not the voice of strangers." Verses 4, 5. The true Shepherd "calleth His sheep by name." This is how they know His voice. He speaks directly to them, to each one individually, and they know it. This is how we know the voice of the Son of God.

And for that voice, and that only, we are to listen. Many voices are crying, many saying, "Lo here!" and "Lo there!" but the Shepherd's voice is different from them all. That is the voice of One whom, when we hear it, we know to be acquainted with us,-with our past lives, and the motives and thoughts and perplexities of our individual hearts. He knows us by name; and if we will hear His voice He will make known unto us His name. And "His name, through faith in His name," shall make us whole, as it did the cripple at the beautiful gate of the temple. Acts iii. 16.

"Paganism in Prayers" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

The folly of vindictive prayers is well shown in the following newspaper item:-

It has been customary on Christmas day for the priests in the churches of St. Petersburg, during the celebration of High Mass, to say a prayer anathematising the French for their invasion of Russia in 1812. This traditional prayer was, for the first time since that year, omitted this Christmas day by the direction of the Metropolitan of St. Petersburg, as a mark of the appreciation in which the French demonstrations were regarded in Russia.

All these many years the priests have been commissioned by the State to pray the Lord to send destruction upon the French. But now the French have behaved so handsomely that they are to be let off. This is done in the name of the religion of Christ, and yet could anything be more utterly pagan than such prayers? The avowed pagan calls on all his gods to curse his enemy; but the gods of the heathen are like unto themselves. When men call on God to curse and destroy their enemies they make Him such an one as themselves.

But the Lord says, "Bless them that curse you, and pray for"-not against-"them which despitefully use you." This is Christianity, and nothing less than this is.

Of a piece with this Russian custom, is the very common one of blessing gunboats, and saying prayers over the immense cannons which are designed to slaughter men by the score. Of course those who do these things are commissioned by the State authority to do them, and that is their business. But the Lord never commissions men save to preach His Gospel. The world talks of Christian nations, but there never will be Christian nations until the nations of the saved walk in the light of the city of God.

It is easy to see the paganism in such prayers as the Russian priests have been praying, but have we ourselves been guiltless? The paganism consists in making God a creature, a servant to carry out the selfish desires. Have we not often come to Him as the disciples did with the request, "Master, we would that thou shouldest do for us whatsoever we desire"? We have desired the blessing of the Lord upon the way, but have pleaded with Him to bless our way. We would make the Lord our servant to grant us what we wanted. This is sheer paganism again. "Not my will but Thine be done" is the prayer of Christ. "Bend Thy will to my will," was really at the bottom of many of our prayers.

This brings us again to the truth that "there is no difference." The pagan hewed his god out of a tree, fashioning it according to his ideas of a god. We have thought of God as in heaven, and yet have clothed Him with our own ideas, and while professing to know Him that He might live His own life in us in His own way. And the life of self that we have lived we have professed to be His life, making Him just what we are. When the Lord reveals Himself to us in His saving fulness we find that we have to repent even of our prayers.

"Multiplication of Light" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

Christ is the light of the world. Now, I can have all there is of the sunlight, and everyone else can have all there is too. From one gas jet or torch you may light a thousand other lights, and each one will be just as bright.

So Christ can die and give the whole of His life to one man, and have just as much to give to you and me and everybody, because there is no diminishing of it. It increases, and never gets any less. Each one gets all there is of Christ.

Each one of us can be crucified with Christ. He tasted death for every man. And yet each one gets the whole of His life; and still He has as

70

much more. So He could give His life over and over again for each soul, and still be alive. This is the quality of eternal life; always giving and never diminishing; always shining and never becoming dimmed.

"Present Tense Religion" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

"I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Gal. ii. 20. "Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for His seed remaineth in him; and he cannot sin because he is born of God." "Whatsover is born of God overcometh the world; and this is the victory that overcometh the world even our faith." 1 John iii. 9; v. 4.

From these and many other texts that might be cited it is evident that the Christian religion is a religion of the present tense. In the Christian life, nothing counts for anything except that which is present. Whatever has been in the past is valuable only for its present influence and effect; and the same is true of that which is to come.

To be born of God is to receive our life from Him, just as we receive life through birth from our earthly parents. But the new birth is a continuous process, and thus something that is ever present. It is the life from the Vine coming into us, the branches. John xv. 1. Thus it is a continuous flow of life from God into us. "I am the Vine, ye are the branches. He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit." John xv. 5.

If religion were a thing of the past tense, we would be turning our eyes backward instead of forward; and if it belonged to the future tense, we would be always waiting for the appointed time. In either case there would be no growth. This is the great trouble with many who profess to be Christian; they look always either to the past or to the future. If to the past, they measure the possibilities of the Christian life by some past experience; or, having had some genuine experience in the past, they think it could not have been genuine because they afterwards fail; and then they become discouraged. And if to the future, they wait for a time that never comes, since they can only live in the present.

Christianity in the present tense takes a person just where it finds him; and therefore none need wait or be discouraged. The Lord purposes to save men,-all men in the world who will let Him do it-and He cannot do this except by taking them just where there are, and just where they are at each succeeding moment of their lives. And therefore His purpose is to take you just where you are, not only now, but at each moment which will become "now" as soon as you reach it. If He cannot save men in this way, He cannot save them at all. But He has assured us that He is able to save all, to the very uttermost, that will look unto Him.

And therefore the only thing to do is simply to look to Him now and believe now, without reference to the past failures or future hopes. The only starting point in the Christian life is "now;" the only point attainable is "now." To live now is not to wish or resolve or anticipate now, but to believe and take. It is looking to Christ now. It is when we forget to live in the present moment by looking at that moment to Jesus Christ for grace and strength,-by taking Him at the present moment as God's gift to us-that we fail.

"Spiritual Worship" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

True worship is always spiritual. "God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth."

Men, however, are prone to lose sight of the spiritual nature of worship and retain only the letter; the form, without the life. With men, the mere letter is of much value. With it they can satisfy their neighbours, and very often their own hearts, as regards their Christian attainments. But it is of no value in the sight of God. No forms and ceremonies, in themselves, have any value whatever. To worship God in the letter only, without the Spirit, is more offensive to God than not to worship at all.

Without the Spirit the worship of God becomes perverted, so that God and the real nature of His requirements are not discerned. Perverted worship is not the worship of God, but of something else. He who worships God must know God; otherwise he cannot give honour and glory to Him, for He will not know in what His honour and glory consist. Paul tells us that "the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils and not to God." 1 Cor. x. 20. They do not intentionally sacrifice to devils; but not knowing God (for he who knows not God is a Gentile and a heathen), the devil puts himself in the place of God in their minds, and they do not know the difference. He does not, of course, present himself in the traditional hoofs, horns, tail, and other diabolical features with which popular theology has clothed him. He knows better than that. He presents himself as an angel light. 2 Cor. xi. 14. His character is not shown by his appearance, but by his words and actions.

SATANIC CONCEPTIONS

Among the more ignorant heathen, prayers are commonly offered to the deity for success in stealing or murdering or for some other design which enlightened people recognise as intrinsically wrong. It is the devil which prompts such design; yet the prayers are supposed to be offered to God. This is how the devil puts himself in the place of God, so that the worship which belongs to God, and is supposedly rendered to Him, is given to himself. The conception which the heathen have of God is nothing else than a conception of the devil; hence their worship cannot but be the worship of the devil.

And this is just as true of the enlightened and civilised heathen as of those who are ignorant, only the example of the latter is a little better for illustration. For whoever does not know God (and no one has, however "enlightened" and "civilised" can know Him but he to whom the Son reveals Him, Matt. xi. 27), makes God such an one as themselves; he clothes Him with the attributes of humanity. He must do so, because naturally, he has no higher conception in his mind.

God says His ways are as much higher than man's ways as the heavens are higher than the earth. Isa. lv. 9. Therefore no man can possibly know God's ways and His thoughts by his own wisdom. He can know them only by revelation. And until he knows them by revelation, he attributes to God such actions as he himself would do and such motives as he himself would have were it left to him to deal with the world and with sinners. But a man's own natural attributes are the attributes of the devil; for they were acquired, as the devil acquired his, by sinning against God. Through Adam, every man is by nature evil. And therefore when a man clothes the being whom he worships with his own attributes,-with envy, pride, spite, revenge, and all or any of those which make up the sum of human

71

nature,-he simply clothes Him with the attributes of the devil and worships the devil in the place of God.

And this is what everyone does whose worship is of the letter without the spirit, for no one, without the Spirit, can know God. The Spirit searcheth all things, even the deep things of God, and reveals them unto us, so that we may have the mind of Christ. 1 Cor. ii. 10, 16. Knowing God, we can worship Him intelligently; we can do that which meets His mind, and which meets the requirements of the case; and only thus can our worship contribute to His honour and glory. To worship Him without knowing Him (if such acts could be called worship) would be like an African bushman offering himself as assistant to an astronomer.

The Jews knew not God, and therefore their worship degenerated into the mere letter of worship, which was nothing more than an attempt to observe the commandments of God in the wisdom of man. It was not the true letter of the commandments, for that cannot exist alone, but is quickly perverted when the Spirit is lacking. So the Jews had perverted and added many things to the letter of the commandments-"grievous burdens," as our Saviour called them-and the history that is given us of their deeds and their words in the days of our Saviour afford some striking illustrations of the truth we are here considering.

KEEPING THE SABBATH

For example, consider the case of the impotent man whom Christ healed at the pool of Bethesda. He had had an infirmity thirty and eight years, and when the Saviour found him he was lying beside the pool waiting for the angel to trouble the waters. "When Jesus saw him lie, and knew that he had been now a long time in that case, he saith unto him, Wilt thou be made whole?" And when the impotent man had stated his case to the Saviour, Jesus said to him, "Rise, take up thy bed, and walk." "And immediately the man was made whole, and took up his bed and walked; and on the same day was the Sabbath." John v. 6-10.

"The Jews therefore said unto him that was cured, It is the Sabbath day; it is unlawful for thee to carry thy bed." They were outwardly strict observers of the Sabbath; but it was all mere form and ceremony. Of observance in the spirit and in truth they knew nothing. To their assertions the man who had been healed replied, "He that made me whole, the same said unto me, Take up thy bed and walk." Such an answer should have been satisfactory to any one of sufficient intelligence to comprehend that something more than human power had been exercised in his miraculous restoration; but it was not so to the Jews. They had entirely lost sight of the real nature of the Sabbath and the object of Sabbath observance. They were not observing it to the glory of God; and therefore notwithstanding all their professions and outward show, they were not observing it at all.

Had they been worshipping God in spirit and in truth,-had they known God and what He requires and what constitutes His glory,-they would have seen that the course of the restored invalid was in strict harmony with the true spirit of Sabbath observance. They would have understood that the object of Christ's miracle and the object of the Sabbath are one and the same; namely, to call attention to the true God, who alone has creative power to manifest in bringing into existence a world with all its various forms of life, or in restoring to strength a man who has lain helpless for thirty and eight years. By taking up his bed and walking, the attention of all would be signaling a call to the power which had wrought so mighty a change, and thus God would be glorified and the real purpose of Sabbath observance would be fulfilled.

All man's worship amounts to nothing if its end be not the glory of God; and the end cannot be the glory of God if the worshipper does not know God and what is required to honour Him. God is a God of mercy, and has said, "I will have mercy and not sacrifice;" and Jesus said to the Jews that had they known what these words meant, they would not have condemned the guiltless. Matt. xii. 7. Had they believed the words which God spoke to Moses when He passed by before him and proclaimed His name on Mount Sinai, they would not have lost sight of the good done to the impotent man in his seeming violation of the strict letter of the Sabbath law.

And this truth has a practical application in our own day. No one, however learned and great, can know God except the one to whom Christ will reveal Him; and no one who knows not God can worship Him in Spirit and in truth. And he who does not so worship Him will not keep the law of God, and will condemn the one who does keep it. Jewish history in the days of Jesus of Nazareth will repeat itself-is already doing so-in our own time.

Christ has revealed the Father to the world, and all may know Him sincerely desire to know Him and do His will. God has no favourites; He gives equal privileges to all. God has spoken to the world by His Son Jesus Christ (Heb. i. 2), and whosoever will believe His words and take the Spirit that is freely given to guide us into all truth, will have understanding to worship God aright. By the word of God we are born again, and passed from the natural man, which discerneth not the things of God, to the new man, and become capable of spiritual discernment. The word is the Bible. Therefore let us diligently search it and receive it into our hearts in faith, that we may be made wise unto salvation.

"'I Want to Be the Lord's'" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

You do not want to be the Lord's unless you are the Lord's, for the Lord wants you to be His so much that He gave Himself for you; and the only thing that ever kept you from Him was your unwillingness. "I want to serve the Lord." You do not want to serve Him unless you are serving Him. "To whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, His servants ye are." Rom. vi. 16. The enemy is simply deceiving you. Satan has deceived multitudes of souls, and is still deceiving, making them satisfied with the want to live the Christian life instead of the Christian life. People have thought, If we can only want and keep wanting, and let the Lord and the people know that we want everything that is good, want the Lord to dwell with us, and want to serve Him, what more could be asked than that?

There is a good deal more we could ask for. I am hungry; I want something to eat. What more could you ask? Food is better than that. Eating is a good deal more satisfactory than wanting to eat. To want to eat is dissatisfaction. When a man is hungry and wants to eat, there is nothing in the world that will satisfy him but something to eat. The man who is always wanting to serve the Lord, will be "found wanting" at last.

The Lord says there is no want to them that fear Him, for He supplies the want. "Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies." Satan is round about us

72

seeking to destroy us. Yes; and the enemy has dominion in ourselves, in the evil that is in our hearts. Yet the Lord prepares the table before us. That presents a picture of wonderful confidence in God. The enemy is raging around us, while we sit down to eat with the Lord, and have a good feast. The Lord has provided the table, and says we are to eat. "Yes, Lord, but here is the enemy coming." "Never mind; eat." What is the food that is prepared in the presence of the enemy? "As the living Father hath sent Me, and I live by the Father; so he that eateth Me, even he shall live by Me." John vi. 57. Eat Him. Take Him into the inmost being, and there is life. Then He gives the victory. He is the victory. He is our strength. He satisfies the desire of every living thing. "My God shall supply all your need, according to His riches in glory." Phil. iv. 19.

"Christ's Identity with the Sinner" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

It is the sinner who can say, "Christ liveth in me." If a man could not say it while yet a sinner he never could say it. Christ comes to him and says, "I identify Myself with you, as having committed that sin. We are sinners together. I go with you to the depths of sin." He does not ask us to come up a little way; but He comes right down to identify Himself with our sin.

But He took it that He might destroy it. We are crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed. We simply have to decide whether we will have the sin destroyed. If I am willing to have the sin destroyed, and believe Christ, then I am crucified with Christ, because He is the sin destroyer. He takes all the sin upon Himself, and swallows it up by the power of an endless life. He swallows up death in victory, and sin in His righteousness.

So He comes to me in the sin, and says, "I am with you in that." Just as soon as I am willing to say I want this sin destroyed, as soon as I cry out as Paul did in Rom. vii. 24, "O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" I can say as he did in the next verse, "I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

The sinless One is willing to be counted a sinner. "He was reckoned among the transgressors." When we know more of that grace of Christ, who, although He knew that He was holy and righteous, and knew that He came from God and went to God; knew there was no guile in Him, and that He always did the will of His Father in heaven, and yet was willing to be made of no reputation, and was willing to suffer the shame and be counted as a sinner, and have laid upon Him the iniquity of us all, it will be easier for us to suffer reproach wrongfully and take it patiently. In fact, that is the only way we can be able to "endure grief, suffering wrongfully."

"Second-hand Smoke" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

A contemporary calls attention to the likelihood of the infants of the poor being poisoned by having to inhale an atmosphere saturated with tobacco smoke. While the limited accommodation at their disposal, it is quite conceivable that men after coming home from work, and in the early morning, poison the air of the room in which the family live. A correspondent gone so far as to say, indeed, that he has met with many such cases, the correctness of his diagnosis being proved by the recovery of the infants when the cause was suppressed.

"The Secret of a Happy Home" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

A home is composed of individuals, and a happy home is composed of happy individuals. Whatever, therefore, will bring happiness into the heart of each one of its inmates will bring happiness into the home.

The Lord reveals the secret to us in Ps. cxlvi. 5. He says, "Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Lord his God."

David declares that he found this to be true, for he says, "I have set the Lord always before me; because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved. Therefore my heart is glad, and My glory rejoiceth." Ps. xvi. 8, 9. "Thou wilt show me the path of life: in Thy presence is fulness of joy." Ps. xvi. 11. He says also that God is his "exceeding joy." Ps. xliii. 4.

Paul tells us in Rom. xiv. 17 that the "kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost." Again in the fifteenth chapter and thirteenth verse he says, "Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost."

Peter adds his testimony in these words concerning Christ: "Whom having not seen, ye love, in whom, though now ye see Him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory." 1 Peter i. 8.

And Luke says that Philip went down to the city of Samaria and preached Christ unto them, and the people with one accord gave heed to the words. "And there was great joy in that city." Acts viii. 5-8.

Jesus Christ, then, received into the heart by faith brings into that heart "happiness," "gladness," "great joy," "all joy and peace," and "joy unspeakable and full of glory." Is that in each heart not enough to make any home happy?

But why does God's presence in our hearts bring such joy? Because "God is love" (1 John iv. 16), and the fruits of His Spirit are "love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance."

Without the Spirit of God in our hearts it is utterly impossible for us to have a happy home, for the best fruits or works of our flesh are "adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like."

With God all things are possible. The most unlikely, gloomy, wretched, sinful home, may be filled with love, joy, peace, light, and righteousness, by letting Jesus in. His light will drive out all darkness, His love will drive out all hate, His peace will drive out all clamour, His joy will drive out all sadness, and His righteousness all sin. In short, the fruits of His Spirit will take the place of all the works of the flesh.

The inmates of that home may thus become accustomed to the atmosphere of heaven, and be prepared to live at last in all the purity and glory of Eden restored.

Oh, shall we not let Him in?

"A Happy Home" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

"If a man love Me, he will keep My words; and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him and make Our abode with him." John xiv. 28.

Have you not sometimes wondered who gave the names to all the birds and animals? Your Bible tells, in the second chapter and nineteenth and twentieth verses. It says that on the sixth day God brought all the birds and animals to Adam, the man whom He had made, to see what he would call them; "and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof." But among all the creatures that passed before Adam, none were equal to him or fitted to be his companion. Without someone who could talk and sympathise with him and who could enjoy things with him, all the beauties of a perfect home could not keep him from feeling lonely, or make him perfectly happy. God did not think it best for him to live alone (Gen. i and. 18), and so He "caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept; and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;" and out of the rib He made a woman and brought her to Adam for his companion. Gen. ii. 21-24. Adam could not help loving her, for she was part of his own flesh; and Adam called his wife's name Eve. Gen. iii. 20.

Yet one thing more God gave them as a token of His special love and care,-the most beautiful home that man ever looked upon, prepared by the hand of God Himself. They needed no stone walls or thick roof to protect them from the cold and storm, for it never rained then (Gen. ii. 6), and the climate was warm and pleasant; God, therefore, did not give them a palace for their home. The blue sky was its roof; the earth, with its velvety carpet of flowers and grass, was its floor; and the leafy branches of the trees were the arched ceilings of its lofty rooms. Its walls of shrubs and trees were hung with clinging vines, the music of fountains and birds floated through the air, and the sun was its lamp by day, and the moon and the stars by night. In it grew "every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food;" flowers of every form and colour, and "lovely vines drooping under their load of tempting fruit." The most beautiful of all the trees stood in the centre of the garden home and was called the Tree of Life, because it had the power of keeping people alive as long as they ate of its fruit. "The lion and the lamb sported peacefully around Adam and Eve, or lay down together at their feet, and the happy birds flitted about them without fear." What a beautiful home!

But it was not only a beautiful home, it was a happy home. Beautiful things alone do not bring happiness. The reason that their home was so happy was because there was no sin there; they loved and obeyed God, and loved each other. No cloud of sin separated them from God. They were visited by the Creator Himself, and by His shining angels. You remember that He is surrounded in light too glorious for us to look upon, and that angels are as bright as lightning. How it must have lighted up the place!

Adam and Eve did not wear clothing as we do, but "were clothed with a covering of light and glory such as the angels were." Their work was to dress and keep the garden and train the vines into arbours of beauty. Gen. ii. 15. Their study was of God's power and wisdom and goodness, as shown in the wonderful things that He had made. Their songs were hymns of praise to the Giver of all their joys. There drink was of the crystal waters, and there meat the fruits and grains. Gen. i. 29.

God gave them the whole earth in all its beauty with everything upon it-all but just one tree called the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, near the Tree of Life, in the midst of the garden. They were to show their love and faith and obedience to God by not eating of this tree. Would you not think that they would rejoice to have this opportunity to show their love for the One who had done so much for them?

1. What animals have you seen?

2. Who gave names to all the birds and beasts and creeping things? Gen. ii. 19, 20.

3. When did he do it?-On the sixth day.

4. Could any of them talk with Adam and think and understand it as he could?-No; even the parrot and other birds that can be taught to talk, do it very poorly and only repeat what someone has said; they do not understand what they say, as man does.

5. Then were any of them fitted to be his companion?

6. Did God think it good for man to be alone? Why not? Gen. ii. 18.

7. Whom did He create and give to Adam for his companion? Gen. ii. 21-23.

8. Out of what was she formed?

9. Was Adam pleased with her?

10. What name did he give to her? Gen. iii. 20.

11. Then who were the first man and first woman that ever lived upon this earth?

12. What did God give them? Gen. i. 28.

13. Besides giving them all these things, how did God show them His special love and care?

14. Where did God plant a garden?-In Eden. Gen. ii. 8.

15. Because it was in Eden what is it called?-The Garden of Eden.

16. Name a few of the beautiful things in their Eden home.

17. Which was the most beautiful of all the trees?

18. What strange thing did it have power to do?

19. Do beautiful things alone make people happy?

20. Why were Adam and Eve so happy in their new home?

21. How may we be happy in our homes? Ps. cxlvi. 5; John xiv. 23.

22. Did Adam and his wife ever have any visitors?

23. Who?

24. Did this add anything to the light and joy of their home?

25. Is it possible for us to have these heavenly visitors in our homes?-Yes; we may not see them, but we have the promise that Jesus will abide with us and angels encamp around us if we love God and do as He says in His Word. John xiv. 23; Ps. xxxiv. 7.

26. If Jesus and angels live with us, what kind of homes are we sure to have?-Happy homes.

27. What kind of clothing did Adam and Eve wear?

28. Did they have any work to do? What? Gen. ii. 15.

29. Then if God thought it best for them to work, should we ever dislike to work?

30. What do idle hands learn to do?-Wicked things that grieve God and destroy us. 78

31. About what did they study?

32. What kind of songs did they sing?

33. What did they drink?

34. What did they eat? Gen. i. 29.

35. In what special way were they to show their love and obedience to God? Gen. ii. 16, 17.

"Blood" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

Blood is to your body what sap is to the plant. It is the common building material of the body. Hair, teeth, gums, nails, bones, and all the different parts of the body, are made and kept in repair by the red fluid, called blood.

The blood is made from the food you eat. "There are little mouths in your stomach that suck in the nourishing part of the food that you eat, as the mouths in the root suck up the nourishing part of the earth."

How important, then, that we should eat and drink only those things that will make good blood.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

-The Russian Government is taking steps to push forward the construction of railways in Central Asia.

-Horseflesh as an article of food is triumphing over prejudice in Paris. Last year over 20,000 horses were devoured.

-Cholera has broken out at Namur, a town southeast of Brussels. Thirty-four cases are reported, with twenty-two deaths.

-Sir H. Ponsonby Fane, who has been the Queen's private Secretary since 1878, it in failing health, being now in his 69th year.

-According to despatches received in Rome, the war indemnity to be paid by Morocco to Spain on account of the Melilla affair will be 20,000,000f.

-According to advices received In San Francisco from Samoa, dated the 8rd inst., the natives of Aiwa have rebelled and proclaimed Tarnasese king.

-Turin University has been closed in consequence of the disorderly conduct of the students, who are protesting against the refusal of the authorities to hold an extraordinary term for examinations.

-A chemist at New York has discovered an antidote for morphine poisoning in permanganate of potassium. A number of tests made with the antidote are said to have proved its efficacy beyond a doubt.

-The directors of the Church Missionary Society have decided to reinforce and extend their mission in Matabeleland without delay, as soon, it is said, as "the circumstances of the country permit of the active resumption of missionary work."

-The London School Board is engaged in debating the question of religious instruction in Board Schools. On the motion of Canon Bristow, it was resolved to add the word "Christian" to the religious instruction given in the schools.

-An electric engine has been tried on the railway between Havre and Paris. It was attached to a train of thirteen carriages, and attained a speed of seventy-five miles an hour. The experiment is considered by engineers as a very satisfactory one.

-A Rome telegram announces that M. Casimir Perier has paid to Signor Ressmann, the Italian Ambassador in Paris, the sum of 420,000f., the amount of the indemnity granted by France to the relatives of the Italians killed during the rioting at Aigues Mortes.

-Prince Bismarck and Emperor William have at last become "reconciled," much to the satisfaction of the people in Berlin and throughout Germany. The result is due to overtures from the Emperor, sent to the ex-Chancellor to a nephew of the late Von Moltke.

-A telegram from Orenberg reports a terrible railway collision not far from Samara between a passenger train and a goods train. Five trucks laden with petroleum caught fire, and the flames at once spread to the wrecked carriages of the passenger train. Fifteen persons perished.

-The allied Honduras revolutionists and Nicaraguans have experienced a reverse at Tegucigalpa by the Honduras Government forces, but the latter are not expected to maintain the struggle much longer. General Machado will, it is reported, be proclaimed president of Honduras by the citizens.

-The Russian Volunteer Fleet, which receives an annual subsidy of 600,000 roubles from the Government, for maintaining constant communication between the Black Sea ports and Vladivostock, is to be gradually increased by six large steamers, which can be used either as cruisers or as transports.

-The resignation of Dr. Talmage from the pastorate of the Brooklyn Tabernacle is announced to take place on March 22 next. No reason is assigned by Mr. Talmage, except his conviction that he has been connected with one church long enough. It is, however, rumoured that the Church finances are in a bad condition.

-A telegram from St. Louis, Senegal, published by the Journal des DÈbats, announces that a French column has entered Timbuctoo without firing a shot. The Temps says, "This capture completes the military conquest of the Soudan."

-King Lobengula is reported to be advancing south from his late position on the Zambasia, with the intent of surrendering himself upon the assurance of good treatment said to have been made in an agreement between Mr. Rhodes and Sir H. Loch, He will not be deported from the country except with his own "consent."

-Admiral Dr Mello has been deposed from his position as leader of the Brazilian insurgents, owing to his failure to bring troops from the south to aid the movements of the fleet by operations on land, and is said to be now on board the insurgent vessel Republica as a non-combatant. The insurgents are suffering from scarcity of provisions.

-The Russian Minister of the Interior has sanctioned the publication of an important new journal, which is to enjoy the especial privilege of exemption from examination by the censorship prior to publication. It is to be devoted to politics and literature. In the new paper, the old title of the Golos is to be revived. It is to be called the Russki Golos (Voice of Russia).

-Negotiations are in progress between the United States and the British Government respecting the amount of damage which the former shall pay to the Canadian sealers in conformity with the Behring Sea Award. The Canadian claims are stated to amount to ?180,000 or there abouts, but it is expected that the matter will be compromised by the payment of ?100,000.

-London's death rate in 1892 was close upon 22 per 1,000 of the population, as compared with under 21? per 1,000 in the previous year. Bronchitis is the greatest enemy of Londoners, slaughtering its 10,000 every year, and generally a thousand or two more. Consumption takes its 8,000 victims, and pneumonia has never had less than 6,000 since 1889. Influenza, which had only three victims in 1888, and five in 1889, now claims over 2,000 a year. Cancer carries off more than 3,000.

-Cold of unprecedented severity is reported from Kursk, a town about 300 miles to the South of Moscow, the mercury having fallen so low as 36deg. below zero (Fahrenheit). Fires have had to be lit in the streets in order that the passers-by may obtain some warmth. Many persons have succumbed to the cold of have been severely frost-bitten, and wolves in packs are committing ravages among the cattle. In contrast to this rigorous temperature, St. Petersburg is enjoying weather of autumnal mildness.

-The Russian Minister of Public Worship, M. Pobiodonostseff, in answer to inquiries from the educational authorities of the southern provinces as to what course should be pursued when the children of Stundists attending the national schools refuse to attend the instruction in religion, and to cross themselves before the icons, has just replied that Stundist children must be made to observe rigorously all Orthodox religious observances practised in the school, and that non-compliance must be punished with immediate expulsion from the schools.

-Renewed offers of hospitality have been made through the Papal Nuncios by several European Governments to the Pope in case the situation in Italy becomes dangerous to the personal safety of the Sovereign Pontiff. The chief of these is by Spain, although the offer of Miramar by Austria still remains open. The reply of Leo XIII. would indicate that the Pope has no intention of leaving the Vatican during any civil commotion affecting Italy only. But in case of war with another country the pontiff would conceive it to be his duty to seek some asylum where the independence of his "See" could be maintained.

-The following statement is made by the Hong Kong Correspondent of the Times as to England's naval strength in Eastern waters. He says that the force consists of nineteen warships, together of 39,000 tons, carrying 135 large guns, Including those of four-inch calibre, and 150 smaller guns. The total crown consist of 3,000 men, against the combined French and Russian squadrons of twenty-one warships of equal tonnage, carrying 153 large guns and 147 smaller guns, 4,000 men, with sixteen torpedo boats, and volunteeer cruisers besides. This startling comparison proves, he says, that, without more men and ships there, Great Britian is exposing wilfully her immense Eastern interests to great danger.

"How to Study the Bible" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

How to Study the Bible.-Just believe in it. "We know that the Son of God is come." Believe it. Stop on that until you know it-know that He is coming to you; and know it, not because it is generally talked about and generally accepted as a fact, but because it is an experience to you. No one who does not know that the Son of God is come to him individually can know that He came eighteen hundred years ago. "We know that the Son of God is come." There is light in that one statement that will explain and make light the whole Bible.

"He Knows All" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

He Knows All.-When God created the world, it was with a word. "He spake, and it was; He commanded, and it stood fast." That word brought everything into existence in its perfection. Therefore we know that before He spoke, God had everything in His mind, even to the smallest detail. As the architect has a complete plan of the house in mind before he begins to build, so God could see the smallest detail, before the word was uttered. When we realise this, it is not difficult to believe that God now knows and cares for the smallest things. He had them in mind before they were created, and it is not difficult for Him to keep them in mind. Nothing is so small as to escape His notice, and it is no trouble at all for Him to attend to it.

"The Wrong Man" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

The Wrong Man.-It will be worth all the world to me if when the time of reckoning comes the avenger cannot find me. The accuser of the brethren comes every day, and here we are before the Judge. "We have come," says the apostle, "to God the Judge of all." The accuser says I am a liar and deceitful, have borne false witness, and have done everything that is evil. This is what you are, he says. Now it would be worth more to me than all the gold that could be piled in the Bank of England, and ten thousand times that, if I could say, "You are mistaken. The one who did all those things is dead, and you are too late. Another man lives here now. Christ liveth in this house. You may bring against Him all the charges you please, for He is able to settle with you for them; but the one you are charging is dead, and you have no case at all." In order to be able to say that, I must be willing that the Lord should take my life, and all that pertains to it. It will be like taking my life, for my life has been made up of sin. So in the midst of sin and temptation I say, I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me."

"Trusting in Man" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

Trusting in Man.-The Chronicle, referring to the case of Mr. Jabez Balfour, who figured prominently in the recent "Liberator" scheme and is now wanted in England for obtaining money under false pretences, says that "it is now probable that a man may be in this Christian land not only highly respectable, but an apparent pillar of the church, and yet may be grasping all the time at that, the love of which his Bible tells him is the 'root of all evil.'"

If people would only read their Bibles, they would understand that a high position in the church and a high profession do not make any person a Christian. Christianity is a life, and not a profession or a position of influence among men. By trusting in the representations of Mr. Balfour and his partners in crime, many people lost their money; but a far worse fate awaits the deluded ones who hang their spiritual welfare upon the representations of bishop or prebendary or vicar or some other apparent "pillar in the church," without studying for themselves the word of God. Less confidence in men and more confidence in the word is the most import lesson of the hour.

"Experience as Memory" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

Experience as Memory.-No person ever has to make an effort to recall the incidence of a railway or other accident in which he narrowly escaped death; they do not have to set down in a note book the incidents of their wedding day, or of the birth of their children, or of the death of a dear friend, and con them over frequently lest they should forget them. No matter how much they may be troubled with "a poor memory," they can give all the details of such events without any effort.

Why is this?-It is because these are matters of experience. These things are a part of their lives; they cannot forget them, because they have lived them. Even so it is with the truths of the Bible. No one can ever forget the words of Scripture that he has made a part of his life. If he has experienced the truth, he will not have to cudgel his brains and spur up his memory, in order to be able to present it to some other person. He will simply be telling, in the words of the Bible, a portion of his own life history. Such presentation of truth will be with power. If you would remember truth, leave it with the heart unto salvation.

"Examining Ourselves" The Present Truth 10, 5.

E. J. Waggoner

We are to examine ourselves, whether we be in the faith. It is not to find out what is in the heart, because no man on earth can find out what is in the heart. The man who starts out to do that is going to be terribly deceived; for "the heart is deceitful above all things," and it will deceive him every time. But the Lord says, "I the Lord search the heart." He makes known to every man the fruit of his ways, and we want to have confidence enough in Him to let Him do the searching of the heart. When we find out that we are in the faith, we shall not be afraid to trust the Lord to search the heart and make known the sin. If we be in the faith we know that Christ died for sinners, in order that they might be separated from sin. Therefore He is more interested in having us know the sins, so as to give them up to Him, than we are to know them. It is not an unheard of thing, by any means, to find professed Christians who do not know that the Lord loves them when in sin; and so they are always afraid of the Lord, from a sense of their sinfulness. Are you in the faith? If so, you will accept the knowledge of sin as a result of the revelation of the righteousness which will take away that sin, and rejoice in the Lord.

February 8, 1894

"Thanksgiving" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

Thanksgiving.-"With thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God." Thanks are the basket for carrying away the blessing of God. You will carry away just as much as your thanks show that you believe in.

"Looking for Peace" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

Looking for Peace.-"Peace I give unto you, My peace I leave with you." Have you that peace of God, then? You look for it to see if you have it, and you are alarmed because you cannot find it. That is not the way to know that we have in it. By believing His word, which says He has given us peace, we have His peace. It is not what we can find by looking about, but what we know by the word of the Lord, and in that word we can rest and have peace, for He speaks peace.

"The Power of the Cross" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

The Power of the Cross.-The power of the cross is love; but the love of God is the life of God; for "God is love." God was in Christ reconciling us to Himself, and in the cross it is that He gives us His life. Failure to realise this, is the reason we have failed many times in the crosses we have borne. We bore crosses separated from Christ, and therefore the power in the cross was only the power in our own lives. It was nothing. But when we are crucified with Christ, and thus bear the cross with Him, we get the power of the cross, which is the power of the life of Christ. It was a power that all the hosts of Satan could not affect. It was a power that Satan could not hold in the grave. So when the cross comes, if we share it with Christ, then the power of the cross to us is the power of His endless life.

"Counting It Joy" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

Counting It Joy.-Christ is crucified, and as He dwells in the heart by faith, His cross is set up in every heart. So we may count it all joy when we fall into divers temptation; because being crucified with Him, His life is with us, and by His life the temptations are met. And in His presence there is fulness of joy. There is joy in the overcoming of temptations. It is the joy of life. "For the joy that was set before Him," Christ endured the cross. With the joy set before us, we may endure the cross with Him. Only let us not make the mistake of trying to bear the cross and leave Christ out.

"Seeing Objections" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

Seeing Objections.-It is most unfortunate for us when we always see the difficulties in the way of a truth, because then we never get the good out of anything. A person never can get the good out of the Scriptures until he believes whatever truth comes to him from the word, whether he can see an inch ahead or not. The difficulty in the minds of some is, they cannot see it all clearly, in order that we may believe. The spiritual way is to believe, in order that we may see. When the truth comes, seize it, get the good out of it, and you will find that the application of it in your life will open out the difficulties as fast as the Lord wants them opened to you. And that which cannot be known, we may be content to leave unknown.

"All Things Freely" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

All Things Freely.-"He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?" Where is Christ? "Far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion," in glory. Are we to be groping along in the dark having a hard time of it? "And the glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them." So coming to Him as a living sacrifice, ever slain yet ever living, to you that believe He is precious, and you may walk with Him in the light of His glory.

"God's Love for Sinners" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

"The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love; therefore with loving kindness have by drawn thee." Jer. xxxi. 3. He loves because He is love. And since His love was manifested in the gift of His son, and since He still loves us, He still gives His Son for us.

We must not believe that God is like a man, and that He bases His love on something He has received. Human love, the love of man for his fellow, is based on the good he sees in that other, and what this other man returned in kind. "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." And sometimes we have thought of God as such an one as ourselves. "But God" on the contrary, "commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." Rom. v. 8.

Does the fact of our condition in life, whether as to poverty or wealth, power or influence, or character have anything to do with the fact of

82

God's love for us? Does He love a rich man better than a poor man? "Let not the rich man glory in his riches." Does He love a man of one nation any better than another? God "hath made of one blood all nations of men." Does He not love a man of might and influence better than the man with no influence? "Let not the mighty man glory in his might." Does He love the wise man more than the ignorant man? "Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom."

The preaching of the Gospel to the poor was the highest evidence which the disciples of John the Baptist were to carry to him as proof of Christ's mission. They were to tell him that the blind saw, the lame walked, the lepers were cleansed, the deaf heard, but above all that, "to the poor the Gospel is preached."

We have the statement that God loved sinners. And that which may be known of God is manifested unto all, because He sends His sun to shine on the evil and on the good, and sends the rain to the just and to the unjust. Then no matter what I have been, no matter what I know I am, there is one fact I may be sure of, that God loves me. Christ "loved me, and gave Himself for me." We cannot imagine how anyone can deliberately say that, believing it, without feeling a thrill of joy begin to spring up in his heart.

"Not Too Short" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

Not Too Short.-The rope of God's salvation let down to earth is not too short to reach all individuals just where they are. Many who desire to be saved, however, talk as though it were too short. They say that they "want to" live for Christ and "are going" to live for Him, etc., as if it were out of the question for anyone to say that he is now a son of God and has Christ now living in him.

What a sad state of things it would be if God had provided a plan of salvation which reached almost to the sinner, but yet stopped just above his reach; if the cord of faith let down from heaven came just to the point represented by "going to," and there ended! It would be a mockery, which would but add to the horror of our despair. If we could not grasp it now, but had to wait till next week or to-morrow, or even the next hour, how sad would be our condition at the present moment. A man who has fallen to the bottom of a well has no more connection with the means of salvation if the rope that is let down to him stop short just beyond his reach, than as though no rope had been let down at all. He has no connection with safety until he has the rope actually within his hands.

The God of all mercy has not left us in such a condition as this. The cord of the faith of Jesus let down from above reaches to the golden moment "now." For "the righteousness which is of faith" says, "The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth and in time heart; that is, the word of faith which we preach; that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." Rom. x. 8, 9. We have but to grasp it and be safe.

"Christ Lifted Up" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

Paul preached Christ crucified. But you say, "Surely he preached something besides that. That would do well enough for an introduction in preaching to the people, but he must have gone on beyond that." But the apostle told the Corinthians that he was determined to know nothing among them "save Jesus Christ and Him crucified," and the preaching of that brought out a church in Corinth, a church keeping the commandments of God, instructed in all Christian duty, and possessing in abundant measure the gifts of the Spirit.

This is because Christ crucified is Christ alive. He is crucified now; He is the Crucified One; but He lives. It was not possible, says Peter, that having been crucified He should be held in the grave. Acts ii. 24. There was, and we thank God for the revelation of that truth, a risk of everything on Christ's part in coming to this earth in the likeness of sinful flesh, so that every one of us has just exactly as good a chance and prospect of overcoming as He had. But when Christ was crucified, all doubt was for ever settled. The power of the cross settled everything. "It is finished," He said, and then the complete victory was gained, and the devil was for ever vanquished. His resurrection was assured, for it was not possible for the enemy to hold Him in the tomb, since he had not been able to lead Him to sin. He had "spoiled principalities and powers," "openly triumphing over them," in His cross. There was no doubt then of His being raised above all principalities and powers.

So when we see Christ crucified, we see Christ the Victor. Then when I am willing to say, "I am crucified with Christ," I see myself a conqueror, and more than conqueror, through Him that loved me.

Christ says that if He is lifted up from the earth, He will draw all men. "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of man be lifted up." He is lifted up from the earth. So when I am crucified with Christ I am lifted up from the earth.

"I rise to walk in heaven's own light,
Above the world and sin."

This crucifixion means more to the believer every day. It means death to sin, crucifixion itself. "In that He died, He died unto sin once." So when I can say "I am crucified with Christ," it means that that sin, that miserable thing which has been the taproot of all my wicked life, the sin that doth so easily beset me, is crucified with Him. When that can be said from the heart, letting every wicked thing go, then know of a surety that Christ crucified is Christ lifted up from the earth, and ourselves with Him.

That crucifixion is a present thing. It never can be in the past. We may say, "I was crucified with Christ." But so long as we can say, "I am crucified," in that crucifixion we are lifted up from the earth. "The preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God." So when we are crucified with Him, that means that it is the power of God to us. That is the Gospel; for the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation. There are infinite worlds of glory and gladness in the cross of Christ.

"Afraid of God" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

How many children have heard words to this effect, "You are a bad boy, and the Lord doesn't love you." And the child has grown up believing that the Lord hates bad people, and is only waiting to punish them. The first part was true enough; the last part was the wickedest lie ever told on this earth. Oh, it is a wicked thing to tell a child that.

There are multitudes of professed Christians who have been taught that, and who are afraid of the Lord. In order that parents may not convey to their children that impression, even though they are not injudicious enough to say it in words, they must know that God is love, for their children's sakes as well as their own. They must know that He is love, and that He loves sinners; and they must exhibit that love in their words and actions.

83

The children know they are bad. They do not need to be told that half as much as they need to be told that the Lord loves them. The child who is brought up in an atmosphere of love, by those who know the love of God, and can reveal that love in their lives, will not grow up as one who is taught even indirectly, that the Lord has no love or care for those who are bad.

"Having Our Way" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

The only question involved in the problem of right living is whether we will have our way or let God have His way. If we insist on having our own way, it is certain that right living will not follow.

The heart of man is very deceitful, and prone to have its own way. Indeed, there is nothing more natural than for a person to think he knows better what is best for him than God does. Of course it is not anything bad that he wants; it is something good and desirable, and he has the best of reasons for wanting it. But that which is good and desirable in itself, may or may not be suited to the circumstances of the individual desiring it. His desire for it is based on the assumption that just the right time and circumstances exist in his case for what he seeks,-an assumption which only the possession of superhuman wisdom could justify.

King Hezekiah, one of the best kings of Judah, was at one time "sick unto death," and received word from the Lord by the prophet Isaiah that he should "die and not live." Hezekiah, however, did not wish to die, but thought it would be better for him to live; and he "wept sore" and prayed that he might live. He expressed his reasons for desiring to live. "I said in the cutting off of my days, I shall go to the gates of the grave; I am deprived of the residue of my years. I said, I shall not seek the Lord, even the Lord, in the land of the living." "The grave cannot praise Thee; death cannot celebrate Thee; they that go down into the pit cannot hope for Thy truth." Isa. xxxviii. 10, 11, 18. Certainly, if reason can ever show a better way than the one indicated in the word of the Lord, it was so in the case of Hezekiah.

The Lord heard Hezekiah's prayer, and sent Isaiah to him with the word that his life should be prolonged fifteen years. But these fifteen years added nothing to Hezekiah, but rather took from the lustre of his reign. For we read that "Hezekiah rendered not again according to the benefit done unto him; for his heart was lifted up; therefore there was wrath upon him, and upon Judah and Jerusalem." 2 Chron. xxxii. 25. Also "in the business of the ambassadors of the princes of Babylon, who sent unto him to enquire of the wonder that was done in the land [in causing the sun to return ten degrees backward], God left him, to try him, that he might know all that was in his heart." Verse 31. And Hezekiah died, leaving on the throne a son that had been born to him during the added fifteen years; and thus the wicked reign of Manasseh followed.

It is never safe, even with apparently the best of motives and of reasons, to seek our own way in opposition to the word of the Lord. The only place any person can afford to be in, is the place where God puts him; and when in His providence the time comes, if it does, that we are to be put in the grave, it will not be wise for us to prefer and seek life in preference to death. The language of wisdom is always, "Thy will, not mine, be done;" and "Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him."

"Meeting the Law" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

We read in the book of Samuel that on account of the apostasy of Israel brought about by the wickedness of the sons of Eli, they were smitten before the Philistines in battle; and that, thinking to make themselves secure against another defeat, they sent to Shiloh and brought from thence the ark of the Lord into the midst of their camp. But they were defeated again by their enemies with great slaughter, and the ark of God was taken by the Philistines.

The Philistines were very glad to get possession of the ark, for they knew there was a supernatural power that attended it, and they supposed that, having possession of that sacred chest, they would also have possession of the power. So they took the ark and set it up in the temple of Dagon, thinking that with the power of the ark of the Lord united with the power of their god Dagon, they would make themselves invincible.

But the experiment did not work to their satisfaction. Dagon fell down on his face before the ark of the Lord and was mutilated to the extent of ruin; and the judgments of the Lord came upon the men of Ashdod, causing a great destruction, so that they soon became as anxious to get rid of the ark as they had been before to get it in their possession. So they sent it to Gath. And "the hand of the Lord was against the city with a very great destruction." Next they sent it to Ekron, and "there was a deadly destruction throughout all the city; the hand of God was very heavy there." 1 Sam. v.

Then the Philistines took measures to send the ark back again from whence it came, and they set it upon a cart drawn by two milch kine, and it came to Bethshemesh. And the men of Bethshemesh (who were Israelites) opened the sacred structure and looked into it, to get a view of the mysterious power that it contained. But terrible was the result; for the Lord "smote the men of Bethshemesh, because they had looked into the ark of the Lord; even He smote of the people fifty thousand and threescore and ten men. And the people lamented because the Lord had smitten many of the people with a great slaughter."

All these judgments were not arbitrary acts on the part of God, done to punish the Philistines for taking the ark of the Lord from the Hebrews, or the men of Bethshemesh for the sin of looking into it. They have a deeper significance than that. They teach us what is the inevitable result when the law of God is brought into contact with sinners.

The ark of the Lord contained the law of the Lord, written on the tables of stone with the finger of God. This was the potent fact which was the secret of the power that went with the ark. It was the power of the life and righteousness of God; for the law of God is nothing less than His life and righteousness. It was indeed a power very desirable to possess, but no less dangerous than it was desirable. For the sinner to reach out and attempt to take it would be like taking hold of a wire charged with the most powerful electric current. Death, quick and inevitable, would be the result.

And this is just what the Philistines, in their sinful ignorance, did. They took the ark, thinking to gain the power that went with it; but they only brought into their midst the holy and terrible law of the Lord. There could be but one result,-judgment and death upon the sinner.

The men of Bethshemesh, curious to see more about the power that attended the ark, ventured to open it and look within; when lo, they stood face to face with the terrible law of God, as

84

holy and righteous as Himself! And the law spoke death to them; it could not be otherwise. And more than fifty thousand people perished! When the law of God meets the sinner face to face there is nothing for the latter but death.

Happily for us, God has not left sinners to meet His holy law in this way. The plan of salvation is nothing else but the means He has provided whereby sinners may meet the law and live. And that means is Jesus Christ. He stands between the law and the sinner, and in Him, the sinner can meet the law and not die. In Christ, the sinner exchanges his sins for God's righteousness, which is the righteousness that the law demands. In Christ, also, the penalty for sin has been paid. Christ is the law freed of its terrors, and human flesh divested of its sin. We meet Him as sinners and lose our sin, and also meet the law without meeting its penalty.

This idea is presented by Paul in his letter to the Hebrews. "Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which He hath consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say, His flesh, . . . let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith." Heb. x. 19, 20. Entering into the "holiest," we enter into the presence of the law of God; and well might the sinner fear to enter there and stand face to face with the law which he has transgressed. But the apostle tells us we may enter in with "boldness" through the "new and living way," "His flesh." Jesus Christ is now our High Priest, mediating for us in that temple which John saw "opened in heaven," and wherein also was seen "the ark of His testament." Rev. xi. 19. In other words, our Saviour is now "a minister of the Sanctuary and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man." Heb. viii. 1. And in the great Judgment day, all who meet the law in Him will be accounted guiltless, and have life throughout the ages of eternity.

Far should it be from sinners to glory in possessing the law of God when it does not come to them in Christ. That was what the Israelites did when they sent and fetched the ark from Shiloh into their sinful camp. When the sacred structure appeared-the symbol of the power and protection of Jehovah-they raised a shout, as if they had won the victory; but when the battle was joined, they were smitten with great slaughter. With the law of God in their midst, it fared much worse with them than it did before. But meeting the law in Christ, the law is a blessing; as it was to Obed-edom, of whom we read, "The ark of the Lord continued in the house of Obed-edom the Gittite three months; and the Lord blessed Obed-edom, and all his household." 2 Sam. vi. 11.

"Walking in the Light" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

THE PERFECTION OF LIGHT

In the account which the beloved disciple gives of his vision of the new heavens and the new earth, we read: "And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God."

"And he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, having the glory of God; and her light was like unto a stone most precious, even like a jasper stone, clear as crystal." "And I saw no temple therein; for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it; for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. And the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it; . . . and there shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth." Rev. xxi. 2, 3, 10, 11, 22-27.

In the sixtieth chapter of Isaiah we have similar language with reference to the same thing: "Violence shall no more be heard in thy land, wasting nor destruction within thy borders; but thou shalt call thy walls Salvation, and thy gates Praise. The sun shall be no more thy light by day; neither for brightness shall the moon give light unto thee; but the Lord shall be unto thee an everlasting light, and thy God thy glory. Thy sun shall no more go down; neither shall thy moon withdraw itself; for the Lord shall be thine everlasting light."

These Scriptures show us that the light of the new Jerusalem will be the glory of God and of the Lamb. Not only will the city be lighted by the glory of God, but the whole earth as well. "As truly as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord." Num. xiv. 21. "Blessed be His glorious name for ever; and let the whole earth be filled with His glory." Ps. lxxii. 19.

The glory of the Lord, therefore, is not a mere name, but is a real thing. The light that shines from God is light by which people can seek to carry on the affairs of life. The nations of the saved shall walk in the light of God's glory. It will be to them, especially in the new Jerusalem, in the place of the sun. "For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord will give grace and glory; no good thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly." Ps. lxxxiv. 11.

That will be simply the perfection of light. "And it shall come to pass in that day, that the light shall not be with brightness and with gloom; but it shall be one day which is known unto the Lord; not day, and not night; but it shall come to pass that at evening time there shall be light." Zech. xiv. 6, 7. R.V. The light will not be fitful, but continuous, because the curse will be removed. The Lord will be the everlasting Light, and all men will gladly walk in that light.

EFFECT OF THE LIGHT

Light is life. God is light, because He is the source of life. The beloved disciple says: "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; (for the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and show unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us). That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full. This then is the message which we have heard of Him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all." 1 John i. 1-5.

85

Comparing the first, third, and fifth verses of the above text, we see that the light of God is the life of God. The apostle says that he has seen and handled and heard the Word of life, and that which he has seen he declares unto us, and then he tells us that the message which he has to declare is that God is light; thus showing that the Word of life is the light of God.

This is what we learn elsewhere. Of Christ, the Word God, it is said, "In Him was life, and the life was the light of men." John i. 4. Jesus said, "I am the light of the world; he that followeth Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." John viii. 12.

From this we learn that the light of that "perfect day" on the new earth, in which the nations of the saved will walk, will be the life of God and the Lamb. God Himself will be the life of all men, and His life will be their light. God's life cannot only be their wisdom and their righteousness, but it will be everything to them: their food, as they eat of the tree of life; their drink, as they partake of the water of life which flows from God's throne; and their light by which they see. They will draw continually from the fountain of life, and it will be literally true of all that in His light they will see light.

In the fifth chapter of the Ephesians we are exhorted to be followers of God. We have already learned that he who follows the Lord will have the light of life. So the apostle continues: "For ye were once darkness, but are now light in the Lord; walk as children of light; (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth)." Verses 8, 9, R.V.

The fruit of the light of the life of God in man, is righteousness. Therefore it is that it is said of the people in the new earth, where God's glory shines undimmed, that they "shall all be righteous." Wherever the light of God is fully recognised, righteousness must be the result.

THE LIGHT NOW SHINING

We have seen that in the land of perfect day, where the light is not alternating brightness and gloom, the people are all righteous. We have seen also that righteousness is the fruit of the light. And we have also read that there shall in no wise enter into that land anything that defileth. All the inhabitants are made righteous before they enter, and they are made righteous by the same light in which they will then walk. Accordingly we read,-"Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. For, behold, darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people; but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and His glory shall be seen upon thee. And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising." Isa. lx. 1-3.

Notice that it is the glory of the Lord, by which the people addressed are to shine,-that same glory by which the holy city and the new earth are to be lighted. And that glory shines even now, when darkness covers the earth, and gross darkness the people, in order to turn them from the darkness of sin to the light of righteousness. That is, it is by the light in which people will walk in the new earth, that they are to be prepared for that glorious state. "The path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day." Prov. iv. 18. One light is not to be exchanged for another; but the same light in which the righteous now walk, will increase until it develops into the perfect day. So the Apostle Peter described himself as "a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed." 1 Peter v. 1.

DECLARING THE GLORY

"The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth His handiwork." Ps. xix. 1. "O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Thy name in all the earth! who hast set Thy glory upon the heavens." Ps. viii. 1.

These texts tell us that in the sun, moon, and stars, we may even now behold with our natural eyes some of the light of God's glory. We could not now look upon the glory of God's immediate presence, and so He reveals to us all the glory that we can endure, in order that by it we may be enabled to see more.

Christ says, "I am the light of the world." This is a simple statement of fact, and is literally true. It was by Him that all things were created (John i. 1-3; Col. i. 16, 17); and therefore it was by His word that light first shone upon the earth. "Darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light, and there was light." Gen. i. 2, 3. God's word is light (Ps. cxix. 105), because it is life. John vi. 63. That word went forth into the darkness of the earth, and carried with it the light by which we now live. Thus it is true in the most literal sense that Christ is the light of the world.

Light was sent forth into the world on the first day of creation, and on the fourth day God made the sun, moon, and stars to be bearers of the light. So we read again, "O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Thy name in all the earth! who hast set Thy glory upon the heavens." Ps. viii. 1. But it is the glory of God, as we have already learned, that is to be the light of the new Jerusalem, and the new earth; therefore we learn that the glory which is seen in the sun, moon, and stars, is some of the same light by which the holy city will be illuminated. Who that realises this fact can fail to regard the light of the heavens with new interest?

THE LIFE OF THE EARTH

All life on earth comes directly from the sun, moon, and stars, the sun, of course, being the chief source. The sun, however, does not originate its own light, but is simply the agent by which some of the light of the glory of God is transmitted to this earth.

Light is life and health. Without it there can be neither plant or animal growth. Shut a plant or an animal up in a perfectly dark place, and keep it there, and it will waste away. Plant seeds in the earth, and then shut away from that portion all the light and heat of the sun, and the seeds will never germinate. Physicians and nurses understand that sick people must have plenty of light. It was once thought that in certain diseases, at least, light must be shut away from a patient; but now it is known that sunlight is necessary in all cases. Sunlight destroys disease germs, simply because it is a part of the light and life of God, who alone conquers death.

All the fruits of the earth are the result of the light of the sun. The rain that waters the earth is first drawn into the sky by the power of the sun; and the rich juices of the fruit, as well as the bloom upon the outside, and the beauty of the flower and leaf, are the product of the sun's rays. If the sun's rays could be shut completely away from the earth for a year, the earth would be destitute of life. So Moses, in his inspired blessing upon the children of Israel, said to Joseph: "Blessed of the Lord be his land, for the precious things of heaven, for the dew, and the deep that coucheth beneath, and for the precious fruit brought forth by the sun, and for the precious things put forth by the moon." Deut. xxxiii. 13, 14.

86

By the sun the glory of the Lord is declared in all the earth, and the fruit of that glory is everywhere seen in the abundance that the earth brings forth; for "there is nothing hid from the heat thereof." Ps. xix. 6.

LIGHT, LIFE, AND LAW

"My son, keep thy father's commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother; bind them continually upon thine heart, and tie them about thy neck. When thou goest, it shall lead thee; when thou sleepest, it shall keep thee; and when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee. For the commandment is a lamp; and the law is light; and reproofs of instruction are the way of life." Prov. vi. 20-23.

The same truth is expressed by the Psalmist: "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." Ps. cxix. 105.

The law is the life of God, as we learn from the following: "Out of the heart are the issues of life." Prov. iv. 23. The law of God was in the heart of Christ (Ps. xl. 8), and therefore was His life; but He lived by the Father (John vi. 57), and therefore the law which was His life, was simply the life of God. The law of God is not a mere set of rules in a form of words, but is a living thing; it is the life of God.

But we have already learned that the life of God is light. "God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all," because with Him is "the fountain of life." It is in His light, or life, that we see light. The same life is in Christ, and that life is the light of men. He is the light of the world, because He is the life of the world. He says, "He that followeth Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life."

But we have also seen that Christ's light is not a mere figure of speech, but is a real thing. His light it is that lightens the earth; it is His light that shines in the sun. And as the sunlight is the life of the earth, and of all mankind, so it is that Christ is actually the life of every created thing. The true light is that which "lighteth every man that cometh into the world."

Since the light of the life of Christ shines in the sun, and the life of Christ is the law of God for all men, it follows that the law of God is revealed in the light which shines from the firmament of heaven. It is not as a figure of speech, but as an actual fact, that the Bible tells us that "righteousness shall look down from heaven." Ps. lxxxv. 11.

LAW FROM THE SUN

Let us now see how this lesson is taught in the nineteenth Psalm: "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth his handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge. There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard. Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In them hath He set a tabernacle for the sun, which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, and rejoiceth as a strong man to run a race. His going forth is from the end of the heaven, and his circuit unto the ends of it; and there is nothing hid from the heat thereof. The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes."

Why is it that Inspiration connects the law of the Lord so closely with the heavens? Because "the commandment is a lamp, and the law is light." The heavens declare the glory of God, and His glory is His righteousness, which is His law. This is shown by the fact that those who sin-transgress the law-come short of the glory of God. The law is the life of Christ, and that life is the light of men, and that light, or as much of it as men can endure, is revealed in the heavens.

God has designed that everything in nature shall teach men of His righteousness and salvation. In the tenth chapter of Romans the Apostle Paul quotes Ps. xix. For, as evidence that the Gospel has been everywhere preached. After saying that all have not obeyed the Gospel, he asks, "But I say, have they not heard?" and answers, "Yes verily, their sound went into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world." Rom. x. 16-18.

Suppose, now, that a man recognises God in all His works. He receives the light of the sun not merely as a gift from God, but as the very life of God. Wherever the light greets his eyes, he recognises this without being grateful. Then as he knows that all life on this earth comes immediately from the sun, whose light is a part of the light of the life of God, he will know that He lives directly from God. He will know, as the Apostle Paul has said, that "in Him we live, and move, and have our being." Acts xvii. 28. And the continual recognition of this fact-the recognition of it in every act of life-constitutes the whole of the Christian life.

For example, a man is tempted to do an evil thing, but he says within his heart: "I am living by the life of Christ; His life is in me, and I must not pervert it. This thing is contrary to His life, and therefore ought not to be done by me. I acknowledge His life as mine, nay, I claim it as mine; 'Christ liveth in me,' and I will let him live His own life in His own way; I will not presume to divert it to my own selfish ways." It is very evident that one who thus continually acknowledges God, will have his paths directed aright. As the light is diffused everywhere, he will always be conscious of the presence of the life of Christ, and will "walk openly as in the day."

Thus we see that in the nineteenth Psalm there is no change in the subject, but that the heavens in declaring the glory of God do indeed proclaim His law. He who walks in the light of day, "as He is in the light," seeing Christ in the light, will be a doer of the law.

THE SUN AND SUNDAY

In the first chapter of Romans we read that "the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth." Then we are told that the power of God is seen in "the things that are made," and that "that which may be known of God" is revealed to all men by this means. This is just what our study in the preceding sections has led us to. Then follows the description of the descent from the knowledge of God into the abominations of heathenism, in these words:-

"When they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves; who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator." Rom i. 21-25.

Men sought power in the things that God had made, but they failed to

87

recognise that power as the power of God, and so they did not glorify Him as God. They attributed the power to the thing itself, and so worshipped the creature instead of the Creator. Of the creatures thus worshipped the sun was chief, as its influence was greatest and most widespread. So it, as the immediate source of all life on earth, was the centre of all heathen worship. The heathen god Apollo was one representation of the sun as the life-giver. The Egyptians worshipped the sun under many forms, chief of which was the bull Apis. Many other names in heathen mythology might be cited as illustrating the statement that they "changed the glory of the incorruptible God," which is seen in the sun, "into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things."

Note the statement that the truth of God was changed into a lie. There is mighty power manifested in the sun, and in all of God's works. The truth of God is that this power is the direct power of God, acting through His created instruments; this truth is changed into a lie when the power is attributed to the instruments themselves; and this lie is continued to the present day in the teaching of philosophy.

As the sun, the chief light-bearer, was worshipped as the chief god, so the first day of the week, on which the light first shone, was taken as the day of the sun, and stood as the emblem of sun-worship. Since the worship of the sun was the result of changing the truth of God into a lie,-the attributing of the power of the Creator to the creature, and thus exalting the creature above God,-it was most natural that the day which should be chosen as the symbol of that worship, and ultimately as a day of rest, should be a day which even God Himself could not have made a Sabbath. For while God could have made the heavens and earth in one day, and rested on the second, He could not have made it in one day, and at the same time have rested on that day as a memorial of finished creation. Therefore Sunday, "the venerable day of the sun," stands as the mark of all religion that sets forth the creature as able to exist independently of the Creator; which represents man as having life in himself, and as being able to evolve righteousness out of himself. The fact that it is regarded by the majority of the Christian world as the true Sabbath, does not at all disprove this statement, but shows the extent to which heathen customs have permeated professed Christianity. It was Constantine, whose presiding deity was Apollo, the sun, who effected the union of the Christian Church with the heathen State, thus paganising Christianity; and so Sunday observance inevitably characterises every phase of professed Christianity which does not utterly repudiate the idea that civil power has of right any voice in matters of religion.

THE SUN AND THE SABBATH

Turn now to the truth of the matter. The sun is only a creature. Its glory is the glory of its Creator, and it shines for the sole purpose of declaring His glory. But he recognises God in all His works,-who humbly acknowledges that no creature, not even man, has any power whatever in itself,-will, when he beholds the sun, naturally think of the Creator and Preserver, and of the time when all things were created. And as soon as he does that, he will remember that "in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it."

In the record of that fact he will learn that "the seventh day is the Sabbath," and that it was given to men, as the Lord says, "to be a sign between Me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord that sanctify them." Eze. xx. 12.

Moreover, he will learn that "no man knoweth the Father save the Son, and He to whomsoever the Son shall reveal Him" (Matt. xi. 27), so that the power and glory of God are known only as Christ is acknowledged. He is the One by whom all things are created, and it is His power and glory which the heavens declare.

The Sabbath, therefore,-the seventh day,-is the mark of the Divinity of Christ; for God is worshipped as Creator only as Christ is honoured as Creator. As the sun declares the glory of God, teaching us that He alone is the source of all life and power, so it is designed to teach us of the true Sabbath, which stands as the sign of perfect dependence upon God. True Sabbath keeping, therefore, is the mark of the most complete separation between religion and the State, God being recognised as the sole director and upholder, without any mediator except Jesus Christ. As no man has any power in himself to do right, so he cannot be made to do right by pressure brought upon him from without. Arbitrary rules and force may restrain him from open violence, but have no power to repress the desires of the flesh and of the mind, nor to cause the weakness of the flesh to produce active righteousness.

Although the truth of God as declared by the sun has been changed into a lie, that very fact assures us that he who will daily with grateful reverence recognise the glory of God in the sun, will inevitably be led into the observance of the Sabbath of the Lord, which is indeed the Lord's rest, the rest which remains for the people of God.

CHANGED BY THE GLORY

"But we all, with open face, beholding as in a class the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, and even as by the Spirit of the Lord." 2 Cor. iii. 18.

The heavens reveal the glory of God, which He has placed upon them. But this glory of God is seen only through Christ, for no one can know the Father except as the Son reveals Him. Christ is the light of the world, and His light is His life. His life is the law of God. But the light of the firmament is simply the light of Christ's life; and so, if we receive it, the sun shines the law of God directly into our lives. How this is in the case of the Sabbath, has been briefly indicated.

He who continually recognises the sunlight as light from Christ, thus acknowledging that his life comes wholly from Christ, will yield himself to the Lord, so that whatever he does may be to God's glory. Such recognition and yielding must kill all pride and self-exaltation. Christ will be considered in everything. Of course food and air, which comes from God, serve the same purpose, but we are now considering only the light.

It is by beholding the glory, that we are changed into the image of God, which is righteousness and true holiness. The influence of the sun is the most widely diffused of anything that God has made. It is emphatically the life of all things. Now he who daily and hourly recognises this, giving thanks not to the sun, but to the Creator, the power of whose life the sun reveals, will inevitably be led in the right way. "In all of thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct by paths." Prov. iii. 6.

So the Christian goes along, continually looking up, walking in the light,-"heaven's own light,"-and

88

rejoicing in it because God is in the light; and thus the transformation proceeds daily. He himself will be unconscious of the change, even as Moses was unconscious of the glory that shown in his face, because he will be absorbed in beholding the glory of God.

Peter described himself as a "partaker of the glory that shall be revealed." This is the case with every true child of God; for Christ said in His prayer to the Father, "The glory which Thou gavest Me, I have given them." John xvii. 22. This glory is now imparted in the form of grace, awaiting the time when it shall be "revealed in us." Rom. viii. 18. Those who trust God for the accomplishment of this work, are content with it. They care not if their bodies are not attractive, because they have the promise that when He shall appear He will change their vile bodies that they may be fashioned like unto His glorious body; and they are content with the meek and quiet Spirit of Christ, with which that glory even now adorns them. Those who have not this hope, are driven to adorn their bodies with gold, pearls, diamonds, feathers, etc., as a substitute for the glory of God. A poor substitute it is indeed.

But while the Christian is looking up, lost to himself in the contemplation of the glory of God, the coming of the Lord draws near. Christ is soon to be revealed in person in the heavens "in the glory of His Father," sitting upon the throne of His glory. The saints of God are looking up, expecting Him. In this looking up, beholding His glory, their characters become completely transformed, and made like Christ's. While still looking, the light in which they have walked blends into "the perfect day," as Christ appears in the fulness of His glory. They are not dazzled by the sight, for it is the glory which they have been beholding, and as it bursts upon their vision, the first glance completes the transformation that has been going on, their vile bodies are changed "in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye," and thus "the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father."

And so the heavens which now declare the glory of God, and the firmament, which showeth His handiwork, impart their glory to those who fully trust and acknowledge the Lord, until even their bodies shall shine "as the brightness of the firmament," and "as the stars for ever and ever."

"The Song in the Heart" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

Often those who are glad in the Lord for the revelation of what He is to all men, feel diffident about telling of His goodness, because they feel unable to frame their thoughts in words. It is like the tune, the air of which runs in the mind, but which the person cannot sing audibly. But the apostle speaks of "singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord." God understands the language of the heart.

We read that the saved sang a new song before the throne, which none could learn except those who had gone through that experience. Sometimes the trouble is that when we sing the Lord's song, we want to put it into our own words. But He furnishes the music, and He will furnish the words also. Let Him do it. So if we cannot sing that song in the words we would choose, let Him put the words in our mouth.

Perhaps it may not sound so finished and elegant in phrase, but sometimes the Lord will let us be fools for His sake. Let it be so. Sometimes we interfere with the Lord. He fills our heart with a song of joy and gladness, and we attempt to sing it in our own way, instead of in His way. David said, "He hath put a new song in my mouth." The Lord put it there. Suppose David had said, "Lord, these are not just the words I was going to use; I think it ought to be put in this way." Just leave the Lord free, and He will make it all right. He who is a fool for the Lord's sake is a blessed one.

We have all heard those simple, broken testimonies that came with more power and did more good than the most finished exhortations. It came from the heart, and it was the power of the life of God in them that was manifest. One of the most eloquent testimonies we remember was one where the individual could not speak a word. The heart was too full for expression. The Spirit of the Lord understood the language of the heart, and translated it into language that all who knew the voice of the Spirit could understand.

"Confessing Unseen Sins" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

The Lord sometimes reproved us for sins which did not seem to be sin to us, and we have refused to confess. The Lord said it was wrong, but we could not see that it was so, and so we would not confess it until we could see it; for we thought that that would be dishonesty. We were so intensely loyal to the truth, as we thought, that if we could not see the thing to be a sin, we would not say it

89

was, no matter what the Lord said. The devil is very glad to have us honest in this way, and he will do his best that we may never see what we profess to be willing to see.

"In Thy light shall we see light." The word of the Lord is light. Then it is our business to say what the word says. Suppose the Lord points out in His word, by whatever means His word comes to us, that a thing is wrong; or it may be a duty to be performed as, for instance, Sabbath-keeping. The Lord says the seventh day is the Sabbath. Someone says, "I do not feel as though it was. As soon as I feel so I will acknowledge it, for I always follow my convictions." When we talk in that way in the course of action we practically say, I always follow my own mind; I never deny myself; I always have my own way. Many people mistake inclination for conviction.

When the Lord speaks we have no business to feel about it. The Lord says a thing is so, and he who will confess it to the Lord simply says that the Lord speaks the truth. We know He cannot speak falsely, and when we take His word as the light that it is, we shall see light always. If we believe His word, that word will enable us to see.

"The Desperate Condition of Sicily" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

It seems as hard for nations as for individuals to learn the extreme folly of trying to keep pace in appearances with their neighbours who possess several times their wealth. We have already several times alluded to the example furnished by Italy in this respect, in her efforts to maintain her part of a "triple alliance" with Austria and Germany; but the following particulars, said to be furnished by an eye-witness, afford a more vivid picture of the actual state of things than could be given by general statements. We quote from Public Opinion:-

"An eye-witness, writing from Chiaramonte, in the province of Syracuse, reports that he has seen the messi (rate collectors) sees the most necessary articles of daily life from the impecunious peasant, upon them for a fifth of their value, and then proceed to further seizures on their next official round. 'I have seen them,' he says, 'tear the ragged cloak from the shoulders of the miserable defaulter; I have seen them snatched from him the only coverlet that served not so much, perhaps, to keep off the cold as to hide the squalid misery of his hovel; I have seen them take the cattle or pot from over the few burning sticks in the fireplace, an empty on the ground a thin soup which was all that stood between the wretched household and starvation. Well-nigh every week, and within the Palazzo Communale (the Communal Hall) itself, I have looked on at the sale of household goods seized and pawned by the rate collectors. These goods have been valued at about a fifth (or less than a fifth) of what they are worth. A handful of knavish confederates "stand in," and make a show of bidding against each other; they raise by a few centimes up set price; and the article is knocked down to one of them, who passes it on, often to the collector himself. At harvest time, at the vintage, at the gathering in of the olive crop, seizures are made of the fruit as it hangs from the tree, and this is placed in pawn. The owner, as frequently as not, finds this process has been carried out against him behind his back-having had no notification from the depositario, who often enough exists only pro forma in the writ. On auction day itself he is apt to be still ignorant that he has been made the object of such proceedings, and he finds all too late that the fruits of his labour passed into the clutches of the speculatori sulla miseria (traders in misery). Nor is that enough. 'As often as not,' continues the eye-witness, 'after the small farmer or wine-grower has been thus perfidiously plundered, after he has had snatched from his mouth the bit of bread he has earned with such crushing labour, after he has been reduced to something more than despair, he is informed by the collector that his goods sold by auction have not sufficed to cover his debt and costs, and that he must at once pay up the balance if he does not want the whole process to be the gun again.'"

And all this in order that Italy may make as big a show as her powerful neighbours and her army and navy! What wonder that the poor Sicilians cannot wholly restrain their feelings of desperation. What have they to gain by a "triple alliance"? And what have the people, individually, to gain by the wars of nations? How much longer can this state of things go on, before the appearance of the "Prince of Peace," who "maketh wars to cease unto the ends of the earth," becomes an actual necessity? Certainly the time is short.

"The First Sabbath" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." Ex. xx. 8-10.

We have learned that on the sixth day God formed the beasts and creeping things, and man and woman, and that He planted the Garden of Eden. The work of creating things was now finished. In six short days the Lord had made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that in them is; and "God saw everything that He had made, and, behold, it was very good." Surely "among the gods there is none like unto Thee, O Lord; neither in the works like unto Thy works. Thou art great, and doest wondrous things; Thou art God alone." Ps. lxxxvi. 8, 10. "For all the gods of the nations are idols; but the Lord made the heavens." Ps. xcvi. 5.

Could man ever forget such a God? It does not seem possible. But God, in His wisdom, saw that men would be tempted to forget Him as the One who gave them all their strength, and power to do right, and He knew that if they did thus forget Him they would learn to trust in the other gods that could not help them, and they would then become wicked and unhappy, and finally be destroyed. He knew that without Jesus no one could be good, or truly happy. God so loved the beings whom He had created that He wanted them always to live and be as good and happy as they then were. He therefore made and gave them something to remember Him and His wonderful works by;-something beautiful, pure, and good; something that would follow them to any part of the earth, and that would present itself to them fresh and new every few days. What a strangely beautiful gift it must be! Look in the second chapter of your Bible and you will find what it is, and how it was made.

It says that the works of creation were all finished, so that instead of working on the seventh day when it came, God rested from all His work which He had created and made. Verses 1-3. God did not rest because He was tired (Isa. xl. 28), but because He wanted to make the seventh day into a Sabbath or rest-day for man,-not that man's body might get rest, but that his heart might have time to drink in new strength to do right, and might receive special help and refreshing in the presence of Jesus. This Sabbath was a wonderful gift that He was going to give man to remember Him by.

Instead of calling the next day after the seventh the eighth day, and the one after that the ninth, and so on, they were to begin all over again, calling the next day after the seventh the first day, and the one after that the second, and so on, until they counted seven again. This they were to do all the time. Every time the seventh day came it was to be the Sabbath to remind them of their God, and of His wonderful works for them,-a sign of what He was able to do for them every day. In this way, you see, they would be strongly reminded of Him again and again every few days. As they were to call every seven days a week, the Sabbath, therefore, would come upon the last day of every week.

After God had rested upon the seventh day, He put a special blessing upon it such as He did not put upon any other day in the week, and He sanctified, or made it holy, by putting His own life and presence into it. (He is so holy and good that His very presence makes a place holy. Ex. iii. 1-5; Josh. v. 13-15.) The Sabbath, therefore, was made to be the glory of the whole week, the holiest of all, set apart and appointed for the special dwelling-place of God, and for a special blessing to man. But whoever should dare to enter it with sinful hearts or their own works would pollute it and bring a curse upon themselves as surely as did the priest who bought and sold in God's temple in Jerusalem. God therefore told man to "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy."

That all might know just when it begins and ends, the Lord says it is to be kept from "even to even" (Lev. xxiii. 32), from the going down of the sun to the going down of the sun. Deut. xvi. 6.

Men now call the first day of the week Sunday, the second day Monday, the third day Tuesday, the fourth Wednesday, the fifth Thursday, the sixth Friday, and the seventh Saturday. But God gave a name to the seventh day Saturday. He named it His holy Sabbath day.

The Sabbath was made not only for Adam, but for "man" (Mark ii. 27), and that means all men. It was made for even little children like you, for we read in Ex. xx. 10: "In it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man servant, nor thy maid servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates." You see it is for us all. How we ought to praise God for His wonderful token of remembrance! We cannot lay it away and forget to take it with us, for it comes to us every week, no matter where we may be.

And this is what the Sabbath says to you every time it comes: "I come with a message from God; He says to you, 'Think of Me.' I still love you as I did when I created man in Eden. I am just as strong and wise as I was then, and as able to care for, and help you to do right. I am willing to use all of My power to help you if you

94

want it. Col. i. 11. Look around you and see how powerful I am. I still uphold the shining worlds above, and cause the grass and flowers and trees to grow; I care for the beasts, and scatter food for the tiniest creatures that I have made. If you use the Sabbath day in not doing your own ways, or finding your own pleasure, nor speaking your own words, and call it a delight, you will delight yourself in Me, for I am in it; and I will bless you greatly. Isa. lviii. 13. You then cannot forget Me and worship idols, for My Sabbath will be a sign between Me and you, that you may know that I am the Lord your God, who can save you from sin and death." Eze. xx. 12, 20.

It will always be true that God created the heavens and the earth, that He is as powerful now to help us as He was then. Since there will never be a time when we do not need to remember this, there will therefore never be a time when Jesus will not want us to keep the Sabbath.

We read that those who keep it faithfully here and love God with all their hearts will finally live on the new earth; and even then they will come together every Sabbath to worship the Lord. Isa. lxvi. 22, 23. Dear child, you may be among that happy company if you now take Jesus for your best Friend, and now remember His Sabbath day to keep it holy.

1. In how many days did God create the heavens and earth and all things therein? Ex. xx. 11.

2. Has any other being ever done such a wonderful thing?

3. Who alone can create?-The One who made the heavens and earth.

4. Then what must He be?-The only true God.

5. How many days are there in a week?

6. What did God do on the seventh day? Gen. ii. 2.

7. Was He tired? Then why did He rest?

8. What did He do to the day after He had rested upon it? Gen. ii. 3; Ex. xx. 11.

9. What only can make a place or thing holy? Ex. iii. 1-5; Josh. v. 13-15.

10. Why did God give a Sabbath day to man? Eze. xx. 12.

11. Why did He want man to remember Him and His great power?

12. Why would a day help him to remember God better than some other gift?

13. How often would it search him out and present itself to him?

14. Was Adam the only man who should keep the Sabbath holy?

15. Name over a few of those to whom He has given this precious token of remembrance. Ex. xx. 10.

16. Do little ones like you need to keep His Sabbath that you may remember Him and love Him as you ought?

17. Which day of the week is the Sabbath? Ex. xx. 8-10.

18. How can we know just when to stop our work and play and begin to keep it?

19. How can we know when it is at an end? Deut. xvi. 6.

20. How much of the Sabbath is holy? And how much does God say we are to keep holy?

21. How, then, do you suppose it makes God feel when He sees us neglect to get ready for the Sabbath in time, and work a little while after the Sabbath begins? And how when we begin our work again before the sun is down in the evening?

22. What does the Sabbath say to you every time it comes?

23. Why should it make us love God and be glad when we think of His great power, and that He is willing to be our Friend?

24. If we love the Sabbath and use it as God says, what does He promise us? Isa. lvi. 2; lviii. 13, 14.

25. How long will it be true that God created the heavens and the earth in six days?

26. How long will we need to remember God and His great power?

27. Then how long does Jesus want us to keep the Sabbath?

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

-A German professor claims to have discovered the bacillus of chronic rheumatism.

-A return shows that 1,055 lives were lost in the coal mines of the United Kingdom last year.

-A strong agitation is reported in Lisbon against the increase of license fees and other taxes on industry.

-Whistling is not permitted in the streets of Berlin. A page-boy who blow a whistle to hail a cab has been fined.

-The German Government will in all probability soon pass a bill to punish all persons caught engaged in capturing or dealing in slaves.

-According to the Etoile Beige, of Brussels, the Congo Free State has decided to construct a telegraph line from Boma to Lake Tanganyika.

-Serious Anarchist disturbances are still reported from various portions of Europe, notably Zurich, Berlin, Paris, Barcelona and Madrid

-The Russians are erecting a tower or the loftiest point of the Mount of Olives, so big that both the Mediterranean and Dead Seas can be seen from the top.

-The Queen of Italy has imposed on herself a year of self-denial. She will refrain from buying pictures, jewellery, etc., and will hand over the sum thus saved to the poor.

-The Anglo-Jewish authorities have resolved that in future February 4th shall be kept in honour of the re-settlement of the Jews in this country by Oliver Cromwell.

-The Panama Canal scandal has been revived by fresh disclosures from Dr. Cornelius Herz, which are said to touch several prominent Frenchmen not heretofore implicated.

-At an extraordinary sitting of the Congregation of Rites at the Vatican, on Jan. 27, the beatification of Joan of Arc was decided upon. The Pope has since confirmed the decision.

-A spark set fire to a great cotton mill at Oldham, doing damage to the extent of ?100,000. The mill contained 80,000 spindles. So sudden was the outbreak that the operatives had to be rescued by fire-escapes.

-Three hundred students of Brussels University have addressed a protest to the Pro-Rector, expressing their sympathy with their expelled comrades, and declaring that they will not enter the university until the present council is dismissed.

-A Glasgow barque laden with a valuable cargo of copper ore from Southern California, went ashore Jan. 28 in Tralee Bay. In spite of every effort to save them, the captain and crew, twentyfive all told, were drowned, and the vessel went to pieces.

-King Christian of Denmark has issued a deems to the inhabitants of Iceland stating that the Bill for a new constitution in the island, recently passed by the Icelandic Althing, cannot receive the royal sanction even should it pass the newly elected Althing.

-Lighting St. Paul's by electricity is to be tried afresh, this time on a more extensive scale than during the previous experiment, which failed. Fourteen strong are lamps will be placed in the dome, incandescent lamps a little lower down, and musters of lights on the columns.

-A London magistrate has decided that idleness is a crime. A young woman had positively refused to work, and in three years had entered the workhouse on twenty-three occasions. She was sentenced to one day's imprisonment, and consented to enter an industrial home.

-Telegrams from Nagoya, Gifts, Osaka, Kyoto, Kofu and Tattozi, in Japan, report violent earthquake shocks at all those towns. Houses were overthrown, and there was some loss of life. In many places the people fled from the neighbourhood of the houses and camped out in the open.

-The American Tariff Bill, with the Internal Revenue Bill, including the income-tax, was adopted Feb, 1, by the House of Representatives, amid a scene of great excitement by 200 votes against 185. The heavy duty imposed by it on diamonds has caused a panic among diamond dealers in America.

-Mob opposition to open air preaching in Dublin, which seems to augur so ill for religious equality under a Home Rule Government, was renewed Jan. 28. in spite of a letter from Mr. Davitt urging that the Evangelists should not be molested; they were driven back to their rooms, and a large force of police had great difficulty in clearing the streets.

-Serious agricultural distress is reported from South-Eastern Spain, which it is feared may lead to the spread of the Socialist movement. At a town of 10,000 inhabitants in the province of Seville, the agricultural labourers resolved to appropriate a quantity of private land and proceeded to divide it among themselves by lot. A force of gendarmes was sent to the spot and the ringleaders were arrested.

-The question of religious instruction is more and more deeply engaging the attention of the London School Board. Recently a nine-hours' discussion took place over a proposition by the School Management Committee to send a circular to the teachers in the service of the Board, telling them that the religion to be taught in the schools was the Christian religion, and defining what the committee conceived to be the Christian religion.

-The Imperial Courts of Europe are in dismay. The Shah of Persia has announced his intention to visit Berlin, St. Petersburg, Paris and Vienna during the present year. He will start in May or June and remain in Europe several months. The occasion for the dismay is the fact that he always carries with him a very large retinue, and entertaining him is more expensive than entertaining any other monarch; yet they can hardly decline the honour.

-The chief incident of the week in connection with the Brazilian revolution has been the vigorous action of the American commander Admiral Benham in Rio harbour is protecting American merchantmen engaged in landing cargoes. The insurgent vessel Guanabara having fired at an American barque which was making its way under American escort to the Sandre piers, the United States warship Detroit after a warning shot, fired a small shell into the stern-post of the Guanabara. The latter then signalled that she would cease firing.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

"There is no use denying the fact," says the Indian Witness, "that opium has gained immensely in popular estimation through the Opium Commission." This simply shows again how readily apologists for almost every species of wickedness can be found in all walks of life.

Apropos of the School Board agitation, Archdeacon Sinclair deplores the scandal of having sacred truth "dragged into a heated election contest through the arena of the pothouse and the sporting club." But truth can never be dragged into such surroundings. It is only error or the form of truth that men get hold of, when they get into debating as an electoral contest. The truth is in Jesus, and nowhere else, and men cannot make Him King by force, nor compel a knowledge of Him by the ballot box.

The Pope charges the social disorder in Italy to those who have broken with the rule of the Vatican. But the same social discontent exists in Spain to almost as great a degree, and Spain is most loyally Catholic. The apparent reason why Italy should be more deeply in the mire than Spain is that it has been sporting such a heavy military armament; but it was the fear of and knowledge of the intriguing hostility of the Papal court which, more than anything else, led the Italian statesmen to join the Triple Alliance.

This is the Roman Catholic plan for the future of America, according to the Catholic Times and Catholic Opinion: "The Catholics of America have of late years consolidated their force, and with an almost universal determination have agreed that the opportunity America gives them is to make their country from sea to sea Catholic." The people of America, notably the professed Protestant churches have indeed given the Catholics opportunity, and they have used it so well that the task is now almost completed.

A native physician of India, an old man of thirty years experience in his profession, testified before the Opium Commission to the terribly destructive nature of the opium habit. Concluding he said:-

I would not stop with opium alone; I would include alcohol just as thoroughly, as the rapid and alarming spread of alcoholic intemperance among the people during the last few years has led to the reproachful saying that "England found India sober and made her drunk."

A Correspondent of the Christian, speaking from experience in theological colleges, says that the study of the Scriptures is relegated to a small place in the course because the time of the student is occupied with other studies which "it is hoped" may better fit him for Bible study. And after beginning work in the pulpit the preacher is expected to read the principal books against the Bible by the learned critics, and so he does not get time for real Bible study. This is given as accounting for the common habit of "regarding the Bible as a collection of 'texts,' each of which was useful in proportion as it set flowing the fountain of original thought in the servant manufacturer." And the people and the learned critics are perishing for lack of knowledge.

"'Great Words'" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

On Sunday, Jan. 28, the Pope held a reception in St. Peter's, at which in response to an address, his secretary read a discourse previously prepared by the Pope. In this discourse, after deploring the present afflicted condition of Rome and Italy, he indulged in the following blasphemous claim for himself:-

It is to be hoped that people will at least profit by bitter experience to see the first origin of the evil, and the most efficacious remedy. It is useless to dissimulate that the ruin of religion, designedly accomplished, has opened the way to moral and material ruin as well. Not only justice, therefore, but political common sense demands that those responsible should retrace their steps, restore religion to the honour in which it was held by our ancestors, and approach with confidence and without suspicion him who holds from God the supreme religious magistracy, for the words of eternal life, of which the Pope is the dispenser, have also the virtue of rendering prosperous even this our mortal existence."

"Hungering and Thirsting" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

Hungering and Thirsting.-"Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness." But surely there would be no blessing in it if it were simply to hunger and thirst. We do not like to be hungry, and be unable to get anything to eat. It is intolerable torture to be thirsty, and to go hour after hour finding no water. The Saviour says, that they that hunger and thirst after righteousness are blessed, "for they shall be filled." The blessing is that He has such an abundance that He satisfies the hungry at once. "They shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of Thy house; and Thou shalt make them drink of the river of Thy pleasure." Hungry and thirsty, yet satisfied with good things, and full of delights. The Lord says, "Eat ye that which is good; and let your soul delight itself in fatness."

"Making Mistakes" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

Making Mistakes.-The fact that God dwells in an individual, as He does in every one that believes on the name of Jesus, does not preclude that individual from exhibiting the limitations of humanity. It keeps him from sin, but not from all the mistakes that arise from the limitations of human vision and judgment. The mystery of godliness is God in man,-God manifested in the life of righteousness and man manifested in the frailties of the flesh. The one contrasts with the other, and by the very contrast it is manifest that the life is not of man, but of God; and that to Him alone belongs the glory.

"Wanting at Last" The Present Truth 10, 6.

E. J. Waggoner

Wanting at Last.-People say they want to serve the Lord; want to be consecrated; want to do right; want the blessing of the Lord, etc. That kind of service will find one wanting at last. Wanting, wanting, wanting,-and never getting; thanking the Lord that we want to do this or that, and never doing it. That experience cannot result in anything at last, but, "Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting." If you want blessings, take them. The Lord has given them to you. If you want the Lord, take Him; for He is yours whether you have acknowledged it or not. And you are the Lord's whether you want to be or not; for He has bought you with His own blood.

February 15, 1894

"When to Be Discouraged" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

When to Be Discouraged.-When in your study of the word of God, you can find where He has spoken a single word of discouragement to you.

"The Objects of Love" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

The Objects of Love.-When did the Lord love us? "But God commendeth His love toward us in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." "Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." Then can we ever let the fact that we have sinned be an obstacle to our trusting in the Lord? That is the great cause for trusting in Him.

"Behold Your God" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

Behold Your God.-The message preparatory to the coming of the Lord is, "Behold your God." See Him. Those who do not look upon the Lord now, will not be able to look upon Him when He comes. It is only by fastening the eyes upon Jesus daily, becoming acquainted with His looks and His glory, that we shall be able to endure the sight when His glory is revealed without a cloud.

"Yokefellows" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

Yokefellows.-Acknowledging that we are weak and without strength makes us yokefellows with Christ; for He took upon Him our sins, and is now "touched with the feeling of our infirmities." He tasted death for every man. "The Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all." Then He says to us, "That is not your sin any more, it is Mine;" for He gave Himself for our sins. If you believe Him, that weakness, that infirmity that binds you down is not your yoke; it is His, and He bears it for you, while you walk at liberty. He says, "Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall find rest unto your souls." Matt. xi. 29.

"What Hinders?" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

What Hinders?-God will not force us to separate from iniquity. He will not force us to give up our own ideas and thoughts, and therefore if we cling to our own purposes and ways we simply refuse to take what He said. That is the only thing that can keep us from having the fulness of the Spirit. If there is a soul that is not rejoicing in the peace and joy of the Holy Ghost, it is because that soul is hanging on to something and is not willing to give up.

"Power and Freedom" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

Power belongs to the Lord alone. It is not safe to trust men with power. When men have power and use it they always become tyrants. The Lord has all power, and in the thought of that is the most wonderful revelation of love, and kindness, and longsuffering, and freedom.

With absolutely all power, with the hearts of men in His hands, the Creator of men, living in the flesh and giving His life to us, so that we live upon His life, has never exercised His power over us against our wills. Such is the Lord. Then no one who knows the Lord, and who yields to Him and His power, will have anything of arbitrariness; there will be nothing savouring of force or compulsion in him. No man who knows the power of God, which is love, will try to compel others to agree with him; and of course nobody of men who know the Lord will do so.

It is the Lord's power that is to work in men. That power we see in all the visible creation. There is a mighty power there, as in vegetation; but no arbitrariness. That power will work its way out wherever there is an opening; but it works in quietness. That power has dwelt in us, yet never has it been exercised against our will. Can we conceive of any freedom greater than that? It is the freedom the Lord has guaranteed to men, and He Himself will maintain it.

The very fact that the Lord has never compelled us to do anything, should show us that His will is not something against man. The Lord has revealed His will to us that we may choose it. His will is life and righteousness. When we choose that His will shall be done in us, then He will do it; for He has all power to work it. He "worketh all things after the counsel of His own will. And when we give Him the privilege, yielding our way to His way, our judgment to His judgment, although He works in us, yet we are still free.

This is religious liberty, the liberty that is to be proclaimed to man. There are many who profess to know the Lord, who are zealous and sincere, who yet do not know the Lord, because they think He is pleased to have them dictate as to how people shall serve Him. The only way this can be counteracted, as far as it ever will be, is to proclaim the Lord, and the freedom of the Lord, to everybody.

Those only can proclaim the freedom of the Lord, who know it. When we recognise the fact that the Lord has been with us all the years, and yet waiting, having all power, and yet refusing to use one particle of it against our will, we shall know what it is that the Lord wants to be proclaimed to men. And this message will be proclaimed in love, for that is the power of the Lord.

It is His power alone that is to be

98

manifested. We stand where Christ stood. "I can of mine own self do nothing." We can say, "His power is dwelling in me, because I am willing it shall. I am zealous of good works. I know His power is sufficient to work them. I have tried to manufacture them, and could not; now I yield to Him, that He may work in me that which is good through Christ Jesus." Then it His power working in us mightily, and that power will work only that which is persuasive and gentle. There will be no compulsion of others, and the man who knows the Lord will always be a free man. "With freedom hath the Lord made us free." The Gospel proclaims liberty to the captives; let us exercise it, and enjoy it.

"The Coming of the Lord" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

We often hear about warning the world of the coming of the Lord. It is true that men must be warned of the coming of the day of God, but there has been in the preaching of the coming of the Lord too much of simply warning. It is a message of joy. We are not to warn the world to look out for the Lord, and be afraid of Him. But we are to carry such a knowledge of Him that it will be joy. People are to have such an acquaintance with the Lord that the news of His coming will be to them a joyful message. That makes it glad tidings of great joy.

As we hold Christ by faith in the heart continually, we know the joy of the Lord, and then we can proclaim to any man that the Lord is God, that He is a mighty Saviour, that He has all power in heaven and in earth, and that this power is not exercised in harshness, but in love and righteousness; and that this Being is near at hand. Take Him, receive Him, and you will live with Him now.

Begin to live with Him now, and then you will go right on living with Him when He comes. There will be no break in the Christian experience. It will be simply a progressive acquaintance with the Lord. While we are looking, the heavens part as a scroll, and the Lord of glory bursts upon our sight. "Look up, for your redemption draweth nigh." We look up at the brightness of His glory, and that changes us as we are looking.

The change takes place unconsciously to ourselves. We are conscious only of the greater glory. As we look, suddenly the glory is brighter, and we see Him in person, and the change goes on. "We shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye." The first glance perfects the change. And we go on looking and living, for our life is in looking. To all eternity we will simply be looking. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up; and they that look shall live. There is life in a look, and looking at the Lord, and not at self, will be our life throughout eternity.

"The Will of God" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

Some people never think of the will of God except when some disaster comes. Somebody dies, and they say that is the will of God, and we must bow to it. They attribute only that which is terrible or sorrowful to the will of the Lord. When anything comes that we can rejoice in, they seem to think that that is something that slipped in when the Lord was not watching. That is heathenism. Moloch, the god of the heathen, was made to represent the idea of God always watching in anger over the people, and they offered their children as sacrifices to appease his anger. The Lord is good. His tender mercy is over all His works. He sends joy and peace; and even the sorrows which come as the result of the curse and sin, He turns to our good, and those who love Him will get good in them. "All things work together for good to them that love God."

We like to do everything we can for our children. We like to have them enjoy themselves. Sometimes they ask something that we know is not best, and we have to deny them. Suppose they should go away grumbling, and say that we never tried to do anything for them. "It is his will; and I suppose we must yield to it." They know better. They know that we plan enjoyments for them, and desire their happiness; and when something comes up that is contrary to their minds, they feel it is all right. They thought it was the best thing, but they have confidence in our judgment, and so give it up. In that way they get the good out of that very thing that is denied them.

Sometimes things may look very dubious. The way seems dark, and there are troubles and difficulties on every side. Now shall we groan over it and mourn and get all the hardness out of it? Some people seem to think that we must be duly solemn and mournful about a trial, because the Lord wants to make us miserable, and we must make it as hard as possible. No; there is good in it, and we get the good if we believe what the Lord says. We may not be able to see how there can be good in it; but He is the one who is to make it work for good. We do not have to make it work for good, and so we need not worry if we cannot see how it will be done. We cannot understand how the Lord will turn a temptation of the devil into strength for us. If He should tell us how He does it, we could not do it nor comprehend it. As it is His power alone that does it, we need not be troubled about how it is done.

What a blessed thing it would be if men would recognise the will of God in prosperity, as well as in the adversity that they suffer. It is the will of God that men should be saved. Why do not men submit to that? If they should, they would find more pleasure in God's will.

It is the will of God that we should be delivered from this present evil world. Gal. i. 4. It is the "good pleasure of His will," that He has made us accepted in the Beloved. It is the will of God that Christ should save us, and raise us up at the last day. John vi. 39. Paul expected "a prosperous journey by the will of God," to visit the church in Rome. And he had it too, although he was shipwrecked on the way; for he knew that "all things work together for good to them that love God." Rom. viii. 28.

If people who talk so solemnly about submitting to the will of God, whenever some affliction occurs, would talk also about submitting to His will in the sunshine, the showers, the air, the food, the flowers, and the fruits of the earth, they would soon learn that God is not always trying to make it unpleasant for His children; and they would soon be able to say, "I delight to do Thy will, O my God; yea, Thy law is within my heart."

"Wonderful Assurance" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

Wonderful Assurance.-Jeremiah prayed: "We acknowledge, O Lord, our wickedness, and the iniquity of our fathers: for we have sinned against thee. Do not abhor us, for thy name's sake, do not disgrace the throne of thy glory: remember, break not thy covenant with us." Jer. xiv. 20, 21.

We come to the throne of glory. The apostle prays that "according to the riches of His glory," we might be strengthened with might. And so

99

Jeremiah prays that the Lord will not disgrace the throne of His glory. If it were possible to conceive of such a thing as are coming to the Lord acknowledging ourselves sinners, cast down by a sense of the sinfulness, and claiming His righteousness, and yet He neglect to give it, the glory would depart from His throne. God's word, which word upholds all things, would be broken, and the universe would come to an end. Therefore in our sinfulness we may come boldly to the throne of grace and glory, knowing that it will not be disgraced; the glory will not depart from it.

"Speculation and Faith" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

Speculation is uncertainty. It is always a risk. A man ventures something, not knowing what the result will be. He thinks that a certain investment will be a safe one, and will yield large returns, but he is not sure. He has no means of being sure. If he could be sure of the result, it would not be speculation. Very often the man who feels the most confident of the good results of his investment is most sorely disappointed.

This element of uncertainty is that which wears out the speculator, and makes him prematurely old. His nerves are always in tension. He may have all his fortune at stake, and it is impossible for him to rest in perfect ease when he knows that a very little thing may dash it from him in a moment. No wonder that a man in such a condition often finds it impossible to sleep.

Faith is altogether different from this. Faith knows. It runs no risks. There is no element of uncertainty in it. Christ is the only object of faith, and He is "the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever." He never fails. His power is almighty, and He loses nothing that is intrusted to Him; no one can snatch anything from His hands. See John x. 28, 29; xvii. 12.

Christ is the "tried stone," the "precious corner stone," the "sure foundation;" and "he that believeth in Him shall not be confounded." His ability to keep is shown in the fact that He upholds all things by the word of His power. Heb. i. 3. When the Lord would encourage us to put our trust in Him, He says, "Lift up your eyes on high, and see who hath created these, that bringeth them all by name; by the greatness of His might, and for that He is strong in power, but not one is lacking." Isa. xl. 26.

So it is as unto "a faithful Creator" that we are to commit the keeping of our souls to Him. That which may be known of Him, even "His eternal power and Godhead," are clearly revealed in the things that He has made, so that all have ample opportunity to become acquainted with Him. Therefore the language of faith is, "I am not ashamed; for I know whom I have trusted, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day." 2 Tim. i. 12.

Faith knows nothing of worry. There is no straining of the nerves to the utmost pitch of anxiety, for fear of what may happen in the future. He who knows the Lord would as soon think of worrying lest a comet should strike the earth, or lest the earth should come into collision with some other planet, and thus be wrecked, as to worry lest at some future time the Lord might allow him to fall. His strength is in quietness and confidence. Under the shadow of the Almighty he abides secure, and is not afraid, knowing that nothing present or to come can separate the soul from that "everlasting love."

"Asking a Sign" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

It is only unbelief that asks for a sign; faith never asks for anything more than God's word. The Jews were constantly asking a sign of Christ; but the Saviour said to them, "a wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign." Matt. xvi. 4. It is no more creditable to be seeking for a sign now than it was then. When God has spoken, all the evidence has been given that anybody needs; and to ask for a sign in addition is only an evidence of unbelief and an evil state of the heart.

Not only has all needed evidence been given when God has spoken, but all the evidence has been given that could be given; for there is nothing greater and more powerful than the word of God. No sign can add anything to the word, though the word can add to the evidence of the sign. "By the word of the Lord were the heavens made." "He spake and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast." Ps. xxxiii. 6, 9. Thus the creation of heaven and earth is itself but a sign of the power of God's word; and therefore the word itself is a greater sign than any sign that has been given since. In other words, the evidence of God's word in confirmation of a thing is just as great as would be furnished by such a sign as the creation of heaven and earth.

In the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, the former is represented as asking of Abraham that Lazarus be sent to the house of the rich man to warn his brothers of the fate which had overtaken him, and saying, "If one went unto them from the dead, they will repent." But Abraham replied, "If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead." If one believes not the word, the greatest sign is powerless to convince him.

But who is asking for a sign? This is a question which each one should ask themselves. Let no one depend upon the integrity of his own heart, for "the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked." The deceitfulness of the heart is often acting and bearing fruit when we do not know it; and thus it may be with reference to what God has spoken. God has given to us "exceeding great and precious promises," and has "blessed us with all spiritual blessings in Christ;" and if His word is sufficient for us, if we ask no more evidence than that, we have these blessings, and they are manifested in our lives. By them we are "made partakers of the Divine nature." We have all that any man has ever had; for God has given His Son, and with Him freely given all things, to every individual one on the earth. Rom. viii. 32. "Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are." James v. 17. The difference between him and ourselves is not a difference in nature or in the amount that he had from God, but in the amount that he appropriated by faith. He believed God's word and asked no further evidence. If we are waiting for some greater evidence, some special experience, some "sign" that what God has promised and says He has given us, is ours, we are simply in the position of the Pharisees. The trouble is not in God's not giving, but in our not taking. We are manifesting unbelief, and depriving ourselves of the greatest blessings.

No miracle was ever done by God to convince the person who doubted His word; and no miracle ever did convince such a person. Unbelief cannot be overcome in that way. And for God to deal thus with unbelief would be contrary to the principles on which He works. It would be to belittle His

100

word. Of one place where our Saviour went it is recorded that "He did not many mighty works there, because of their unbelief." Christ could not do anything to put a premium on unbelief. He could not do anything to tempt men to disbelieve until they had seen a miracle. They might no doubt have been pleased, as Herod would have been, to have seen some mighty miracles done by Him, but He could not work miracles to gratify the desires of the flesh. And as has been said, it would have had no good effect had He performed them. The example of Pharaoh stands out as an example for all ages of the inability of miracles to overcome unbelief.

When doubting Thomas had beheld his Lord and touched with his hands the wounds made by the nails and the spear at the crucifixion, and said "My Lord and my God!" Jesus said to him, "Thomas, because thou hast seen Me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed." The faith that does not require sight is the faith that will stand the test. We do not need a sign; all we need is to believe His word. We do not need something more than God has given. We only need to appropriate by faith what we already have.

"The Knowledge of Want" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

The word says, "There is no want to them that fear Him." That is because that when we know the Lord, we no sooner had a knowledge of want then the want is supplied. The revelation or sense of want comes from Him. So when we feel the want in our soul, it is God's way of saying He has that thing to give us.

You want righteousness, do you? That is, you feel the lack of it. How did you find out that you wanted it? who told you your need? The Lord let you know that want. How did He make you know it? Simply by the revelation of the thing which will supply the want.

If we were to go into the wilds of Africa, out of this track of civilisation entirely, where the people know absolutely nothing of the conveniences of modern life, should we find the people begging for watches, for instance? Of course not; they would know nothing about such things. But in our cities a boy doesn't get very old before he wants a watch. The knowledge of that thing, and the possibility of it, create the want.

Why is it that you want righteousness? It is only because the Lord has revealed righteousness to you, the knowledge of right; for there can be no knowledge of wrong without a corresponding knowledge of right. We know a thing is wrong because it is contrary to the right.

In every heart there are desires, greater or less, for a better life. We do not know how many discouraged souls there are longing to be delivered from the degradation into which they have fallen. They do not know how to get deliverance; and the reason is that they do not know love. They have not learned that God is love, and have not seen God's love manifested in those with whom they have associated, and so they do not know how to have their longings supplied. But every desire of the human heart for anything better, every longing for righteousness, has been created by the Lord, and created in order that the soul might look to Him for the supply of the want.

Whenever we want to be better than we are, the very moment that want comes, it is the plain language of God to us, saying, "Here is something that you lack; take it." This is why there is no want to them that fear God; for every want is supplied and the very knowledge of it, if we but know it. In Christ there is everything, even the fulness of God. He is the "Desire of all nations," and in Him is all that men can desire.

ILLEGITIMATE DESIRE

Men may, it is true, desire many things that are not in Christ. But we can all testify from our own experience that the receiving of those things did not satisfy the desire. There was still a want there. Then that was not the real thing that we wanted, after all. We thought it would satisfy us, but a trial of it showed that there was no satisfaction in it.

It is as if we should sit at a table, hungry, and should try first one thing and then another, without finding the hunger satisfied. At last we find just the thing which the taste seemed to be calling for and which satisfies. There are longings as of the intemperate man for drink. He drinks; but he is not satisfied. The more he drinks, the more the longing is cultivated. There is this and that pleasure that men desire and indulge in, which do not satisfy. The Lord says, "Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labour for that which satisfieth not? hearken diligently unto Me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness." Isa. lv. 2.

There is not a longing in man that is not, unconsciously to himself it may be, really a drawing out after God, and for something which God can supply. So David says, "My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth for the courts of the Lord: my heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God." Ps. lxxxiv. 2. The nature of the flesh is sinful, and always sinful. But all this longing of the flesh is dissatisfaction. There is only one thing that can satisfy, and that is God. He is the Desire of all nations, and He satisfies "the desire of every living thing."

If you do really want to be better, if you want God's righteousness, stop and thank Him that He has given it to you. "His Divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness."

"Christ's Trust in Adversity" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

There is no time when one would naturally feel less that the Lord is with him than when being sorely tempted. But that is the very time when we must know it and confess it.

The tempted one says, I am bad; is the Lord in me now? I believe He was there in that good meeting, when every one was happy. But here I am alone, and feeling depressed, and everything goes wrong, and the enemy is tempting me, and I feel as though the Lord had left me. By and by when this temptation passes, and I feel better, and as though the Lord is with me, I will confess it then.

But it is in the trial that we need Him with us. It was in the trial that the Saviour confessed the Father. "The Lord God hath opened Mine ear, and I was not rebellious, neither turned away back. I gave my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not winds My face from shame and spitting. For the Lord God will help Me; therefore shall I not be confounded; therefore have I set My face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed. He is near that justifieth Me; who will contend with Me? . . . Behold, the Lord God will help Me; who is he that shall condemn Me?" Isa. l. 5-9.

When Jesus was in the Judgment Hall, and every one of His disciples had forsaken Him, and the soldiers

101

were mocking Him and heaping upon Him the refinement of insult, who saw in Him the Son of God? Not even His own disciples. There was no outward evidence. The priests and soldiers saw no sign that He was the Son of God. "If they had known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory." What evidence had He Himself? What fruit of all His labours was there? He had chosen twelve disciples, and one of them had betrayed Him, one had denied Him with cursing, and all had fled. Of course His enemies would throw this in His face. They doubtless said, "You came making great professions; but where are your followers?" We know that they did mock at His claim to be the Son of God. See Matt. xvvi. 68; xxvii. 39-44. Even the face of God was hidden from Him.

What evidence did the Saviour have?-The word of God. "I know I shall not be ashamed. He is near." It was the same in the temptation in the wilderness. Weakened by fasting, His visage "marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men," a wanderer in the desert, the devil comes to Him and says, "You do not look much like the Son of God." Himself coming as an angel of light, he tries to make out that Christ is an imposter. He says, If you are the Son of God, you created all things. Why don't you take the stones and satisfy your hunger?

And Christ knew that He could have done it. He knew that He was the Son of God in the wilderness, just as well as when at the supper, He washed the feet of the disciples as an humble One, He knew "that He was coming from God, and went to God." He held to the word of God all through His temptation. He confessed, and declared the name of the Lord, witnessing a good confession.

That is what it means to confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. It does not mean simply on certain occasions when there seems to be a wave of glory sweeping over the congregation, and we are moved in spite of ourselves. It is so just as much when we are physically helpless. It is just as true when the enemy is pressing us with temptations. It is as much so when afflictions are pressing about us, as when all is pleasant and clear. To confess is to hold the word of God as true continually. And the value of confession is confessing it in the heart. "Believe in thine heart." "This word shall be in thine heart." Let not the enemy snatch it away.

It is only by the fixed knowledge, through His word, that God is with us, that we can ever resist any temptation. So when the enemy comes in like a flood, let the Spirit of the Lord lift up the standard against him in your heart. "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Keep "the faith of Jesus," and victory is yours.

"The Papacy and the Schools" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

For over twenty years the Board of Schools of London have been conducted according to a "compromise," to the effect that "religion" shall be taught, but that the children shall not be instructed in any distinctive doctrines. Of course this resulted practically in no religious teaching at all, and thus satisfied many Nonconformists who thought that religious instruction is the work of the church, and not of the Government. But as it was only a compromise, trouble must necessarily result from it. There are now two distinct parties on the School Board, and among the people. One party wishes to have the teaching of definite dogmas, while the other party wishes to have the compromise maintained. There are none on the Board, and none to speak of among the people, who dare advocate no religious instruction whatever in the public schools.

It is obvious that the party which stands for definite religious instruction has the stronger position, and it is also the stronger in numbers. For any thoughtful person can see the inconsistency of trying to maintain "religious" teaching while insisting that nothing definite shall be taught.

Quite recently the party which is determined to force definite religious instruction upon the school children, has scored a victory. This party may be styled the "church party," since its leaders are very "high" churchmen. The victory consists in the passage of an amendment to the effect that the "Christian religion" is to be taught. Of the value of this amendment the Catholic Times and Catholic Opinion speaks thus:-

The denominational party in the London School Board have scored a triumph. Mr. Athelstan Riley and his friends had carried an amendment which is of vast importance for the future of religious instruction in Board Schools. To some easy-going people there may not appear much in the resolution which substitutes the words "Christian religion and morality" for "religion and morality." But there is a deep, underlying principle in the change.

Indeed there is, and that "deep, underlying principle" is the principle of the Papacy. In the fourth century, when Constantine was manipulating the church for political ends, he first issued an edict granting freedom of worship to all. Then he commanded that all church buildings should be restored to the Christians. But this was not definite enough, because there were divisions among the professed Christians; and therefore Constantine issued another decree specifying that the property must be given only to the "Catholic" Christians, as distinct from the Arians. But this was not sufficient, as there were parties in the so-called "Catholic" church; therefore Constantine had to specify which party of the Catholic church He meant to favour.

So we see that the Catholic Times has good reason to be pleased with this triumph of the denominational party in the School Board. It knows that the logical outcome is the specification of what the "Christian religion" is, and that means eventually the complete Romanising of the schools.

This next step is already being taken. A few days ago there was a contest in the Board, of over nine hours' duration, over the proposed issue of a circular to the teachers defining exactly what they should teach as the Christian religion. The matter was not settled before adjournment, although the church party had a majority. It might be a matter of interest to know that in this struggle the spirits of the church party were kept up by a liberal supply of beer and oysters, while the members of the opposing party regaled themselves with oranges and buns.

We have space for only the two following paragraphs of the circular which the church party propose to send to all the teachers:-

The Board have never intended their teachers to diverge from the presentation of the Christian religion which is revealed in the Bible. While following the Syllabus which is suggested to you yearly, you are at liberty to refer to other parts of the Bible by which the principles of the Christian religion may be elucidated and enforced. But in the course of the lessons as opportunity occurs you will impress upon the children the relation in which they stand to God the Father as their Creator; to God the Son as their Redeemer; and to God the Holy Ghost as their Sanctifier.

The Board cannot approve of any teaching which denies either the Divine or the Human Nature of the Lord Jesus Christ, or which leaves on the minds of the children any other impression than that they are bound to trust and serve Him as their God and Lord.

In moving the adoption of this circular,

102

Canon Bristow congratulated the Board on the stage at which it had arrived on this difficult and important question. He said that they had settled that the religious instruction was to be in the Christian religion. "The further question now came, What did they mean by the Christian religion? The circular explained exactly what they meant."

Still further, the Rev. J. J. Coxhead, who is the author of the circular, in replying to a speaker who asked "that there should be left in the hands of the teachers absolute liberty to explain according to their private judgment the doctrines of the Bible," said that "they had no right to give that amount of liberty to the teacher." Therefore we are assured that the religion to be taught in the schools is not merely the Christian religion, but is to be the Christian religion as defined by the majority of the School Board.

It is useless to raise the cry of bigotry, or to charge the promoters of this scheme with being hypocrites. We cannot allow that they are thoroughly honest in their convictions, and that there is no more bigotry in their composition than there is in those who are opposed to the circular. Hard words will not affect the matter in the least.

Neither will we at this time speak particularly of the manifest injustice of taking the money raised by taxation of the entire body of the people, for the purpose of teaching what is believed by only a portion. The precept, "Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so to them," should be honoured by all who profess to be Christians. Therefore if a Christian would object to being taxed to support the teaching of infidelity, he should be as unwilling to tax an infidel to support the preaching of the Gospel. The fact that the Gospel is right, and that infidelity is wrong, has nothing to do with it. Christ who is the Truth, says, "If any man hear My words, and believe not, I judge him not." John xii. 47. That course which is contrary to the teaching of Christ, is not Christian, no matter what it may be called.

The ground on which we base our dissent from such a course as is proposed, is the ground that the Christian religion cannot be taught in the way that is proposed; it cannot be made a matter for examination, as is arithmetic and grammar. We believe in God; we believe in Jesus Christ as the Word is God, and who was made flesh; and we believe in the Holy Spirit as the Divine revealer of both the Father and the Son,-a Being so wonderfully sacred as not to admit of description even by Inspiration. But the truth about the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit cannot be taught in Board Schools. The teaching will at best be but a form of godliness, without the power, and that is the Papacy, or Paganism veneered with seeming Christianity.

The Scripture says: "No man can say that Jesus Christ is Lord, but by the Holy Ghost." 1 Cor. xii. 3. When Peter made his clear confession of faith to the Saviour, "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God," Jesus replied, "Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but My Father which is in heaven." Matt. xvi. 16, 17. And again Jesus said: "All things are delivered unto Me of My Father; and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and He to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him." Matt. xi. 27.

From these Scriptures it is evident that any amount of teaching about God will not make people acquainted with Him, unless the Holy Spirit prompts and accompanies the teaching. No man knows of the Lord, unless he knows Him as His own, personal Saviour. No one knows Jesus Christ, except he in whom the Holy Spirit dwells. Therefore the only way in which the children can be taught the things which the circular requires, is for the teachers to turn the schools into missions, and to labour in earnest for their genuine conversion. We strongly suspect that the churchmen who are clamouring for religious instruction, would be the first to object if such teaching were given as would lead the children really to know the Lord.

This movement is wholly Papal. There is in it none of the religion of Jesus. It is essentially Papal, in that it requires teachers to take their religious ideas from the School Board, which thus occupies the position of pope.

It is Papal, in that it makes religion to consist of dogmas, instead of being only the life of Christ. Pure and undefiled religion is nothing less than the life of Jesus Christ personally lived by Himself in an individual. The life of Christ can never be put into a formula nor a creed. No man can comprehend God; and so no man can describe Him. Therefore no man, nor any body of men, can frame any propositions that will set forth the true religion. The life of God is "broader than the measure of man's mind." Personal yielding to God, for Him to live His own life in us in His own way, is the only true religion.

We pass by the fact that an inquisition would be demanded to decide upon the ability of men and women to teach religion. The main point is that at the very best the form of godliness would be taught, without the power. It would be religion without life, which is Paganism. But it would be Paganism under the name of the church of Christ, and that is Papacy.

We call no man hard names, and have nothing to do with the controversy. Our part is to set forth the religion of Jesus Christ, and that leaves no time for controversy. And we wish that all who profess to love the Lord, might be so well acquainted with Him that they would know that it is hollow mockery to profess to make either adults or children acquainted with Him, by familiarising them with a form of words.

"God's Word to You" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

"God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son, whom He hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also He made the worlds." Heb. i. 1, 2. "Us" means each one, each individual, to whom the words that are spoken come. The same thought is presented in the language of Paul's discourse in the synagogue at Antioch: "Men and brethren, children of the stock of Abraham, and whosoever among you feareth God, to you is the word of this salvation sent." Acts xiii. 26.

God's word, therefore, comes directly from Him to us as individuals; and in this way we should receive it. There are two things that we should note in connection with the word of salvation; first, that it is God who speaks; and second, that we are the ones to whom He speaks. If we fail in either of these points, the word is not, to us, the word of salvation.

The word of man is nothing, and whatever word we receive as from man, amounts to nothing to us. If we do not hear the voice of God, the words spoken can do us no good. And if, hearing the voice of God, we do not take it to ourselves so that we receive it into our hearts, we likewise derive no benefit.

Paul and his letter to the Thessalonians, expresses his thanks to God, that "when ye received the word of

103

God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe." When it is received as the word of God, it effectually works in the believer's heart; and this is the benefit that it brings to us. If we receive it not as the word of God, or receive it not in our own hearts, it cannot work in us, and it is in vain that we have heard it at all.

It is a fatal mistake to let anything come between us and the word of God, for thereby we debar the word from entering into our hearts. The Psalmist said, "Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against Thee." The word of God in the heart, keeps the individual from sin, and this is the greatest good that can come to any one of the children of Adam. But when something comes between us and the word, the safeguard against sin is not there.

No pope, no church, nor any man or invention of man, should stand between the individual and the word of the Lord. He who receives the light of God's word through the traditions or opinions of men, whether ecclesiastical or not, will receive it so darkened that he will be unable to discern by it the way of life. He who lets priest or minister explain to him the word of God, and depends upon that rather than on the word itself, is not standing on a foundation that cannot be removed. First receive the word in truth, whether it be understood or not; and then look to God to make His meaning clear. Then whatever means God uses to do this, will be recognised as but a means, all the attention will be drawn alone to God.

Let it be ever remembered that the word of God is Jesus Christ. "God . . . hath spoken unto us by His Son." And we read also that "In the beginning was Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." John i. 1, 14. That Word is Christ. Therefore if Christ be in us, God's word is innocent; and if His word be not in us, neither is His Son, and we are with those "having no hope and without God in the world."

In Christ, who has identified Himself with sinful flesh, the word of God is veiled, so that its glory and power do not destroy us. There was a time when God spoke His word directly to men with an audible voice, as we read in Exodus xx., which describes the giving of the law from Mount Sinai; but the Israelites could not endure the words, and removed in terror and stood afar off, and said to Moses, "Speak thou with us and we will hear; but let not God speak with us, lest we die." Ex. xx. 19; Heb. xii. 19. And the Lord said that their words were well spoken; for He knew that they could not endure His words. Deut. v. 28; xviii. 17. So God spoke to them through Moses and "by the prophets;" and in "these last days" He speaks to us "by His Son," "in whom we have redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins." Col. i. 14. In Christ we have the life of the word of God, but not that which speaks death to sinners, and struck such terror to the hearts of the listeners around Mount Sinai. When Christ's intercession for man is ended, when His work as High Priest in the heavenly Sanctuary is done, then the Word of God will come forth again to men in unveiled majesty; and the result will be that described in Rev. xix. 13-15.

If we receive not that word now, we must receive it then, when its effect will be destruction. Therefore let us receive the word now, by faith, by believing it, while it is veiled in the flesh of Christ. Christ is the Word; and that word is now to us, if we but take it, "wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption." 1 Cor. i. 30.

"Defining Religion" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

In one course of the discussion upon the question of teaching religion in the London Board Schools, a point was recently reached where it seemed to devolve upon the School Management Committee to define religion which it is proposed to have taught, which is doubtless meant to be the Christian religion. Some definition will of course be necessary if religion is to be placed in the catalogue with other well-defined subjects which pertain to school education, and made, as they are, a matter of Board supervision; for the only way in which a School Board or Committee can know whether religion is being taught or not in the schools is to ascertain whether the teacher is conforming to some standard of religious teaching which has been previously determined for his guidance.

Wherever religion is made a subject of law or school regulation, a definition of religion becomes necessary in order to know whether the regulation is being carried out or infringed. Without it, the regulation would become inoperative. We may draw an illustration from the National and State Constitutions in America. The United States Constitution provides that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;" yet this did not prevent the National Congress in the summer of 1892 from enacting that the gift of $2,500,000 in aid of the World's Fair at Chicago should be conditional upon the observance of Sunday in all things that pertain to the Fair. And the State Constitutions, most, if not all of which guaranteed to all citizens entire freedom in religious belief and practice, are not considered to be violated by laws which compel those same citizens to keep Sunday by refraining from all work except works of necessity and charity. These provisions might and probably would be more or less evaded even were they accompanied with a definition of what the term "religion" includes; but without it there is practically no restriction at all, since the law is left to become operative in as many different ways as there are different conceptions of "religion" in the minds of members of Congress or of State legislatures, or of the courts. Nor is this diversity of opinion any less among people here than it is across the Atlantic.

We have not yet seen any definition of religion purporting to come from the authorities having charge of the Board Schools and do not know whether they have yet attempted to produce one; but we are certain that whatever definition of religion they may produce will not be a correct one. It cannot be; for religion, as a belief, cannot be defined. Why not? Because it is not a belief, or system of doctrines, but a life. It is something a person can receive, but not something that he can learn. It cannot be given him by man, but must be imparted to him by God, through the experience of death (to sin) and the resurrection.

Only God Himself can define religion, and He has never seen fit to do so. But the man, whose thoughts and knowledge are as much below God's as the earth is below the heavens, thinks himself competent for the task! The work which men have done in making creeds and "Confessions of faith" in past times, affords no lesson to the wise men of this generation. But did not the Apostle James define religion? Yes; James said, "Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world." James i.

104

27. But this is a life, and not a creed. It can be lived, by Christ dwelling in the heart; but it cannot be defined. It cannot be separated into different precepts and put piecemeal into the youthful minds. It can never be made available for any such purpose as that now agitating the authorities of the Board Schools.

Solomon says, "Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man." Eccl. xii. 13. The ten commandments are, indeed, a definition of religion, but not one that is available for us. The sin-darkened mind cannot understand the law of God; it must be enlightened by the Spirit of God in order to discern that which the law forbids. The law itself does not enlighten the sinner. It only condemns him. Christ is the source of enlightenment, for He is "the light of the world;" so that it is useless to try to teach people religion by teaching them the law; for until they first have Christ, they can neither understand the law or keep it. Without Christ, the law is a yoke of bondage, speaking only death; and all ceremonies, observances, and doctrines become but the works of the flesh.

Religion-the Christian religion-is Christ dwelling in the heart by faith, living His life and working His works. When Christ and His life can be defined, religion can be defined, and not before. And until Christ can be put into the heart by a course of instruction, as history and mathematics can be put into the mind, it will be useless to try to teach the Christian religion in the schools. All that any person can do is to let Christ live the Christian religion in him, so that it will attract those around him, and teach them the language of the word of God. Then they can get the Christian religion by believing that word, and this is the only way that any person can ever get it. The knowledge of the Christian religion comes not through man, but through faith in the word of God.

"Sitting in Heavenly Places" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

The Christian, though on earth, sits in heavenly places; for we read that "God, who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ (by grace ye are saved), and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." Eph. ii. 4-6.

Sitting in heavenly places, we have a view of heavenly things. We have not been raised to heavenly places to continue still looking at earth, but in order that our themes of contemplation may be the exalted themes of the life immortal. This is our privilege, now, even while still here in the flesh. We have been as it were taken out of this world, and lifted above into the glorious realm of eternal joy and light and peace; and the Lord now wants us to realise the fact, and open our eyes and ears to take in the glories which this realm affords. Though still on earth, we have been translated, as it were, to heaven itself, that our thoughts may be the thoughts of heaven and our language the language of heaven. The Lord does not compel us to wait till the last work is done before knowing and seeing something of the celestial Canaan. He is willing that we should know something of it here. He is anxious that we should see and experience now the joys of the life to come.

God shut man out of the literal paradise, lest he should as a sinner put forth his hand and eat of the fruit of the tree of life, and live for ever; but He has never shut man out of the spiritual heaven. He has never withheld from man anything that was for his good. He has never shut away from him the light and joy and peace which heaven knows. On the contrary, He has at infinite cost kept these still within man's reach, and invited and pleaded with him to take them. Though confined bodily to this world of darkness and sin, God never designed that man should give himself up to the influence of its darkness and see nothing but its misery and sin. Enoch the seventh from Adam, walked with God. He had the society of God, the thoughts of God, and all the joys that companionship with God affords. He experienced heaven below; and it is just this that we may do and must do before we know it above.

We have been made to "sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus," and all we have to do is to open our eyes and behold what is around us. But we may keep our eyes shut, and still not know where we are; and how pitiable is the condition of the one who has been exalted to heaven, but refuses to open his eyes, and so imagines himself still on earth! No person will know anything of heaven until he is willing to open his eyes. Until he does that, he will never see anything more than he has seen, and his thoughts will never rise above the same low level.

The mission of Jesus Christ is "to open the blind eyes." Isa. 42:7. He opens the eyes that are blind to spiritual things. He is the light of the world; and in Him we see. We cannot see when we are not in the light. So likewise we cannot see heavenly things outside of Him. We "sit together in heavenly places" not without Him, but in Him. To be in Him and abide in Him, we must believe. So in order to see, we must have faith. People commonly reverse this and think they must first see in

105

order to have faith; but such is not the scriptural way. By faith we abide in Him, and then, being in the light, we see.

If we try to see first, we shall not be able to do it; for we are in the blackness of darkness before we have faith. What we have to do is to believe, and then He will take care of the seeing. Believe His word, believe all His promises, believe that He has given you all that He says He has, that He has blessed you with "all spiritual blessings in Christ,"-believe them strongly enough to claim them, and you will know that you are raised up to sit in heavenly places in Him, and that henceforth heavenly views and heavenly joys are yours.

"Boldness to Enter In" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

"Having therefore, brethren, boldest to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, . . let us draw near with a true heart, in full assurance of faith." Heb. x. 19, 22. "That we, being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him, all the days of our life." Luke i. 74, 75. As we have access by Christ unto the Father, of what need we be afraid?

One who has free access to the palace and the table of royalty will not tremble with fear in the presence of some lower officer of State. Such an one enters the presence of the highest in the kingdom, and it is only a light matter to come before ordinary people.

How can it be that one who has boldness to enter into the presence of the King of kings, even into His secret chamber, not merely into the outer court, but into the "secret place of the Most High," and not only to enter there, but to abide, as a friend who has a right there,-how can such an one be afraid of anything else in the universe? We have that privilege, and the Lord desires us to use it.

How would any parent feel, who has a parent's heart, if his children should start with fear when he came into the room? if when they wanted something they should come cringing in a fearful manner, as though they did not know whether or not they had a right to live? We like them to have that confidence in us that they will come with boldness and ask for that which they want, knowing that it will be given them if it is for the best.

So we can imagine how God must feel to have those for whom He has done everything, for whom He has given His life to bring all things to them, and has given them all things before they ask, fearing to come to Him to claim anything, almost apologising for their very existence. He does not want us to be afraid of Him.

The Lord came down to earth to show us how gentle He is. He lived and talked with people. He sat down by the wayside with them. He took children in His arms and blessed them, and they were not afraid of Him. Whosoever will receive the kingdom of God must receive it as a child, with trusting confidence. He is goodness, and mercy, and tender-heartedness itself. He is pleased that our very boldness.

The boldness is not presumption; it is not arrogance. No one who is puffed up with pride, who is haughty, can ever come into the presence of the Lord with boldness. The pride and arrogance of men is simply the result of their separation from Him. When they put him far off, and hide Him from them, they can be very bold. But when they come into the presence of God, every mouth will be stopped. It is impossible for one to come into the presence of the Lord with arrogance, knowing that he is in His presence.

But the believer may come with boldness, lifting up the head. It shows that we believe that He is a God who keeps His word, that He is just what He is, a God of tenderness and infinite lovingkindness. And dwelling in the secret place, and abiding under His shadow there is no fear. "Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day; nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday." "Thine heart shall meditate terror," but there will be no fear in it.

If we can endure the time of greatest trouble, such as is here described, when destruction shall be over all the land, then we can have no fear now. No matter what persecution might be stirred up, we are free in the Lord, without fear, because we are walking and talking with the Lord; enduring as seeing Him who is invisible. We can stand in the presence of authorities and kings, if need be, to answer for the faith, and not be afraid; because we are living in the presence of the King of kings.

"The Faith of Jesus" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

The Faith of Jesus.-"Here are they that keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus." In the twenty-second Psalm it is said, "He trusted on the Lord." He had faith, and was made to hope even from His mother's breast. How are we going to get that faith? We have it. "The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth and in thy heart; that is, the word of faith which we preach." The only thing we have to do is to keep the faith, as Paul did. "God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith." Rom. xii. 3. "One Lord, one faith, when baptism. One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all." "But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ." One faith, and that only the faith of Jesus, and God has dealt it to every man. Only recognise it, and thank God for it. "Hold fast that thou hast."

"The First Week" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

The air that we breathe, the water that we drink, the food that we eat, the light that we enjoy, is full of life, wonderful life. The grass and herbs and trees live and grow. Multitudes of creatures great and small live in the sea; beasts and creeping things live on the dry land; and birds and insects live in the air. Besides all these, men, women, and children live and move and have there being in nearly all parts of the earth.

Where does all this power and life come from? Not from the creatures themselves, for they cannot keep themselves alive one moment; not from men, for he cannot cause so much as one little blade of grass or wonderful insect to live. Man can take life, but he cannot give life; he can kill, but he cannot cause to live; he has not more life than he needs for himself.

But there is One with whom is the fountain of all this life, from whom flows the life of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind. In Him we live and move and have our being, for it is He that hath made us, and not we ourselves. We read that in six days He created the heavens and the earth, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day. Can you tell, now, who it is?

The Lord needs not that anyone should give Him life, for He has life in Himself, a never-ceasing fountain of life, so that there is enough for Him and for all the creatures that He has made. As He is the only fountain of life in all the universe, it must be that every person and every thing that has life receives it from Him.

Is He not good to be willing to share His life with us who have never done anything for Him? How it must grieve Him when we use it to dishonour Him and take His name in vain, and to do contrary to His will! Oh, let us not do it anymore. Since it is His own life, let us allow Him to live it in us just as He wants to. He wants His life to work out goodness and eternal life in us, but it cannot as long as we hold onto it ourselves and do our own wicked ways with it. When we give it up to Him and let Him use it just as He wishes, we shall become new creatures, not hateful and full of sin, but lovely and good like Him.

He whose life had power in the beginning to create man and all things perfect and good, can by that life now create us anew, if we allow Him to. His life has power to drive out all sin and to bring in all righteousness.

Look around you and above you at all the wonderful things that God created. See the starry worlds on high, more than you can count. They are hung upon nothing, and travel faster than the fastest train that you ever saw, and yet they never fall, and never run into one another. Who holds them and keeps them where they belong? See the tiny spires of grass pushing their way up through the hard ground every spring. What gives them such power? Why do they not forget to come up some year? See the birds and all the creatures so full of life and beauty. Who is it that gives them life now, and tends to all their wants? Who keeps us alive through the night as well as through the day? We read that the same One who created all things changes not and does not slumber nor sleep, but that He keeps and cares for the smallest creatures that He has made.

Since God is still alive and still as powerful to create and uphold as He was in the beginning, can we not trust Him to care for us? When He says that He is able to keep us, to keep us from falling into sinful ways, and is able to present us without fault before the throne of God, can we not believe Him and trust ourselves to Him to let Him live His own way in us? It is no more difficult for Him to keep us in the right way than it is for Him to keep the stars in the right place, that is, if we allow Him to have His way with us as fully as the stars do.

As you look at the beautiful light, and remember that on the first day God said, "Let there be light; and there was light," remember also that He is able to put the light of His life in your sin-darkened heart, that you may all the time be like the shining light.

As you see the wondrous workings of the unseen air, and remember that God created it on the second day, remember also that although God's Spirit and life is unseen, it can work wondrous things in you if you will allow it to.

You drink of the crystal water, and remember that God gathered the waters together on the third day, remember also that He invites you to drink just as freely of the "living water," which is His Holy Spirit.

When you see the grass and flowers and vines and trees and think of how they sprang up on the third day at God's word, think also of how you are like the grass, perfectly helpless without God; of how you may trust in God and grow as the lily; of how Jesus is the Vine and we are the branches; of how you may bear fruit for God and be rooted in His love.

As you look at the sun, moon, and stars and remember how God on the fourth day, made them His light-bearers, do not forget that you may be His light-bearer too. Do not put this off, for the sun and moon have darkened and the stars have fallen from heaven, and that is a sign that Jesus is coming very soon to take His light-bearers to shine with Him in heaven.

When you see the water animals and birds and insects, remember that God created them on the fifth day, think of the wisdom and love shown in making such multitudes of beings in one day, all perfect, and provided with just the clothing and tools that they need! Remember that your heavenly Father feedeth the birds, and therefore will not forget you,-also that God says that you may learn useful lessons even from little insects.

When you look at the noble horse and friendly dog, and remember how all the beasts were created on the sixth day, remember that the Lord has promised to create a new heaven where all the animals will again be so friendly that a little child can lead them.

110

When you remember that man was created on the sixth day in the image of God, do not forget that God is your Creator too, and that if you remember Him now in the days of your youth, and let Him live as He wills in you, He will change you into His own image, and at His coming will give you even a body like unto His glorious body.

As the seventh day returns to you week after week, to remind you of God, and you remember how He created all things and rested on the seventh day and blessed it, and made it holy with His presence; remember also that the Sabbath is a sign between Him and you that you may know that He is the God that has power to sanctify you and make you holy in the same way in which He made the Sabbath holy. And then, oh, let Him in, and you will indeed find rest from your sins.

1. Name some of the things in this world that have life.

2. Where only is the fountain of life? Ps. xxxvi. 9.

3. Then from whom has every living thing received the life that it has? Job xii. 10.

4. Why cannot men make things live?

5. Why is the Lord called the fountain of life?

6. Since every living thing has received life from God, who must have given life to you?

7. Is He not good to share His life with you?

8. How must He feel when you never thank Him for it, and when you use it to please yourself and dishonour Him?

9. What had His life power to do in the beginning?-To create all things perfect.

10. What has it power to do now if you will allow it to live in you in God's own way?-To create you anew and make you perfect. Eph. ii. 10; 2 Cor. v. 17.

11. Will God be able to keep you in the right way after He is created you anew?

12. What makes you think so? Col. i. 17; Heb. i. 3; Jude 24.

13. Will He take time to help a little child like you?

14. What makes you think that He will? Matt. vi. 26; xix. 14.

15. When are you going to ask Him to do it?

16. What did God create on the first day? Gen. i. 1-3.

17. Then is He not able to put the light of His life into your heart?

18. What did God make on the second day? Verses 6-8.

19. Although unseen, like the air, what can God's Spirit do if you allow it to have its way in your heart?

20. What did God gather together on the third day? Verses 9, 10.

21. Of what does He want us all to drink as freely as we drink of the water? John vii. 37, 39; Rev. xxii. 17.

22. On the third day what sprung up at the word of God? Gen. i. 11, 12.

23. In what way are you like the grass? Ps. ciii. 15; 1 Pet. i. 24.

24. Who cares for the lily, and clothes it with all its purity? Matt. vi. 28-30.

25. If you drink in His Spirit, and feed on His word, what does God promise?-That you shall grow as the lily. Hosea xiv. 4, 5.

26. What can a branch do without the vine?

27. What can you do without Jesus, the True Vine? John xv. 4, 5.

28. In what way may you be like a good fruit-tree? Rom vii. 4.

29. What did God cause to appear on the fourth day? Gen. i. 14-19.

30. How may you be a light-bearer for Jesus? John viii. 12; Eph. iii. 17.

31. How do we know that Christ's coming is near, even at the doors? Matt. xxiv. 29-33.

32. What did God create on the fifth day? Gen. i. 20-23.

33. Who feeds the birds? Matt. vi. 26.

34. Then do you need to fear that He will forget you?

35. What was created on the sixth day? Gen. i. 24-31.

36. What promise has God made about the beasts? Isa. xi. 6, 7.

37. Who is your Creator? Ps. c. 3.

38. If you remember Him now what will He do for you?

39. What does the Lord call the seventh day? Ex. xx. 10.

40. Of what is it a sign? Ex. xx. 12.

41. What does God say we shall do if we allow Him to live His life in us? Ex. xx. 8-11.

"Interesting Facts" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

-There are 350,000 unemployed persons in Austria, and 100,000 in Vienna alone.

-A number of Balmacedists have been arrested at Santiago de Chile, and a state of siege has been proclaimed.

-The United Kingdom's annual imports of foreign fruit are valued at something like ?10,000,000.

-A London magistrate has decided that a divorce granted by Jewish rabbis does not dissolve the marriage tie.

-A rich Jewish family, with their servants, numbering thirteen in all, have been poisoned at Minsk, in West Russia.

-Serious religious riots between Mohammedans and Hindus have occurred at Ycola about a hundred miles from Bombay.

-The execution of the anarchist Valliant took place In Paris on the morning of Feb. 5, unattended by any disturbance.

A serious riot occurred Jan. 26 at the iron-works at Nishni-Tagil, in the Ural, Russia, where some 5,000 workmen are employed. Soldiers were called in, and in the conflict which ensued many were killed on both sides.

-A second encounter has taken place between British and French native forces in West Africa, resulting in some loss on both sides.

-A new submarine boat has been tried in the Gulf of Spezia, and is said to have proved a complete success. The boat belongs to the Italian navy.

-M. Nielsson, a well-known Swedish hunter, starts in a fortnight's time for Greenland in search of the members of the Bjˆrling Arctic Expedition.

-Wolves are said to be unusually fierce this winter in the Russian province of Sarstoff. Several peasants have been attacked by them and devoured.

-The French Government has proposed an increase of import duty on wheat, in consequence of which immense quantities of wheat are being landed at Havre.

-Father Castaneda, a priest who was accused of conspiring against the Mexican Government, has been shot by the authorities near Tenancingo, in the State of Mexico. The event has produced a deep impression on public opinion.

-An official report has been received at Berlin respecting the flogging of women by Germane in the Cameroons, which led to the recent revolt of the natives. It is probable that the officers responsible for the flogging will be punished.

-The Police Department of New York has just completed the census of the unemployed in that city. The report states that there are 68,000 people at the present moment out of employment, while 80 per cent. of these are actually suffering from want.

-An instance of the depreciation in the value of estates is afforded by the fact that Lord Iveagh has practically completed the purchase of Elvedon for ?150,000. In the year 1876 the Maharajah Duleep Singh refused an offer of ?500,000 for this estate.

-News has reached Liverpool to the effect that the French have hoisted their flag at Half Cavally and practically annexed it. Half Cavally adjoins the Liberian coast, and it was captured by the Liberian troops from the natives a few months ago and occupied by them.

-Intelligence has reached Paris of the destruction of a French column near Timbuctoo by Touaregs. Several French officers are said to have been killed. It is supposed that the attack was made owing to the irritation of the Touaregs at the hoisting of the French flag. Details are wanting.

-The Sikkim-Thibet Convention has fixed the trade mart where the Indian and Thibetan traders can meet at Yatung, on the Thibetan side of the frontier. From May 1 British subjects will be free to reside at this place. Trade will be unrestricted, all goods except arms, salt and liquors being exempt from duty for five years.

-A telegram from Rome gives several instances of the persecution of Roman Catholics in Russia, whose position is said to have become intolerable. Among other matters, it is mentioned that no bishop is allowed to write to Rome except though the intermediary of the Russian Imperial Chancellery, and any priest who baptises a child born of a mixed marriage, or hears the confession of a Uniate, is exiled to Siberia.

-According to the Figaro, a Corsican engineer living in Paris has invented a magazine rifle of surpassing deadliness. Its chief peculiarity is that it can discharge two different sizes of bullets, the lighter being used for long distances, and the other at ranges up to 800 yards. Each magazine consists of 100 shots, which can be discharged with the utmost rapidity, without causing the barrel to become unduly heated. Both rifle and ammunition are very light, 100 cartridges weighing only 2lb. 9oz., whereas 100 of those used in the Label, or German military rifle, weigh 6lb. 3oz.

-Stirring events are likely to occur at Rio Janeiro in the course of the next few days. Admiral da Gama, the commander of the insurgent fleet, has given forty-eight hours' notice that he intends to establish a blockade of Rio de Janeiro. He has already drawn up the vessels composing the insurgent fleet under his orders, and is prepared to carry out his threat. This step is equivalent to a claim of belligerent rights on the part of the insurgents, and the action of the various foreign admirals is looked forward to with great anxiety. Meanwhile it is stated that the Brazilian Government fleet has again sailed for Rio, and a naval conflict is expected.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

In the Glasgow Herald a writer states that "two-thirds of the priests in England, Wales, and Scotland, whose names are contained in this year's (Roman) Catholic Directory, are either ex-Anglican ministers or the sons of converts."

The Vatican is deeply stirred by the persecution of Catholics in Russia. Priests are severely punished for receiving members of the Greek Church, or for sprinkling the children of a mixed marriage between Roman and Greek Catholic parents. But this same question has long existed in Austro-Hungary, where Protestants have similarly suffered at the hands of Roman Catholics.

In the circular which it was proposed to send to the teachers of the Board Schools, we can see an expression of the popular idea of the Christian religion, and of the relation of the Bible to it. The circular says: "While following the Syllabus that is presented to you yearly, you are at liberty to refer to other parts of the Bible, by which the principles of the Christian religion may be elucidated and enforced." The idea is that the Christian religion consists in certain statements of doctrine, and that the Bible is useful as a book which by judicious manipulation by a skilful "exegete," may be made to furnish texts in support of those statements. That the Bible itself is the only possible statement of the Christian religion, and that religion itself is a life, is what the people need to learn.

The Catholic Times states that several correspondents have written complaining of the difficulty that they find in keeping Lent properly, on account of not being able to get good fish. One correspondent says that the fish is "dressed with some liquid taking away all the taste so delightful in fresh fish, but which has the quality, so welcome to the fishmonger, of preventing decay being so readily perceived." We learn that at Billingsgate market alone, eighty-nine tons of fish were seized by the inspectors last month, and condemned as unfit for food. That was of fish already decayed. How many tons of fish that had not reached that stage, but reached it while in the hands of the retail dealers, thus finding its way into the hands, and stomachs, of consumers, no one knows. We know of only one sure remedy against this evil, and that is to leave the fish alone; how such a course would affect the church regulations concerning Lent, we do not know.

The Rev. H. Hensley Henson, vicar of Barking, writing to yesterday's Times on the religious instruction question, says that Sunday schools cannot do the work of day schools because, among other reasons, "the time is insufficient, and the children who most need religious instruction do not, and apart from compulsion will not, attend Sunday schools." Mr. Henson thus confesses that in his opinion the Church is incapable of doing the work for which it exists, namely, the teaching of religion, unless the help of the secular arm is given in order to compel people to receive the Church's instruction. The founder of the religion which Mr. Henson professes did not require the aid of the governor of Judea to induce children or anyone else to listen to his teaching.-London Daily Chronicle, Feb. 7.

In closing a lengthy review of a new and striking monograph on "The Great Pestilence (A.D. 1348-9), now commonly known as the Black Death," the Daily Chronicle shows that we are by no means now insured against such visitations. He says:-

One reflection is forced upon us as we read these dreadful stories with their shocking details, and that reflection is not a little disquieting. There seems to be no reason why a similar outbreak of deadly pestilence should not burst upon the nations again and play its fearful havoc. The science of medicine has not advanced so rapidly but that even now the medical profession can do little to avert or to cope with such epidemics as have prevailed among us during our own times. The origin of the black death is still a crux to the profession-the nature of the poison is unknown. If the scourge should visit us again with the old violence, who shall say whether the number of its victims would be incomparably less in the nineteenth century than they were in the fourteenth?

"Only a Shadow" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

Only a Shadow.-Every shadow of darkness, every cloud of gloom, every fear of whatever kind is simply the shadow of death and of the devil. He has cast his hellish shadow over the world. Now, as Zacharias prophesied by the Holy Ghost at the birth of his son, the Lord has visited us and delivered us out of the hand of our enemies that we "might serve Him without fear."

He has delivered us from every tremor of fear, and hath sent the Day-spring from on high "to give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death." If you have His life you have His light. What is there to be afraid of? To the one in Christ death itself is only a shadow. The sting is gone. Satan can cast a shadow over him, but there is nothing in a shadow to be afraid of. He is delivered from the power of darkness. He is going through an enemy's land, whose weapons are all broken. He is going into a nest of scorpions, whose stings have been removed. He is going into a prison house, the key of which is held by One who loves him.

"Sacrifices" The Present Truth 10, 7.

E. J. Waggoner

Sacrifices.-There is only one sacrifice in the Christian religion, and that was made by Christ. We have never made a sacrifice. God does not call us to make sacrifices, but to accept the sacrifice that He has made. True, we have to give up all things that pertain to self, but giving up self is simply taking Christ. Suppose a poor beggar comes to us, with ragged clothing, and a few coppers in his pocket, and we say to him, "Take off these rags and we will give you a new suit, and give up the coppers and we will fill your pockets with sovereigns." Would he begin to mourn, or talk about the great sacrifice he was called upon to make in giving up his rags and the coppers he had in them?

Of course we give up something, but what sacrifice is it, when we get ten thousand times as much, and infinitely more? God wants us to give up our miserable ways, and take His ways; our narrow, circumscribed thoughts, and take His thoughts; our poverty, and get His riches; our gross ignorance, and get His wisdom; our wickedness, and get His righteousness.

February 22, 1894

113RD>

"'Common Things'" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

"Common Things."-How many go on day after day and year after year receiving the light of the sun, breathing the air of heaven, and never think of recognising God in them. These things are regarded as only "natural;" the sun shines because it is natural for it to do so, the air is here as a regular thing, the grain and the fruits grow because that is their nature, and these all are but common things.

Common to Heaven.-"Common things!" If it were possible for one who goes on day after day receiving these things from God without recognising them continually and praising God for them,-if it were possible for such an one to get to heaven, he would think it a common thing to seek the glory of God day by day, and would regard the water of life as a common thing. If a man sees the glory of God in His works here, and takes it as a common thing, he would regard the glory seen in the works of God in heaven just the same; for it is the same glory and the same power, only there it will be revealed in fuller measure than the eye of mortal man can endure.

"Common Paganism" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

Common Paganism.-A man may profess to be a Christian, may belong to the church, and may use the name of God in his prayers every day,-taking His name in vain,-but if he does not recognise God as a present, living Saviour, who in the gifts of food and drink, and air, and sunshine, and everything, is simply giving us His own life and salvation, that man is simply in Paganism. The Gospel is the power of God unto salvation, "for therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith." Rom. i. 16, 17. And the power of God is seen in the things that He is made. Verse 20. Therefore, as the Gospel is the power of God, we should see the Gospel in the things that are made, in the sunlight, air, food, and drink, and all things. The righteousness of God is revealed in them. It was the failure to recognise the power and righteousness of God in the things that are created, that made men base heathen. See Rom. i. 18-28.

"Breathing in the Gospel" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

Breathing in the Gospel.-"The just shall live by faith." But men live by breathing, whether just or unjust. When God made man He put into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being. The ungodly man has all his life been using that breath,-not recognising God in it,-to speak his own words, and even to blaspheme. He has been making the Lord to serve with his sins (Isa. xliii. 24), by perverting the breath of the life of God. But when that unjust man takes the breath by which he lives as being indeed the very breath of the life of God, and lives in the recognition of it, then he is living by faith. And faith justifies. "Being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." Such a recognition of the life of God, implies a constant yielding to God to direct the life to His own glory. God has multiplied the means of grace, so that in all the things that He has made men may see Him, and believe on Him unto salvation.

"A Glorious Gospel" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

A Glorious Gospel.-Should a man ask how he can receive this breath of the life of God, we can say, You have it. "The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth and in thy heart." God has given His life to all, and has surrounded all with an atmosphere of life. This is the glorious Gospel, and if it be hid, it is hid to them that are lost; in whom the God of this world has pulled a veil over the eyes of them that believe not, lest the light of the glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ should shine in. It cannot help shining in if men will let it. We have not to go and search for it. In the power of God His righteousness is revealed, and the power of God is seen in the things that He has made, which are all about us and in us. So if a man will only recognise it, the light of the sun will shine the righteousness of God into the heart. The sun will shine every precept of the law of God into the heart of the man who recognises God in the light, and walks "in the light as He is in the light."

"Religious Liberty" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

Religious liberty, freedom from control in religious matters, must have its spring in every individual heart. This liberty is not effected by wholesale, but it is an individual affair. All the favourable law that could be thought of might be passed, but that could not bring it. We might get a majority vote, proclaiming freedom of religion, but that would not be it.

Religious liberty comes only from the yielding of the individual mind to the Lord, and from His freedom ruling in the heart. The Lord has made all men free to give themselves to Him. The devil himself cannot prevent us. Although sold to him, and though he holds us with an iron chain, and will still control the flesh, yet the conscience and the will God has set in every man eternally free. Men can choose, and just as soon as he chooses God, he is

114

God's, because he belongs to God. The Lord has bought him. Christ tasted death for every man, and by His blood purchased the right to every soul. Whoever yields himself to obey, his servant he is to whom he obeys. Oh, the breadth and depth of the plan of salvation! The power of this love is that which wins us to Him. "Let the peace of God rule in your hearts, and be ye thankful."

"Overcoming Evil" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

The heathen way of overcoming evil is expressed in the well-known maxim, "Fight the devil with fire." This is the method which the human heart seeks naturally to employ, and unfortunately the conditions are everywhere favourable for its practical application. On every side, in affairs both small and great, the results of the application of this principle may be seen; yet evil and deplorable as they are, the natural heart is too blind to see that there is any better method available.

A forcible illustration of the baleful workings of this method of overcoming evil is afforded where crime, real or imaginary, is punished with lynch law, as in some parts of North America. Recently the Independent, in many respects the leading American journal, devoted a large amount of space to the consideration of the nature of this evil and what can be done to remove it; for so frequent have these lynchings become in some of the Southern States that the national reputation is at stake, and many minds are being filled with apprehension and alarm as to what will be the outcome.

The victims of these terrible affairs are almost invariably negroes, and there is no doubt but that bitter race prejudice plays a leading part in actuating those who are most guilty; but even were the miserable victims guilty of the revolting crimes with which they are charged, as in some cases they doubtless are, the method of dealing with them would illustrate no less forcibly the futility and wickedness of this way of overcoming evil. So far from eradicating it, the occasions of such a terrible lawlessness have only become more frequent since the method was first introduced. And this, of course, was inevitable; for all crime grows when it has something to feed on. Lawlessness never cultivated a respect for law. We mention these occurrences only because they afford a striking illustration of the inherent badness and uselessness of the principle we are considering, and which is held by men everywhere, of fighting the devil with fire.

When fire can put out fire, when murder can put down murder, and self can cast out self,-then and not till then will it be either sensible or right to fight the devil, or the evil which he causes, with his own weapons. Satan does not cast out Satan; his kingdom is not divided against itself. And we have much better weapons for overcoming evil than any that Satan could give us. We have the word of God, which is "the sword of the Spirit." We have Jesus Christ Himself. Only Christ can cast out self, which is the first step to be taken by each individual in the conflict with people. Only God and His power can put evil out of the heart. The only uplifting and reforming power in the world is the religion of Jesus Christ.

"Teaching Children Religion" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

In these days when the matter of religious teaching in schools is the cause of so much controversy, it is worthwhile to consider what religious teaching really is, and how it is to be carried on. As with everything else that pertains to religion, the Bible is our only sure guide, and in Deut. vi. 4-9 we find the subject made very plain, in these words:-

"Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord; and thou shalt love the Lord woman thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart; and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes. And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates."

The reader's attention is directed to a few of the important truths set forth in the above scripture.

1. The words to be taught are not empty sounds, nor are they simply combinations of certain letters of the alphabet. And they are such words as can be in the heart, and that means that they are life, even the life of God. The life of God, revealed in Christ, is the only law for mankind. The teaching of Bible religion, therefore, does not consist in the teaching of certain dogmas, or statements of doctrines, backed up by certain texts of Scripture, but in presenting Christ so that through the Holy Spirit He may be formed within, the hope of glory.

2. We learn that the duty of teaching religion to children rests with the parents. If they choose to allow others also to instruct their children in religion, that is doubtless there privilege; but no parent can lightly shift upon another his own responsibility. Although the elders or pastors of the church are to feed the lambs as well as the sheep, parents are not thereby released from their obligation to teach their own children. If they are negligent in this matter, the work will never be perfectly done, for-

3. Religious teaching is to be constant, and not confined to one or two hours of the day. Bible religion is not only life, but it is the whole of life. Everything in nature is to be used to impress the truth of God upon the mind of the child. In the margin of Deut. vi. 7, we have as an equivalent of "teach them diligently," "whet, or sharpen." The idea is that of repetition. But the repetition is not to be the repetition of a form of words, but of vital truths.

Children can understand the Gospel as well as their elders. It is true that they cannot understand the theological terms, but neither can a grown people. Nobody understands what is meant by theological terms and formulas, and that is the reason why there is so much discussion over them. They are arbitrary terms, and mean to each individual whatever he happens to think about them. But simple, practical Scripture truth is easy of comprehension by a child. Timothy knew the Holy Scriptures from childhood, and knew them to his salvation. 2 Tim. iii. 15. Whoever enters the kingdom of God must do so as a child. There is no religious truth that cannot be understood by a child as well as by anybody else.

4. Whoever teaches must first have the words of life in his own heart. Since true religion is not only a life, but the life, it follows that no one can sharpen a child or anybody else in it, unless he himself has the life. The question will arise, "What if the parents are deficient in this respect? shall the children therefore be deprived of religious instruction?" Not necessarily. The true Christian is a missionary, and the church of Christ has no other business on earth but to seek

115

out the lost, both old and young. If Christians do this work in the Spirit of Christ, there will be none who do not hear the sound of the Gospel.

It is very evident that this teaching is not such as can be done according to programme. He who has the word of life in his heart, will not need that somebody else should tell him what he should teach, and how he should teach it. And he who cannot teach religion except according to a syllabus, cannot teach true religion at all.

The conclusion of the whole matter is this, that religious instruction must be wholly a voluntary affair, and must be a labour of love. It must aim at direct practical results, namely, the conversion of those who are taught. While the labourer must live, it is evident that true religious teaching cannot be done by one who engages in the work as a profession. He who has the words of life in his heart, will need no urging to make them known, but will be unable to refrain from teaching in some way. The love of Christ constrains them, and they cannot but speak the things that they have seen and heard. The main thing is to have the life in the soul. If the living word abides in the teacher, that word will regulate everything.

"Identified with Us" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

The Lord has given His life to everyone. "In Him we live and move and have our being." This was said, not to Christians, but to heathen. It was His life that we have been squandering in fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind. Only by the power of His life, which He allowed to remain with man when he had sinned, could man work evil, and live on in wickedness. Thus He is "touched with the feeling of our infirmities." He feels the infirmity, and feels it now; for He still gives life to men. He is one with us.

Then the very fact that we feel the weaknesses of the flesh will be, if we allow it to be so, a reminder of Christ. How He feels our infirmities and bears our weaknesses we do not know, but so it is. It is because He feels the infirmity, and because sin touches His very life, that He makes it known to us, in order that we may free Him from the burden of that sin, and ourselves also may walk at liberty. He felt it, and reminded us of it, causing us to long to renounce it.

We may take this thought as encouragement, that God is not far from every one of us. The enemy has made us think that the Lord was far off, and that has been the source of our weakness. But, so far from having us discouraged at the weakness, the Lord would remind us by that very thing that He is near. When we feel the weakest, then we may be more sure of the presence of the Lord. We know that Christ was without sin, even though He bore our sins; and therefore when the weaknesses of the flesh remind us of His identification with us in the flesh, they also remind us of the fact that He is with us as the power of God. By this we can understand what the apostle means when he speaks of those who "out of weakness were made strong." Heb. xi. 34.

"The Cross and Crosses" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

The failure with many people is that they make a distinction between the cross of Christ and their own crosses. There is no cross that comes to any person on earth, except the cross of Christ. If we will always remember this, it will be life and joy to us.

The Lord does not give us some crosses of our own,-little crosses adapted to different ones,-one having one cross and another another. We cannot separate Christ from His cross. Christ is crucified; He is the only crucified one; therefore whatever cross comes to us must be the cross of Christ; and that cross is with us continually. But in the cross of Christ we find Christ Himself.

UNION WITH GOD BY THE CROSS

What do we get through the cross?-Forgiveness of sins, reconciliation. "Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God." 1 Peter iii. 18. "That He might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross." It is the cross, then, that unites us to God, and makes us one with Him. Everything then that is a real cross is life to us, because it brings us to God. Take the things that come to us; new duties, perhaps, are revealed to us; sins, it may be, are shown to us, that must be denied. Different things come up that cut directly across our habits and our own way and convenience. We can take them in a hard and cheerless way, groaning over our religion, and giving everybody that comes near a the idea that it does not agree with us, but that we must endure the service of Christ, hoping that by and by we shall get something better, when we get out of this grinding service. Or we can find joy in the cross, and salvation and peace and rest, by recognising that cross as the cross of Christ.

THE CROSS WITHOUT CHRIST

Suppose we are stingy. Well, we have to make sacrifices for the cause of God, and so we know we must give something. We groan over it, and shrink from it, but finally by dint of hard work, will manage to give something. Then we think afterwards of what a hard cross we have borne.

Or take the Sabbath as a typical case. To keep the Lord's Sabbath is very inconvenient for our business, and we perhaps stumble over that cross a long time. But there it is plainly before us: "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." If we do not keep the Sabbath, we are afraid we shall be lost. So in order to save ourselves from destruction, we agree to keep the Sabbath. It is a weekly cross, and we are always thinking of the inconvenience and hardship. Surely it must be we shall get credit for that because it is so hard to do. Not so; when we take it that way it is our own cross, with Christ left out; and there is no salvation except in the cross of Christ.

With a thousand other things it is the same. We mourn over them, and it is only by will power that we force ourselves up to the rack, and take the bitter medicine, consoling ourselves with the thought that by and by all this will be ended. We shall not have such hard times when we get into the Kingdom.

Possibly we put this rather strongly and yet this is the idea of the Christian life with a great many people who profess to be Christians. We sing of the "resting by and by," and of joys to come, giving the world the idea that there is no joy in the present. The idea too commonly is that the harder the cross is, the more joy there will be when it is done with.

PAGAN AND PAPAL PENANCE

That is not Christianity at all. It is heathenism. How much more Christianity is there in that than in the case of the man who puts pebbles into his boots and goes on a pilgrimage, so that the worse he can make himself feel now, the better he will feel when his journey is ended? The only difference is in the sort of penance we endure. We take this duty and that as scourges with which to afflict ourselves, thinking we are working out everlasting joy for ourselves by and by.

116

We have all done more or less of this. It is human nature. That is the devil's way of deceiving people. He does not care how many crosses we endure. In fact, he must thoroughly enjoy seeing people groaning over their religion, and having a hard time of it generally.

Now all these things we have been labouring over may be things that God requires us to do. He doesn't require us to scourge ourselves with whips, or to go on pilgrimages on our knees; but the only difference between ourselves, when we have made burdens of our duties, and the man who has scourged himself or worn a hair shirt, is that we make our penances out of those things which God requires, and he makes his out of those things which the Lord has not required. Yet we have thought we were better than he!

OPPOSITION TO CHRIST

Both classes are trying to put up a cross that would take the place of the cross of Christ. People ask the Lord to accept their offering for sin. Every cross men bear in that way is hard. If that were all that is in the cross, those crosses ought to have served the purpose; for they were bitter and cruel enough. Then there must be something else in the cross besides hardness. Popularly the idea is that anything that is a discomfort-that a person doesn't like to do-is a cross, and some men perform their duties as the Catholic wears his hair shirts, to make themselves uncomfortable all the time.

It makes no difference how much people talk about the Lord; how much they say they believe in Christ; how much they call themselves Christians; the setting up of a cross aside from the cross of Christ, is opposition to Christ. Although there is much about Christ and much about crosses, in Roman Catholicism, we know that in the system itself there is none of Christ. Of course many individual Catholics have Christ, and many more would gladly know of Him; but, as a system, with its penances put upon the people, we know that Catholicism tends to eclipse and shut out the cross of Christ; so that each individual is virtually to have his own cross, and atone for his own sins. In many cases the individual is deluded with the idea that what he is enduring is the cross of Christ, and that is worse yet.

Now thousands of professed Protestants are doing what amounts to the same thing, and yet all the time they are preaching and talking against the Papacy. These crosses, men have thought, were going to bring them nearer the Lord. The idea has been, "No cross no crown;" the more we suffer, the more we shall enjoy by and by. This is the time of suffering; by and by we shall have the time of enjoyment. So we will endure it. Certainly, we thought, these crosses will bring us nearer to God.

But as a matter of fact, try as hard as we could, even at things that were right in themselves, we couldn't get nearer to the Lord than before. We were always wanting to get nearer, and yet finding ourselves afar off. Then we did not have Christ in the cross, although we persuaded ourselves that we were believing in Christ and bearing His cross. For if we had had Christ in the crosses that we bore, we should have been brought near to God. The trouble was that we had a cross in the place of the cross of Christ,-a substitute for it.

SELF IN PLACE OF CHRIST

Who was on that cross?-Self. The power of the cross of Christ is the power of His life,-the power of an endless life. The power in our crosses was only the power of our own life, which is nothing, and could not bring us nearer to God. We were crucifying ourselves on our own crosses; and as we thought that those crosses were the cross of Christ, we were putting ourselves in the place of Christ. We were very antichrist ourselves. And all the time we were doing that, we were throwing stones at the Pope. Christ said those who were without sin might throw stones; and whoever indulges in stone-throwing, thereby tacitly proclaims himself to be sinless.

And those who do as described above are claiming that very thing; because the cross is a sacrifice for sin, and atonement for it, and they are "bearing the cross." Didn't we do this duty? Didn't we perform that uncomfortable service? Didn't we deny ourselves? And thus by all these crosses, had we not, in our own minds, freed ourselves from sin, so that we could throw stones at other people? Again we put the case rather strongly, perhaps, and yet we are assured that we are giving the experience of the natural heart. Many who have found Christ indeed testify to these old experiences, and there are many who are living through these experiences now, and are finding the way hard and wearisome and deceitful.

ONLY ONE CROSS

There is only one actual cross in the world, and that is the cross of Jesus Christ. "If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me." We have often thought we were denying self, when we were only building self up; we were putting ourselves in the place of Christ. Our talk of self-denial was but Pharisaism. People are apt to get a wrong idea of what a Pharisee was. The word "Pharisee" denoted one who was "separated." They were the separated once, zealous for the law, and for God, as they supposed. They were not bad as people saw them. The observer might find nothing crooked in the outward life of Saul, the Pharisee; before men he was blameless. But when he came to himself he saw that he was all sin. There is no writer who states the depravity of human nature so vividly as the Apostle Paul. While it was all written by inspiration, he wrote what he had experienced. When he told of the wonderful grace of God, he told exactly that grace that had been revealed to him, as chief of sinners; for the man who sins and calls it righteousness, is of all sinners the chief.

KNOWING CHRIST

The question for everyone is, Do you know that Christ lives in you? Are you joined to Him? There are many who are workers for Him professedly, who dare not say that Christ lives in them; they do not know that Christ is one with them. When we were bearing crosses after the manner we have described, we could not say, "Christ liveth in me." So we were separated from Him, and thus separated from His cross. It was self in the place of Christ, "a form of godliness but denying the power thereof," for the power of godliness is the cross of Christ. We denied the cross of Christ, and so denied the power of the Gospel.

THE JOY OF THE CROSS

Christ endured the cross, but He endured it for the "joy that was set before Him." Heb. xii. 2. Now the joy set before us is the only thing that will enable us to endure the cross, His cross. Remember that the Lord does not have separate crosses for us. There is one cross, the cross of Christ. When we get to that we will find connected with it what He found. When we take it as His and not our own, there is the joy in it which was His strength to endure it.

117

We are not crucified with Christ except we are one with Him in the crucifixion. He must be identified with us in the cross; for it is His. There is no crucifixion of the man that amounts to anything unless he is crucified with Christ. Crucified together with Him, there is virtue to us, because we get the virtue that is in Christ. That virtue is freedom, separation from sin, and redemption, life, joy, peace. So it is not so difficult a thing to bear the cross when we are crucified with Christ. He is with us and in us. Now it is Christ enduring the cross, and to us there is joy in the Lord in it. Christ is made peace for us through the blood of His cross.

RECONCILED BY THE CROSS

Christ was crucified for sin. There was no cross except for sin. He bore our sins. There is wonderful joy that comes to us in this, that while we are yet in sin we are permitted to claim Christ as ours, and to say, "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." If we could not assert this with all assurance while yet sinners, we never could assert it. But while in sin we may claim Christ as ours, and that He is in us. We know it because the Holy Ghost says that it is so. To the man who believes the Lord and dares assert it, it is everlasting strength. "God who is rich in mercy, for the great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ." We could not be quickened or made alive together, unless dead together. So Christ identifies Himself with us in death, even the death in trespasses and sins, and it is He who bears the burden in His own body on the cross; and while we are crucified with Him we also live with Him, delivered from sin.

SAVED BY THE LIFE

Christ is the present Saviour of all men. He is the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." John says, "If any man sin, we have an Advocate [or Comforter] with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and He is the propitiation [sacrifice] for our sins." 1 John ii. 1, 2. Him "God hath set forth to be a propitiation [sacrifice] through faith in His blood." Rom. iii. 24. His blood is now shed for us; He is now lifted up for us. The knowledge that the cross is set up in every heart, that He is crucified for us, makes a delight of the crosses which come to us, all the burdens to be born, all the habits to be given up, which are as taking our life, because they are our life. The knowledge that now Christ is crucified for us, that now are we crucified with Him, not in fancy but in fact, makes the presence of the cross a joy to us, for there we find Christ, and are brought into fellowship with His death, and live with Him. Being reconciled by His blood, we know we shall be saved by His life. To take up the cross is to take Him. To deny self is to own Him. To crucify self indeed is to take His life, and the life we live with Him is not one of hardness and discomfort, and the performance of disagreeable duties for the sake of joy by and by, but it is the constant springing up of life and joy; so that with joy and not groaning we draw water from the wells of salvation. It makes all the difference when we have His cross. "Therefore the redeemed of the Lord shall return, and come with singing unto Zion; and everlasting joy shall be upon their head." Isa. li. 11.

"Kept from Honour" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

In the twenty-fourth chapter of Numbers there is a record which very clearly sets forth the nature and the value of earthly honour. Balak, king of the Moabites, had sent for Balaam the prophet to come and curse Israel; and Balaam had come, but instead of cursing Israel he blessed them. Several times the king attempted to get from the prophet's mouth a curse upon his enemies, but each time with exactly the opposite result; until finally, in a rage, he smote his hands together, and said to Balaam, "Flee thou to thy place; I thought to promote thee unto great honour, but lo, the Lord hath kept thee back from honour."

This reveals the relation between worldly honour and the honour that comes from God: or rather it shows that there is no relation whatever between them. A prophet of God, yet kept "back from honour!" Losing that which Balak had to bestow, and therefore losing "honour"! Thus does the voice of the world always speak to the Christian, to persuade him to give up Christ and grasp as much as he can of earthly fame. Alas, that any are so foolish as to listen to it!

There was Balak, with all the nation over which he ruled, in mortal terror for themselves and their kingdom, because of the approaching host of the armies of Israel; the wicked king trembling for his very existence, with no flattering prospect of its long continuance, and yet offering to promote Balaam to "great honour"! What honour had such an one to bestow, and what thought had he for Balaam's welfare?-Simply none at all. All he cared about was the welfare of himself,-to avert, if it were possible, the destruction which threatened himself and his kingdom. He could confer upon Balaam a momentary distinction of honour or wealth in the eyes of men, and that was all. This was what he called "great honour;" and this is what the world designates "great honour" to-day.

The Lord had put Balaam in his position, and now a man offers to "promote" him above the promotion given him by the Lord! This is the "promotion" which the world has to give to its votaries in place of that which is offered by the God of heaven; nothing that is real, nothing that is lasting, nothing that satisfies, or brings happiness and peace to the soul, yet it judges a man very foolish who will not seek for it in place of seeking for the honour which comes from God. The earth is plunging into the gulf of ruin, whirling swiftly across the threshold of eternity, separated by only a hand breadth from the hour of its dissolution; yet offering to promote men unto "great honour" if they will but devote all their time and their powers to its affairs. The honour it has to confer is just that which Balak had to bestow on Balaam.

Those who take earthly honour, cannot have that which comes from God; and those who seek that which God bestows, cannot have the honour of the world. The two will not mix or grow together. The world will not honour righteousness; God will not honour sin. No person ever yet had honour both from the world and from God at the same time.

Those whom God honours are those who honour Him. 1 Sam. ii. 30. They are those who serve the Lord Jesus Christ. John xii. 26. And how can a man honour God? He cannot honour God as he would honour a fellow-mortal. God gives men all the honour he has, and man's only way of showing respect and honour to God is to believe His word. "Without faith it is impossible to please Him."

118

"Faith which worketh by love," is the only actuating power by which a man can do service to God.

Those who seek worldly honour cannot have faith. "How can ye believe," said the Saviour, "who receive honour one from another, and seek not the honour that cometh from God only?" John v. 14. It is useless to expect to know the will of God and understand His word while seeking honour from man; for no one can understand God's word until he first believes it. But relinquishing the honour of the world, he can then believe, and by faith receive the honour that God bestows, which is that of being made a son of God, and a brother of Jesus Christ, and an heir of all things. 1 John iii. 4; Rom. viii. 17; Heb. ii. 11. How much better to be kept back from the worldly honour by God than to be kept back from infinite and eternal honour by the world!

"Fiendishness" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

Here is a horse at the bottom of the hill, with a load as great as he can possibly draw on a level road. Every particle of strength that the poor horse has is exerted to draw the load on the smooth, level road; but notwithstanding that, the merciless driver plies the lash with all his might, to try to compel the horse to draw it up the hill, a thing which is impossible. Could anything be more wickedly cruel? If the horse had sufficient strength, a little application of the lash would incite him to use it, but it cannot impart any strength to him. Whipping a horse never adds to his strength; and so to whip a horse to make him do that which he has no strength to do, is fiendishness. Who would not feel indignation at such cruelty?

Here is a man who is "without strength," to do that which is right. That weakness he shares in common with all men, "because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." Rom. viii. 7. No man is stronger than Christ was, and He said, "I can of Mine own self do nothing;" "the Father that dwelleth in Me, He doeth the works." John v. 10; xiv. 10. And now a company of men associated together in some capacity, decide that that man shall be compelled by all the pains and penalties of civil law, to serve the Lord. They will bring all the machinery of Government to be upon him, to compel him to do that which is utterly beyond his power. If the other is fiendishness, what is this?

Ought not the man to do right?-Yes. Does not God require him to do right?

Most certainly. Then why is it wrong for his fellow-men to try to compel him to do what the Lord requires him to do?-Simply because the Lord Himself does not seek to compel men to do that which is right. He knows that that would be of no use. He knows that man has not the power, and so He Himself supplies the power that the man needs. He comes and works in the man, "both to will and to do of His good pleasure." Surely God's way is infinitely above man's way.

"Not a Creed" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

Justification by faith, and that means salvation by the Lord Jesus Christ, is not a theory. It can never be put into a creed, a form of words. Every professor of religion who has certain points of doctrine which he holds, and who is satisfied with them just as he has put them into a formal statement, has as iron-bound a creed as any ever imposed by a council.

But the truth of God is ever-growing, ever enlarging. "The path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day" (Prov. iv. 18), and we cannot put that light into writing and say, "This is the sum of the doctrine." We may speak what we know, and write what we know, but this simply calls attention to the truth; there is more and more. There are oceans of light and truth, wonderful revelations that the Lord will make to every soul, beyond what he has ever seen, in the treasures of the grace of Christ, if he will but give up to the Lord continually for Him to live His own marvellous life in him. Continually should the prayer be made, "Open Thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of Thy law." Every difficult thing that we see is but the forerunner of a still more wonderful thing to be revealed, if we will but be open to receive it.

"All Things Given" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

All Things Given.-"What man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him." The natural conclusion would be, "How much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good gifts." And this is really the way it does end, for the Holy Spirit comprises every good gift. God has given His Spirit freely, has poured it out abundantly to all. If we will but open our hearts to receive it, every good and perfect gift will come in its train, because all good gifts are in the Spirit. "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights." Jas. i. 17. This does not mean simply that there is nothing good except that which comes from God; but every good gift cometh down from above. God has withheld nothing; everything that He has comes down to us. There is no selfishness with God. He has not a single good thing in His possession that He has not given to us. Every good gift cometh down,-is coming down now. He gives Himself for us, and everything is in Him; and yet the enemy seems to paralyse the senses so that we seem incapable of comprehending the fact that everything is ours.

"The Works of the Flesh" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

"Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like." Gal. v. 19-21.

The flesh can do nothing good. Its works are sin, and that only. Even though it tries to do something good, as it often does, the result is the same. The flesh is joined to sin, and there is no way in which the two can be separated. When the one is manifested, the other is manifested also. In life or death, the two must go together.

The flesh works whenever faith is absent. "Whatsoever is not of faith is sin." Rom. xiv. 23. Where faith is present, God works; where faith is absent, the flesh works. The flesh cannot do the works that God does. This the Saviour declared when the Jews asked Him what they should do in order to work the works of God. "This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent." John vi. 29. By faith, we receive Christ, and then the works that are done are done by Him. Consequently they are the works of God.

The great mistake which men make is in thinking that the flesh can do the works of God. The natural mind is so ignorant of what those works are,-

119

the ways and thoughts of man are so far below the ways and thoughts of God-that we have naturally no conception of what righteousness is. Consequently we go about, like the Jews of old, to establish our own righteousness; and in so doing we miss the righteousness of God. We may get something which looks like righteousness to us, but in the Judgment day we shall, if we depend upon that, find ourselves terribly mistaken.

THE FLESH IN BONDAGE

When the flesh tries to do the works of God, there is manifested only bondage. The flesh is in bondage to the law of God, for it is "not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." There can be no harmony between them. The Spirit lusteth against the flesh, and the flesh against the Spirit (Gal. v. 17), so that "ye cannot do the things that ye would." And this is what reveals the bondage of the flesh,-the inability to do the things that it tries to do, and that God has commanded to be done; the lust of the flesh against them; the utter inability of the flesh to come into harmony with them. When the flesh stops trying to do the works of the law, there comes a sense of freedom, not because the bondage is gone, but because it is not felt. The captive struggling to walk at liberty has a keen sense of the chains that bind him; but when he relinquishes his efforts and sits passively down, the power of the chains is not felt. And if a man were as blind to literal things, he might easily imagine that he was no longer in bondage.

The flesh is chained to sin; and whenever it tries to go in a direction contrary to sin the chains hold it back, and the individual realises a sense of bondage. But if he ceases trying to go contrary to sin, he no longer feels the pulling of the chains. The individual may then, in his blindness, imagine himself at liberty, and rejoice at having as he thinks gotten out of bondage into freedom. But he has no freedom, only the freedom that Satan gives. For Satan holds the chains, and leads his victim captive at his will. So long as he moves where Satan wants him to go, he feels not the restraining force of his bonds. The devil will give his captive rope enough so that he will not be unpleasantly conscious of his captivity. But the moment he tries to leave the path of sin and walk in the paths of God, he finds himself in bondage, and try so hard as he may, he cannot set himself free. He finds himself joined to sin, so that he can only go where sin goes also.

By the law is the knowledge of sin. Without the law, sin is dead. Rom. iii. 20; vii. 8. The individual is now then conscious of his inability to work the works of God. But when the commandment comes, sin revives. Rom. vii. 9. The bondage of sin makes itself felt. To the flesh, "the law worketh wrath." It "gendereth to bondage." Gal. iv. 24. It brings forth bondage, so that it is felt and realised by the individual. "The woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth. . . So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress." Rom. vii. 2, 3. The individual who, in the flesh, takes upon him the name of Christ, thus becomes guilty of adultery, which is the first mention of the works of the flesh. For the flesh is the "old man," the first husband of the "woman," and this husband must be dead before she can be lawfully joined to another. Thus the very effect of the flesh to work the works of God becomes only an effort to commit adultery. Whatever the flesh does or tries to do, is of course but a work of the flesh; and they which do such works "shall not" we are told, "inherit the kingdom of God." Gal. v. 21.

SOME ILLUSTRTATIONS

Abraham tried at one time to work the works of God through the flesh. God had promised him that he should be the father of many nations, and Abraham was anxious of course that the promise should be fulfilled. But as Sarah his wife was barren, he had no son. So Abraham and Sarah set about working out the fulfilment of the promise. The result was Ishmael, the child "born after the flesh," the "son of the bondwoman." Gal. iv. 29, 30. In this Abraham and Sarah showed a lack of faith, for faith would have believed that God could do what He had promised, even under conditions which would seem to make it impossible. And faith being absent, what they did was a work of the flesh, and the result was a son born after the flesh. The flesh, attempting to accomplish the work of God, simply gendered to bondage.

Jacob and Rebekah tried to work out God's promise for Him when they deceived Isaac, and induced him to bestow the blessing intended for the firstborn, upon Jacob; and the result was a life-long separation, with much suffering and deep repentance on the part of Jacob before he was restored to the tranquility of his early years. Moses thought to work out the promise of deliverance for the captive Israelites by his own might, when he "slew the Egyptian, and hid himself in the sand;" but that was not God's way, and he was obliged to flee into the desert while the fulfilment of the promise was delayed forty years. And thus it is with every attempt of the flesh to work out the purposes of God. It falls as far short of that which God intends and requires as the mind of man falls short of the mind of God. The promise is never fulfilled, the work never accomplished, until it comes through faith.

DELIVERANCE THROUGH DEATH

God has given to us "exceeding great and precious promises;" but we can never know their fulfilment through the works of the flesh. "To Abraham and his seed were the promises made;" and only they who are the children of faith are the seed of Abraham. In the flesh, we are bound to the "old man," the carnal nature, which is not, and cannot be, subject to the law of God; and therefore we cannot in the flesh be Christ's. But we can become Christ's by being crucified with Him. We may meet Him and become united with Him at the cross. Gal. ii. 20. At the cross the "old man," the first husband, is crucified and put to death, and we can then be "married to another, even to Him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God." Rom. vii. 4. The flesh cannot be separated from sin; and therefore, in order that sin may cease, it must die. We are then delivered from the "law of sin and death," the law which bound us to sin while we were in the flesh. "For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead [the law of sin] wherein we were held [because the flesh is dead]; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter." Rom. iv. 5, 6.

This is the wonderful change that is wrought in us at the cross. The law does not die, but the flesh dies, the law of sin and death is abolished, the enmity between us and the law dies, the bondage ceases, and we become joined to Christ in faith, and the law becomes to us "the law of the Spirit

120

of life in Christ Jesus." Then the works of the flesh cease, and we work the works of faith, which bring forth the fruits of the Spirit, and are heirs with Abraham of the promises made to him and to his seed.

"'Let This Mind Be in You'" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

The Creator of heaven and earth in a stable! The King of glory in a manger! How came He there? Ah! that is the wonder. He never would have been there if His mind had been like Satan's mind, like the mind that you and I so often have.

We sometimes think that because God is the King of all kings, and is so wise and powerful, that He must be proud and selfish like many of the kings of earth. But this is a great mistake, as you will see when you become better acquainted with the babe in the manger.

God is unselfish and altogether lovely. He is not in the habit of looking upon His own things and forgetting whether those around Him have anything or not. But He is always looking upon others to see if they have all that they need. If they have not, His greatest joy is, not to please Himself, but to do something for them, going without Himself if necessary, in order that they may have what they need. Notice carefully and you will see that this is true.

Man, who had been created pure and good in the image of God, had given up his life and purity and all that he had to Satan, the enemy of God and man. The Lord knew that that meant sin, and sorrow, and eternal death for every one of us. For Satan was a hard and cruel master and much stronger than we, so that he would never allow one of us to go free.

It was all man's fault, to be sure, but God loved us so that in spite of all that, His heart was overflowing with grief when He saw our helpless condition. His heart yearned over us as a mother's heart yearns over her dying child. The riches and glories of heaven were nothing to Him compared with His love for us. He could not be happy and enjoy them alone; He must have us to share them with Him.

Why did He not send someone to overcome Satan, then, and break his fetters and give man back his freedom and his life of purity? Ah, who could He send? No man could do it for Satan was stronger than any man. Not even the angels could do it, for they had no more life for purity than they needed for themselves; all they had was given them by God. God only was stronger than Satan. And with Him alone was the fountain of purity and life. Nothing could drive out the darkness of sin but the light of His life. Nothing could break the chords of sin with which Satan had bound us, but the righteousness of His life. Nothing could take away the keys of the grave but the power of His marvellous life which could go down into the grave, and pass through the grave, and carry the keys away with it.

But this would mean a life of pain and temptation in sinful flesh, and a cruel death upon the cross-for God! Oh, did He love us enough to give up His glorious home and all His riches and joys in heaven, and come down to earth as the poorest of the poor, and the weakest of the weak, and pass through every pain and temptation of sinful flesh, even to death's dark door? Yes, He did! God came in His Son to reconcile the world unto Himself.

Look at Him there in the rude manger of Bethlehem.

Look at Him in the lowly home of Nazareth, subject to His parents in all things and sharing all the homely burdens and labours of His father-as the carpenter.

Look at Him in the wilderness without food for forty days and forty nights, and tempted by the devil.

Look at Him thrust out of the synagogues and cities and hunted to the death by those whom He came to save.

Look at Him going about without a home or friends with no place to lay His head, yet with never a murmur, and with always a kind word and a helping hand.

Look at Him in Gethsemane sweating as it were great drops of blood.

Look at Him betrayed by the kiss of one of His professed followers.

Look at Him in the judgment hall mocked, scourged, spit upon, dressed in an old purple robe, and crowned with a crown of thorns.

Look at Him fainting by the way, and oh, look at Him hanging on the cursed cross with His tender hands and feet still quivering from the cruel nails! Look at Him dying of a broken heart because of your sins and mine! "Behold your God!"

Oh, can you longer doubt His love

124

for you? Can you doubt His willingness to accept you as His child? Can you ever doubt His unselfishness?

Follow Him to Joseph's new tomb, and see Him laid away with a great stone before the door.

But look once more. The stone is rolled away. The grave clothes lie there, but our Lord is risen! Death could not hold Him. The glorious work is finished. He has bought us back and has broken the last fetter and unlocked the last door that shut us in with Satan! HE HAS SET US FREE! He has proclaimed liberty to every captive "and the opening of the prison to them that are bound!" In the name of Jesus we may walk out into all the liberty of the sons of God. Satan cannot overcome us or cause us to sin once more if we believe in Jesus and stand fast and rejoice in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free. As long as we believe that He has made us free and yield to Him in everything, letting His mind be in us, Satan cannot touch us.

We, to-day then, are called upon to make the same decision that the angels of heaven made so long ago. "Who is on the Lord's side?" "He that is not for Me is against Me."

We, as they were, are left perfectly free to choose for ourselves. We need not be on the Lord's side unless we wish. But, oh, do we not wish to be? Has He not proved Himself to be "the chiefest among ten thousand and the One altogether lovely"? Has He not shown Himself worthy of our confidence? What more could He do to show His love for us than He has done?

Having suffered Himself being tempted, He is able to help them that are tempted. He is still touched with the feeling of our infirmities. He knoweth our frame and remembereth that we are dust. Although we are so poor and wicked, yet He thinketh upon us, and His thoughts toward us are thoughts of peace. Oh, then, shall we not choose Him for our Master, and let this mind be in us, which was also in Christ Jesus?

"Following Jesus" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

Jesus called Paul to go to Jerusalem, and Paul was willing to go, though he knew he should be bound with chains. Sometimes we do not like to do what we know we ought to do. Let us learn from Paul to follow Jesus, wherever He may lead us. A child who thinks he must have his own way will not make a good soldier for Jesus, for a soldier must always follow his Captain.

"Two Masters" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

"Choose ye this day whom ye will serve." Joshua xxiv. 15.

When God created the angels they all were pure and good like everything else that God made. Their hearts were filled with joy and praise as they looked in the loving face of their Creator and thought what He had done for them. He gave them their beauty and wisdom and strength, and let them live in all the light and glory of His heavenly home. Lucifer was the wisest and most beautiful of all the angels. He was with God more than any of the other angels, and was loved and honoured next to Christ. God says that he was perfect in his ways from the day that he was created, till iniquity (sin) was found in him.

And this is the way sin came into his heart. Little by little he began to think of himself instead of God, and began to love himself in place of God. He looked at his own beauty, and thought of his great wisdom, and was too well pleased with the love and honour that was shown him by the angels. Instead of looking at Jesus and praising the wondrous beauty and tender love of Him who had created him and given him all that he had, he looked at himself and praised himself and felt jealous of his Creator. He thought that he ought to be obeyed and honoured as much as God Himself. He became so proud that he thought he knew more than God, and thought he was able to be a better master to the angels than Jesus. Instead of a pure-hearted angel he became Satan; and that means "an enemy."

He began to work slyly against God. He secretly talked with the angels and found fault with God, and told things about Him that were not true, until he caused many of the angels to think that he was right, and God was wrong. He caused them to believe that if they would follow him he would be a better leader than Jesus. You see he wanted to be king himself, and have the angels honour him instead of God.

God's love for Satan and his followers was great. It grieved Him at His heart to see them destroy their own happiness. They were no longer contented and happy, for you remember that no one can be truly happy without Jesus. He bore with it long and did all that He could do to draw them back to Him, but they would not.

Finally Satan got his followers to believe that they were stronger than God and His Son, and could easily overcome them and have the kingdom. Thinking of self he made his heart so ungrateful and cruel that he gathered his followers together and fought against his Creator! "And there was war in heaven," Jesus and His angels fought against Satan; and Satan fought and his angels. But the One who could create was stronger than the ones created, so the angels who had made themselves so evil could not overcome Jesus. And Satan was cast out of heaven and, as lightning, fell to the earth; and his angels were cast out with him. Once more love and harmony was in heaven. Never again came Satan into the beautiful home that he had left; but it was all his own fault.

God knew that Satan did not deserve to live another moment, but he had done his evil work so secretly that others did not know how bad he was, what terrible thing sin would bring. If God had destroyed him then they would have thought that He was cruel, and would not have served Him because they loved Him, but because they feared Him. So God in His goodness still allows Satan to live that all may see how wicked he is, and what a terrible thing sin is. Then they will know that God does right when He finally destroys him. God has said that by and by Satan and his angels and all his followers will be burned up. Then there will be no more sin or sorrow nor anyone to tempt or trouble the followers of God.

Now which of these two masters will you choose: Jesus or Satan? God says you may follow just which one you please. Jesus loves you and does all things for you. Satan hates you and tries in every way to destroy you. God says, "Choose you this day whom ye will serve." He lovingly says to you, "Do not give place to the devil" (Eph. iv. 27), but "Come unto Me." Matt. xi. 28. If you listen to Satan, he will put his own hateful, selfish mind in you just as he put it in those angels in heaven who listened to him. But if you listen to Jesus and love His words, He will put His pure, unselfish mind in you, and you will think of God and His goodness and live to please Him, instead of living to please yourself. God says, "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus."

1. Who created the beautiful angels? Col. i. 16.

2. When God created them how many were pure and good?

3. What did God give them?

4. Where did He allow them to live?

5. Must not that have been a beautiful home?

6. As long as they all looked to Jesus and remembered His love, how did they feel?

7. Which was the wisest and most beautiful of all the angels? Eze. xxviii. 12; Isa. 14.

8. How was he treated by the other angels?

9. How did sin finally come into his heart? Eze. xxviii. 12-15, 17; Isa. xiv. 12-15.

10. Then when we think more of ourselves than of others, and praise ourselves instead of praising God, like whom are we becoming?

11. What kind of mind has Jesus?-Unselfish; He is always thinking of others instead of Himself, and trying to make others happy. Phil. ii. 5-8; Acts x. 38.

12. What will Satan do if we listen to him?-He will put his selfish mind into us. Phil. ii. 5; Rev. iii. 20.

13. Why?-Because he hates us and wants us to be destroyed.

14. What will Jesus do if we let Him?-He will put His unselfish mind into us. Phil. ii. 5; Rev. iii. 20.

15. Why?-Because He loves us and wants us to be saved.

16. What does God say that you should do this very day? Joshua xxiv. 15.

17. How has God felt when He saw His brightest angel destroying his own happiness and leading others astray?

18. What did God and His Son and the good angels all plead with him to do?

126

19. Would he do it?

20. How did he finally treat the One who had made him, and given him all that he had? Rev. xii. 7.

21. Where were he and his followers cast? Rev. xii. 9.

22. Whose fault was it?

23. Why did God not destroy him then?

24. Will Satan always tempt and trouble God's people? Rev. xx. 7-10.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

-Large Dervish reinforcements have lately reached Dongola from Omdurman.

-A dispute has arisen in the Newcastle building trades, which has resulted in the looking out of 2,000 men.

-The Salvation Army has now in its ranks more than 200,000 "soldiers," 10,237 local officers, and 3,258 bandsmen.

-A rumour emanating from native sources is current at Tati that Lobengula is dead. Runners have been sent out to verify the report.

-Cholera, which had almost completely disappeared from Constantinople, has again broken out. Some fifteen fresh cases and several deaths have been reported during the last three days.

-The French official version of the second and least important conflict between British and French forces in West Africa has been received in Paris, and tends to throw the blame upon the British.

-Statistics compiled by the Census Bureau show that in the United States there are 14,969,467 horses, or one horse for every four inhabitants; mules, 2,295,532; cows, 16,511,950; swine, 57,409,583; and sheep shorn, 32,126,868.

-Despatches from Honolulu, dated February 3, state that the position of Mr. Willis, the United States Minister, is growing uncomfortable. The Hawaiian newspapers call for his retirement, and if a Republic is formed it is thought likely that he will receive his passports.

-A striking departure in Chinese education was inaugurated at Tientsin on the opening in December of the Imperial Medical College by His Excellency the Viceroy of Pechihli. The college cost 30,000 taels, and will be under the administration of an English doctor.

-Admiral de Gama, the Brazilian insurgent leader, is reported to be dying from wounds received in a stubborn engagement between his forces and the government troops at Nictheroy, in which the former were repulsed in an attempt to advance upon Rio Janeiro.

-Hom?opathy has made rapid strides in the United States, where at the present time there are 1,000 hom?opathic practitioners, 22 special hom?omopathic newspapers, and 76 hom?opathic hospitals, one of which, that at Middletown, has 1,800 beds.

-Fighting is still going on in Nicaragua. President Vasquez succeeded in driving the insurgent beseiging forces a mile from Tegucigalpa, and reopened communication; but later despatches state that he is again closely hemmed in by the insurgents and their allies.

-The Swiss Federal Council has decided to expel from Switzerland six Italians, six Germans, and one Austrian as being the instigators of the riotous demonstration of sympathy with the population of Sicily which was made on January 28, in front of the Italian Consulate at Zurich.

-The following is the actual cost of maintaining for a year the specified parks under the control of the London County Council: Victoria, ?11,091; Finsbury, ?6,535; Clissold, ?1,878; Battersea, ?10,520; Kennington, ?1,408; Brockwell, ?2,483; Dulwich, ?3,272; Southwark ?3,461; Ravenscourt, ?1,619; and Waterlow, ?2,541.

-The French Government has sent a congratulatory telegram to Captain Philippe, commanding the French force at Timbuctoo, in recognition of his recent services. Three hundred men of the Foreign Legion have received orders to hold themselves in readiness for departure to the French Soudan in case their services should be required.

-A despatch from Mauritius reports that a fearful cyclone devastated Diego Suarez, on the north coast of Madagascar, on the night of Feb. 5. The military and civil buildings were greatly damaged. The hospital, school, clench, market, and warehouses were entirely destroyed. Two-thirds of the houses were overthrown, and the in-habitants were left without shelter.

-It is announced that the German Government has semi-officially requested the Vatican to exert its influence with a view to inducing the Centre party to vote for the Bill ratifying the Russo-German treaty of commerce. The Vatican however, has not received the advances favourably, and will, it is stated, leave the members of the Centro free to vote as they choose.

-Another terrible bomb explosion took place in Paris, the perpetrator being a young man, who was captured while running away. The scene of the explosion was the cafÈ of the Hotel Terminus, situated opposite the St. Lazare railway station. The cafÈ was crowded at the time, and terrible havoc was wrought by the bomb, one person being killed on the spot and about fifteen others wounded. The perpetrator affirms that anarchist motives prompted him to the deed.

-Brigandage, which has been rapidly spreading of late in many parts of southern Spain, is now assuming especially alarming proportions in the Mancha, the southern portion of the Province of Ciudad Real. The Governors of this province and of the neighbouring Province of Toledo have been ordered by the Minister of the interior to unite the whole of the available gendarmery forces of their two provinces, and to cooperate in a reconnaissance into the Toledo Mountains, with a view of driving out the brigands now infesting them.

-The great wall of China was recently measured by Mr. Unthank, an American engineer engaged on the survey of a Chinese railway. His measurement gave the height 13ft. Every few hundred yards there is a tower 25ft. high. The foundation of the wall is of solid granite. For 1,300 miles the wall goes over plains and mountains, every foot of the foundation being of solid granite, and the rest of the structure solid masonry. In some places the wall is built smooth up against the bank, or crosses a precipice where there is a sheer descent of 1,000ft.

-Dr. Dawson Burns gives some interesting statistics in the Times in relation to the annual drink bill. He says that as between the three kingdoms, the expenditure per head on intoxicating liquors is highest in England, Scotland being second, and Ireland third, the figures being ?3 18s. 5d., ?3 Os. 5d., and ?2 2s. 9d.; but as between the kinds of liquor the expenditure is very unequal. Beer takes ?2 12s. 3rd. from each inhabitant of England, of Scotland 19s. 9d., and of Ireland 15s. 7d. With regard to ardent spirits it is different, England paying 18s. 5d. per head, Scotland ?1 14s. 2., and Ireland ?1 1s. 5d.

-A terrific blizzard, which is said to be more severe than any during the last ten years, is reported from all parts of the Central States of North America. Property has been destroyed to the extent of millions of dollars, and scores or lives have been sacrificed to the storm and the cold. In Oklahoma the effects of the blizzard were most severely felt, owing to the unprotected state of the inhabitants, many of whom were living in tents or rude huts. One hundred persons are estimated to have perished there, and many other deaths are reported from neighbouring States. The loss of live stock is almost unprecedented.

-A statistician has calculated that a week's work in Birmingham comprises among its various results, the fabrication of 11,000,000 pens, 6,000 bedsteads, 7,000 guns, 300,000,000 cut nails, 1,000,000 buttons, 1,000 paddles, 5,000,000 copper or bronze coins, 20,000 spectacles, 6 tons of papier mach? wares, over ?30,000 worth of jewellery, 4,000 miles of iron and steel wire, 10 tons of pins, 5 tons of half pins and hooks and eyes, 130,000 gross of screws for woodwork, 500 tons of nuts and screw bolts and spikes, 50 tons of wrought-iron hinges, 350 miles of wax for vestal, 40 tons of refined metal, 40 tons of German silver, 1,000 dozen fenders, 1,500 bellows, 800 tons of brass and copper wares, to say nothing of the myriad other articles, such as pianofortes., reed organs, fog horns and signals, ammunition of all kinds, cylinder castings, perambulators, wheels, axles, railway carriages and waggons, safes, locks, etc.

"What Doubt Is" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

What Doubt Is.-Doubt is the difficulty which men find in the attempt to make the Scriptures harmonise with their ideas and experience. For instance, we read that God has blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. But some one says that he has not experienced all blessings, and so he doubts the statement. In order, however, to seem to avoid the reputation of unbelief, he will declare that he believes the thing that the text may mean, but that it does not mean what it says. Another reads "the seventh day is the Sabbath;" but he has not been accustomed to observe that day, and he cannot make it harmonise with his plans and convenience, and so he straightway begins to doubt the statement. He, too, declares that it does not mean what it says. Doubt arises simply from the unwillingness of men to have their lives transformed, and fashioned after the Divine plan.

"Board School 'Bible Teaching'" The Present Truth 10, 8.

E. J. Waggoner

For the benefit of those who think that there is no possible hope for the salvation of children unless they are taught religion in the Board Schools, we give two incidents that have come under our immediate notice, so that they may see the kind of "religion" that is sometimes taught.

One teacher was giving a lesson on the days of the week. Having elicited from the pupils the fact that Tuesday is the third day of the week, she asked, "Which do we keep as the Sabbath?" The reply was, "Sunday." On being asked what day of the week that is, the children replied that it is the first day of the week. Then the teacher continued, "But the Bible says that the seventh day is the Sabbath; why do we not keep that day?" The children very naturally could see no reason for not doing as the Bible commands, and so the teacher informed them that although the Bible tells us to keep the seventh day, "we" keep the first day instead, because Christ rose from the dead on that day.

It is not likely that any member of the Board, whether in favour of "compromise," or zealous for denominational teaching, would find any fault with the above. And that shows what they mean by desiring to have the Bible taught in the Board Schools. The last thing in the world that they desire, is to have the Bible really taught. If that teacher should teach the Bible just as it reads, in the matter of the Sabbath, and in many other things as well, she would not be able to keep her position.

In the above instance the Bible was squarely ignored. The teacher set forth the undeniable fact that the seventh day is the Sabbath, and then gave the children to understand that it makes no difference what the Bible says, if people choose to do differently. And this is called Bible teaching!

The other instance illustrates another phase of so-called "Bible teaching." The lesson for the day was indeed the eighteenth chapter of Genesis, which begins thus: "And the Lord appeared unto him [Abraham] in the plains of Mamre; and he sat in the tent door in the heat of the day." The teacher proceeded to draw on her imagination after this fashion: "Abraham was sitting in his tent door in the evening, resting himself after his hard day's work, and I suppose he was smoking a long pipe to refresh himself; don't you?" ! ! !

Ignoring the statement that it was "in the heat of the day," the teacher allowed her "warm, ungoverned imagination" to picture the scene as evening; and then, to cap the climax, pictured Abraham, the patriarch and prophet, "the friend of God," smoking a long pipe! Here her imagination seemed to fail her, for she did not represent him as hospitably offering pipes to his heavenly visitors, so that they might refresh themselves after their journey.

Here we have an illustration of the two most common methods of "Bible teaching." One is to contradict the Scripture statement, or to teach that it is of no importance, and the other is to read a text, and then soar into the realms of fancy. Perhaps some people may think that it is better to have the Bible "taught" in that way, than that the children should have no "Bible instruction;" but we most emphatically dissent. We think that all who regard the Bible as the sacred word of the living God, will agree with us that it is better to leave the soil of the mind free, than to cumber it with such stuff.

"Every word of God is pure; He is a shield unto them that put their trust in Him. Add thou not unto His words, lest He reprove thee, and thou be found a liar." Prov. xxx. 5, 6.

In the foregoing we have looked at the matter only from the Bible point of view. We have not said anything about the impropriety of leading the children to think that smoking is both decent and helpful, nor the wickedness of making the Bible appear to sanction the pernicious and degrading habit. Of course the children, as well as grown people, take the imaginings of their Bible teachers as being Bible truths.

It is worthwhile, also, to note how indulging one's fancy in regard to the Bible, is at the expense of other things as well. In this instance the teacher's fancy led her wholly to ignore the fact that tobacco is a native of America, and was unknown to the Eastern Continent until about three hundred years ago. "Civilsation" is indebted to barbarism for the tobacco habit. The following facts are taken from the "Encyclopedia Britannica," art. "Tobacco":-

Although the fact has been controverted, there cannot be a doubt that the knowledge of tobacco and its uses came to the rest of the world from America. In November, 1492, a party sent out by Columbus from the vessels of its first expedition to explore the island of Cuba, brought back the information that they had seen people who carried a lighted firebrand to kindle fire, and perfumed themselves with certain herbs which they carried along with them. . . . The practice of tobacco-chewing was first seen by the Spaniards on the coast of South America in 1502.

While the plant came to Europe through Spain, the habit of smoking it was initiated and spread through English example. Ralph Lane, the first governor of Virginia, and Sir Francis Drake, brought with them in 1586, from that first American possession of the English crown, the implements and materials of tobacco smoking, which they handed over to Sir Walter Raleigh. Lane is credited with having been the first English smoker, and through the influence and example of the illustrious Raleigh, who "tooke a pipe of tobacco a little before he went to the scaffolde," the habit became rooted among Elizabethan courtiers. During the 17th century the indulgence in tobacco spread with marvellous rapidity throughout nations.

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." This is a truth that is not very much regarded; but it is a fact that the ignoring of strict Bible truth is a sure way to foolishness in general matters.

March 1, 1894

"Doubt" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

Doubt.-Doubt means devil. You can keep this in mind by the fact that both words have the same number of letters, and both begin with the same letter; and they mean the same thing. Belief comes from Christ; for He is the Author and Finisher of faith. He is the faithful One. Doubt is simply the whispering of the devil. Belief is the acceptance of the Lord Jesus Christ.

"The Ways of God" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

The Ways of God.-It is common for God to do good. It is common for Him to show great power; He cannot help it, for He is power. It is common for God to shower blessings. That is His way. It is common for God to show great mercy and love. That is His name. We must learn now to recognise Him, and we shall have no trouble about being thankful to the Lord. Nature is only God's way of working. God Himself has always been near us although we have thought Him afar off.

"In the Light of His Countenance" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

In the Light of His Countenance.-It is written in the Psalms, "Thou hast set our iniquities before Thee, our secret sins in the light of Thy countenance." Ps. xc. 8. How many have thought that the Lord was holding them there against us, over our heads, and have found no comfort in this word of the Lord? But He is of purer eyes than to behold evil, and cannot look on iniquity. Hab. i. 13. Then when He sets our sins before His face, that iniquity is gone, consumed by the glory of the Lord. In the light of His countenance there is health and righteousness. That light dispels sin, just as the light of the same glory in the sunlight purifies a dark unhealthful place, and destroys the germs of disease.

"Talking with a Friend" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

Talking with a Friend.-When we meet our friends to have a conversation with them, we do not approach them with stilted forms and set phrases, but we simply talk with them, and if we are honest we say the things we have in mind. We tell that which we wish them to know, and if we want something, we ask directly for that thing. So the Lord wishes us to know Him as a Friend. He calls us friends, because He will make known to us His secrets. We are to be on intimate terms with God the Maker of all things. His life is ours. We should expect Him to do great things because He is great. Prayer is simply talking to a wealthy Friend, who is our loving Father. And the talk is not to be one-sided. If we really talk to Him, we shall hear Him talking to us.

"Living with Him" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

Living with Him.-We are to dwell in the house of the Lord continually, and the Lord doesn't have a spare chamber for visitors. He has nothing that is not for every-day use. The best robe, the robe of righteousness, is not too good to be worn every day. His best room, the "secret place of the Most High," is for us. When we leave a good meeting, we need not leave the Lord behind. We may go to the house of worship with Him, and go away in His company. And do not think the love of the Lord is going to forsake you when you get into the routine of daily work. The Lord loves a woman just as much when she is washing the dishes, as when praying in a prayer-meeting. Do not let this idea of the love of God be a thing for occasional use. He is not ashamed to associate with us in our daily tasks. His presence, if we let Him go with us, will keep us from vanity, and will keep us humble.

"'Every Word'" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

"Every Word."-Man shall live by every word of God. Every word has the life of God in it. Wherever we get one word, that is the life, whether we understand another or not. But when we get the life in one word, we cannot reject it in another word, and still retain the life. While each word has life for us, and one word is enough to give us life, we must live by every word that comes to us. Thus we shall have life, and have it more abundantly.

"God's Glory His Gospel" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

When Isaiah saw the Lord on the throne, high and lifted up, surrounded by the seraphim, he heard those beings crying one to another, "Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of His glory." Isa. vi. 3. These words were spoken hundreds of years ago. Are they true now, and is the earth now full of the glory of the Lord?-Most certainly; all the while the word has been, "Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee." Isa. lx. 1.

The whole earth is full of the glory of God. He has revealed it in every blade of grass, and every flower, and everything that He has made. "His glory covers the heavens, and the earth is full of His praise." The plant springing up and yielding its fruit, is showing forth the glory of God; for when in Cana of Galilee Christ accelerated the process, and, instead of waiting six months for the rain to come down and be taken up into the vine and converted

130

into the juice of the grape, changed the water into wine by the power of the same word which sends the rain and is the life of the plant, it was written that this beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, "and manifested forth His Glory."

POWER AND GLORY

The power of God is the glory of God. He showed His mighty power in the resurrection of Christ from the dead; but Christ was raised from the dead "by the glory of the Father." The power of God is also shown in the things that He is made, and the Gospel, which is this power manifested unto salvation, it is the "glorious Gospel" of God. The Gospel is glory; it is also power.

And the whole earth is full of it. The earth preaches no set sermons. It does not begin with firstly, secondly, thirdly, and deliver an artistic address. What does the earth do? It receives the light from God, and manifests it forth. It simply receives the gifts that God sends upon it, and glorifies God in returning the fruits of the life. That is the Gospel. The Gospel is "the power of God unto salvation, to every one that believeth," "for therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith."

WHY ALL DO NOT GLORIFY GOD

Someone may ask, "Then why am I not as much to the praise of God as the heavens?" Simply because you do not desire to be. We are all exactly what we wish to be. It is a fact that God satisfies the desire of every living thing. The trouble with some is that they do not want to be satisfied.

If you really want to know the Lord, nothing in the world can hinder; because the Lord wants you to know Him. There is no use in standing off, and saying we want to know the Lord, and want to serve Him, when for many years He has been seeking for us, and knocking for us to open the door and let Him in, and has been speaking to us in every way He could. He has spoken to eyes, and ears, into every sense we have; for there is not a thing in heaven or earth that does not proclaim the power and the glory of God.

Therefore as soon as we are willing to believe that the Lord is better than we are, that He is more at peace and rest than we are, we shall have Him; for we shall then be willing to give up our ways, and our poverty, and our unrest and disquietude, and have the peace and rest of God, and the riches and righteousness which He has given to us. But this is a giving up of all there is of self. To give up our ways means to confess that we do not know as much as we thought we did, and that is hard. It is a difficult thing to say that we are mistaken, and that we have no wisdom, or might, anything that is good and worth having. This hurts; but it is only saying that the Lord is greater than we are, and that we are willing that His life in us shall manifest forth His glory, that we also may be to the praise of the glory of His grace.

"Messengers of God" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

Human eyes are often dazzled, and human minds bewildered, by the imminence and splendour of earthly potentates; but there is a position open to men that is far higher than any held by these. Above all the imminence of kings and queens, emperor or president, is the calling and station of a messenger of the Lord of hosts.

Human hands place a crown upon the head of an earthly potentate, or administer to him the oath of office, and human wills commission him to the place of earthly dominion; but how inferior is this to the commission given by the eternal God and sanctioned by the infinite host who stand in His presence!

The prophet Isaiah presents before us a picture of the scene attending his own commission as a messenger from God to Israel. "In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphim; each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory. And the posts of the door moved at the voice of Him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke.

"Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Then flew one of the seraphim unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar. And he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged. Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me. And He said, Go!" Isa. vi. 1-9.

What earthly scene of coronation or investment with the authority of man, could ever be compared with this? And who that could be commissioned with the authority and power of the King of kings would ever thirst for the honour that comes from men? Yet all God's servants may be so commissioned, for God desires that they shall be. For they are to be His witnesses, witnessing to His power (unto salvation) by revealing it in themselves before all men. They are to be ambassadors of God unto the world, clothed with the glory and authority of the Divine government which they represent. This is the position open to all who will become, by faith, the children of God.

Who will choose this honour in preference to worldly fame and distinction,-the honour that is seen and recognised by "the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life"? To-day "the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong in behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward Him." 2 Chron. xvi. 9. To-day the call is sounding, "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" Who is willing to have his sins purged and his iniquity taken away by a live coal from the altar of the Lord, in order that he may say, "Here am I; send me"? The altar of the Lord represents sacrifice; and only those who possess the spirit of sacrifice, even "a broken and a contrite heart" (Ps. li. 17) for their undone condition in sin, can become the messengers of God. It is ours to repent and believe, and His to do the sending.

"An Unideal World" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

An Unideal World.-In building a house not only a plan but materials are necessary. The best kind of a plan would be unworkable with useless and unsatisfactory material. This is the reason why, after all the centuries of time, and the patient and impatient labour of philosophers, the ideal society or commonwealth has never been seen except on paper. Mr. Herbert Spencer confesses in the last Fortnightly Review that the theories which he and his school had originally conceived cannot be worked out except by people of a certain type, and this type cannot be found in actual society. Before the French Revolution the philosophers had beautiful theories of fraternity and peace, but when it came to actually putting these things into operation it

131

was a massacre rather than a millennium that followed.

When God is left out of the plan there must be failure, the matter how correct it may be in form; and the only way to get the Lord into it is to take His own plan. He makes no plan that is not perfect, and, as a perfect plan requires perfect material, He first of all sends the Gospel of power to transform and perfect those who are willing to be delivered from their own evil ways. This Gospel knows nothing of reforms in masses and communities, but takes hold of individuals. This Gospel of salvation from sin and self may look very barren to those who stand aside from it, and are impatient to see wrongs righted in social and political matters; but as it was sin that brought every evil, so in the Gospel is the only remedy for wrong of every kind. Men will not believe this; for the natural man has always thought himself wiser than God. But the first chapter of Romans, taught to a man by the Spirit of God, contains more wisdom on social economy than all that the world knows outside of the Lord.

"Debatings" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

The religion of Jesus Christ is a life to be lived, and not a theory to be debated about. Christ did not debate with the devil in the temptation in the wilderness; He simply lived. There is no debating the question of actual life; and anything less than this is not worth debating about.

"You say you are alive," someone says; "let us debate the question."

"I refuse to debate such a question."

"If you do not debate, people will think you are afraid."

Suppose a man should, in order to "defend the truth," get up and debate the question as to whether he is alive or not. Anyone who would do that would show that his life is not of sufficient value to give him good sense.

The truth as it is in Jesus, is the life of God, and the life of God lived in His own way. All that we have to do is to let Him work in us, so that the injunction may be obeyed, "Do all things without murmurings and disputings: that ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world; holding forth the word of life." Phil. ii. 14, 15.

The word to us is, "Arise, shine,"-not debate. The lighted gas jet is very quiet. We may argue with it all we please, that it has no light, nevertheless it shines, and by the power of its shining it silences all cavilling. The sun shines, and men may rail at it all they wish, but it has not time to stop shining to go to arguing. The religion of Christ is the life of Christ, and it is the life that is the light. Let it spring up, and do not try to stop the flow. It is a fountain; do not be afraid of exhausting the supply.

"How Do You Know?" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

"But the righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this wise, Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down from above:) or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead.) But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach; that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." Rom. x. 6-10.

This is the way of righteousness and this we want to learn. Christ is the way, the truth, and the life. Righteousness comes by Him; but where shall we find Him? Who knows anything about Him? We have in the Bible the story of His life, and have read about His crucifixion and resurrection and ascension to heaven; but how do we know that it is true? We never saw the men who wrote the Bible, nor anybody who did see them. Who knows that Christ ever came into the world to save sinners, about which we have read? If we should ask the average man whom we meet to-day, if he believes there was and is such a being as Jesus of Nazareth, he would say, "Yes, of course." You say you believe in it; but what reason have you for believing it? Can you give any evidence of it?

This is a fair question, and one that we ought to expect that the world will ask. The Lord expects that people will ask us a reason of the hope that is in us, and tells us that we should always be ready to give an answer. There are different ways people have of answering this question; but there is only one right way. Now and again we see in papers professedly devoted to Christian evidences, efforts to substantiate the truth of the Gospel by references to contemporary heathen writers who had mentioned the Scriptures, or by quotations from the ancient fathers, who professed faith in them. We sometimes see quotations from the sayings of great men of past days, or from men still living, who say they believe the Bible; and if they, with all their learning and greatness, believe it, why should not we? But that is no reason to us at all. We cannot believe it because somebody else does. We may believe the person to be honest in his belief, but that cannot make us know it. No man, however great and learned, can believe for another, no matter how mean and ignorant he may be.

Now the question comes to every professor of Christ, How do you know that such a person as Jesus of Nazareth ever lived? It is a question which every disbeliever in the Bible has a right to ask, and to which he has a right to expect an answer. It will do no good to berate him as an infidel; that will only serve to confirm him in his unbelief, by leading him to think that his questions cannot be answered. How will you answer?

You may tell him you believe in it. Very good; but that will not convince him, for there are other people who believe other things that are not true. He does not question the fact that you believe, but wishes to know why. You may quote him great men, but what of that? The Lord Himself would not admit that as evidence. On one occasion He said, "I receive not testimony from men." It makes no difference how many men the questioner might be referred to, he would still want to know how they knew it was true.

KNOWING BY FAITH

There is only one way of knowing, and these words of Paul in Romans point that out. We have searched for Him, but the scripture says we have not to ascend into heaven to bring

132

Him down, or into the deep, to bring up Christ, but "the word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart; that is, the word of faith which we preach." "For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness." This is the righteousness of faith; and in Eph. ii. 17 we read that Christ dwells in the heart by faith. We can really know nothing in this world about Christ, except that which we know by personal experience. The testimony of hearsay is valueless. We must tell only what we know. We have read about the crucifixion and resurrection, that Christ "suffered for sins, the just for the unjust;" that, "in that He died, He died unto sin, and in that He liveth, He liveth unto God;" and that "death hath no more dominion over Him;" but how do we know this is true?-By proving it.

WITNESSING TO THE TRUTH

"If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus." Now to confess a thing means to tell the truth about it. We are here as witnesses for God, just as the believers were sent out after Pentecost to be witnesses unto the Lord in Jerusalem, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost parts of the earth. "Ye are My witnesses, saith the Lord." Isa. xliii. 10. We are to be witnesses with Him, who is the "faithful and true witness." When the Saviour was asked before the Roman governor if He was a King, He "confessed and denied not." And Paul says He "witnessed a good confession" before Pontius Pilate. 1 Tim. vi. 13. In doing this He said, "To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth." John xviii. 37. We are to confess with Him to the truth.

One who is a witness must run no risk in his testimony. When we go into the witness box, we are put under oath to tell the truth, and only what we know to be truth. It will not do to tell what we think is true, we run the risk of perjuring ourselves. So we dare not speak of things which we do not know positively.

Is Jesus of Nazareth raised from the dead? It may be you have talked about Christ and the resurrection. Do you know that He was dead, and is risen? The whole Gospel is summed up in that. The angels announced to the shepherds the birth of Christ, and said that the message was one of glad tidings of great joy, which should be to all people. Then if you have known the fact and do know it, it is joy to you, and you must have found joy in proclaiming it. If you have not found all joy and peace in it, then you must have missed the Gospel in some way, and if you have professed to believe in it, then you have been bearing false witness in your testimony.

It may be that you have assumed the birth of Jesus as a fact so well established that you thought it was hardly necessary to prove it. "Everybody," you say, "believes that Christ lived and was crucified." No; there are more who do not believe it than there are who do believe it. Even in what are termed "Christian lands," there are many who do not believe it, and we cannot rest in the assumption that everybody believes it.

FALSE WITNESSES

Perhaps in the very telling about it to others, there was a dolefulness in the testimony which belied it. Unbelievers coming into a meeting where professed believers were in the witness box testifying before the Judge, would often get the idea that it is a very gloomy thing to be always giving up something. There is such a sadness, such a feeling of want and dissatisfaction in many testimonies, that they would think that there was little attractiveness in Christ. This is a bearing of false witness before God; because the angel from heaven announced that this was a message of great joy, and here are those talking about it, who give the impression that there is no joy in witnessing to it, but a hard striving after something that we hoped to get but did not have.

Then again, you have perhaps said that Jesus was raised from the dead, and have assumed that this was so generally accepted that you did not need to prove it. Some day someone may come to you face to face and ask you how you know that Jesus was raised from the dead. You may say, "Oh, the Bible says so." But he will ask you how you know that the record is true. Here is a live question which comes to us eighteen hundred years after Christ. And were it not possible for us to-day to give just as sure evidence, and to speak just as positively as did the apostles, we should have to give up. If you do not know of positive knowledge that Jesus Christ is risen from the dead, then it is not possible for anyone to know it. Surely witnesses for God ought to be as sure of their testimony as witnesses before an earthly magistrate are required to be; and that means that you know of your own personal knowledge, irrespective what others have told you. If you cannot do that, you know nothing about it, and thus stand down from the witness box.

The Apostle Paul was brought before the magistrate on this very question at one time. He was on trial for his life, accused for saying that there was another King than C?sar, namely, one Jesus. But the Roman governor on investigation said he found it a question of religion only, about one Jesus whom the Jews said was dead, but whom Paul affirmed to be alive. Acts xxv. 17-19. A very simple question, but one which involved the whole Gospel. Paul could stand before the court and testify under oath that Jesus was raised from the dead.

It is a wonderful thing. You are telling men that one who was dead came to life. How do you know it? "I was reading it in a book and-" But hold, if we want the testimony of a book we will get the book; you must tell only what you know. "Well, I was at a place and heard a man speaking very positively, and he told a story which fitted together perfectly; and he made the matter so plain that I believed it." But again you are missing the point; it is not some other man's testimony that you are to give, but only your own. Did Jesus really die, or is this whole story a myth? Was it merely assumed that He died and rose again?

How do we know that Jesus lives? We have talked with Him, we have heard His voice, and we can say positively that He lives at our house. Suppose that a man has disappeared, and foul play is suspected. We are called to testify as to our knowledge of him, and can say that he is not dead because he is living at our house, and we have been in conversation with him every day. That is evidence enough as to our knowledge of him. Moreover there is a record to put in evidence. The record says that Jesus was declared to be the Son of God with power, by the resurrection from the dead. Now this Being with whom we are in communion every day corresponds exactly with the specification of the records. We find the truth of the record demonstrated by Him every day.

Here are habits of one kind and another, which might be enumerated by

133

the score. In fact, our whole life was perverse. In spite of ourselves, we found that these habits would assert themselves and make us miserable. There was impatience, and we would say words that were wrong, and although resolving most solidly to refrain from allowing such feelings to enter the heart, we found that it was impossible to shut them out. We were helpless in the hands of these habits, and could not shake them off.

WHAT WE HAVE SEEN

Well, we saw Jesus of Nazareth. We saw Him being led to Calvary. We saw Him crucified. Someone may say, "I don't believe you saw that." We cannot help it; we saw Jesus set forth crucified before our eyes, and that for which He was crucified was the sin of the world, our sin. And when He told me that "He loved me and gave Himself for me" (Gal. ii. 20), I believed Him. In fact we have evidence of His love before that. He had borne witness from our earliest infancy to His love, and although we had gone our own way and denied Him, yet "He left not Himself without witness, in that He did good, and gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness." He did not withdraw His love and His life from us. So we had had previous witness of His love for us and His power.

CRUCIFIED WITH HIM

So when He told us again that He loved us, and would deliver us from the sin that bound us, we believed Him, and gave ourselves to Him. He said He would identify Himself with us, and He did; although sinless, "He was made to be sin for us," counting our sin as His. We had gone astray, and the Lord laid on Him the iniquity of us all. So when He was crucified, He was crucified for our sin. We saw Him lifted up, and we consented to be crucified with Him. And we knew it was a crucifixion too. It was no fancy; for when we came to giving up those evil things, we found that the whole life was composed of them, and it was giving our life. We found that the disease of sin was in the blood itself, and it was taking our very life to have it taken away. But we said to the Lord, "We identify ourself with You, as You with us," and so we were crucified with Him. And in that crucifixion we found Him a wonderful Being, the like of which had never lived on the earth before; for although crucified, He still lived, and when we accepted His terms, and told Him that He might take our life in the crucifixion, we took His life for us, and ever since He has lived with us.

LIVING WITH HIM

How do we know He lives? Is there any evidence that we are not dreaming? Yes; because our faith brings Him as a living Being into our heart, and that thing which we found utterly impossible is now done. We can say, "The life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me." Gal. ii. 20. Therefore we can witness that Jesus Christ is not in the heavens, nor in the deep, but in our heart. And this is the way in which the Apostle Peter says we are to be able to give a reason for our hope. He says: "Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts; and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you, with meekness and fear." 1 Pet. iii. 15. It could not be done in any other way, because Christ in us is the only hope of glory. Col. i. 27. He in whom Christ is not formed, has no hope at all.

Someone says, "I should like to know this." You may know it just as well as anybody if you wish. "The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is the word of faith, which we preach; that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved; for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness." The reason is that Christ is righteousness, and when He dwells in the heart by faith; our faith in that which is a fact, makes us know the fact.

FAITH IN A FACT

If the story of Jesus of Nazareth were a myth, no faith that we could put in it would make it a fact. One cannot believe a lie so strongly as to make it a truth. We cannot believe anything which does not exist, so strongly as thereby to make it exist. Therefore that which through faith we find to be an actual fact, must have been a fact before we believed it. That which we seek must have existed before we saw it. Our faith in the story of Jesus, that He was born, and was crucified, and that He lives, produces an actual power in us to do that which we could not do ourselves, or which no power of man could do. And this shows that the story is not a myth, but a present, living reality.

We did not believe in that thing because the power operated in our heart, but that power worked in us because we believed it. We saw Jesus Christ lifted up before us, and we were crucified with Him, and in that crucifixion we demonstrated the fact that He had risen from the dead. The crucifixion is because of sin, and it is a giving up of life, and all that there is of this life. But "if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life." Rom. v. 10. "I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." Gal. ii. 20. The living is the living of Christ in us. The joy of the Lord is the strength of our life. Neh. viii. 10. So let us not tell our neighbours and friends that the Christian life is a doleful one. But there is no use in our telling them that it is not a sad life, unless the joy and peace of it is seen in the telling of it, and is manifested in the life.

GIVING AND TAKING

One part of the life is a giving up, a crucifixion. But do not tell the world that that is all there is of Christianity. We cannot persuade men to give up their sinful habits and pleasures by simply talking about giving up. "What is there left?" they will say. If they give their sinful pleasures up in Christ, seeing Him crucified, and are crucified with Him, in that very giving up they get something else. They get His life, and this life is peace and righteousness. In Him all things consist, which are in heaven and earth. Wherefore, "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?" Each man can have but a very small portion of this world, but if a man had all the world, we could say to him: "Give this up, and take Christ, and in Him you will have all the treasures of the universe; for in Him are all things, and in Him 'we have obtained an inheritance.'" Eph. i. 11. The Spirit of God is to make known to us "what is the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power" to us.

We are to give everything we have, and what vast possessions are ours to give up? What have we? Our wretchedness, misery, poverty and blindness. We had an impatient disposition.

134

What returns did it make to us? The dislike and ill-will of many. These pleasures we thought were yielding us something at the time, but afterwards they left emptiness or disease behind them. "What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death." Rom. vi. 21. Although we have not felt to the full the death, there was a certain looking forward to the Judgment; and the fear of death resulted from the continued bondage. Now the word comes, "Give up all this, and take Christ and His riches, and by His strength you will overcome the evil habits whenever they attempt to put you under the old bondage;" and your faith in that fact makes it a fact to you. Your belief in the fact that Christ is crucified and risen, makes it a fact that Christ lives in you, and brings all the joy of the universe into your life.

We go to Calvary. We may never have seen that spot just outside the walls of Jerusalem. Not many have either the time or the means to go there; and it would not add to their faith in Christ if they could. We are glad we do not have to go to Jerusalem, either to see the place or to see Him crucified. Calvary is right here. Here is the cross set up, and we see Christ set forth crucified among us. Gal. iii. 1. We see Him as Isaiah saw Him, "high and lifted up." He is crucified for all the sins of the flesh, and they are all ours. We say, "Lord, I will go to the cross with Thee, and be crucified with Thee." And as we see Him lifted up from the earth we see in Him some things wonderful. We see in Him joy in the midst of tribulation. We see in Him righteousness under provocation such as no man on earth ever had. There is power and attractiveness in all these things.

LIFTED UP FROM THE EARTH

And now we believe, and are crucified with Him; and what comes to us? As He is lifted up from the earth, we are lifted up with Him from the earth. Oh, the preciousness of this fact to everyone who knows and believes that there is anything better than this earth and its sin, and who can joy in the sunlight of heaven. The marvel of it is that our belief makes us know it, because we experience the same thing, and so can bear witness that it is a fact. Then we can go and bear witness to the world that Jesus Christ is crucified and risen again. We know it is so, because we not only saw Him crucified, but were crucified with Him, and are raised to life with Him.

And that is not the end of it. We found that although it was an unequal partnership, He made it equal. We gave our life, which had only poverty and death in it; His part was to give His life, an endless life, which we took as righteousness and peace to us.

PEACE IN CONFLICT

This is how we know that the Bible is true, and that Jesus of Nazareth is raised from the dead. We say from the heart that Jesus is crucified for our sins, He died for us, and now He lives, and we know He lives; for our faith brings Him into our life, and faith keeps him there, so that in the midst of temptation there is peace and deliverance. Yes, even in the face of the enemy, He gives rest and assurance. "Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies." Ps. xxiii. 5. The enemy surrounds us, and is ready to make a charge upon us, but the Lord says, "Never mind them; come and let us sit down at the table, and feast our souls upon the good things prepared. Their power is gone, and they can do no harm." So we laugh them to scorn, and delight ourselves in the abundance of His table, with the enemy raging all about us.

Every enemy that comes against the soul to destroy it is the same old enemy that came against Jesus of Nazareth and He conquered them. They know Him; for Christ gained the victory on the cross. On the cross He completed the work, and the enemy was everlastingly overthrown, and all His strength taken away, together with all his armour wherein he trusted. When the enemies come, we know that it is only a show of armour they bring; so we say to them, "Christ is risen, and Christ lives in us." That which we state with positiveness because we believe in it, and our belief makes it true to us because it is everlastingly true in itself, whether we believe it or not,-that fact puts the enemies to flight; for they have been beaten and overthrown by that same life, and therefore have no desire to try conclusions with it again. So we hold up the life, and claim it as ours, and it is our safety and defence. The victory is already gained for us in the life of Christ, so that all we have to do is to allow ourselves to be continually crucified with Him, that thus we may have His life in us. And thus any man who is a sinner, and knows himself to be a sinner, and desires to be free from that bondage of evil habits, may say, "Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Cor. xv. 57.

"Taking the Word as of God" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

Taking the Word as of God.-No man takes the Scriptures as the word of God unless he experiences the power of the word. A man may say, "I believe that this is the word of God." Very well, take the text, "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me; because the Lord hath anointed Me . . . to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound." Now he says he believes the Bible, but he is afraid to say that he is free. Then he does not take it as the word of God. God has spoken to him saying that he is free, but he says that he is not free. Now if he accepted that as the word of God, he would be free, because he would know that God's word has power to give him freedom. God speaks with authority. No matter what a man may profess about the word of God, if he is not free, he simply does not believe in his heart that it is the word of God.

"Guarding the Rest Day" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

A growing fear is agitating many minds throughout Christendom, especially on the other side of the Atlantic, that the world will lose its rest day. A prominent churchman has declared that "the more we assimilate Sunday to other days by the amusements, the occupations, the teaching and reading and thinking with which we fill it, the greater is the danger that ultimately we shall lose it altogether." So it is proposed to guard against such a loss by "every sanction which the law can furnish."

So far Sunday is concerned, this fear is doubtless well grounded. There is a growing tendency to disregard the religious distinction which that day has for several centuries enjoyed, and to make it a day for secular pursuits and pleasures; and there is no power on earth that can stop it. The distinction between it and other days of the week, excepting the seventh, is one which rests only upon human authority and custom, and to human authority and human power it must look for that which is to save it from being swept away. Many men have observed, and do now observe the day from conscientious convictions of duty, believing it to be the day Divinely instituted and given to man to be kept

135

holy. But with the knowledge that it is not and never was a holy day,-now fast being disseminated throughout the religious world,-and that its claim to sanctity rests on nothing but the traditions of men, while the seventh is the Sabbath of the Lord, which all men are bound to observe, as the fourth commandment declares, there springs up naturally in men's minds a disregard for the Sunday, which the argument of law is powerless to cure. No human law ever changed the convictions of a person's heart. The most that human law can do is to make some of those who do not believe Sunday to be a sacred day, act as though they did believe in it; that is, to make hypocrites; for all who do believe it to be of a sacred character will observe it without the law. This is the only additional guard that secular enactments can throw around the day,-a guard of hypocrites.

But how is it with "the Sabbath of the Lord," the seventh day? Is there any danger that it will be lost? We hear no such fear expressed. Though its adherents are very much less numerous than the number who profess allegiance to Sunday, none of them have any doubt that it is sufficiently guarded and secure. It comes regularly once in each week, and shows no tendency whatever to get lost. The masses not only of the world but of Christendom, are against it, but it is losing no ground. On the contrary, its cause is moving steadily forward, and the number of its adherents is growing in all parts of the world day by day. No human law gives it aid, no popular church party gives it sanction, no man of wealth and influence are behind to push it forward; yet it moves onward with a power and majesty which discomforts and confounds its enemies.

The reason of this is simple. It is "the Sabbath of the Lord." He is behind it and in it. His power is with it. Upon His word, it rests. Small wonder then that it flourishes without the aid of human laws, influence, or wealth. Human power will turn against it, but that will make no difference. It is guarded and upheld by the word of the Lord, and can no more be vanquished or lost than can God Himself.

The only way to get the Sabbath is to get Christ. The only way to keep the Sabbath is to keep Christ. In Christ is rest; without Him there is no rest. "Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Would not this gracious invitation of the Master be as good to present to the poor workingman as a law compelling him to rest (?) whether he will or no?

In Christ, the workingman and every other man will find his rest, and he will not find it in any other way. He will find the Sabbath; for He is Lord of the Sabbath, the Creator of all things, and the Institutor, with His Father, of the day of rest. He kept it. The keeping of the Sabbath is a part of His life; and therefore those who have His life in them will keep it too. And they will not be afraid of the consequences, whether it be loss of position, loss of wealth or influence, or persecution from those who know not God. If they meet all these, they will still have as much as the Saviour had here on earth, and they ask no more.

When Christ can be put into the heart by human law, then Sabbath rest can be given to an individual by law; and not before. Until then, it is useless to talk of throwing guards around the Sabbath by human enactments.

"Enforcing the Law of God" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

"For we know that the law is spiritual." Rom. vii. 14. Then there can be no fulfilling of the law save in the Spirit. "God is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in truth." Sometimes people talk about keeping the spirit of the law without the letter, but there is nothing in the Bible about keeping the spirit without the letter. By that expression men mean that they will keep what they think the law means, regardless of what it says. But God knows that the thoughts of man are vain. We are to forsake our own thoughts, as well as our own way. "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts." Isa. lv. 8, 9. God is Spirit; therefore they that worship Him must do so in the Spirit which He supplies. He provides the means, and does not ask us to worship Him in our spirit, or in our conception of His law.

We are not to worship God as we think Him to be, but as He is. And no one, as stated in the text just quoted, can comprehend God, or define the bounds and limits of His will. Then no man can lay down a rule for another, or even for himself. Here is the unlimited word. No man can put a limit on the word of God, or say of any text that he has fathomed its depth, and that he has all the truth there is in it. No; the word is spiritual, and no man can fathom the depth of the mind of the Holy Spirit. For this reason no man, and no body of men, is at liberty to put any construction on the word of God, or to change it, or to hold or teach that it means anything different from exactly what it says.

The knowledge of this shuts out everything like religious coercion, persecution, or the laying down of rules for people to follow; for true worship must be rendered in the Spirit which God alone gives. The word must be taken, not in our own spirit, but in the Spirit of God, and that must lead us into larger and larger ideas, and work in us that which we do not know ourselves. Men have secret faults of which they are utterly unconscious. Not only so, but no man knows the depth of any sin which is brought to his attention, or the fulness of any command which is enjoined upon him. It is plain, therefore, that no man can measure his own righteousness, nor his own sin. He can simply know that he is a sinner, and that the righteousness of God is given to him. The more of the Lord he knows, the greater sinner he will realise himself to be. Therefore no man or body of men, whether in church or state, can lay down rules by which a man must live; because the field of God's requirements is as unbounded as His own life, and must therefore ever keep increasing to our vision; and though men filled the world with books in the attempt to define everything, there still would be something omitted. The Spirit of God must work its own life in every man. This takes the matter out of the realm of civil government entirely. No human authority whatever can impose the Spirit upon any man, or define the mind of the Spirit. The law of God, which is His righteousness, is the one thing which men are to seek. Christ said, "I know that His commandment is life everlasting." John xii. 50. We also are to know the same thing. The law itself is spiritual; it is life everlasting. But life is not a figment, a fancy; it is real, and wherever there is life there must be something living. When we read the commandment is life everlasting, it does not mean that the written characters are life. They simply declare the fact. Everlasting life is in

136

Jesus Christ. "As the Father hath life in Himself, so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself." John v. 26. He is the fountain of life. Ps. xxxvi. 9; Jer. ii. 13.

The commandment or law of God is everlasting life because it is His own life. Then it is the life of the Spirit of God; and putting the Spirit of God into the hearts of men puts the life of God there. It is the law of the Spirit of life in Christ, it gives freedom and peace with God. "The Spirit is life, because of righteousness;" and "if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His." Rom. viii. 1, 2, 9, 10. Nothing less than the life of Christ is the law of God; and anything contrary to the life of Christ is condemned. Then we can leave the right of any body of men to enforce the law of God entirely outside of the question. It is merely a question of power. Has it the power to enforce the law of God? Has any government on earth power to take the life of God and put it into the hearts of its subjects? Certainly not.

Then when men do make religious laws, and enforce religion upon people, it is certain that they are not enforcing the religion of Christ. Therefore when they do that, those who are loyal to Christ can have no complicity with it whatever. It is paganism, no matter what form of truth there may be. It is but the form without the power or life. If such enforcement is put in the very terms of the Bible, it is only the more thoroughly pagan; for it is paganism trying to palm itself off as Christianity.

The attempt to enforce the ten commandments, even just as they read, would be the greatest dishonour men could offer to the Lord. It would be saying that the law of God is no better than any man may be of himself. It is the same as saying that a man is all right if he keeps the law so that no man can find fault with him. But the man who merely refrains from the outward violations of the law may be worse than the man who utterly disregards it, and knows he is guilty. In the latter case the man has nothing wherein to trust, while in the other, the man is building himself up in his own righteousness, and thinks that he is all right as long as he keeps the letter so far as men can discern.

But the law is spiritual, and only the power of the Spirit can work righteousness in an individual. The recognition of civil government as having anything to do with the law of God, is directly opposed to the idea of justification by faith. To lay down a rule or law requiring obedience to the law of God, with a penalty for disobedience, is to say to a man, "You could keep it if you would try; but you will not try, and so we will compel you to do it." This is putting man on an equality with God. Anything less than the life of God is sin, and therefore for any power to attempt to enforce any of the precepts of Christ is simply an attempt to compel people to sin, and to hold them in sin.

"Union with Christ" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

Are you separated from Christ? And if so, must you remain separated from Him? These are questions which vitally concern the welfare of every individual on the earth. The consideration of them should take precedence over every other matter.

There are two parties concerned in this matter,-Jesus Christ and yourself. If the union does not exist, is it His fault, or yours? If you have done what He has told you to do, and He has still allowed something to separate you from Him, or some stronger power than His has prevented Him from fulfilling the promise made to you, the fault is His. Otherwise, it must be your own. And though we know that He cannot break or forget His promise, and that all power has been given to Him in heaven and in earth, so that no power can stand in His way, we often excuse ourselves for the separation of which we are conscious, by charging the fault upon Him. We are not conscious that we have done anything in particular to prevent the union, and so we tacitly if not openly lay the blame upon God, and pass along as if the only thing we could do was to wait until God by some special manifestation, came and united Himself to us. This is because we do not realise what it is that keeps Him from us. It is because of the deceitfulnes of sin.

Do you think God is far off from you because you do not see Him or hear Him? Is it because some peril hangs over you, where because you are in distress,-suffering from some calamity that has overtaken you, or in poverty, without food or sufficient clothing? These are the things that make men feel that they are separated from God, and they think so because they feel so. But God has shown us that we have something better to depend on than feeling. He has told us something on this very point which enables us to set all such feelings aside, and to know that the impression they cast over us is not the truth; for through the Apostle Paul He said and still speaks to us these words: "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?. . Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Rom. x. 35-39.

None of these things, therefore, nor all of them put together, can separate us from God. So if the separation exists, it is not due to any cause of this kind. It is not because we do not see or hear the Lord or feel as though we were close beside Him. The trouble is that our feelings are a part of our human nature, and are dependent upon natural conditions; and we are trying to make them serve the purpose of revealers of spiritual truths. They are in no wise fitted for such work. They are entirely disconnected from spiritual things. They can be affected by spiritual things, but they cannot themselves affect spiritual things; so that whatever our feelings may be, we are not to take them as an index of our relation to spiritual things. A gloomy or depressed feeling is no more evidence that God has withdrawn Himself than an obscuring cloud in the sky is evidence that the sun is further away than when it shone brightly upon us. In the Christian life, feelings play altogether a secondary part. Knowledge comes first, feeling afterward; and this order is never reversed.

Men are continually trying to discover God by their natural senses. He can never be found in that way. The uncivilised pagan thinks he must have a god that he can see; so he makes an image of wood or stone; but it is not God. And why does he do this? Simply because he knows nothing about the one true way of seeing and knowing God, which is faith. His civilised brother knows better than to worship wood or stone, but he too, very often, knows no better than to think that God must be found in some way by his natural senses; and because these do not reveal God to him he thinks either that there is no God or

137

that He has withdrawn Himself a great way off. He has planned some way in which he thinks God ought to manifest Himself if He were near by; and because no such manifestation appears, he concludes that God comes no nearer than the remote outskirts of his individual life.

All this is the result of trying to find and know God through the various avenues of the flesh. And it is all failure, because it is not God's way. God has provided faith as the avenue through which He reveals Himself to man, for the very reason that man could not know Him through any means of his own. Man cannot find God till they come to Him, and they cannot come to Him without faith; for "he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him." Heb. xi. 6.

The testimony of faith is just the opposite of the testimony of the natural senses. When the latter declare that God, if He exists at all, is far off and only rarely if ever condescends to take notice of individual affairs, faith says that He is very near. And by faith the individual knows that God is near and takes notice of him; for faith cannot lie, since it declares only what is said by the word of God. By faith the individual can look up and rejoice in darkest trials, knowing that in spite of all contrary appearances, he is united with Christ and has underneath him the everlasting arms of his heavenly Father.

Faith declares that God is near us; even that He is "not far from every one of us." Acts xvii. 27. The natural eye cannot see Him, but faith says He is there. When our feelings testify that He is a great way off, faith says, He is near. Faith declares that Jesus Christ has united Himself to the human family and is identified with them; for we read that "He took upon Him the nature of the seed of Abraham," and is "touched with the feeling of our infirmities." Heb. ii. 16; iv. 15. So that Christ has done all that He can do to unite Himself with us, and if we are not united with Him it is not His fault but ours. But all that we have to do to become united with Him is to come into harmony with Him, that is, to agree with Him and testify that His word is true. He has made the union of Himself with each one of us complete already, except on the point of our own free will to believe or disbelieve what He says. The part left to us is to believe; not merely to nod assent to His word but to build upon it, to rest ourselves in all that we have and hope for upon it. As long as we do this, the union with Christ is complete, whatever may be our circumstances and the feelings and appearances to which they give rise. But if we fail to believe, we nullify, so far as we are concerned, all that He has done to unite Himself with us, and are no better off than as though God were really as far from us as we have imagined Him to be.

The Lord declares that His hand is not shortened that it cannot save, neither His ear heavy that it cannot hear. That is not the reason His presence is not realised. "But," He says, "you iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from you, that He will not hear." Isa. lix. 1, 2. In other words, there is a lack of faith. When faith comes, the iniquities disappear; for by faith we are justified, and our transgressions, like a thick cloud, are blotted out. Isa. xliv. 22. Then you can rejoice because you know by faith, that you are united with Christ, from whom not height, nor depth, nor poverty, nor suffering, nor death itself, have power to separate you. And thus a bright light will shine in upon you now, this very day, if you will but let it, to illumine your darkest hours, when appearances and the feelings of your own heart are all against you, and supply that power which it gave to those of old who "out of weakness were made strong." Heb. xi. 34.

"The Knowledge of Freedom" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

The knowledge of freedom does not rest on the fact that we have escaped some temptation; but the escape from the temptation is made through the knowledge that we are free. It is not that we are to try for a time to see if we can live free lives, overcoming a temptation, and then conclude that we are free. Many think this way: They were in close places, and they asked the Lord to help them, and He did, and so now they know that the Lord hears them. But suppose it had been an imaginary need, and the Lord had not sent what they asked for? They would have taken that as an evidence that the Lord did not hear them.

If the enemy can have his way, he will lead us to take counsel of ourselves, to put ourselves in the place of God, and find out from ourselves whether or not God is good, and whether He means what He says. The only thing that keeps anyone from knowing and seeing that he is free, is this consulting with himself. One thinks that if he can go on for a week or two living in freedom, he will then be able to say with confidence that he is free. But that is but bondage to self. It is the Lord who proclaims freedom, and He proclaims it to those who are captives, and bound. By asserting the liberty which the Lord has given, and asserting it in the face of temptation, and in the midst of bondage, the knowledge of freedom gives the victory.

"'Come unto Me'" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

Do you know, little one, why Jesus says, "Suffer little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not"?

It is because He loves them and knows that they need Him as much as the little lambs need a shepherd.

When David was a shepherd and kept his father's sheep on the hills of Bethlehem, there came out, at one time, a lion and a bear and took a lamb out of the flock. If David had not been there the poor little lamb would have been torn to pieces; for it was altogether too weak of itself to resist the strongest of all beasts. But David went out and smote the lion and delivered the lamb out of his mouth; and he slew both the lion and the bear. How good it was that that little lamb had a strong and loving shepherd!

But that little lamb did not need a shepherd any more than you do, for your enemy "the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour;" and he will devour you if you do not have a shepherd who is stronger than he.

You cannot resist him yourself one moment, for he is strong and you are weak. Your mother cannot drive him away from you, or even your father, for he is stronger than both of them together. If all the soldiers in the world should come out against him in one vast army, they could not overcome him.

But the Lord says that you can "overcome evil with good," and that the Lord alone is good. Therefore you can overcome Satan with the Lord. You are perfectly safe if you have Jesus for your good Shepherd. He loves every one of His little lambs, and therefore loves you. He will not allow Satan to overcome you once, so long as you trust yourself to Him.

Because you cannot be saved without Him any more than the little helpless lamb could be saved without the shepherd, He says, "Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth."

"Our Worst Enemy" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

"The devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour." 1 Peter v. 8.

You have learned that Jesus is your best Friend, that He loves you more and has done more for you than even your own mother. Through each twinkling star, through every fleecy cloud, and murmuring brook, through the tiniest creatures and flower and leaf that He has made Jesus whispers, "I LOVE YOU, AND I CARE FOR YOU."

What a Friend! so powerful that He made the heavens and earth and all things by His word, so wise that He made no mistakes, so kind that He fitted every creature with just the things it needs. Shall we not love and trust Him with our whole hearts? As we study this lesson we shall see more and more how much we need just such a Friend.

We learned last week that we have an enemy as well as a Friend. An enemy is one who is not a friend,-one who does not love but hates us and wishes to hurt and injure us in every way that he can. The worst enemy that we have is Satan. He is also called Devil and Serpent and Dragon and other names. In 1 Peter v. 8, we read that, like a fierce lion, he walks about trying to destroy people

He does not look like a lion, for, you remember, he is a fallen angel; nor does he destroy people in the same way that a lion does. Satan destroys people by causing them to hate God and to refuse to have His goodness and eternal life.

You see no one but God has any goodness or any eternal life, and Satan knows it; so he follows us about and tries to make us afraid of God, and tries to get us to hate God so that we shall not go to Him for life. He knows that without God's goodness we can have only wickedness, and without God's eternal life we can have only eternal death. He therefore does everything in his power to deceive us and make us think that God is our enemy instead of our Friend. If he only can get us to refuse to have anything to do with Jesus, he knows that he is sure of our eternal death. And that is just like the selfishness of Satan; he has put off Jesus until he has lost all hope of eternal life himself, and so he does not want any of the rest of us to have it.

He knows, too, how God loves us and how it grieves Him to see us choose wickedness and death, and thus throw ourselves away. Satan therefore tries all the more to lead us into sin, for He hates God also.

He comes to us in different ways. He does not often come and tell us who he is and what he wants, but he slyly hides himself and talks through someone else, or makes himself look like someone else. Sometimes we do not see anyone, but we suddenly begin to think of something wrong and want to do something naughty. When we feel this way, we may be sure that Satan is near putting these bad thoughts into our hearts, coaxing and tempting us to deny our best Friend, and choose his way of death instead of Christ's way of life.

But we do not need to do what Satan our enemy wants us to do, even though he is so much stronger than we, and even though he is constantly going about like a lion, seeking whom he may destroy.

How can we help it, you say? Easily enough, for there is a Friend going about seeking whom He may save, and He is so much stronger than Satan that Satan cannot overcome Him at all; he has tried it and failed every time. Can you not think who this dear Friend is?

Yes, it is, the powerful Creator of all things. He has seen your danger and has come to your help, and says, "Behold, I stand at the door, and knock; if any man hear My voice and open the door, I will come in to him."

Oh, will you let Him in? If God be for you, who can be against you? All you have to do is to let Him come in, and let Him stay with you, and let Him drive Satan away when he comes to tempt you. Without Him you cannot overcome Satan once, but with Him all things are possible.

Then never fear. Although an enemy is constantly going about seeking whom he may devour, a mightier Friend is going about seeking whom He may save, and He will save you if you will let Him.

1. What do we call a person who loves us and does a great deal for us?

2. Who is your best Friend? Prov. xviii. 24.

3. What makes you think that He is the best Friend that you have? Rom. v. 8; John iii. 16.

4. What does He whisper to you through everything that He has made?

5. What has He done that shows His great power? Gen. i.

6. How wise is He? Col. ii. 3.

7. How has He shown kindness to every creature that He has made?

8. What do we call a person who hates us and does all he can to injure us?

9. Who is our worst enemy? Why?

10. Like what fierce animal does he walk about? 1 Peter v. 8.

11. Why does he want to destroy this?

12. How does he seek to destroy us?

13. Why will refusing God's goodness and life destroy us? Ps. xxxvi. 9.

14. Tell some of the different ways in which Satan comes to us.

15. How does he try to do this?

16. Do we have to do what Satan wants us to do? Eph. vi. 13.

17. Who is willing to help us overcome Satan's temptations? Heb. ii. 8; iv. 15, 16.

18. Which is stronger, He or Satan? Matt. iv. 1-11.

19. Then do we need to be afraid of Satan when Jesus is with us? Isa. xli. 10.

20. If we let Satan overcome us when Jesus is so willing to help, whose fault is it?

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

-Anarchist bomb outrages still continue to be reported from Paris.

-By a fire at a school in Oscarshamn, in the province of Kalmar, Sweden, eleven children were burned to death.

-The Socialists of Austria are preparing to hold simultaneous demonstrations in favour of universal franchise all over the empire.

-The trial has been begun at Vienna of the fourteen Anarchist prisoners who were arrested in September last. It is being conducted with closed doors.

-No decided change in the situation is reported from Rio Janeiro. The yellow fever in the city is still on the increase, the deaths numbering scores daily.

-The French Senate has passed the second reading of the Bill already adopted by the Chamber, according to women the right to vote in elections to tribunals of commerce.

-The French Corn Duties Bill, which increases the duty on wheat to 7 francs, and raises the duties on other kinds of grain, has been adopted by the Chamber of Deputies by 361 votes against 155.

-A Frenchman claims to have discovered a substitute for silk. The threads are produced from wood-pulp, which is said to be durable, luminous, and elastic. Compressed air forces the pulp through apertures small enough to form threads.

-An ice-floe in the Gulf of Finland broke adrift from the mainland, carrying off fishermen and peasants, with their wives and children, 500 in all, who were encamped on the ice at the time. They were rescued, after being adrift for forty-eight hours.

-An epidemic having broken out among the children a village in Hungary, the people said it was caused by an old woman who was suspected of being is witch. The unfortunate woman was seized, and, after being gagged and flogged, was crucified.

-A report from Moscow states that in the neighbourhood of Tomsk and elsewhere in Western Siberia a large number of arrests have been made of propagandists of the doctrines of the "Old Believer" sects, together with many of their newly converted disciples.

-Dr. Sharpe, lecturing at the Imperial Institute on "Bird life," said that the species of birds in the British Isles numbered nearly 400. Of these 108 are resident birds. Our feathered winter visitors number about 61, including the snow bunting from the Arctic regions.

-The Italian Chamber of Deputies on Feb. 22, elected Signor Biancheri as its President. Signor Blancheri headed the list with 191 votes, against 187 given to Signor Zanardelli, twenty-three voting papers remaining blank. The defeat of Signor Zanardelli has given rise to much comment.

-From Vienna it is reported that of the seventy-seven members of the Omladina Society who have been tried at Prague on the charge of high treason, sixty-seven have been found guilty, and sentenced to terms of imprisonment ranging up to eight years, while the remaining ten have been acquitted.

-It has been definitely decided that the Czar shall leave shortly for San Remo or the south of France, and not for Kieff as was expected. The contemplated journey is regarded as likely to be attended by considerable political importance, as his Majesty may meet some of the rulers and chief statesmen of Europe.

-The Parliamentary Committee of the Trade Union Congress has decided to convene a conference of all the trade unions and friendly societies in the country, to discuss the position of Employers' Liability, on Saturday, March 17, and a national demonstration will be held in Hyde Park on Sunday, March 18.

-The Emperor of Austria is about to make a visit to France, which is looked upon as being of great significance. It is stated that M. LozÈ French Ambassador in Vienna, has been instructed to ask Count Kalnoky to prevail upon the Emperor Francis Joseph to make a short stay in Paris before going south.

-The women of Canada who subscribed for a pair of horses, a sleigh and furs as a wedding present for the Duchess of York are indignant that the horses were docked before being shipped, and are sending a memorial asking the Duchess to express her reprobation of the cruel practice by refusing to accept the horses.

-The Argentine correspondent of the Pall Mall Gazette states that everybody there is favourable to the cause of Jabez Spencer Balfour, and the judges and lawyers assert that his arrest is illegal, and is a disgrace to the Argentine Government. Balfour himself declares that his arrest is due to political causes in England. The British Minister has presented the claim for his tradition, bet no decision has yet been taken on the subject.

-The Supreme Court of Canada has decided that the Roman Catholics in Manitoba had no right to appeal to the Governor in Council against the provincial statute which abolished Catholic separate schools. Two of the judges dissented from this finding. The question has been the subject of much controversy in Canada during the past three years. The decision of the Court relieves the Federal Government from further action in the matter.

-In his financial statement to the Italian Chamber of Deputies, Signor Sonnino announced that the deficit for the financial year is estimated at 178,000,000 lire, while the debt of the Treasury exceeds 500,000,000 lire. To meet this critical state of affairs the Minister proposed new taxes yielding some 100,000,000 lire, and economies in the Government services to the amount of 30,000,000, besides the conversion of certain redeemable rentes.

-Some statistics have just been compiled as to the chances that man has of living in different large towns. The towns whore the greatest percentage of the inhabitants per thousand die is Rheims. The proportion is 28.62 per thousand. Then follow: Dublin, 27.05; New York, 26ï17; and Vienna, 25ï07. Paris occupies the next place with an average of 23ï01 deaths per thousand inhabitants. In Berlin the people only die at the rate of 20.58 per thousand; in London the proportion is 19ï11; in Chicago, 18ï95, etc. It appears that the town in which relatively the fewest number of deaths occur is Minneapolis, in the United States, where, according to statistics, only 9ï80 persons per thousand die in each year.

-The exact figures of the vote on the Ontario prohibition plebiscite are given as follows: For prohibition, 192,187; against, 110,757; majority for, 81,730. Analysing these totals it is found that the most overwhelming vote for prohibition was that given in the counties-that is, the rural districts-where the poll was sixty per cent. of the total) vote, and showed 154,000 for and 83,800 against prohibition, a majority of 70,200, or almost two to one. In the cities and separated towns and tracts about forty pet cent. of the total vote was polled, and it showed 38,400 for prohibition, and 26,800 against, a majority of 11,600. The women polled thirty-five per cent. of their total vote, and were six to one in favour of prohibition. The grand total shows that fifty-eight per cent. of the electorate polled, and the vote was nineteen to eleven in favour of prohibition.

"Hard Times" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

Hard Times.-The year of financial depression has resulted in much destitution and suffering. Yet notwithstanding this, for self-indulgence in two articles alone, drink and tobacco, the country has spent over ?140,000,000. To the spenders this amount was more than thrown away; for the indulgence weakens the constitution and lessons working capacity. "Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your earnings for that which satisfieth not?"

"Fluctuating Values" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

Fluctuating Values.-A South American correspondent of a missionary journal gives one remarkable effect of the prevailing financial depression. The Archbishop of Santiago has advertised a raise in the scale of rates for priestly ministrations. Masses, baptisms, funerals, etc., are advanced 50 per cent., and indulgences cost double. One would naturally expect to see the rates lower in times of depression, but the course adopted plainly confesses the mere commercialism of the whole thing. One day this merchandiser of Rome will find a buyer at any price; "for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her."

"The Model State" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

The Model State.-The Catholic Universe, expressing the hope that a dispute between Ecuador and Peru will speedily be settled by arbitration of the Pope, says:-

Ecuador is a model Republic, being the only government in the world which grants a subvention to Peter's-pence, and which openly protested against the usurpation of Rome in 1870. Religious orders and all Catholic works prosper there.

Again and again Ecuador has been cited by Catholics as a model state, and so we may know very well what, according to the Papal idea, constitutes a well-ordered commonwealth. The priests are the law makers, and the country is administered solely in the interests of the Church and religious orders. So lose is the administration that no record is kept of revenues or disbursements, and when receipts fall short an officer with a file of soldiers calls on the merchants of the cities for forced loans. Bible colporteurs have never been able to get into the country, and no books can be imported save by permission of the Jesuit priests who control the customs house. No Protestant is allowed to live in Quito, even for purely business purposes. This is therefore a model state in the eyes of Rome, and all Catholic works prosper amid the ignorance and darkness. Some day the light will break even in Ecuador; for the everlasting Gospel must be proclaimed to every nation and people.

"Perfection Yet Growth" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

"Ye are complete in Him," is the word to the believer. The difficulty in the minds of many in the way of grasping the completeness of the life of Christ is the fact that the Christian life is progressive. We are to continually grow in grace, and in the knowledge of the Lord; but this to some seems incompatible with being complete in Christ.

When Christ Jesus was on earth as a boy of twelve years He was perfect. But we read that He grew in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God. Luke ii. 52. Complete, yet growing in grace and knowledge; perfect all the time. The plant is perfect at every stage of its growth. We admire the beauty of the plant when the leaves burst forth. It is perfect when the flowers bloom, and perfect when the fruit comes. Yet keeps on growing.

It is not that we are to grow into grace, but grow in grace. We are not to get more and more into grace, but in the grace we are to grow and increase in wisdom, complete in Him. The very statement of this fact implies that we are not complete in ourselves. There is nothing in us, but He is ours, and of His fulness have we all received, and grace over grace. Grace superbounds and fills all.

"Experience" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

Experience.-It is true of everything in the Bible, and everything that God has for us, that no one can understand it without experiencing it. Understanding is experience. This shows that the preaching of the Gospel does not consist in laying down certain arbitrary propositions to be believed. And the acceptance of the Gospel does not consist in the belief of those propositions. It is a life, and a laying hold of life. All true doctrine grows out of the life, and he who yields to the life will go on learning more and more of the wonders of God's law; for the law of God is but the life of God.

"Gladness" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

Gladness.-"Light is sown for the righteous, and gladness for the upright in heart." When we sow a thing we expect it to multiply and increase. So the Lord has sown gladness for the believer, that it may spring up continually. When we represent Christ in us, it will be by our gladness for the truth He has given us; not what we see, but what we know; not what our reason has been able to trace out, but that which our faith has laid hold of and brought into the very life. It will not be a forced gladness, but the springing up of the joy of the life of Christ.

"To-day" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

To-day.-Many are afraid to rejoice in the Lord to-day, for fear that they will fall in the future. But the Lord delivers from all fear. His love casteth out fear. There is no danger of falling in the future, to-day. It cannot be done. To-morrow cannot be brought into to-day. And when to-morrow comes, it will be to-day. So that if we trust the Lord to-day, we can trust Him for ever. All time is present with God. So we may rejoice in the full salvation of God now, and the future can throw no cloud over to-day, to darken the way of rejoicing.

"What a Man Knows" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

What a Man Knows.-Between a man of wonderful intellect who does not know what he is talking about, and a man of feeble intellect who does know what he is talking about, it is not difficult to choose. If a man of great intellect is talking about something that he does not know, he is just as ignorant as any fool on that thing. But when a man who does not know much, really knows a thing, he knows it just as surely as anyone can know it. No one who knows the life of the Lord will be afraid to tell it. "We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen."

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 9.

E. J. Waggoner

The Apostle Peter gives us this exhortation: "Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you; but rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings." 1 Peter iv. 12, 13.

It is the thought that when we are tempted we are partakers of Christ's sufferings, that enables us to "count it all joy" when we fall into divers temptations. James i. 2. "For in that He Himself hath suffered being tempted, He is able to succour them that are tempted." Heb. ii. 18.

We are to overcome even as Christ Himself overcame. See Rev. iii. 21. "Forasmuch, then, as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind; for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin." 1 Peter iv. 1. It becomes us, therefore, to study carefully the account of the great temptation of Jesus in the wilderness.

In the first place, remember that the great temptation immediately followed the anointing by the Holy Spirit. Let no one therefore think that a wonderful blessing is a pledge of freedom from trial. Rather conclude that God, foreseeing fierce temptations about to assail you, is preparing you to meet them successfully. Satan plies his temptations the most vigorously after one has been greatly helped, because he knows that he may find the soul off its guard. Uzziah "was marvellously helped, till he was strong. But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction." 2 Chron. xxvi. 15, 16. "Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall."

The first recorded words of Satan to Jesus were, "If Thou be the Son of God." He would have Jesus doubt His Sonship. There is no way in which Satan causes more people to fall than by leading them to doubt their acceptance with God. And these temptations are the most likely to come, too, just after a great spiritual uplifting. Satan will seek to lead us to doubt our experience, or to think that God has forsaken us.

At such times it is a most pleasant thing to know that we have the same assurance that Christ Himself had. What was the evidence to Him that He was the Son of God?-It was the word of God that came to Him after His baptism, saying, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." That same word comes to us, "now are we the sons of God," and calling us "beloved." 1 John iii. 2. "Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of Judgment, because as He is, so are we in this world."

March 8, 1894

"Waiting" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

Waiting.-Nearly everybody expects to be saved some time. But the fact that they expect some time to be ready to give up to the Lord, makes them satisfied with not being ready. This is what produces the feeling of indifference and lethargy. The Lord will never work with any greater power than He is now using. He is just what He is. He has not two measures of strength. When He works He works with His own power, and He is working now. Those who are expecting some mighty movement to come and sweep them off their feet, and carry them on board to Zion, will be disappointed. God never can increase in power. He is the perfection of power and goodness. Our part is to recognise the power already here, and to yield to it.

"Doubt and Murder" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

When Jesus read the prophecy of Isaiah, in the synagogue at Nazareth, and began to say to the people, whose eyes were fastened upon him, "This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears. And all bare Him witness, and wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth." Luke 4:21, 22. The Spirit of the Lord was indeed upon Him, and as the result His words produced conviction. Involuntarily they responded to the power of the Spirit.

Then came in another feeling. They said, "Is not this Joseph's son?" They gave place to doubt. True, the words which Jesus had read and spoken had come with the force of the Holy Spirit, and they had acknowledged their gracious power; but they could not make the gracious words harmonise with their reason and experience, and so they lost the blessing.

The same thing is repeated again and again in these days. People hear burning words of truth, which cause their own hearts to burn in response, and then doubt comes in under the guise of "prudence" and "caution." "We must not be too quick to accept new things;" "Have any of the rulers or of the Pharisees believed on Him?" "We will not commit ourselves until we see how this thing is going to turn." "We cannot be too cautious"-these and many other things hold many people back from following the convictions produced by the Holy

146

Spirit. Looking at the matter from a worldly critical point of view, they conclude that the influence of the Spirit was only a sudden impulse, which it would be most unwise to yield to. They are confirmed in this view by the fact that, as the result of their unbelieving calculation, the Spirit's voice has been silenced, and they no longer feel that response in their hearts to the words of truth. And thus carnal wisdom proves their ruin.

But this is not the end. The Gospel narrative tells us that the very people who at first bore witness to the gracious words of Jesus, seized Him a few minutes later, and attempted to throw Him down headlong from a precipice. Murder was in their hearts. That they did not kill Jesus was only because they had not the power.

What caused this change?-Nothing but the cherishing of a single doubt. Here is a warning for those who think that doubt is a trivial matter. Every doubt has murder connected in it. Those doubts which seem so perfectly "natural" that you scarcely call them doubt, but only the manifestation of proper caution are the things which if cherished, will cry, "Crucify Him." It is not a light thing to doubt the witness of the Spirit of God. One of the things which made David a man after God's own heart, was the fact that he "made haste, and delayed not" to keep the commandments of God, when they were made known to him. Ps. cxix. 60. Take heed not to quench the Spirit by doubt.

"Christ's Humiliation His Glory" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

Christ's Humiliation His Glory.-"He humbled Himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted Him, and given Him a name which is above every name." Phil. ii. 8, 9. The exaltation of Christ, that which is and will be His highest glory, and which makes angels bow before Him, is due to that which He has done and suffered for us. The prints in His hands, and the wound in the side will be throughout all eternity the tokens of His exaltation and power. When the Lord comes from heaven in glory, it will shine brightest from the side that was pierced. "His glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of His praise. And His brightness was as the light; He had bright beams out of His side; and there was the biding of His power." Hab. iii. 3, 4, margin. Thus as every eye sees Him in the clouds of heaven, and also that pierced Him (Rev. i. 7), the marks of His humiliation when on earth will be the highest glory.

"Healthful Doctrine" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

The marginal readings in the Bible frequently give the more literal rendering of the text, and are often more suggestive than the free translation. In the Revision the marginal rendering of the words, "sound doctrine," "sound speech," etc., occurring several times in Paul's epistles to Timothy and Titus, is "healthful" teaching, "healthful speech," etc. that is what it is literally.

Sin is a disease, a deadly taint that has stricken into the very heart and life. "The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint. From the soul of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it." Disease is but the working of death and decay, and so it is that the "wages of sin is death."

Thus it is that the remedy for this malady must be "healthful doctrine," "healthful" words. No words of man can avail anything; for there is no life in human words. Life is the only antidote of death. The word of God is living and vitalising, as Jesus said, "The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life." "He sent His word and healed them." Ps. cvii. 20.

The one who would help his fellow men to escape from sin must declare the word of life as it is, taking nothing from it nor weakening it by putting human interpretations into it. Men may have a doctrine of Christ as a theory, and be for ever arguing and debating about it, but the doctrine of Christ cannot be held as a theory, as it is a life, vigorous and healthful. The man with a theory has a form without life, diseased and revolting, and no matter what the shape may be he cannot give it the warmth and glow of health.

The apostle carries this idea of healthful words further in 1 Tim. vi. 3, 4: "If any man teach a different doctrine, and consenteth not too heathful words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness; he is puffed up, knowing nothing, and doting about questionings and disputes of words." The word "doting" is put in the margin "sick." It means that diseased condition of mind and heart that sees in the healthful doctrine of Christ only something to be discussed and argued about, a form of words. This is why it is that only the individual who has been healed by the word and knows the vitalising life of it, can declare the health-giving word of God.

There is need of this preaching of healthful words now. Deadly error is stalking about endeavouring to mask itself with the Scriptures of truth, but its emasculated form shows readily enough that there is no health and life in it. Yet human nature that loves sin loves to have it so. Warning of the dangers of the last days, when the apostle was shown that perilous times would come, he tells Timothy to "preach the word," the healthful word of God; "For the time will come when they will not endure healthful doctrine." 2 Tim. iv. 3. This charge comes to every believer now; for we are in the perils of the last days, and the very word of God is our only safety and health.

"Feeling at Liberty" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

The religion of Jesus Christ is not simply one of emotions. It does not quench feelings, but it consists of more than emotions. It is a fact. It holds good when a person can have no emotions. It holds good when the body is paralysed, and the nerves are numb,-when there is scarcely enough consciousness left to take notice of anything, and the mind has almost ceased to work. The man who knows Christ does not then have to reason out his hope, but rests in the consciousness of the fact of the life.

It is a glorious truth that the religion of Christ needs not to be reasoned out. We do not have to trace evidences, and weigh arguments to know at any time what it is. This does not mean that God discounts the intellect with which He has endowed His creatures, but that faith is superior to reason. Human reason, not guided by the Spirit of God, leads to folly. Faith is a guide of reason; but the truth of the Spirit of God is not to be reasoned out, else there would be partiality; the kingdom of heaven could not in that case be received by a child as well as by a philosopher. But "the world by wisdom knew not God." 1 Cor. i. 21. The righteousness of God is not revealed to reason, but to faith. When one is at the very point of death, and the brain so sick and sore that it is a positive task to think at all, one can lie perfectly still and know that he is accepted, not

147

because he feels that he is, but because God has said so. He need not look about to see if his feelings correspond to the demands, but he can rest in the Lord, knowing that he is in His hands.

There are times, and it will come to every Christian, when he will not feel that he is free. He may be depressed in body. The weather often has an effect on people, and at any rate we are all still in the flesh. The flesh is still unconverted, and it will always remain so, for it is enmity against God, and cannot be subject to Him. It will demand that we serve it in this and that thing, and will demand satisfaction. Then is the time we want to know that we are free. If there is any doubt then we are in danger.

The devil knows the weakness of the flesh, and he will work to regain his position. You say, "I am in doubt, and do not know. The other day in meetings the Lord seemed to set me free; but I do not feel so now. If I were free why should I feel so depressed?" And when we begin to hesitate and temporise, the devil, who is an expert in his art, brings us into discouragement and captivity. It is a fact that the Lord has proclaimed liberty to the captives. He holds the keys still, and the devil never can get hold of them. He has loosed the bonds of every man. David says, "I Lord, truly I am Thy servant; . . Thou hast loosed my bonds," and it is true of every soul. There is not a soul in the world who might not say with truth, "Thou hast loosed my bonds;" and if he continued to say it on the authority of God's word, he would continue free; for the Lord has proclaimed liberty to every captive.

It is not a matter for feeling, but for practical use. When the enemy comes to destroy, when the flesh would rise up to assert its domination, then is the blessedness of this word, "I am free." God has freed from that power, and He has power to maintain the freedom. Why should the experience of so many professors be fitful, now rejoicing and then again gloomy and full of doubt? God has declared freedom; will He put us in prison again?

How many times we hear people talking about being in the dark; "it was light, but now it is gloom." They have simply allowed Satan to thrust them into the dark cell, because they wandered near Doubting Castle. Bunyan had the truth of the thing when he told the story of Christian and Hopeful in Doubting Castle. They had been lying there in the dark for a week or more when Christian bethought himself of the key of Promise which he had in his bosom, which opened every door and gate in the castle, and they walked at liberty because they believed the Lord.

Now why should we be in doubting Castle when the Lord sets us free and enlightens the gloom? We have the promise that the word is not far off. It is not in heaven, that we should go up to bring it, nor across the sea, that we should send for it. It is nigh thee, even in thy heart. So to everyone that key has been given, and all can be free all the time, if they will use it. The Lord never puts us in bondage, and the time for us to assert our liberty is when the enemy would drag us back into captivity. He would be a strange man who, when the notice came to him in prison that he had been pardoned and set free, should wait until he felt free, before walking out at liberty. It would show that he did not believe in the genuineness of the pardon, or that he doubted its authority. It is because people do not believe God, that they refuse to assert their freedom when He proclaims it to every soul.

"Hollow Conventionalities" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

Everybody knows that there is much insincerity and gilt-edged hypocrisy hidden under many of the conventionalities of social life. Greetings are exchanged when face to face, and hard things are often said when parted.

"I am glad to see you," is often spoken when but a moment before, as the visitor entered the gate, the word had been, "There is Mrs. Tiresome; how I do dislike her."

But someone asked, "Would you have people to be discourteous, and give offence to those whom they dislike, and still are obliged to meet?" Not at all. The Gospel lays down no rule for the guidance of people with dislike, hatred, envy, or jealousy in the heart. They must deport themselves as may be most expedient. They have deceit and dissimulation in the heart, and out of the abundance of the heart the mouth will speak; so dissembling and insincerity must come out.

But the one who would follow Christ, and be a Christian indeed, need have no fear about being discourteous by being sincere. The Christian has no business to dislike people. It is not the Christ in him that dislikes his fellow, but the remnants of the old man. The problem is not how to keep the old animosities and get on passably, but how to get rid of the wicked feelings, root and branch.

"But now ye also put off all these; anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth. Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds; and have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created him. . . . Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering; forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any; even as Christ forgave you." Col. iii. 8-13. With this spirit there will be no hollow conventionalities; and this is what the love of God sheds abroad in the hearts of those who are willing to receive it.

Of course some people may be tiresome and disagreeable. But the Lord did not set His love upon us because we were such pleasing company; we wearied Him with our wickedness and heaped reproach upon Him. His kindness was shown to sinners, and as partakers together in sin, and as objects together of love, we all our brethren, and He is not ashamed to call us such.

Conventional phrases may sometimes hide malice from others; but they fail to do so more frequently than it is conventional to notice. Those who will not submit to God's way must struggle along with hollow words as best they can. But the love of God suppresses the symptoms by curing the disease, that the Christian may be "sincere and without rebuke in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation." John says of those whom he saw in mount Sion, that "in their mouth was found no guile." It is because their hearts are freed from guile and insincerity.

"Unspeakable" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

Unspeakable.-Many who have recognised the goodness and preciousness of the Lord feel a diffidence about testifying to others, because they cannot express in words what they see and know. But if it could be fully expressed, it would not be a true Christian experience. The apostle says, "Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift." If it were not more than can be expressed in human language, it would not be more than we could think. But the Lord gives us more than we can ask or think. And the Spirit of the Lord reveals it to us. And just so the Spirit of the Lord

148

takes the feeble expressions of one in whom that Spirit dwells, and conveys to the hearer all that is in the heart of the speaker, but which his words are inadequate to express. Christ spoke the language of the common people; His words were very simple; but the power of the life behind His words, clothed them with authority, so that those who heard Him said, "Never man spake like this man."

"'Have Faith in God'" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

These words were spoken by our Saviour to His disciples when they had expressed their surprise at the sudden withering of the barren fig tree. Mark xi. 22. They are no less applicable to each one of us to-day than they were to the little companies who followed Jesus in His walks about Judea. They are the words of eternal life to the sinner sitting in the darkness and shadow of death. They are the sum of all that God, by the various ways in which He communicates with man, speaks to the human soul.

Have you faith in God? Do you know that you have it? Are you certain that you know what faith is? The disciples thought they had faith, but in the time of test and trial they were found wanting. Faith stands every test; but that which is not faith, does not endure the test. If you have faith, you will abide unshaken the storms and temptations of this mortal life; but if that which you think is faith is only a counterfeit of faith, when the storm beats hard your house will be overthrown. It is all-important to know now whether your house is built upon the sand, or on the solid rock.

The solid rock is the word of God; and there is no such thing as faith without this word. The rock is Christ, and Christ is the Word. John i. 1, 14. That word may not seem to you to be solid; nevertheless it is. We are not accustomed to think of words as being substantial like rocks, but this is true of the word of the Lord. That word is as substantial as God Himself. And while the earth and earthly things shall pass away and be no more, the word of the Lord will abide as firm as the eternal throne. By that word they came into existence, and by that word will they be dissolved and vanish away.

Faith is composed of two elements,-belief, and the word of God. Counterfeit faith has only one of these elements; it always lacks the word. It rests upon something else,-some feeling, or impression, or hope, or desire, or process of reasoning, or upon the word of some man. Faith accepts the word of God, no matter how it reads, without questioning. Pretended faith is often obliged to explain the word away. Genuine faith "worketh by love." Pretended faith either works not at all, or by some motive which has its root in self. What love is, we are told in the thirteenth chapter of 1 Corinthians. With these facts in mind, it becomes an easy thing to determine whether you have faith in God or not.

The Saviour said that he who had faith should ask whatsoever he would of God, and it should be given him. He who has faith, will ask according to God's will, and God will always hear such a petition and answer it; for faith always rests upon God's word, which is the expression of His will. And he who asks in faith, will believe that he receives the things he asked for, basing his belief upon the promise of God. He not only believes that he has them, but he does have them, really and literally. So it makes all the difference in the world with an individual, in the truest sense, whether or not he has faith. It is only the blindness and perverseness of the natural mind which makes a person who admits and knows the substantial benefits that come from faith in man, think there is nothing substantial to be derived from faith in God.

"Visited and Redeemed" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

When Zacharias, filled with the Holy Ghost, prophesied at the birth of John the Baptist, he said, "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; for He hath visited and redeemed His people." Luke i. 68. John's message was to prepare the way of the Lord. It is specifically prophesied of in Isaiah. "The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it." Isa. xl. 3-5. Further on it says, "Behold, the Lord God will come with strong hand, and His arm shall rule for Him: behold, His reward is with Him, and His work before Him."

The work which John began, therefore, was not only to prepare people for the first advent of Christ, but was to continue until the Lord should come with strong arm to redeem, bringing His reward with Him. See Rev. xxii. 12. So the same work is still going on. "The glory of the Lord shall be revealed," and we have it revealed to us now in the things which God has made. The everlasting Gospel is but a call to worship Him that made heaven and earth and all things. The light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon all men.

Then we may say the same thing which Zacharias spoke by the Spirit, "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; for He hath visited and redeemed His people." Anyone can say, "He hath visited me, and redeemed me." We have redemption through His blood in the forgiveness of sins, because the blood of Christ stands for the life of Christ. We have redemption through His life, for He gave His life a ransom for many. Matt. xx. 28.

When did He visit us? Long He has been saying to every one, "Behold I stand at the door, and knock; if any man hear My voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me." Rev. iii. 20. He is a welcome visitor, too, because He brings His provision with Him, when we have nothing. When we say continually, Lord, abide with us, He does abide. He will stay as long as we are willing to have Him, and His presence is life and redemption. This is as really true to-day as when Zacharias spoke; and whoever believes it must be as happy over it as he was.

Redeemed! A slave set free! It requires no great stretch of imagination to see how a slave, a captive, driven, scourged, and bound, would feel with his fetters removed, and his freedom given to him. He would be a happy man. He would not receive the news of freedom stoically, and with a long face-not if he believed the message. His heart would be so full he would leap for joy.

The Lord wants us to rejoice; not because we think we ought to rejoice, but because we have so vivid a sense of His redemption that we know it to be a fact. We have been captives of a cruel master, and now we are redeemed. We know it because the Lord says so. He has bought us, and given us His own life. Now when the enemy comes in the form of doubt, in the form of indifference, envy, pride, slavish fear,-in a thousand different forms, -

149

trying to force us back into bondage, we are to maintain the fact that we are free. Eternal life is our right, through Christ. Let us stand fast, therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

"Courage" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

The worldling may associate gentleness and meekness with lack of firmness and strength; but in this is shown only the folly of worldly wisdom. Love vaunteth not itself and makes no display that appeals to the senses and passions, but it is an element that stands firm when all else is shaken. The Christian character is the firmest and most unyielding thing in this world; because it is the life of Christ within, the power that upholds all things, the word indwelling which stands though heaven and earth pass away.

"He that ruleth his own spirit," is better "than he that taketh a city." Mere physical courage cannot fathom or comprehend moral courage. Many a soldier who is nourished by the peculiar fighting passion of the battle field to engage superior numbers or storm a battery amidst a shower of shot and shell, has been too great a coward to yield to the convictions within that told him he ought to read his Bible and pray even though his companions showered ridicule and harmless abuse upon him. Physical courage may enable a man to kill somebody else, but only moral courage strengthens him to crucify the flesh with its lusts and ways. True courage is of God; wars and fightings are of the devil.

No such battle was ever fought, and no such courage ever required as in the Christian warfare, which is waged "not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, again spiritual wickedness in high places." The strength for this battle is given of God, and with it the courage of God. It is strength and courage every hour for the conflict with sin. One who fights this battle, and allows the Lord to lead him as He pleases, will not be engaged in fighting against the flesh of others. There will be no time when he can draw off his forces to combat somebody else.

The man who yields most fully to the gentle life of the Lord will be firmest in standing for that which is right and truth. With Christ he can say, "The Lord God will help me; therefore shall I not be confounded; therefore have I set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed." The lack of firmness and strength, and the timidity, is not because of humility and meekness, but is an evidence that we have not learned to distrust ourselves and put our trust in God. Christ said, "I will put My trust in Him" (Heb. ii. 13), and to us is given "the faith of Jesus," the same trust, that like Him our faces may be set like a flint, and that like Him also there may be nothing of hardness in the disposition, but only gentleness, meekness, love.

"Confessing Christ in the Flesh" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

WHAT CONFESSION IS

"Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God; and every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God." 1 John iv. 2, 3. Confession means, speaking the same thing; acknowledging that which is said; agreeing together. The confession of sin is the acknowledgment of sin that has been pointed out. The Holy Spirit comes as a convicter of sin, and says, "You have sinned in this thing," and we confess our sin when we speak the same thing, and say, "Yes; that is true."

"If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." An instance of this is found in the case of David, who had slain Uriah in battle, and taken his wife. Nathan the prophet was sent to rebuke him, and by means of a parable he made the enormity of the sin stand out vividly before the king. Then he said to him, "Thou art the man." "And David said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord." There was confession. And there was faithfulness in forgiving, according to the promise; for immediately Nathan replied, "The Lord also hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die." 2 Sam. xii. 13. David agreed with the Lord, speaking the same thing. That was true confession. Confession, therefore, means the acknowledging of what has been made known to us.

CHRIST IN HUMAN FLESH

"Every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God." It does not say that every spirit that openly denies it, but every spirit that does not confess it. Bearing in mind what is meant by confession, we learn from these verses in John's epistle that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a fact, whether we confess it or not. "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." John i. 14. "Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He also Himself likewise took part of the same." Heb. ii. 14. "For verily He took not on Him the nature of angels; but He took on Him the seed of Abraham. Wherefore in all things it behoved Him to be made like unto His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people. For in that He Himself hath suffered being tempted, He is able to succour them that are tempted." Heb. ii. 16-18.

The Apostle Peter exhorts us by this fact. "Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind; for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin; that he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God." 1 Peter iv. 1, 2. He who arms himself with the same mind as Christ, will not, even while remaining in the flesh, live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of the flesh; because although Christ suffered in the flesh, being tempted in all points like as we are, yet it was without sin. He the Son of God, coming in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, "condemned sin in the flesh." Rom. viii. 3.

NATURE OF THE FLESH

We have here the statement of Scripture that Jesus Christ, the Word, who was in the beginning with God, and who was and is God, "was made flesh and dwelt among us," in us, "full of grace and truth." In being made flesh, He took upon Him the

150

same kind of flesh that we have, the flesh of man, which is sin, for Paul said on Mars Hill (Acts xvii. 26) that God "hath made of one blood all nations of men." The Revised Version has it that God has made us one, that is, one person, Adam, all persons, thus showing emphatically that all human flesh is the same. The apostle also says that there is "one kind of flesh of men, and another flesh of beasts, and another flesh of birds, and another of fishes." 1 Cor. xv. 39. So that there is but one flesh of man; so that whether white or black, yellow or another-colour, whether dwelling in Europe, Asia, or Africa, all men are of one flesh.

"Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these: Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like." Gal. v. 19-21. This is the description of human flesh. Whatever we may know of man and of the wickedness of men in the flesh, we may each one know this, that is the wickedness of our flesh. This is something which should ever keep down pride and self-exaltation in the human heart. The cruelty and abominable deeds that startle us, are the natural works which spring spontaneously out of just such flesh as we all have. When we hear of deeds of savagery, whether among civilised or uncivilised people, all feel the indignation which we must all feel, we are reminded when our indignation begins to boil over into condemnation, that there is but one flesh of man. So we have nothing to boast of over another. Boasting is excluded, and our indignation turns to . . ., because such are we by nature.

BEARING CURSE

And now we read that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, when He took upon Himself the nature of man; was made in the likeness of sinful flesh, "in all things like unto His brethren" (Heb. ii. 17); and more than that, we read that even now He is "touched with the feeling of our infirmities" (Heb. iv. 15), our weaknesses. He has not forgotten the temptation and suffering which He felt when upon the earth; but He knows and feels it still. Seven hundred years before Christ was manifested in the flesh, Isaiah said by the Spirit, "the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all." Isa. liii. 6.

Jesus Christ "was foreordained before the foundation of the world." 1 Peter i. 20. He is the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." Rev. xiii. 8. It is by Him and in Him that we have lived and do "live, and move, and have our being." Acts xvii. 28. He is the true light that "lighteth every man that cometh into the world" (John i. 9); and that light is the life of men. Verse 4. It is only by the life which is given to men through the grace of God in Christ, that men have the power to commit the evil deeds which we see and know. It is the breath of life which God breathed into man's nostrils, and which He still continues to them, that men use in blaspheming the name of God. It is the power which not only comes from God, but is the life of God, which men pervert in fulfilling the lusts of the flesh and of the mind.

PERVERTING GOD'S LIFE

When God in His mercy gave to sinful man a probation, and permitted him to live on this earth, so that he was not blotted out of existence in the very act of sinning, He simply continued to him for a time a portion of His own life, with which to live that probation. He gave man His own life, so that he might show whether he would live that life to the glory of God, by allowing Christ to direct the life, and live it in him, or whether he would take it and still pervert it to his own base uses. In Him all men live and have their being, and so "the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all." Thus it is that the Lord says, "Thou hast made Me to serve with thy sins." Isa. xliii. 23. That life of Christ is in every man that comes into the world, the life by which he lives and moves, and it is that which every man uses and perverts in the commission of sin. So that every sin committed in the flesh since the fall of Adam is a sin charged up to the Lord Jesus Christ. It is laid on Him.

THE SOURCE OF ALL GOOD

This serves to explain the good traits, the generous impulses, and the desires for righteousness, which are manifest to a greater or lesser extent in all men. Even the wickedest men show at times good traits, and have times of yielding to better influences. These good traits and impulses and occasional longings for righteousness, are the result of the Divine light-the life of Christ-which is given to every man. They are the strivings of the Spirit. The flesh itself is totally corrupt, and irreclaimable, so that every good thing must come from God.

Christ has not forgotten, and cannot forget the sufferings of the temptations incident to sinful flesh; because He still lives, and His life is still given to man, and will continue to be given to all men, even to sinners, as long as probation continues. All men still live by it, and therefore He is now identified with human flesh, and is touched with the feeling of our infirmities. Inasmuch, therefore, as He suffered in the flesh for sin, and yielded up the life which had been perverted by men in sin, "He is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by Him." Heb. vii. 25.

THE MYSTERY OF GODLINESS

When Christ was here on the earth in the flesh, it was God manifest in the flesh. "Believest thou not," He said, "that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me?" God was in Him in the flesh which He voluntarily took,-the only begotten Son abode in the bosom of the Father, and therefore He knew no sin, although in sinful flesh. This is "the mystery of godliness."

So we have this glorious fact, the confession of which will lift the soul up to God, the fact that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, that all iniquity is laid upon Him and charged up to Him, and that He bears all the weaknesses and sinful tendencies of the flesh of man. He accepts it. And He still bears it, neither will He lay it off until He comes "the second time without sin unto salvation." Heb. ix. 28.

This being a fact by the word of God, whosoever confesses the fact, whosoever "confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is of God," and whosoever "confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is not of God." But it is a fact whether it is confessed or not. It is a glorious truth,-one with which one can go to the outcast and tempted,-that although Christ has "gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto Him," yet He still abides with men. Before the first advent His life was the light of men, and upon Him was laid the iniquity of all. And when He came to earth revealed as a man, it was simply in the line of giving to us a larger manifestation of the fact, and showing to us what God in the flesh, unhindered and not denied, means.

151

Jesus Christ witnessed a good confession before Pontius Pilate. And that confession, and that witness to the truth, He maintained throughout His life,-that He was the Son of God, and that the Father dwelt in Him. He confessed the Father's name before the world. In Ps. xxii. it is written, "I will declare Thy name unto My brethren;" and in John xvii. 26 Christ repeats it, "I have declared unto them Thy name." Every moment of His life He was confessing and never denying that He came from God and went to God, always acknowledging that the Father was in Him. He confessed, "I can of mine own self do nothing." John v. 30. "The words that I speak unto you I speak not of Myself; but the Father that dwelleth in Me, He doeth the works." John xiv. 10. He confessed continually that God had come in His flesh, and showed to us what the life of God in human flesh means when it is always confessed, never denied, and never perverted.

HELP FOR THE TEMPTED

And now He "is come in the flesh." You can go to the tempted and outcast with that, and assure them that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, and that every sin that they have committed, and even the sinful nature which led them into those sins, He takes upon Himself, and identifies Himself with it, assuming all the responsibility for the sins committed with the life which has been perverted. Oh, the blessedness of the fact that God hath made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. 2 Cor. v. 21. Tempted, and suffering as no man ever yet suffered in the flesh for sin, He knew no sin. Again and again He said of Himself He could do nothing, but He trusted God; and when we read that Jesus Christ came and took all the weaknesses of sinful flesh, we also read that these weaknesses never manifested themselves in His life. Therefore when from the heart we confess the fact which the Scripture tells us, that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh even now, and even in us, because we are in the flesh, the recognition of that brings also the other fact with it, that in Him was no sin while in the flesh; therefore His life, while we confess it, cleanses us from sin.

This is not a fact to be passed over once for all. It is not something to be experienced one moment, and then to be looked back upon as an experience, as many regard conversion or the new birth. Present experience is what counts. He that "confesseth"-is confessing-is of God. He that confesses it day by day, and hour by hour, and moment by moment, living continually in the recognition that Christ is in him, and that it is His life that he has,-He is of God.

"For Christ also hath suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God." 1 Peter iii. 18. It was in order that we might abide in Him, and His life be perfectly manifested in us. That part of it Christ has performed. "I in them," yes, in sinful flesh. Now He wants us to acknowledge that fact continually, that we may thus be in Him. He in us means that He has taken all of our sins and carried our sorrows,-that our burdens are upon Him, and that He feels them. We in Him means that we are made "the righteousness of God in Him," and that all His righteousness which He had in the flesh is ours. All our sin is His, all His righteousness is ours. He in us to bear the sin, that we may bear the righteousness.

There is everlasting glory and life in that confession; for "this is life eternal that we might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent." John xvii. 3. This weakness of ours He feels; for Christ is come in the flesh. This sin He has borne. He knows all about it. Not only did He bear it then, but He bears its still, since it is His life that He has given us. He gave it to us, because He "tasted death for every man," and it is His life that feels and meets the pressure of this sinful flesh of ours. Those evil desires, that thirst for liquor, that craving of appetite, the longings of the flesh,-He has felt it all, and even now identifies Himself with us, and says, "I know that. It touches Me. I am come in the flesh, have identified Myself with it, and every sin is laid on Me."

Just as soon as we can know that, and while we continue to know it, the soul is filled with joy unspeakable. It makes known to us the fact that the One who feels that sin, who identifies Himself with us in it, is the glorious Son of God in whom is no sin, and therefore all His righteousness is ours, and we are in Him as He is in us. For the knowledge that He bears the sin, is the knowledge that we are freed from its guilt and power.

A PRESENT SAVIOUR

"Every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God." It is not every spirit that says that it is not a fact, not every spirit in whom it is not a fact; for it is a fact. But every spirit that does not confess that Christ is come-not has come, but now is come-is not of God. It is always now. And when we confess this fact, that Jesus Christ identifies Himself with us in our sinfulness, He also confesses us before the Father in His righteousness, and we are one with Him. So the righteousness of faith speaketh on this wise, "Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into heaven? (that is to bring Christ down from above!)" He is come down in the likeness of sinful flesh. "Or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that is to bring up Christ again from the dead.)" He is risen. "But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith which we preach; that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." Rom. x. 6-9. Confess what?-That Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. There is something in that which every man in this world may lay hold of and find in it a lifting up.

CHRIST'S LIFE GOD'S LIFE

We confess that His life is ours. Everything then is to be brought to the touchstone of the life of Christ. We confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, and His righteousness is ours, because His life has no sin in it. Sin is "the transgression of the law," and the law was in His heart (Ps. xl. 8), and "out of the heart are the issues of life." Prov. iv. 23. So the life of Christ is the law of God. He said, "I have kept My Father's commandments and abide in His love." John xv. 10. Therefore when we confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, it means that the life we live is the life of Christ,-"Christ liveth in me,"-and we cannot confess that unless we are letting Him live the life in His own way. We must not be so presumptuous as to think that we can live the life of Christ ourselves. We have no power to do it. Therefore we shall find that to confess the life of Christ, to confess that He is come in the flesh, is to confess that while in the flesh He kept the commandments of God; and while we confess that, we

152

confess allegiance to the law of God, that He may live it in us.

Let us see what is involved in the confession that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, and that in the perfect example that He has set us in the flesh, He kept the Father's commandments. What will He live in us when we confess that He is come in our flesh, and when we by continually confessing that fact, allow Him to live the life in His own way?

BELIEVING UNTO RIGHTEOUSNESS

"Thou shalt have no other gods before Me." The tempter showed to Jesus all the kingdoms of the world, and said, "All these things will I give Thee, if Thou wilt fall down and worship me." But the Saviour said, "Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve." Matt. iv. 8-10. Therefore when the devil presents himself to us in any form, to bring something between our soul and God, if we confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, then He says in us and for us, "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve." "Then the devil leaveth Him," and so he must leave us when Christ living in us commands him to depart.

"Thou shall not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain." Christ said to the Father, "I have declared Thy name unto My brethren." And not in vain did He do it, for Christ came not in vain; He did not suffer in vain. So we find wrought in us, the utmost reverence for the name of God.

"Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy." There was once a time when the Pharisees accused Jesus of breaking the Sabbath day, as the disciples were allowed without rebuke to pluck the ears of corn, thrashing out the grain and eating it as they walked through the fields. But He said that the Son of man is Lord of the Sabbath day; He had not broken it, because it was His day. Then at another time a man was healed on the Sabbath day, and the Jews accused Him of breaking the Sabbath; but He told them that it is "lawful to do well on the Sabbath days." Matt. xii. 12. It is one of the commandments of God of which He said, "I have kept My Father's commandments." He was not a breaker of the Sabbath commandment which says, "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it." Ex. xx. 8-11.

That is the day on which Christ said it was lawful to do well; not to do ill. It is the seventh day of the week, the last day, which the Jews profess to keep, but did not. Christ kept it, and He comes in our flesh for the purpose of keeping it in us. So when we have confessed for years, it may be, that Christ is come in the flesh, that His life is in us, there comes to us at last the fact that He always kept the commandments, and it dawns upon us that the fourth is one of them, and that it enjoins the observance of the seventh day, the Sabbath. But it will be inconvenient for us to keep it, and will cause the loss of friends, and possibly the loss of our very means of gaining a living. Suppose we say, "We will still confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, but we cannot go so far as to keep the Sabbath of the Lord,-the seventh day." How will that do? "He that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God;" but all the time Jesus was in the flesh, the will of the Father was perfectly done in Him. It is not with the mouth alone that confession is made. "My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth." 1 John iii. 18. Of some it is written, "They profess that they know God, but in works they deny Him." Titus i. 16. It is from the heart that the true confession comes. "He that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God." But Jesus Christ in the flesh always did and does the will of God; therefore we confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh,-our flesh,-when we yield to everything that the Scriptures reveal to us in His life. Whenever a new feature of His life appears, we are to say to Him, "Live this in us also by Thine own life. Keep the Sabbath in us, even as Thou didst in the flesh in Judea and Galilee."

Then again the Lord says, "Honour thy father and thy mother." And Jesus said, "I honour My Father." And further we read in Luke ii. 51, that as a child Jesus was subject unto His parents. So a child as well as older people confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, and, confessing that, they will have His obedience lived in them: Christ learned obedience, and will impart to them obedience.

"Thou shalt not kill." Christ said, "The Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them." Luke ix. 56. So far was He from taking men's lives, that He laid down His own life to save them. So then He who from the heart confesses that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, will be ever careful of the welfare of others.

"Thou shalt not commit adultery." Jesus is of purer eyes than to look upon evil. He was pure in heart. So, knowing that He felt the strivings of the lusts of the flesh, because He was tempted in all points as we are, but yet without sin; if when we are tempted, we confess that Jesus Christ is in our flesh, we know that by the power of the endless life which dwelt in Him and enabled Him to put down and condemn sin in the flesh, we also are made the righteousness of God in Him.

"Thou shalt not bear false witness." Jesus said, "For this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth." John xviii. 37. "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." John xiv. 6. When we intelligently confess that He is in us, we shall allow Him to witness to the truth, in us.

"Thou shalt not covet." So far was Christ from coveting, that He would not even hold on to that which He had. "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: who, being in the form of God, thought it not to be a thing to be grasped to be on an equality with God; but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men: and being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, yea, the death of the cross." Phil. ii. 5-8. In Him was no grasping after the things of others, but all meekness and lowliness. And when day by day and hour by hour we confess that Jesus Christ is come in our flesh, all these graces He brings into us, identifying Himself with our sins, that we may be in Him identified with all His righteousness.

THE SPIRIT OF ANTICHRIST

"Every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world." The spirit

153

of antichrist is described in 2 Thess. ii. 4, exalting itself and opposing itself "above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God." This is that spirit of antichrist, confessing not that Jesus is come in the flesh to subdue and keep it under, but exhibiting the very lusts of the flesh, domineering and using force, building up self continually. We exhibit that spirit of antichrist when we would bring everything to our standard, and judge every man by ourselves. Jesus said, "I judge no man." How wonderfully the principle of freedom and religious liberty is manifested in the life of Christ. We get that glorious liberty when we confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh.

Whose life were we prostituting all the years that we have lived in sin? It was the life of Christ. In Him all men live and have their being. He gave us His own life, all the while knowing that He was the standard of everlasting righteousness, and yet He did not compel or force us in any way. He simply drew us all the time by His everlasting love. Such wonderful freedom was never known among men.

Men say, "There are many of us that believe thus and so. We as a people, as a church, as a nation, hold this to be truth. Those who do not believe as we do must be compelled to do so. If they cannot be compelled to believe, we will compel them to act as though they did, and to conform to our customs. It is an offence to us that men should thus act contrary to what we believe. It disturbs us, and they must be forced to stop."

TRUE RELIGIOUS LIBERTY

But Jesus Christ lived with us all these years, while we were sinning. Did it not disturb Him that we sinned, that we blasphemed His name, and perverted the life He gave in endless ways? Most surely it was a grievous offence to Him; yet He said, "If any man hear My words and believe not, I judge Him not." John xii. 47. "Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear My voice, and open the door, I will come in to him." Not by one hair's breadth will He compel us to act contrary to our own will. That will He has set for ever free. He has besought us. Long and lovingly He has pleaded with us to accept Him; but never did He seek to compel. In Him we learn the perfection of religious liberty.

Now He says, "If ye continue in My word, then are ye My disciples indeed; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." John viii. 31, 32. So if we have been bound down by the chains of the flesh, and the dominion of the flesh has asserted itself over us (and that dominion is only a manifestation of that same dominion that men in the flesh have asserted over others), we know that Christ was compassed with the infirmities of the flesh, and yet was free. He was the Word of God, and the word of God is not bound. And when we confess Him in our flesh, we know that He steps in and takes that burden, and the burden of sin is ours no longer; it is His. "The Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all." The burden we have not known how to carry, the bondage of evil that will overshadow us, He will take upon Himself, and show us how to be free. He will show us what He can do with sin. That weakness is His; He will show us how His strength can be made perfect in weakness.

Whatever the difficulty and temptation, we confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, and He accepts us and says we are in Him and He lives in us. "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief." 1 Tim. i. 15. Yes, because He, the chief among ten thousand, the One altogether lovely, came down and suffered as the chief of sinners, because He bore the sins of all. The chief in heaven, He died the chief of malefactors. So we are the chief of sinners, that in us, as chief, Jesus Christ might show forth all longsuffering and salvation. Oh, let everything that hath breath praise the Lord, and let all say, "Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift."

GLORIFYING GOD

Tell it to the world, not to the people, to the devil himself when he comes to tempt us, "Jesus Christ liveth in me." "I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Gal. ii. 20. What will be the result of this confession; when Jesus wrought a wonderful miracle, the people glorified God who had given such power unto men. Matt. ix. 8. He Himself was passed by, and God was glorified. The Apostle Paul said, "But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by His grace, to reveal his Son in me, that I might preach Him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood." Gal. i. 15, 16. And when to Paul it was revealed that the Son of God was in him, in order that he might confess Him before the world, the brethren heard that he now preached the faith which he once destroyed, and they glorified God in him. Gal. i. 21. When Christ is revealed in us, men will glorify God because of what is seen in us, even as they did in the cases of Jesus and Paul.

Christ is the light of the world, the light which lighteth every man which cometh into the world; and so He says, "Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works (the fruit of that light) and glorify your Father which is in heaven."

"Free in Christ" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

Free in Christ.-If you have Christ, you must be free; for no fetters can bind Him. He is free and abideth ever free.

"Enjoying Freedom" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

Enjoying Freedom.-It is said that when the Czar of Russia goes for his outing in Denmark, he may be seen almost every morning, by those who rise early enough, tramping across the meadows, with osier basket on his back, in quest of mushrooms for his breakfast. For a short time he is a free man. Very generally the poor peasant with frugal fare, a thatch to cover his head, a strong arm, and a free heart, knows more of the real enjoyment of life than those who wear soft raiment and are found in kings' palaces. Even this natural life is a great leveller, and we have the poor rich and the rich poor breathing the same free air. "Better is little with the fear of the Lord than great treasure and trouble therewith." Prov. xv. 17.

"Furious Athleticism" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

Furious Athleticism.-True recreation is re-creation, a building up and healthful process for mind and body. But when it degenerates into an end, administering solely to pleasure, athletic exercise is sadly perverted, and becomes simply "sport." However great may be the difference in the particular forms in which the passion for "sport" manifests itself, the brute instinct exhibited so frequently shows that all the world is akin. We in northern lands are accustomed to denounce the Spanish bull-fights as barbarous. But a Spanish writer who has watched one kind of football contests says: "Be still! You can say nothing of the barbarity of the Spaniards. In bull-fights they disembowel brute beasts; in football they destroy men-respectable and studious youth, as if they were mad dogs. The handsome youths attack one another, tread upon one another, they bruise, they wound, they dislocate the joints of one another, they break each other's noses, they kill one another." This is the way it appears to the Spaniard.

"Beer and Milk" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

Beer and Milk.-In prosecutions for adulteration, according to an annual report on the workings of the Food and Drugs Act, watering the milk is considered by the magistrates a small thing as compared with the grave offence of watering beer. A shilling is often the penalty of the former, while as much as ?50 is frequently exacted for "adulterating" beer with water.

"Worshipping the Creature" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

Worshipping the Creature.-Mrs. Besant's lectures in India show how far one may go when refusing to see God in His works. The path leads straight on to the worshipping of the works of our own hands. Glorifying Hinduism, she "spoke in appreciative terms of the idol worship of the Hindus. The idol was endowed with magnetic energy, working good to those around it-it was a living centre of blessing to whole villages and towns. In going to some of their temples, the lecturer said, she had found but a faint wave of the magnetism imparted to idols by the sages of old. But the possibility of revival was not lost."

"Complicated" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

Complicated.-It might be supposed that anywhere in the British Empire the marriage contract would be a very simple affair, so far as solidity is concerned, when the parties thereto are acting voluntarily and intelligently. But in Malta the Catholic authorities have disputed the validity of mixed marriages, that is between a Catholic and Protestant, unless celebrated according to the religious rites of the Catholic church. The question is being argued before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, and is said to involve "canon law, civil law, matrimonial law, Maltese law, Colonial law, and international law." All this because of the effort to force men to recognise a religious ordinance.

"Passive Instruments" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

Passive Instruments.-To know the power of God, we must be passive in His hands. To live, we must first die. We must die unto sin, as did our Lord Jesus Christ. Rom. vi. 10. When Christ was dead He was passive in the hands of God (as He always had been), and God raised Him from the dead, and He lived. So must we become passive instruments in God's hands by dying unto sin, that we may know the power of His resurrection. "Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord." Verse 11. If we will be passive in the hands of God, as a dead man is passive in the hands of an earthly friend, God will make us alive and active by the power of His glory, which raised up our Lord from the dead, in all things pertaining to salvation.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 10.

E. J. Waggoner

In a recent sermon on "Christ and Democracy," the Dean of Ely gave expression to a religio-political confession of faith, one of the articles of which reads thus:-

We believe that in any truly Christian city there would undoubtedly be a bye-law of the council suppressing the scandalous indecencies of the Divorce Court, and the brutalising horrors of the Police Court, in the public prints, and prohibiting the publication in any newspaper of all betting lists, the odds on sporting events, and any information likely to stimulate gambling, whether on the turf or the Stock Exchange.

But the query is, How could such a bye-law be necessary in any "truly Christian city"? Can a "Christian city" have a standard different from that of a Christian man? and would the good Dean think it consistent for a Christian man to bet and gamble, or to be connected with "the brutalising horrors of the Police Court"? The statement is a most significant one, as it unconsciously reveals the nature of all so-called "Christian governments." They are simply those in which the wickedness is done under cover, so that it does not appear. And it cannot possibly be otherwise, because law can never give people more than a form of godliness, without the power.

A law has been enacted in Guernsey providing that religious instruction in the elementary schools "shall be in conformity with the doctrines of the Anglican Church, and shall be under the direction of the ecclesiastical authority." The school money is raised by compulsory rates. Nonconformity is strong in the island, and protested vigorously, but to no avail. The legislature is not elected, and paid no attention to the protest.

March 15, 1894

"Russian Stundists" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

Russian Stundists.-"Missioners" of the Greek Church are making missionary visits among the Stundist villages in the Uman district. The Stundists of one village were recently imprisoned and abused for fifteen days, and then let go with their heads shaven, to show how serious a thing it is to dissent from orthodoxy. In other places the priests are going among those sentenced to banishment, offering freedom if they will recant. These persecuted believers, however, know a freedom of which their priestly enemies seem never to have dreamed; and as they are scattered abroad they go preaching the word. The Lord's work is going forward in Russia.

"Doubts and Thistles" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

Doubts and Thistles.-It is very bad for a farmer to have thistles growing abundantly in a field. The best thing for him to do is to kill the roots, and thus clear the field of them. But if he will not do that,-if he is determined to raise thistles,-then let him cut off the tops before they ripen, so as not to sow thistles in his neighbour's field. I have seen the air full of thistle down from the field of a slack farmer, providing a crop for all his neighbours, yet I never saw the original crop diminished by so much as one thistle. Remember this: You cannot diminish your own crop of thistles by sowing your neighbour's field with them.

Even so it is with doubts. If you have them, the best thing to do is to root them out. But if you will not do this, do not sow them in the heart of your neighbour. Keep them to yourself. By giving expression to them, you sow the seed in the hearts of others, and do not in the least diminish the amount in your own heart. Keep your thistles and your doubts to yourself.

"Confessing Christ" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

Confessing Christ.-It is by our lives that we confess or deny Christ. To confess Christ is to confess that He is the Saviour of the world, and specifically that He is our individual Saviour; and this can only be done by manifesting that He is our Saviour, in the fact that we are saved by Him from our sins. Anything less than this would afford no evidence that Jesus is the Saviour of man.

When we choose our own way in preference to His, that is, when we do not let Him have His way in us, we deny that He is our Saviour, for we thereby virtually say that our way is better than His, and if that were true He would not be our Saviour, for we could better save ourselves. So it is by our life, and not by empty words, that we confess or deny Him, and determine whether He, before His father and the angels, will confess or deny us.

"The Blessing of Suffering" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

The Blessing of Suffering.-Suffering is not usually counted a blessing, but it is such, if received in the proper way. Besides working in us patience and other Christian graces, when endured without murmurings or rebellion, it identifies us with Christ. For the Apostle Paul wrote, "I am crucified with Christ," the result being that "Christ liveth in me." Gal. ii. 20. Crucifixion means suffering; but it means also union with Him. Christ suffered in being tempted. Heb. ii. 18. So when we are tempted and endure suffering in not yielding to it, we have the blessed assurance that in that very thing we become identified with our Lord and Saviour; knowing that those who suffer with Him will also reign with Him in His glory.

"Filled with God" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

The time must come when all things in the earth and the universe will be filled with the glory of God. He is the Creator and Upholder of all things, and the One that "filleth all in all." Eph. i. 23. Now we see not all things filled with His glory, because He has, for a little time, allowed another ruler in His universe besides Himself; namely, sin, in order that fallen man might live on probation, and have a period of time in which to accept or reject eternal life. So sin rules in most places on the earth, where God is the only rightful Ruler, through the longsuffering and forbearance of God toward men.

This cannot always continue; for God cannot permanently yield up His rightful place as Ruler to the foul usurper, even in the smallest part of His dominion. He would not be God,-the Omnipotent and Omniscient,-if He were baffled in any place in the exercise of His universe. And though for a time,-now nearly six thousand years-He has allowed sin a place in His universe, He has from the first been steadily working to fill all things with Himself, thus dispossessing sin. He might have done this in a moment had He so willed, but He did not, for this would have been the destruction of man. He loved man, so He instituted another and a longer way.

That way is the Gospel. By faith in Christ, the sinner can become filled with the glory of God and still live; for in Christ he meets the glory of God, and meets it as a righteous person, so that there is no antagonism between

162

the glory and himself. But if he will not accept Christ, he must die; or the time will come when, the great work being completed and the plan of salvation for sinners having finished its course, God will fill all things, independently of men's volition, with His glory, but that will result in the utter destruction of every sinner. So the question is, Will you be filled with His glory now, and live? or be filled with it after probation ends, and die?

"Grass and Trees" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

The message which God sends to prepare for His coming is briefly summed up in these words: "All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof as the flower of the field; . . . the grass withereth, the flowers fadeth; but the word of our God shall stand for ever." Isa. xl. 6-8. "For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat, but it withereth the grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth; so also shall the rich man fadeth away in his ways." James i. 11. Such is man: as frail and as helpless as the grass. His breath is in his nostrils, and he is nothing to be accounted of (Isa. ii. 22), for his life is but "a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away." James iv. 14. Yet God does not despise the grass, but clothes it with the wondrous beauty, surpassing the glory of Solomon. See Matt. vi. 28-30. And so we are to learn that God does not despise our low estate, but cares for us, even to the extent of clothing us with His own beauty. He who does not forget the grass, will surely remember man.

Even in the grass, the mighty power of God is shown,-power to push aside all obstacles. As long as it is rooted in the soil in which God has placed it, His power works through it, till it has accomplished His purpose. So the power of God may be manifested in the feeblest of men, until they have been brought to the standard that He has designed for them,-even to "the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ."

But when God thus accomplishes His purpose in them,-and He does it in all who are as passive in His hands as is the grass,-they cease to be considered as grass, and are called trees. The message which tells us that we are grass, is a message of comfort, in that it reveals to us the word of power. Now to all those who receive that comforting message from the Lord, comes this further message of comfort, that He has come,-

"To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He might be glorified." Isa. lxi. 3.

"The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree; he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon. Those that be planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God." Ps. xcii. 12, 13.

And so we have this wonderful growth in grace, that whereas we start as grass, we develop into trees, which cannot be withered, nor wrenched from their place, nor even bent, by the mightiest blast that may blow. What wondrous possibilities there are for those who are rooted in Christ!

"A Mother's Comfort" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

We know a boy who has the utmost confidence in the power of a kiss to heal the bumps and bruises which lie in ambush on every side for little feet.

"Kiss it, mamma," is the tearful cry a dozen times a day.

"Where?" for the very spot must be touched.

"Just there;" and the tears are dried and the trouble is passed.

It is because the little one has confidence in the mother's love and power to help, and knows the comfort of sympathy.

If only men and women who profess to believe God would go to Him with their troubles and sins in the same confidence, there would be very many lighter hearts. Very often they do not come when the wound is fresh, confessing the very spot where the hurt of sin is upon them; but they feel as though the Lord would be ashamed of them, and so wait about at a distance from Him until the keenness of the wounding has worn off. Then they come, generalising about their need of help, as though they would get healed without letting the Lord know just what is the matter.

It is all because they do not know the Lord as the child does its mother. When the sin is done He is wounded for it, and by His wounding we are healed. We have a very fountain of love and sympathy to go to for comfort; and to carry about the troubles and the bruises for a moment, is to say that we do not believe His love. When conviction comes it is the invitation of the Lord for us to lay bare that very sin before Him and receive the healing touch; for it is the Comforter that convicts. "As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you," saith the Lord. Isa. lxvi. 13.

"The Way, the Truth, and the Life" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

"I am the way, the truth, and the life; no man cometh unto the Father but by Me." John xiv. 6.

These words of our Lord spoken to Thomas on the evening preceding the crucifixion, contain the very essence of the whole Gospel. Without Christ, nothing whatever that any person can find or that he can receive from others can take a step nearer to the Lord than he already is.

There are many paths in the world, but only one way to the world to come. Men can find out many ways that are true, but there is only one truth that leads to the realms of eternal day. There are many things that exist in our world, but only one manifestation of eternal life.

Christ is the way. Wherever He is not, there is not the way. There are paths which run alongside and seemingly parallel with the way; yet they do not lead to God. A man may walk in them if he chooses, and imagine himself to be travelling directly toward the celestial city; but if he does so he is deceived, and will never reach the city of God, so long as he continues therein; because Christ, and Christ alone, is the way. It matters not what knowledge he may have, or what strength of purpose or good intentions; if he is not walking in Christ, he is not in the way. Christ is the way of God; all other paths are the ways of self.

Christ is the truth. It matters not how much knowledge one may have, if he has not Christ he has knowledge merely and not "the truth." There is a difference between simple knowledge and "the truth in Christ." Knowledge with Christ is "the truth;" knowledge without Him is knowledge merely, and though true, it is not the perfect truth. The world has knowledge, and wisdom of a worldly sort; yet the Apostle Paul declares that "the world by wisdom knew not God." So while they had knowledge, they still had not the truth, because they were in great error concerning God. The familiar proverb says, "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing," and never is the saying

163

truer than when it concerns religion. Knowledge should help a person to recognise God, Him who is the Author and Preserver of all things; but he who will not recognise God in His works, thereby perverts his knowledge so that he makes it declare something that is not true, and so turns it into a lie, as did the heathen of whom we are told in the first chapter of Romans. A half truth is the most dangerous of falsehoods. So he who has knowledge, yet cannot see Christ, is the most certain of all persons to be misled.

Christ is also the life. But here again we find only nothingness for the one who has not Christ. For though all men have life, which comes from their Creator Jesus Christ and is therefore His life, he who will not recognise in his life the life of Christ thereby shuts out Christ and His eternal life from himself; but he who glorifies God by recognising Him as the Creator and the Giver of all things, recognising Him not merely in form but in reality, as evidenced in his words and deeds, thereby accepts Christ and has eternal life. There is no life outside of Christ. "He that hath the Son, hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." 1 John v. 12. That which he has who has not the Son, seems to be life, but it is not. It is only a vapour, that appeareth for a moment, and then vanisheth away. Jas. iv. 14. He who will have life, can find it only in Christ.

"The Price of Votes" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

Under the head of "Protestant Notes," a Church paper calls attention to the practices of one of Lord Salisbury's appointees, and threatens the Marquis with a loss of the support of Protestant voters at the next election if he does not "publicly express his deep regret for making such an appointment." Of course he will not do so, as the source from which the votes is doubtless well considered before appointments are made.

But is this a strictly Protestant method of protesting against error, or of bringing a man to repentance? If a man deeply regrets an act, of course he will say so, but if he does not, and is induced to say so by threats of personal loss, he is made a hypocrite. In politics such methods are considered lawful, as this is the way of the world; but Protestantism should stand for the word of God and Gospel methods. The Gospel is so pure, so free, so identical with Christ-likeness that there is nothing in it that savours of worldly policy or force. Paul once breathed out threatenings, but he was then Saul the persecutor. When he found Christ he dropped all of that. The priest threatened Pilate with political disaster if he did not meet their demands, and a fallen church in Constantine's day purchased his "conversion" by their political support. The Gospel is never advanced in that way.

Those who consent that the man who is victorious in a political contest shall have the power to appoint men to give the bread of life to the people, have no right to protest in the name of Protestantism, if those appointed know nothing of the living word. The Lord only can give the credentials needed. It is not within the power of any political party or politician to give or withhold them. After having helped to make a Prime Minister an authority over the church, it is useless to complain that he does not act as a Protestant should. Protestants are not made in that way.

"The Delusion of Spiritualism" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

A correspondent of the Pall Mall Gazette writes of spiritualistic seances and manifestations among the Chinese, and says that it may be generally alleged that Spiritualism is quite as common in China as it is in Europe or America.

Of course it is; for Spiritualism, as it is called in the West, is the characteristic of all heathen religions. The ancestral worship of Chinese is but one form of the worship of the supposed spirits of the dead, which dates from the earliest days when men refused to retain the knowledge of God, and were left to their own imaginings.

It is well known that the gods of the heathen were but the ancient dead, about whom mythology had woven tales of supernatural powers. Thus it was that when Israel forsook the Lord and joined themselves to Baal-peor, "they ate the sacrifices of the dead." Ps. cvi. 28.

It is not at all unlikely that those giving themselves over to their own ways in this worship anciently had just as clear manifestations of supernatural power as the Spiritualists of our own time insist upon. The Lord repeatedly warned against the practice of enchantments and divination; and when Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses they were able to work wonders and deceived Pharaoh by them.

The devil was ready to supply manifestations in order to hold men in his deceptions. Instead of dealing with the spirits of the dead, therefore, they were paying their homage to and receiving manifestations from the spirits of devils. In the same Psalm from which we have quoted, the Lord says His people "mingled among the heathen, and learned their works. And they served their idols: which were a snare unto them. Yea, they sacrificed their sons and their daughters unto devils." Verses 35-37.

The Apostle Paul says the same thing of the heathen in his day, those cultured Greeks and Romans who talked so beautifully of the divinity of man, and the life which he had in himself, and who lived such wicked and profligate lives because they did not recognise, even as one of their own poets had said, that their life and every power of their being were not of themselves but of God, and in Him only. "But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils." 1 Cor. x. 20.

All through paganism this thread of evil runs, and the modern revival of Spiritualism, Theosophy, etc., in all countries only shows that the time has come when the enemy will try to cause all the world to "give heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils." Everything indicates that we are living in the last days, and just here it is, that "as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses"-by the power of the wonders they wrought-so now by the same means will men "resist the truth." "But they shall proceed no further: for their folly shall be manifest unto all men, as theirs also was." 2 Tim. iii. 8, 9. The Lord is mightier than Satan. When the enemy magnifies himself to do great things, the Lord says, "Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice; for the Lord will do great things." Joel ii. 21.

But a knowledge of the Lord and of the life and power of His word, is our only safeguard. It is no idle warning that is given to the world for such a time as we have entered upon. "Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time." Rev. xii. 12. The Lord says that the devices of the devil, his signs and wonders, will be such as, if it were possible, would deceive the very elect. We are in the beginning

164

of these things, and multitudes are already being deceived by them.

The natural heart exalts self always, and the natural man likes to believe that he has life in himself, and immortality in his own nature. Therefore men refuse to come to Christ that they may have life indeed; and when Satan comes as an angel of light, professing to demonstrate the pleasing fable, they readily yield themselves to him. But to those who yield to the life of the Lord in everything, casting aside all human reasoning and holding fast the word of God, the promise is: "Because thou hast kept the word of My patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth. Behold I come quickly: hold that fast which thou hast." Rev. iii. 10, 11.

"A Word of Faith" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

A letter which shows more real confidence in God and the power of His word than anything we have lately seen in the correspondence on the Ritualist question in Church papers, appears in the last English Churchman. Mr. William Acworth writes from a sick room what he says will probably be the last letter he will ever write, and proves that he at least believes that the Gospel cannot be united with the world. It is to save the people out of the world and its alliances. Referring to an address by the Bishop of Liverpool, who showed the rapid growth of Ritualism, but who yet counsels the people not to forsake the Establishment, Mr. Acworth says:-

Does he think that the people should go to the parish church, and pray to be delivered from all false doctrine, when they know that he who administers, is an avowed supporter of these false doctrines? Until I am convinced that I am wrong my advice must be, "To your tents, O Israel." Better not go anywhere than to go where false doctrine is taught. For has not Jesus Christ Himself taught us that "the Truth" is the grand means of the sanctification of the Church?

For forty years of the more than sixty of my ministerial life, I was as much enamoured as Bishop Ryle of a National Church. I am now led to doubt the correctness of my views. . . . Dr. Ryle says he would rather see the Church become Congregational, or Wesleyan, than have no Establishment. In the days of the Commonwealth, Presbyterians and Congregationalists lifted their heads so high, and exalted their pretensions so much, as to induce the nation to fall back again upon Episcopacy. Priestcraft is now, as it has ever been, the natural outcome of attempting to combine spiritual and secular authority. The Church has yet to learn what our Lord taught: "Render unto C?sar the things which be C?sar's and unto God the things which be God's."

This is real Protestantism. Who that knows that the Gospel is the "power of God" can expect to add power to it by allying it to the world? There is no use in fighting the assumptions of Romanism and thus we are prepared to renounce them ourselves, and put our trust in the word that alone has power to save souls from sin.

"Satisfaction" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

"There is no peace, saith the Lord, unto the wicked." Isa. xlviii. 22. "The wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt." Isa. lvii. 20. "It shall come to pass, that when they shall be hungry, they shall fret themselves, and curse their king and their God." Isa. viii. 21. "From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members? Ye lust, and have not; ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain; ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not. Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts." James iv. 1-3.

This is a description of men by nature. Everywhere we find unrest and dissatisfaction. The poor have no cause to envy the rich, for discontent is found in the mansion as in the hovel. Those in any station in life who are perfectly contented, are in a very small minority. Everywhere we see people seeking for happiness in various ways, and vainly confident that they will find it if they pursue the object of their desires far enough.

Although these longings are so often for things forbidden, and for that which only increases the dissatisfaction, it is God Himself who has implanted them in the human heart. It is not that God has caused men to desire unlawful things, but that the desire for unlawful things is only the perversion of a desire which God Himself has placed in man.

God is a bounteous Provider. He scatters His benefits with a lavish hand. He desires that men should enjoy the abundance which His love has prepared, and that they should be satisfied. He is no niggard, neither is He a tyrant. He knows what will perfectly satisfy every soul, and yet He never attempts to compel anyone to find satisfaction in His way. He knows that no one can be satisfied under compulsion, and that even that which is good will not satisfy unless it is the individual's own choice. So He gives everyone full liberty to choose whatever he will.

Jesus Christ is "the Desire of all nations." Haggai ii. 7. There are comparatively few of the people in the world who know Him, and who recognise Him as the object of their desire; but it is a fact that all the very longings of the human heart can be satisfied in Christ, and in Him alone. God has implanted desires in every soul, which can be satisfied only by the possession of Christ, in order that when He is lifted up before them, they may see in Him the object of their desires, and be drawn to Him. The devil's work is to deceive people with the thought that their desires may be satisfied in some other way than by the possession of Christ.

David was a man of like passions with other men, his flesh was sinful, and as full of evil desires as any other human flesh. Yet when the Spirit enlightened his understanding, he said, "O God, Thou art my God; early will I seek Thee; my soul thirsteth for Thee, my flesh longeth for Thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is." Ps. lxiii. 1. And again: "My heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God." Ps. lxxxiv. 2.

165

How can it be made to appear that the appetites and lusts of the flesh are really the crying out of the flesh after God?-Simply by the fact that no man was ever yet satisfied by the indulgence of fleshly appetites and lusts. The drunkard drinks to satisfy a craving that is never satisfied. The vicious and licentious man, in common with the miser, finds no satisfaction in the gratification of his passion. The reason why he follows the lusts of the flesh so eagerly, is that they make him their slave, deluding him with the idea that the next time he will find that complete satisfaction which evades him this time. The Lord, knowing that He alone can give the soul perfect and complete satisfaction, calls to us, saying, "Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labour for that which satisfieth not? hearken diligently unto Me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness." Isa. lv. 2.

What a wonderful God is ours! How tender and loving and thoughtful! What wonderful provision He has made for the salvation of every soul! He has so constituted man that he cannot find peace and rest outside of Himself; for the reason that everything outside of Him is death, and in Him alone is life and safety. These unsatisfied longings of weary hearts are but a proof of the tender, loving care of the Father above, and that He will not leave any of His children without continually reminding them of the fulness that He has to bestow; for every want felt by mankind is but the announcement, if they would recognise it so, of the fact that God has something which He wishes to give us,-something which will satisfy the want. Only at His hand can "the desire of every living thing" be satisfied. Ps. cxlv. 16.

Thus God has provided comfort for us, even from our very weaknesses and lusts. Here is help for the tempted. No matter how much the flesh cries out for sinful pleasures, we may be assured that those things are "deceitful lusts," that will not give the satisfaction they promise; and then the comfort comes in the knowledge of the fact that the longing is in reality for Christ, and that by accepting Him for all that He is, the desire will be satisfied. There is life and victory in that. Knowing that, we may count it all joy when we fall into divers temptations; because with every temptation He provides the way of escape, that we may be able to bear it. Then we shall sing:-

"O Christ, in Thee my soul hath found,
And found in Thee alone,
The peace, the joy, I sought so long,
The bliss till now unknown.

"Now none but Christ can satisfy;
None other name for me;
There's love, and life, and lasting joy,
Lord Jesus, found in Thee."

"More About Sunday Closing" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

The report of the meeting of the Sunday Closing Association, recently held in Birmingham, presents some points that are worthy of note. It shows the fact that men high in position in the church, both established and nonconformist, are willing to compromise to any extent with the liquor traffic, if only the Sunday, which has no Divine authority whatever, may be strictly devoted to ecclesiastical purposes.

For instance, the Bishop of Coventry, in apologising for non-attendance, wrote:-

I have been long convinced that the stoppage of the sale of drink on Sunday would be no real hardship to the drink consumer, and that he could by a little forethought obtain on Saturday all that He may require on Sunday, and by a little self-control keep what is so obtained on Saturday for Sunday use.

So it seems that it matters not a particle how much one drinks, even on Sunday, provided he buys it the day before. From the very beginning of this Sunday-closing agitation we have maintained that it was in no sense a temperance movement, since the amount of liquor consumed would not be appreciably diminished by Sunday closing. It simply means that publicans should sell in six days what they now sell in seven.

The Chairman appealed to the audience to do something for the 300,000 persons who were employed on the Lord's Day in the public-houses of the country. Some barmaids worked as many as 110 hours a week. The public should do something for the social benefit and physical welfare of the persons who were engaged in an occupation which medical statistics and the returns of the Registrar-General showed was certainly calculated to shorten life.

Indeed they ought, and the only correct way is to induce them to abandon such a business. But men are engaged in a business that tends to shorten their own lives, and whose only tendency is to shorten the lives and ruin the morals of their patrons, common sense should teach us that the way to give real help is to induce them to give up the traffic altogether, and not to build them up so that they can work harder for the destruction of their fellow-men. The movement for Sunday closing appears to be wholly in the interest of the liquor traffic, and the Pagan Sunday. Therefore no consistent temperance man, to say nothing of those who love the Lord and His truth, can have anything to do with it.

Canon Wilkinson was "anxious that one day in every seven days should be assigned to men for rest and religious exercises." But suppose the men do not choose to use the day for rest and religious exercises, after it has been so assigned them; what must then be done? It is evident that the next thing would be a law compelling them to go to church, with fines for non-attendance, and spies to see who evaded the law, as it was in Scotland in former days, and in some of the American Colonies.

There is nothing more sure than that such a thing as this must necessarily follow the strict enforcement of a law prohibiting all Sunday labour. It is as true now as ever, that Satan finds mischief for idle hands to do. Idleness means sin and crime. Work is not a curse, but a blessing. Enforced idleness means simply enforced crime. When the Government forces men to be idle one day in the week, it forces them into a condition that must necessarily result in crime; and then it must provide some means of employment for those forced to be idle, to prevent the mischief which its previous action has already planned for.

Someone will ask, "Do you not believe in Sabbath-keeping? in resting on the seventh day?" Most certainly; but mark this point well: That for which we plead is the observance of the Sabbath of the Lord, and not for the heathen Sunday, which was brought into the church by Constantine and the worldly-minded bishops of his day.

"But what difference can there be in the matter of idleness and crime, between resting on Sunday and on the seventh day of the week, commonly called Saturday?" our friend asks.

Listen, and I will tell you. If it were merely a matter of idleness, and enforced idleness at that, there would not be the slightest difference between Sunday and Saturday rest. But remember our statement, that the thing to which we urge men, is the observance of "the Sabbath of the Lord." Now note well the following points:-

166

1. The Sabbath of the Lord is not the portion of time commonly called Saturday, which begins and ends at midnight, but is the seventh day of the week, according to the scriptural method of reckoning time, namely, from sunset on what is known as Friday until sunset of the next day. See Gen. i. 5, 8, etc.; Lev. xxiii. 32; Mark i. 32.

2. True Sabbath-keeping is not idleness. "Is it not rest?"-Yes, it is rest, but it is the Lord's rest, and that is not idleness. When Jesus was reproved for not keeping the Sabbath according to the notions of the Pharisees, He said, "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." John v. 17. On another occasion, when he also healed a man, He said, "It is lawful to do well on the Sabbath days." Matt. xii. 12. True Sabbath-keeping does not consist in idling away one's life, but is the receiving of fresh life from God, and the imparting of it to others. It is the great conserver of righteousness through faith in Christ Jesus.

3. True Sabbath-keeping is not and cannot be forced. It is as impossible to force a man to take even physical rest, as it is to force him to sleep. How much more is this true when we speak of spiritual rest, which alone constitutes true Sabbath-keeping. "God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth." "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." Where there is not freedom of soul, there is no true worship of God. True Sabbath-keeping is the evidence that one knows God (Eze. xx. 12); and he who knows the Lord is free. See John viii. 31-36. Sabbath-keeping, therefore, being of the very essence of liberty, cannot be forced to the slightest degree.

4. It is evident therefore that Sabbath-keeping is something far different from mere Saturday-keeping, which would correspond to Sunday-keeping. It is a thing which men engage in of their own free will, and which stands for the perfection of freedom. Thus it is as far from enforced Sunday observance, as the midday sunshine is from midnight darkness.

And now we turn again to the statement that enforced Sunday rest-Sunday idleness-tends to crime, and that the present Sunday laws are responsible for the great amount of Sunday intoxication. There is nothing more certain than that the great majority of people, even in England, do not wish to devote Sunday to religious exercises. If they were so inclined, they would do so, for there is nothing to hinder them. The fact that comparatively few people care to attend church, is too patent to need any argument.

Now when these people are by law prohibited from working on Sunday, since they have no religious conviction, and perhaps a greater portion of them no literary aspirations, they must inevitably seek some form of gross amusement. And then the only way left for the Government to check this evil which it has originated, is to attempt to get them into some place of meeting. But such forced attendance will have no worship in it. It will be only a form of worship, with no power over the heart and life. And the sinful desires still remaining in the heart, will be sure to find vent in some way. Sin cannot be repressed except by the Spirit of the Lord.

The only proper thing to be done, therefore, is for the Government to have no Sunday laws of any kind whatsoever. Leave people just as free on Sunday as they are on every other day, either to work or play, as they may choose. Let the Government know no distinction in days. Let no one fear that this will result in the utter abolition of Sabbath-keeping. Not by any means. There are many thousands of people who are keeping the Sabbath of the Lord in obedience to the commandment of the Lord, although human legislation discriminates against such observance, rather than in favour it. And people who wish to observe Sunday, thinking it required by the Lord, are as free to do so as Sabbath-keepers are to keep Sabbath.

If that were done the world would be in a far better condition than it now is. There would be less of a form of religion without the power. But it will never be done. The observance of Sunday has no warrant whatever in the Scriptures, and first-day advocates are so conscious of this fact that they realise the impossibility of inducing the people generally to observe the day at all, if deprived of the power of the civil law in its behalf. Therefore we may expect that Sunday will be more and more strictly guarded by law, and that as a form of religion is thus enforced, the power thereof will correspondingly decline. But all those who love the Lord give fresh heed to His word alone, and thus have no fellowship with anything except that which is backed by the power of the Holy Ghost.

"In the Hollow of His Hand" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

Anyone who has been at sea in a storm knows how utterly insignificant man and all his works appear in comparison with the force disporting itself about him. Yet "the Lord on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty waves of the sea." Ps. xciii. 4. The forces that we see in nature are but the "outskirts of His ways."

If you wish for a vivid illustration of God's infinite power, fill the palm of the hand with water, and note how few drops there are, and how easily they are comprehended. Then know that God "hath measured the waters in the hollow of His hand" (Isa. xl. 12), these waters that wash all shores, and across which the traveller sails day after day with no horizon but the waves. He cannot go beyond the hollow of the Lord's hand, and as water that is held carefully in the hand, so near are we in all the affairs of our lives to the heart and thought of God.

This fortieth of Isaiah begins with, "Comfort ye, comfort ye My people," and the comfort is that all the mighty power of God revealed in the chapter is pledged to the faint. When things go wrong, and you are tempted to think that even the Lord cannot hold them level and bring calmness and quietness to the troubled waters, just fill the hollow of your hand and see how easily you can hold it still. With infinitely greater ease the Lord can bring quietness and peace into the troubled life.

"The Source of Comfort" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

Comfort, like every other blessing, has its source in God. He is "the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort." 2 Cor. i. 3. In other words, all mercy and all comfort spring from Him. He gives comfort for every affliction, no matter how great, to all who will come to Him as to a Father. But no comfort can be found elsewhere. Those who can give the most comfort to an individual are not those least afflicted, as we might naturally suppose, but those who have most of the Spirit of God, the Comforter.

Paul and Silas, when released from prison at Philippi, after they had been beaten severely and had their feet bound in the stocks, might be thought to have been the most in need of comfort among the leaders there; but we are not told that they were comforted by their brethren, but that the brethren were comforted by them. Acts xvi.

167

23, 24, 40. They themselves had the comfort which comes from God, and having this in a larger measure than their brethren, they were able to impart comfort to them.

It was after many years of trouble and persecution that Paul wrote to his brethren in Corinth: "Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God." 2 Cor. i. 3, 4. Having this assurance, we need not faint in the day of trial and adversity. It is only when people cut themselves off from God by refusing to believe His word to them, that they are left without comfort and hope; and only when they have the comfort of God themselves that they are fitted to be a help and a blessing to others.

When we can say, with Jesus Christ, "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me," then we can also say, "He hath anointed Me to preach good tidings unto the meek; He hath sent Me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound; . . to comfort all that mourn." Isa. lxi. 1, 2. This is the highest and noblest work that lies within the sphere of human attainment. God imparts the Spirit freely, and all who will accept it and take it, will do this work.

"Belief and Action" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

Belief and Action.-There is no such thing as belief without action on the part of the one believing, where it is possible for him to act. Men may think they believe while they do not act; but in this they only deceive themselves and others. We speak of a decrease of belief, as if one kind of conviction could be stronger than another; but in reality there is but one kind of conviction, for when we know a thing, we cannot proceed any further in the way of ascertaining its truth. We cannot have any stronger reason for taking action than positive knowledge. If we do not act, it is because we do not truly believe.

The man who thinks he believes the word of God, and yet is not moved to action in harmony therewith, only deceives himself. Believing is yielding to God, and resistance to the devil. We cannot believe that what God says is true, without acquiescing with His will, which is yielding to Him. And yielding to Him is itself resistance to Satan,-the only effectual resistance it is in our power to make. But God never lets an individual who yields Him remain destitute of His own life and power, but immediately fills him with it; so that action becomes the inseparable accompaniment of faith; for no one filled with the spirit and life of God, can possibly remain inactive. If therefore you are not an active Christian, you are not a Christian at all.

"Sunday Slavery" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

A London newsagent, says The News, strongly urges the publishers who supply Sunday papers to bring out the addition on Saturday evening, stating for himself and others, that "we have ascertained beyond a doubt that nearly all our customers would be more than satisfied." In behalf of his view he says:-

It is alleged that the British workman will have his Sunday paper regardless of any one, therefore it must be supplied him. Surely this misrepresents the attitude of those whose working hours are limited, and whose Sunday rest is so jealously guarded! Will the working classes (for whom the Sunday editions alone are produced) repel this charge of selfishness, and assist a longsuffering body of their fellow-workers to attain to the same privileges they themselves enjoy? If so, the victory is won, and Sunday publishing is doomed. I may say that I myself have never touched Sunday trade, directly or indirectly, from strong Sabbatarian principles, believing in the wisdom of the old commandment, "Six days shalt thou labour," so I am the more ready to lend a hand to free those who chafe under the present state of things. What chance have those who are discouraged and demoralised by forced Sunday labour of attaining a knowledge of things concerning man's higher self?

"Forced Sunday labour." This can be nothing else than Sunday slavery. A person who is compelled to labour against his will is a slave. It is a sad thing, truly, that a portion of our citizens should be kept, even for one day in the week, in a condition of involuntary servitude.

What holds them thus? The true cause of such slavery must first be found before we can know the remedy.

It will be said, of course, that the printing and delivering of a Sunday paper necessitates Sunday work. And this is true. But does this fact compel any person in the kingdom to labour involuntarily on Sunday? Are not all persons free to act their own pleasure in the matter of the observance of Sunday?

Ah, the trouble is, if they should refuse to labour on Sunday they would in all probability lose their positions. So they dare not refuse; for if they should lose their places, they would not know what would become of them and of those dependent upon them for support. This is a sad condition to be in. It is slavery,-a compulsory and involuntary obedience to the dictates of another will than their own.

But we inquire, To what are they in bondage? And the answer is obvious: they are in bondage to fear,-the fear that it will not be well with them if they do that which their inclinations or it may be the dictates of conscience would lead them, were they free, to do.

There is a remedy for all this,-a full and complete one. Some, like the newsagent before quoted, propose to do away with all Sunday work; but this is at best an uncertain remedy, and one which would not touch the real difficulty,-the fear. It is far better to have the fear removed than simply to be relieved from the conditions which caused it to be left, and thus leave it to spring again into activity whenever these happen to change.

This is what the true remedy does; it removes the fear. It sets the soul free from every possible thing to which it could be brought into bondage. The remedy is Jesus Christ and His freedom.

Christ has given Himself to every individual, and whosoever will accept Him, will have Him. And having Him, he will have all things; for all things are in Him, He being their Author and Upholder. God the Father has blessed us with all spiritual blessings in Christ; and we have the declaration, "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?"

No person can have Jesus Christ and still be in bondage of any kind. Christ sets the soul free from all slavery. Having Him, we have no fear. No; we "have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear." Rom. viii. 15; 2 Tim. i. 7. We are sons and daughters of the Omnipotent, and have no fear that it cannot be well with us while doing the will of our Father. For "all things work together for good to them that love God." Rom. viii. 28.

This is freedom worth having. "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty;" and that liberty is perfect liberty which nothing on earth can take away. And of this freedom there is no better symbol than the Sabbath,-the weekly day of rest; for that day is a day of perfect freedom and rest in the Lord, to all who will take it as God has made it. Six days we must labour, and do all our work; but when the Sabbath day comes we

168

enter a period of time when our own work and all that pertains to the cares and perplexities of our earthly subsistence is shut out, and the soul is left free to rest in Him who is the source of all pleasure and delight.

So to all who are in bondage to any fear, we say, Come to the liberty that is in Christ. Do not trust to man's efforts to give you liberty, but trust in the work of One who can never fail. Liberty by human law,-which is always compulsion and force, and in Sunday observance and other religious matters always contrary to the Gospel,-is not true liberty. The true liberty is found in being actuated by "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus." The freedom of Christ takes all worry and anxiety out of our lives. Come, then, to Him and be set free. "If the Son. . . shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed." John viii. 36.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

There is said to be considerable anxiety in Church circles as to the policy of the new Premier and ecclesiastical appointments. Lord Roseberry, it is stated, is "as indifferent to rival Church parties as Gallio was to Christianity itself."

The officials in St. Petersburg maintain stoutly, and no doubt sincerely, that there exists no religious persecution in Russia. The persecutor generally makes himself believe that the exercise of his power is because of his charity for mistaken souls.

We are glad to learn, from a letter of Mr. Henry Frowde to The Church Times, that there is very little demand for the New Testament, either revised or old version, apart from the Old Testament. This is as it should be. There is no more reason for cutting the Bible in two between Malachi and Matthew, than between Isaiah and Jeremiah, or Luke and John. It is all one book, inspired by the same Spirit, and all equally profitable.

The Dean of St. Paul's said in a recent speech:-

To compel a poor person to send his child to a Board School, where a system of religious instruction was taught in which neither he nor anyone else believes, and then to find or imprison him if he did not, was, in his opinion, a system of religious persecution parallel to that in Rome, when the heathens burnt Christians because they did not believe in heathenism.

But even though someone else believes, the injustice is the same to the parent who is compelled to patronise a religion which does not believe. Here is where both sides in the religious instruction controversy miss the mark.

The London School Board is still wrestling with the problem of religious education. Those who oppose definite religious instruction have the most difficult part of the problem to solve, since they believe that it is the duty of the State to teach religion. The task which they have set for themselves is that of showing how religion can be taught in Board Schools, without having any definite doctrines taught. If they would take the position that the State cannot by any possibility teach the Christian religion, and that when it attempts to do so the result is only Paganism, they would be consistent in their protests.

"Terribly Handicapped" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

Terribly Handicapped.-A physician, who has been making a study of the children of habitual drunkards in the slums of Paris, says: "There is a flaw in the very nature of those young wretches, that the psychologist sees clearly and notes with apprehension-the absence of affectionate emotions; and where they do not become the lunatics, they show insensibility and pitilessness." What an awful harvest the world must yet see from the vice of intemperance, which is filling the slums of all the great cities. And this same law of heredity must surely work in all grades of society; for it is no respecter of persons. The nursing babe, whose mother thinks she requires the stronger spirits as a stimulant, is very often getting from one to three per cent of alcohol, we are told, in the mother's milk, and the foundation of the appetite for liquor is well laid before the child can walk. Intemperance is but one of the evils which are at work to make men hard and pitiless, "unthankful, unholy, without natural affection," as Paul says in describing the last days. Now as never before, it is for every soul that knows the Lord to crucify the flesh and add temperance to knowledge; for there is a Gospel to be proclaimed that has actual and present power to break every yoke, and save to the uttermost all who are willing to be separated from sin.

"The Altar" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

The Altar.-A writer in the Irish Ecclesiastical Gazette refers to Isa. lvi. 7, and asks, "Can this be a prediction of an altarless church?" No; it is not. But the altar is not one lighted with candles, for the performance of the mass. The verse reads: "Even them will I bring to My mountain, and make them joyful in My house of prayer: their burnt offerings and sacrifices shall be accepted upon Mine altar; for Mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people." The apostle in Hebrews tells us what the sacrifice is: "By Him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name." Chap. xiii. 15. And the altar is described by John in the Revelation: "And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel's hand." Rev. viii. 3, 4. This is the altar to which we have access by the faith of Jesus. There is courage in the thought that not a petition that comes from the heart is lost, but all are offered up before God, mingled with the sweet grace of Christ, His merits and intercessions. Let no timid soul find discouragement in the fact that it is the prayers of all saints that are offered before the throne. The saints of the Bible are people who know that they are sinners, and who know that Christ died to save them from their sins.

"An 'Unhappy Dogma'" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

An "Unhappy Dogma."-The Guardian, which is supposed to represent a large majority in the Church of England, speaks of the "unhappy dogma" of justification by faith, which Luther preached. Luther did not preach it as a dogma, but as a life, and such it is. The grand truth that sinners are "justified freely by His grace" is now as unknown to multitudes who go through the forms of religion in all sincerity, as it was in pre-Reformation days.

"The Cost of War" The Present Truth 10, 11.

E. J. Waggoner

The Cost of War.-The support of the three and a half millions of Europe's standing army is impoverishing the people, and it is no wonder that financiers are looking with apprehension at the cost of putting into the field the entire war footing of fifteen million drilled soldiers. "The statement which is sometimes made," says a scientific journal, "that the fortunes of war are decided behind the green baize doors of bankers' private offices, contains more truth than is at first apparent."

March 22, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Whatever a man eats that is not real food, is not only useless to him, but is a positive injury, since it taxes the digestive organs, without adding any strength. Therefore anything that one eats, that is not or cannot be assimilated, and does not go to build up the system, is only a damage.

Even so it is with our reading. If we read that which is not useful,-that which does not tend to build us up, and make us stronger mentally and spiritually,-it is only an injury to us. It is even worse than eating that which is not good food. It is both a waste of time, and a wasting away of the faculties.

It is much the same if we read even good matter, and do not think as we read. To be sure, we are not having our minds poisoned, as when worthless trash is read; but the mental powers are not strengthened by such reading, but vitiated instead. Such a manner of reading weakens the memory, and is little better than dreaming. In short, if we do not get positive nourishment by what we read, our reading is, to say the least, of no benefit to us.

Apply this now to our reading of the Bible. If we read it simply as a story book, we get no real benefit, except that we are kept from reading something that is not good. If when we read the promises, or the record of victories which pertain to those promises, we see nothing more than the bare fact that certain men had certain experiences, then our reading is like swallowing clumps of food that is in itself good, but which is not digested nor assimilated.

The Bible is the language of the Spirit God spoken through men. Consequently it is not the language simply of the men who penned it. The Spirit of God, who knows the human heart and its needs, as well as the Divine gifts, has put language into the mouths of certain men, which may be used by all. So when we read the words of David, "Bless the Lord, O my soul, . . . who forgiveth all thine iniquities" (Ps. ciii. 1-3) we are to appropriate that language as our own. If we do so, we shall understand the Scriptures, and shall be benefited by them. But if we are content to read it simply as David's experience, it is the same to us as though it had not been written.

Let us learn to read the Scriptures in this way, and the Bible will soon be a new book to us. The reading of it will be a delight. When we read reproofs and warnings, we shall know that they mean us personally; and when we read the promises which always accompany reproofs, we shall rejoice in them as much as though we were addressed by name. When we read the statement of experience, we shall adopt it as our own, and realise all the benefit of it.

Until we learn to read the Bible in this way, we cannot be said to really believe in it. We may indeed believe that God spoke to and blessed David and Paul; but if we do not make that language and blessing our own, we do not really believe the word, for it is addressed to us. If you wish to know if you really believe the whole Bible, you may test yourself by this text:-

"I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Gal. ii. 20.

If you read this merely as Paul's experience, then you have not yet learned to believe the Bible. But if in reading it you can speak that word "I" as meaning yourself, and can repeat the text intelligently as the language of your own heart, as the Spirit of God meant that you should, then you really believe not that verse alone, but the whole Bible, and the joy of God's salvation is yours.

"Willing and Able" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

The teachings of the epistles of the New Testament are all illustrated by the life of Christ. For instance, we read in Gal. i. 4 that Christ "gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father." The will of the Father was manifest in the Son, and that will is that we might be delivered from this present evil world.

This is practically illustrated by the miracle of cleansing the leper, which is recorded in Luke v. 12-15. The leper said to Christ, "Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me a clean." Jesus "put forth His hand, and touched him, saying, I will; be thou clean. And immediately the leprosy departed from him."

Here we see the effect of the will of God in Christ Jesus, upon one who submitted to it. "This is the will of God, even your sanctification." 1 Thess. iv. 3. How easily that will is accomplished, is seen in the case with which the leprosy was cleansed. From that we are to learn how to be cleansed, the leprosy of sin. Knowing that

178

it is the will of God that we should be cleansed from sin, and that He has given Christ power over all flesh (John xvii. 2), we may approach Him with confidence. The apostle says:-

"And this is the confidence that we have in Him, that, if we ask any thing according to His will, He heareth us; and if we know that He hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of Him." 1 John v. 14, 15.

So we may come to the Lord, not as the leper did, saying, "Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean," but saying, "Lord, I am unclean; Thou canst cleanse me, and it is Thy will to do so; therefore I know that Thou dost hear and answer, and I have cleansing from Thee." For the promise is, "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

"Working with Him" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Behold in the miraculous draught of fishes, recorded in the fifth of Luke, the difference between working without the Lord, and working with Him. Jesus said, "Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught." Peter answered, "Master we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing; nevertheless at Thy word I will let down the net." The result was that "they enclosed a great multitude of fishes."

This miracle, which immediately preceded the calling of forth of the apostles, was designed as a lesson for them, and for us as well. We may learn that work under the direction of Lord, and with His presence, will bring great results, even after much more arduous toil in the same place, without Him, has accomplished nothing.

We hear a great deal in these days about working for the Lord, but very little about working with Him. Now this latter is what the Bible speaks of, while it says nothing about the former. There is a vast difference. Many people, in their zeal to work for the Lord, set tasks for themselves, which He has not required. This is not always the case; but if one is content to work only with the Lord, such a mistake can never be made.

He who works for the Lord, often labours with all his might, but with only his own mind, and then asks the Lord to bless his efforts. He who labours with the Lord, asks the Lord to work in him, "both to will and to do of His own good pleasure." He who speaks only the words of the Lord, needs not to ask the Lord to "give power to the word," because he knows that "no word from God shall be void of power." His word will accomplish that which He pleases, and prosper in the thing whereto He sends it.

"We then, as workers together with Him, beseech you that ye receive not the grace of God in vain."

"How to Obey" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

In the record of the call of the apostles, we have a lesson on how the Lord wishes men to obey His call, "Follow Me." Simon and Andrew were fishers. Jesus said, "Come ye after Me, and I will make you to become fishers of men." Not a moment did they hesitate, but "straightway they forsook their nets, and followed Him." Mark i. 17, 18.

Peter and John were also fishers. They were in their boat, mending their nets, which had been broken by the great number of fish that they had just taken. See Mark i. 19; and Luke v. 6. Jesus called them, "and they left their father Zebedee in the ship with the hired servants, and went after Him."

"And after these things He went forth, and saw a publican, named Levi, sitting at the receipt of custom; and He said unto him, Follow me. And he left all, rose up, and followed Him." Luke. v. 27, 28.

There are two great difficulties that confront people when they are asked to follow Christ. That is, most people are confronted by one or the other of them. One of them is the poverty of the one called, and the other is the wealth. One man hesitates because he has hard work to make a living, and he doesn't know how his family will be provided for if he obeys the Lord. Another man has so extensive a business on his hands that it is impossible to leave it, at least until he has had time to arrange his affairs.

Both these classes of people are represented in the above calls, but they took no account of the difficulties. We know that Peter had a family, and being a humble fisherman he could not have been wealthy. Yet he did not stop to consider how he should support his family if he obeyed the voice of Jesus, but left his nets, and went with Him.

Levi was wealthy, for the office of publican was a very lucrative one; yet he left his business at a moment's notice, when Jesus said to him, "Follow Me."

So it was with Paul. He says, "But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by His grace, to reveal his Son in me, that I might preach Him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood." Gal. i. 15, 16.

That is the way the Lord wishes men to obey His voice. He reveals Himself in the Sabbath of the fourth commandment-the seventh day, see Ex. xx. 8-11-and says to them, "Follow Me." Many hesitate. With some, it is their poverty that stands in the way. They don't see how they can live if they keep the Sabbath, forgetting that people who did not keep the Sabbath also die; and forgetting that it is the Creator of the heaven and earth, who calls them; forgetting that He who calls them to obey Him, says, "the silver is Mine and the gold is Mine" (Haggai ii. 8), and also, "The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof." Ps. xxiv. 1. Of His power to provide for His followers, we have a striking proof in the wonderful draught of fishes that the disciples took at His word.

The more wealthy are still more inclined to hesitate to obey the call which Jesus sends them in the Sabbath, because the Sabbath is the best day for business. They do not reflect that it is He who gives them power to get wealth (Deut. viii. 18), and that He is just as able to give wealth to those who obey Him, as He is to give it to those who disobey Him; and that, after all, "a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth."

Men cannot be too slow to follow strange and doubtful voices; they cannot be too cautious about moving when God has not spoken; but they cannot be too quick to obey the voice of the Lord. David said, "I made haste, and delayed not, to keep Thy commandments." Ps. cxix. 60. And then he declared that he would run in the way of the commandments of God. God's will is to be done on earth as it is in heaven; and in heaven the angels "do His commandments, hearkening unto the voice of His word.

"Christ and His Prophets" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Christ and His Prophets.-It was Christ who inspired the writings of all the prophets. Peter testifies that "the Spirit of Christ. . . was in them" (1 Pet. i. 11), and Christ Himself said of the Old Testament scriptures, "they

179

are they which testify of Me." John v. 39. If we slight them, we are slighting the testimony of Christ; and if we read them without seeing in them Christ and His eternal life, we are no more profited thereby than were the Jews who would not come to Christ that they might have life.

"Saved by His Life" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Every lost soul will one day acknowledge that God has done everything for him, and that God gave him life and he would not hold it. God has given eternal life to every soul on this earth. "Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life." Rom. v. 18.

"The law entered that the offence might abound." How many have offended against God?-"All have sinned and come short of the glory of God." "But where sin abounded grace did much more abound." Sin abounds in the heart of man. The natural heart is the most prolific soil in the world. Men have tried to cut off the weeds of sin, and dig them out, but they have sprung up and overshadowed everything. That is abounding sin. But the statement is that where sin abounded grace did much more abound. Therefore every soul is surrounded with an atmosphere of grace. God has done everything for man. "What could have been done more to My vineyard, than I have not done in it?" says the Lord. Every power to act that the man has, every capability of sinning, has been because of the grace of God perverted. Our very existence is because of the grace of God. Our life is the breathing in of the grace of God; but if we do not consciously accept God, if we do not yield to Him, of what use is the life? "What is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" Then those who breathe in the grace of God do it in vain if they do not acknowledge it.

How much of the grace of God we have squandered! How much we have perverted and abused! We have used it as a common thing. This thing comes to us with a force that would be crushing were it not for the knowledge that grace brings salvation. There is no room for condemnation; for the moment we recognise the grace we have squandered, the breath we have used in idle talk and to deny Christ, the powers we have used to work our own evil way of selfishness, the very recognition of that fact brings knowledge of the grace that forgives sin.

Oh, the wonderful patience of God! Day after day and year after year He showers His grace. He causes His sun to shine on the evil and on the good, and sends His rain on the just and the unjust. He sends the fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness. He is witnessing of Himself all the time, and has patiently kept it up year after year, while we were groveling like the beast, and not recognising it. But if we begin to recognise it, what can we not expect of the Lord? "For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life." Rom. v. 10. We are saved by the same thing that reconciles us. In His death He gave His life to us, and when we recognise that, and as we are recognising it, we are saved by His life.

"Purging the Church" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

This is the way a Church of England clergy man has proposed in a letter to the English Churchman, to purge that body of the Ritualism which is fast making it an exact copy of the Roman Catholic body:-

There is a "constitutional means" and the only "practical means." Secession won't "purge the Church;" moving the table to the centre of the church won't "purge the Church." It would be moved back again by the next incumbent, perhaps. But making it, by Act of Parliament, illegal, under suspension or deprivation, for any clergyman to turn his back to the people, to use lighted candles except in case of atmospheric darkness, or at any time during service to make the sign of the cross, or to use a mixed chalice, or any other than pure wheaten bread at the Lord's Supper, or any hymn during the administration of the Lord's Supper, or to wear any vestment other than the surplice, except in the case of the bishops, the usual episcopal robes being allowed, and the academical hood and black gown in the pulpit; and then, as I have said before, no Reformation would be required in our purely Protestant Church, no progress in Ritualism or Romanism would or could be made, as far as outward symbols are concerned; and Ritualists and Romanistic teachers would then find that there is no scope for their purposes in the Established Church of England.

The statement that under such an Act of Parliament no progress in Romanism could be made, "as far as outward symbols are concerned," is quite safe. But what difference does it make whether any progress toward Romanism is made in "outward symbols" or not, if inwardly the clergy and members are full of Romish sentiment? If the sentiment is within, it is no worse for it to find expression; and if it is not within, there is no danger. And there is no one so enamoured of civil legislation for the church, that he will claim that an Act of Parliament can change men's hearts.

The Jewish Church was never more corrupt than when it was most correct in all the externals. Hear the words of Christ: "Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess. Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also." Matt. xxiii. 25, 26.

Read also the list of sins recited by the Apostle Paul, as being committed in the last days by those possessing "a form of godliness but denying the power thereof." 2 Tim. iii. 1-5. The form may be secured by strict legislation, but the more Acts of Parliament are depended upon for purging the Church, the more will the power of godliness be denied.

Suppose that an Act of Parliament were obtained, what surety could be given that it would not be repealed by some succeeding Parliament? It is majorities that make laws; and even though a majority might at present be opposed to the outward forms of Romanism, the inward tendency would not be legislated out of a single soul, and in time a majority would be found, who would reverse everything.

How then shall the church be purged, not only of Ritualism, but of every other evil? Here is the answer: "Christ also loved the church, and gave Himself for it, that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word." Eph. v. 25, 26. Said Christ, "Now are ye clean through the word which I have spoken unto you." John xv. 3. "If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin." 1 John i. 7.

Here is cleansing that is cleansing indeed. Every attempt to cleanse the church by any other means will prove as ineffectual as to attempt to stop the flood of a river with a barbed wire fence. Indeed, civil legislation for the church only increases the evil; for the only real Gospel power is the power of God; and just to the extent that the church depends on civil power, will it neglect the power of God; and where the power of God is lacking,

180

there the power of the devil will be supreme. And thus civil legislation in behalf of religion, instead of purging the Church, will at last bring it into the condition described by the angel:

"Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird." Rev. xviii. 2. There is only one way by which this deplorable condition can be brought about, and that is by the church's depending on worldly power, in defiance of the word of God.

"Thus saith the Lord, Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord. For he shall be like the heath in the desert, and shall not see when good cometh; but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, in a salt land and not inhabited." Jer. xvii. 5, 6.

"Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help. His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish. Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Lord his God, which made heaven, and earth, the sea, and all that therein is: which keepeth truth forever." Ps. cxlvi. 3-6.

Parliament cannot change the heart, but God can create a new heart; parliaments, with all their powerlessness, are subject to change, but God in His might is "from everlasting to everlasting."

"A Pitiful Story" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

A Pitiful Story.-In an editorial entitled, "Going into the Highways and Byways," illustrative of the work of the Salvation Army, the New York Independent relates the following incident:-

In a revival in a church, recently, a woman whose life was bad, and who had been touched by a sermon at the funeral of her child, was converted. Her penitence was real, her determination to lead a new life fixed. She at once broke off her sinful relations, but would not join the church. "I cannot," she said; "I should not feel at home. The women know what my life has been; they would try to be kind, but I must go elsewhere." And the women of the church did not urge her. She joined the Salvation Army. "It will make no difference there," she said, "I can work with them."

The most pitiful part of this story is that the Independent does not recognise in it anything out of the way. It rejoices that there is such a body as the Salvation Army, where such people can be made welcome, but does not seem to realise what a terrible shame it is to the church, that such things should be. The fact that it is taken as a matter of course that people of notoriously bad lives, who repent, cannot feel at home in the churches, reveals the painful fact that the churches have largely forgotten the words of their reputed Head, "I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance," and have become too much like respectable social clubs. The greatest honour ever bestowed on Christ was the sneering statement of the scribes and Pharisees, "This man receiveth sinners." Not only so, but He seeks them out. Let those who call themselves by His name remember that the disciple is not above his Lord.

"A Difficult Class" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

A Difficult Class.-An item of school news in the journal of a missionary of the Universities' Mission to Central Africa shows one of the difficulties of the teacher with a class of Central African juveniles when he has to teach them in a language of which he is not yet a master:-

I try a little religious instruction, reading first Bible stories out of Yao lesson-book. I read a sentence, and then all the boys repeat it after me. This is not quite a success, for if I try to question them on the subject matter, they only repeat my question, and whatever I say. Thus yesterday, having read to them about the creation and Adam and Eve, I asked them in the best Yao available, "Who made the world?" The boys all echoed, "Who made the world?"

I then said: "Don't repeat my words, but answer me."

The boys altogether.-"Don't repeat my words, but answer me."

Teacher.-"I want you to tell me who made the world."

Boys.-"I want you tell me," etc.

Teacher.-"Now, don't say my words."

Boys.-"Now, don't say my words."

Teacher (getting impatient, and lapsing into English).-"Oh, you sillies!"

Boys.-"Oh, oo 'illies!" (Loud laughter.)

One does not seem to get much forwarder by this plan. However, by-and-by we shall hope to do better.

"Look Up" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Look Up.-It has been said, If you would be discouraged, look within; if you would be distracted, look within; if you would be distracted, look around; but if you would be revived and strengthened, look up. Jesus Christ Himself has bidden us look up. There is something better to look at than the things that are seen in the world. We are in the time spoken of by our Saviour to His disciples when they had inquired what should be the sign of His coming,-the time of which He said, "Look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh." Luke xxi. 28. Are you waiting for the day of redemption, "looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ"? If you are not, your life is without the brightest knowledge and the grandest privilege which our time affords.

"'This Is Our God'" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

"This Is Our God."-In the day of our Lord's appearing it will be said, "Lo, this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us. This is the Lord; we have waited for Him; we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation." Isa. xxv. 9. These words, however, will be spoken only by those who know the Lord. There will be an emphasis on "this" and "our;" "Lo, this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us." For just before this the people who know not God-whether in the world or in the church-will have professed allegiance to another, even to him who "is transformed into an angel of light" (2 Cor. xi. 14), and whose steadfast aim is to put himself before men in the place of God. It is not enough to know that Christ is coming; we must also be acquainted with Him, so that we may be able to recognise Him when He comes.

"Being Thankful" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Being Thankful.-We often hear the expression that we are not as thankful to the Lord as we ought to be. We do not have to make an effort to be thankful. The effort to be thankful is unthankfulness. If, after we have done a favour for an individual, the person has to make a great effort to be thankful to us for it, we would rather he would not make the effort. Thankfulness is the natural outgrowth of a recognition of favours granted. If the person is not thankful, he does not recognise the favour. He takes it as his right. But whoever recognises that he has received a favour, will be thankful. So we have nothing to do with making ourselves thankful. All we have to do is to recognise God. If we believe the promises of God, we cannot help being thankful. If we recognise that His life is given, our thankfulness will grow and increase. Thankfulness is a sign, then, of growth in grace.

"Faith and Breath" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Faith and Breath.-"The just shall live by faith." Rom. i. 17. That means that their whole life will be faith, as the Apostle Paul said, "The life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Gal. ii. 20. Faith, therefore, is not a thing of a moment; the man who believes a thing to-day, and is in doubt about it to-morrow, has not faith. Faith is continuous; it is an everlasting

181

foundation. All men live by breathing. They cannot live by breathing one day, and ceasing to breathe the next day. As soon as they cease to breathe, they cease to live. So it is with faith; when faith ceases, the righteous life ceases. He who exercises faith as often and as long as he breathes, will be righteous as long as he lives.

"How He Knew" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

How He Knew.-How did Moses learn about the creation? There was no man living when the heavens and earth were created, so that he could not have learned the story from man. Those who assume that he compiled the narrative from various existing documents, do not help the matter at all. For no man who lived before Moses had any better chance to learn about creation than he had. Even Adam had no more personal knowledge of the facts of creation than Moses had; for creation was complete when Adam first saw the light. He saw nothing of the process himself. Then how did Moses know what to write? Did he imagine it?-Not at all; he wrote just what he knew, because the Lord told him. He who created the heavens and earth, "made known His ways unto Moses, His acts unto the children of Israel" (Ps. ciii. 7), for the Lord spoke to him mouth to mouth. Num. xii. 8. This is the way the entire Bible was written, "for no prophecy ever came by the will of man; but men spake from God, being moved by the Holy Ghost."

"Not an Allegory" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Not an Allegory.-Some people think to strike a happy mean between the idea that the first chapters of Genesis are actual history, and the theory that they are pure fiction, by claiming that they are allegorical. Of all such it may be said, "They know not what they do." They do not realise that any view other than that those chapters describe actual occurrences, is a denial of the whole Bible, and of the very Gospel. The third chapter of Genesis tells how sin came into the world, and contains the first promise of the Saviour, who should die for the sin. To deny the literalness of that account, is to deny the story of the cross. Upon the first and second chapters of Genesis, the fourth commandment is based. If they were not literal history, the Sabbath would be gone. This indeed is why those chapters are discredited. But they who discredit the story of creation, and the Sabbath, do not realise that in so doing they are denying sanctification. God says, "I gave them My Sabbaths, to be a sign between Me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord that sanctify them." Eze. xx. 12. Without the knowledge of creation and the Sabbath, there can be no knowledge of perfect sanctification. "Thy word is truth from the beginning." Ps. cxix. 160. It is all "profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." 2 Tim. iii. 16, 17.

"Creation and the Cross" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Creation and the Cross.-The eternal power of God is clearly seen in the things that He has made. Rom. i. 20. Creation is the measure of God's power. Not that anyone save God can measure it, because it is infinite; but the power manifested in creation is the same power that saves men from sin. Rom. i. 16, 17. So that the Gospel is simply creative power applied to sinful men. See Eph. ii. 10; 2 Cor. v. 17. But the preaching of the cross is also the power of God. 1 Cor. i. 17, 18, 23, 24. Christ crucified is the power and the wisdom of God, and so it is the Gospel. On the cross Christ shed His blood to reconcile us to God, in the forgiveness of our sins. Col. i. 14; Rom. v. 9, 10. The blood is the life (Lev. xvii. 11, 14); so that it is the taking of the life of Christ that reconciles us to God. But we have redemption through His blood, because in Him were all things created. Col. i. 14-16. He is the source of the creation. Rom. i. 14. All created things sprang from His life. So that the power of the cross, by which we are saved, is the power by which the worlds were made. Thus it is that if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature, or a new creation. Only as we consider the power of God as manifested in creation, can we learn the wonderful power of the cross. David said, "For thou, Lord, hast made me glad through Thy works; I will triumph in the works of Thy hands." And Paul wrote, "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ." And both of them gloried and triumphed in the same thing.

"For a Time of Need" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

For a Time of Need.-If we do not grasp that which we profess to believe, and lay hold upon it for deliverance from sin in time of temptation, it shows that we do not understand that thing about which we talk. Every word of God may be laid hold of it in time of temptation, and it is deliverance. We are to lay hold of the life that is in the word; for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus makes us free. We are to find life and godliness in every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.

"Christian Service" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

If there was less talk about service, there would be more service. We talk about service, and seem to regard the Lord as a Master merely. He is indeed a Master, and a very good one; but He is more than that; He is a Father, and He loves His children, and has given His life for them. The service which He wishes us to do for Him, is to yield ourselves to Him, that He may serve the world through us.

We do not discount the idea of labouring. The one who knows the Lord, and loves Him, will do all the Lord wants him to do, and the Lord wants people to be very busy and active. But there are those active who do not know the Lord. Mere activity is not a sign of knowing the Lord. The Lord's own life of activity and blessedness will be operating and controlling in that one who really knows Him and receives that life by faith.

Before working there is something necessary, and that is, to get alive. And when one gets alive, and lives by faith there will be work done. The people in darkness want light, but it is the life of Christ that is the light of men. Many seem to regard light as a mere working of the intellect. It is supposed that we get light by a well drawn argument showing the relation of two or more texts. But that kind of light does not lighten the darkness. "He that followeth Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life."

"Cannot Forget" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Cannot Forget.-The woman referred to in another item, who lived a loose life, but had repented, could not join the church, because, as she said: "I should not feel at home. The women know what my life has been; they would try to be kind, but they could not forget." She was not complaining, but was stating a simple fact; and the women themselves showed it to be a fact, by their willingness to have her go elsewhere. Thank God that not all churches are like that one. And although a part of any church, or the whole of it, may have that feeling, it is still a fact that no Christian-no true follower of Christ-ever turns the

182

cold shoulder to one who is or has been a sinner. Whenever professed Christians cannot forget the sins that another has committed, it is because they have forgotten that they themselves are or were sinners. Every one who knows the Lord, knows himself to be a sinner, even the chief of sinners;-a sinner saved by the grace of God;-and such an one can never despise any on account of their sins. "All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; being justified freely by His grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." Therefore boasting-the Pharisaic boasting of self-righteousness-is excluded. All are one in Christ Jesus.

"Light and Works" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Light and Works.-The Saviour said, "Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven." Matt. v. 16. Most people unconsciously reverse the order, assuming that it reads, "Do so many good works before men, that they may see your light and glorify"-whom?-Man. But the light is to shine so that men may see the good works. What is the light?-Jesus said, "I am the Light of the world; he that followeth Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life" (John viii. 12); because His life is the light. John i. 4. Now when the light of Christ's life shines in a man, it will make it manifest that his deeds "are wrought in God." John iii. 21. So both the light and the works are from God, and that is the reason why He will be glorified when they are seen.

"Offended Feelings" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

A Spanish correspondent reports that the Protestant churches in some of the provinces have been closed, and a church in Madrid has been required to close its front entrance, and use the side door, as the open doors on the street constituted an offence against the religious sentiments of the people.

Offended feelings have played a great part in the history of religious persecutions. It is human nature to take offence because someone has the temerity to differ from its opinions; and because the great majority of men in all ages have clung to the natural disposition, religious history-Catholic and Protestant alike-has to record manifestations of intolerance in every chapter.

In an old volume, published about a century ago, Rev. Jno. Macgowan, of London, gave some of the shifting scenes in modern church history. In answer to the question, "Has any sect besides the papists been found to persecute those who differ from them?" he says:-

Yes, every sect who has, at any time, been happy enough to grasp the reins of government for the time being. The worthy papists bore the bell of orthodoxy for the space of twelve hundred and sixty years, during which time much blood was shed by open massacres, secret assassinations, pretended judiciaries, acts of bloody faith; and at last to finish the bloody reign of antichrist, England, France, the Netherlands, and the valleys of Piedmont swam with the gore of such who would believe the Bible sooner than the voice of the priests. Queen Mary's reign furnished the Orthodox in her day, with a fine opportunity of discovering their zeal for the church, by murdering those who believed and obeyed the Bible; but her reign being short, and Elizabeth ascending the throne upon her demise, the other scale rose uppermost, and the Protestants, in their turn, became orthodox, i.e., got the government into their hands.

Oh, the violence of repeated orthodoxy! Those same gentlemen were no sooner emerged from prison than they also let the world know that they were not to be differed from with impunity; that their formula of their faith and worship must be regarded with as implicit obedience as that in the former reign imposed by the papists. Now the Presbyterians, Independents, and other Congregationalists felt the weight of their rage, or, if you please, zeal for orthodoxy and the good of the Church. Now the prison-keepers and their friend, Master Ketch, had pretty near as good a run of trade as in the reign of Mary. And now the wilds of America began to be well peopled with English Protestants who oppressed the dissenters; and the good Episcopalians at home, kept the fleece to themselves and had all the good of the Church before them.

But those said Presbyterians and Independents had no sooner crossed the ocean for conscience' sake, and found themselves secure from Episcopalian rage, than they themselves commenced orthodox, and set up their own formula as the standard of religion, to which they required as implicit submission from others as the good bishops of England had ere done for themselves; and now the poor antipedo-Baptists and Quakers were taught, that a mittimus is a mittimus whether it is signed by a papist, an Episcopalian or a Presbyterian, and that sentence of death is to be dreaded as much from the mouth of the latter as of the former. Those same dissenters who had so lately found Old England too hot for themselves, by the glowings of priestly zeal for orthodoxy, soon made New England too hot for the poor Quakers and antipedo-Baptists; who, to escape the rage for presbytery, fled, the one to Pennsylvania and the other to Rhode Island, that they might not be compelled to worship God according to other people's consciences and contrary to their own.

This is human nature, and a sorry picture it makes. Yet nowadays we hear about offences against religious sentiment even in professedly Protestant circles. The tendency toward regulating people's conduct by law in religious observances is increasingly manifest. It is now urged that men must be made to respect Sunday, just as it was formerly thought that respect for the communion or baptism must be enforced.

Religious sentiment may be offended and provoked to retaliation, but Christian sentiment never. Can we imagine such a thing of the Saviour, as that He should become offended and make somebody feel the penalty of differing from Him? He was meek, gentle, long-suffering, He gave His back to the smiters, and His cheeks to them that plucked off the hair; nor did He hide His face from shame and spitting. This is the spirit which is given to those who will let the human nature die, and become partakers of the Divine nature. This is Christianity. Is it not time for Christians to follow Christ?

"'All Things Continue'" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

"All Things Continue."-In the last days, we are told, there shall come scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of His coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." 2 Peter iii. 3, 4. It is natural for man to think that the things which seem to be firmly established now, will continue without serious change for ages to come. Those of whom the text speaks affirm that all things have continued the same from creation. But this is not true; for the world that was originally created perished in the flood, as the word of God declares. It is only the narrow range of a man's experience-comprised in his threescore and ten-that leads him to imagine that there is anything on this earth, and of it, that is permanent. "The heavens and earth which are now," we are plainly told, are "reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men." 2 Peter iii. 7.

"Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness?"

"Similarity in Externals" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Similarity in Externals.-The authorities of the British Museum have arranged an exhibit of objects identified with the ceremonial side of various religions. The collection of ecclesiastical trappings affords opportunity for instructive comparisons. The Thibet section, for example, is stated by the Echo to be "extremely interesting from its resemblance in externals to those of Christianity." There are the cowl-like hats of the Thibetan monks, a head-dress similar to the miter, various vestments, censors, holy water ewers, prayer cylinders, and rosaries. Now, these things antedate the days of

183

apostles. The false religions of Asia did not get their externals from the Christian Church. The reason of the similarity is perfectly well-known to historians. But the early church fell from its apostolic simplicity and purity, and thus from its apostolic power, it sought to gain favour with heathenism round about it by adopting and adapting the forms and mysteries of the pagan worship. Thus the church itself became permeated with Paganism. One would find nothing for exhibition in the externals of the apostolic church. Christ alone was exhibited, not by forms and ritual, but He was set forth by the preaching of the word in demonstration of the Spirit and of power.

"Faith and Religion" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Faith and Religion.-Is there a difference between religion and faith? We often hear the expression, "the faiths of the world." How many faiths are there?-The Scripture says there is but "one Lord, one faith." The papal definition of faith is "a system of doctrine or belief." The man who believes this system, whether he understands it or not, has faith. That is not Scripture faith. Faith is trust, it is building upon a sure foundation. It is that upon which the individual depends, and of course it is used only with reference to Christ; for he who depends upon anything else than Christ has no foundation. He who does not build upon the rock builds on the sand. But faith is a substance; it is the substance of Christ; for He is "the Author and finisher of faith." And therefore there is no faith except the faith that centres in Christ.

"The Lord's Forgetfulness" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

The Lord's Forgetfulness.-There is not a sin that any soul has committed, that is not known to God. Yet the Psalmist uttered the following inspired prayer: "Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions; according to Thy mercy remember Thou me, for Thy goodness' sake, O Lord." Ps. xxv. 7. It is the Spirit that teaches us how to pray, because He knows the human heart, and also the mind of God, and He maketh intercession for us according to the will of God. Rom. viii. 26, 27. Therefore we may know that it is the will of God to forget our sins, and we may ask it in full assurance. God says of those who hearken to His voice, and yield to His Spirit: "Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more." Heb. viii. 12. What a blessed assurance! The great God, who knows all our sins as even we ourselves cannot know them, receives us gladly, and treats us as though we had never sinned, because He forgets our sins, and sees in us only His own righteousness. Thus we can associate with Him without any fear or restraint. He does not despise us, nor abash us with reproachful pity. He does not shrink from us, as so fearful that we may defile Him, but receives us into His bosom. Happy are they who know the Lord indeed; and happy are the repentant sinners who see only Christ in His professed followers.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

The Echo says: "No student of English history-even the most superficial-needs to be told that the perpetual religious question, in some shape or other, as always lying at the back of the temporary political question, whatever it may be." "In any case, it is ecclesiastical zeal upon which each political party counts for feeding the fire with oil." How much of such religion is the religion of Him who said, "My kingdom is not of this world"?

A clergyman of the Church of England writes thus from a country parish to the Church Times: "People and towns can have no idea of the difficulty we have in little villages like this of making the villagers understand that Good Friday is not a holiday, but a holy-day. Protestant teachings on the subject of fast and festival has taken deep root."

We can appreciate the difficulty one must meet in trying to teach the people that Good Friday is a holy day, with not the slightest proof in the world whereby to establish such a claim. Many besides Churchmen have experienced the same difficulty in trying to convince people, contrary to the teaching of Holy Scripture, that Sunday is a holy day. We can offer no sympathy, however. People who try to teach the sanctity of that which God has not made holy, must endure the hardship of their own presumption.

The first subject on the programme of the Free Church Congress, at Leeds, was "Worship," on which subject a paper was read by Dr. Hunter, of Glasgow. It was held that "the real and final part of worship lay in those acts of prayer and praise which we commonly described as liturgy." The author affirmed that "we are now picking up with gratitude and reverence things which our fathers had flung aside." And those who are doing that are steadily and surely going back to that which the fathers left, namely, Romanism. There is no religious body that can outdo the Roman Catholic body in magnificence of rituals; and therefore it is obvious that when professed Protestants come to think that they can attract the masses only by a liturgy, it is evident that in time they will be forced into that body which has that matter so perfected that they cannot compete with it.

"Federation" was the watchword of the recent Free Church Congress. The report says: "The federation of all the evangelical churches in England was, it may almost be said, one of the originating forces of the Free Church Congress. Certainly it was an ideal present to the minds of all the readers and speakers at Manchester last November twelvemonth, and to-day that idea had forcible, adequate, explicit enunciation. Not that the difficulties, practical and doctrinal, were overlooked. Far from it. But, if for nothing else, this Free Church Congress will be remembered as inaugurating a movement the ultimate issue of which can only be the federation of all the principal Nonconformist bodies in England-and, perhaps, of all Evangelical Churches throughout the world-in one harmonious organisation, with one aim, one purpose, one hope of its calling, one resolute determination to conquer England and the world for religious freedom."

In the course of the debate on this subject, Dr. Mackennal "moved a resolution to the effect that the Baptist and Congregational Unions of England and Wales the English Presbyterian Synod, the Wesleyan, New Connection, Primitive Methodists, the Bible Christian Conferences, the Annual Assembly of the United Methodist Free Churches, the Independent Methodist Assembly, and the Free Church of England, and other bodies be asked to appoint representatives to a conference to be held on the subject, with a view to substitute cooperative for competitive action among the Churches. The time has undoubtedly come, said Dr. Mackennal, when we should unite in one great Evangelistic service of England."

"Let brotherly love continue," is the Apostolic exhortation;-union among Christians is the thing by which the world is to know that Christ is being sent into the world; but it will not be brought by legislation, either in civil or ecclesiastical courts. When that gigantic Federation shall have been effected, instead of England or the world having been "conquered for religious freedom," it will have been conquered for a religious despotism more complete than has ever yet been known.

"For the Lord spake thus to me with a strong hand, and instructed me that I should not walk in the way of this people, saying, Say ye not, A confederacy, to all them to whom this people shall say, A confederacy; neither fear ye their fear, nor be afraid. Sanctify the Lord of hosts Himself; and let Him be your fear, and let Him be your dread. And He shall be for a sanctuary; but for a stone of stumbling and for a rock of offence to both the houses of Israel, for a gin and for a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem." Isa. viii. 11-14.

When the Lord God is sanctified in individual human hearts (1 Peter iii. 15), those and those only who do so will know the truth, and they will be free indeed.

The Congregationalist says that "the Salvation Army evidently has outlived persecution and reproach," and that "it has virtually taken its place among the distinctive and honoured religious forces of the day." So much the worse for it, then. If that be so, it is evident that it has practically outlived its usefulness. The Master said, "Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man's sake." "Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets." Luke vi. 22. 26. Will the Salvation Army now in its turn become a persecutor?

"Complimentary Indulgences" The Present Truth 10, 12.

E. J. Waggoner

Complimentary Indulgences.-How light a matter it is with the occupant of the Pontifical Chair to grant plenary absolutions, is shown by a story told by a Paris correspondent. When Queen Catherine, of the Bonaparte family, with her child, the Princess Mathilde, visited Rome, she asked Pius VIII. for an audience.

He named a day, and from extreme politeness to one from whose head a crown had fallen, ordered a brief to be made out to enable her without sin to eat meat for the rest of her life in Lent. As she was leaving, the Pope gave her his paternal benediction, and handed her the brief, informing her of the favour it accorded. She was a frank person, and said at once that it could be no good to her, as she was brought up a Protestant, and meant to remain so. "But," said the Pope, "after the trouble of writing it, why let it be lost? Is the little Princess also a Protestant?" "Not quite," said the Queen. "She was baptized into the Roman Catholic Church, and will remain there should she make a Catholic match." The Pope asked what her Christian names were, and ordered his secretary to interline them above those of the Queen, which were to be erased. The brief was then handed to Princess Mathilde, who still possesses this souvenir of her first visit to the Vatican.

March 29, 1894

"What to Forget" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

What to Forget.-Forget self. No person ever gratified self when self was forgotten. And we may forget self by losing self in Christ. He has been lifted up from the earth, in order that we may see Him, and beholding the wondrous sight, forget all else.

"Your Choice" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

Your Choice.-The Christian life is a life of choosing that which is right and good and refusing that which is wrong. When temptation comes to you, you have the privilege of choosing between your Saviour and that to which you are urged by the temptation. Choosing Him, you will be chosen by Him, and He will make Himself more precious to you than any selfish thing, and keep you by His power from all evil.

"Near at Hand" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

Near at Hand.-To very many who pray, God seems afar off. They do not know whether He hears or not. They do not hear His voice. That is not the way to pray to God. What is the difference between praying to a god that has ears but hears not, and has eyes but sees not, and a mouth but speaks not, and praying to the true God, and not knowing whether He sees or hears or speaks? God is not a long way off. He is "not far from every one of us," said the apostle, speaking to heathen men; "for in Him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also His offspring."

"His Offspring" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

His Offspring.-God never forsakes His offspring. He does not cast off His children when they fall into sin. He fills every relationship in life. He is to us a Father, Mother-"As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you"-Brother, Friend,-everything. But we are always children as far as He is concerned; "little children;" babes, also. We are to grow in grace and increase in knowledge; and yet in growing from infancy to old age, or from first conversion to ripened Christian experience, we do not at all diminish the difference between us and God in knowledge and understanding. God will always be infinitely above us, so that the wisest man will always be less, as compared with Him, than the little babe is as compared with its parent.

"The Resurrection" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

"I am the resurrection and the life; he that believeth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live." John xi. 25.

The doctrine of the resurrection from the dead is the bright light that shines through all the gloom of mortal existence. And the darkest hour, when standing beside the form of one bound to us by the closest ties, we look upon the folded hands from which the burden of life has dropped, there are no words that comfort us like these. The hope of man is in a coming restoration; and all that strikes against the doctrine of the resurrection strikes against that hope.

That doctrine underlies the Christian faith, and he who holds it not has not the faith. The Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy of some "who concerning the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is passed already; and overthrow the faith of some." 2 Tim. ii. 18. There are doctrines in our own day which tend directly to belittle the doctrine of the resurrection, making it nearly if not altogether a superfluous thing; and now, as in the apostle's day, they will result in the overthrow of the faith to such as receive them.

The teaching of "the grace of God, that bringeth salvation," and "hath appeared unto all men," is, "that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." Titus ii. 12, 13. If this is our position, we are in obedience to the Gospel. And this glorious appearing of Christ is for those that "sleep in the dust," as well as for "we who are alive and remain" unto His coming. For we are told that "the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the force of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first." 1 Thess. iv. 16. And with this knowledge we are to comfort one another while He tarries beyond our sight.

Faith in the resurrection of Christ implies faith in the visible, bodily reappearing of all those who sleep in Him, at the last day. And without faith in the resurrection of the saints, there can be no faith in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And without faith in this no hope can be derived from the Gospel. "If Christ be not raised," says Paul, "then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain;" and he adds, "then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished." 1 Cor. xv. 14, 18. And to the Thessalonians he writes, "If we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him." 1 Thess. iv. 14. The resurrection of Christ, in visible, bodily form, as He appeared to His disciples after the crucifixion

194

(Luke xxiv. 39), and the resurrection of His saints in like manner, and their dependence for life and immortality upon His resurrection, are doctrines that stand or fall together. But they cannot fall, because they rest on the word of the Lord.

The glorious second coming of Christ, the resurrection of the just, and the bestowal upon the righteous of their reward, are the events that transpire together. For when Christ comes His reward is with Him, "to give to every man according as his work shall be." Rev. 12; Luke xiv. 14.

The resurrection will be as universal as death has been. The Saviour said, that "the hour is coming in the which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good under the resurrection of life, and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation." John v. 28, 29. But we are told that every man shall come in his own order; "Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at His coming." 1 Cor. xv. 23. They that are not Christ's do not appear at His coming. That resurrection is "the resurrection of the just" (Luke xiv. 14); the "resurrection of damnation" follows afterward. The Apostle John saw in vision "the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus and for the word of God," and "they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. But the rest of the dead lived not again till the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection." Rev. xx. 4, 5.

God is the Author of life, and the only source from which life can come. The righteous have eternal life, the life of Christ Himself. They cannot be held by death, any more than Christ Himself could be held in Joseph's tomb. Those who have the righteousness of Christ must also have His life; for righteousness is eternal. They may be laid away in the grave; but they still have life in Christ; and "when Christ who is their life shall appear," then shall they also "appear with Him in glory." Col. iii. 3, 4.

"Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection; on such the second death hath no power; but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years." Rev. xx. 6. And "Blessed," also, "are the dead that die in the Lord from henceforth; yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours, and their works to follow them." Rev. xiv. 13.

"What Can He Say?" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

In a meeting of the Foreign Missionary Society of the American M. E. Church, a returned missionary to Persia, who was described as "full of enthusiasm for his work," spoke as follows:-

I am often asked by the Persians how it is, if the Christian religion be the pure Gospel I claim, that my nation, Christian America, has a far longer list of crimes than Persia? What can I reply? What can I do but bow my head in shame, and raise my heart in prayer to God to lift the cloud from rum-cursed America? Oh, this Christian nation will have to rouse from her slumber, and sweep this evil from her borders ere she can hold out pure hands to other nations, asking them to accept her Bible and her God.

A man who would have any trouble in answering such a question as that asked by the Persians, ought to get better acquainted with the Gospel before going out as a missionary. He should learn that the Gospel is "the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth," no matter in what land He dwells. He should be able to assure the questioners that the Gospel is an individual matter, and that therefore America is not, never was, and never will be Christian, and that it is not possible that any nation on earth, as a nation, can be Christian.

The fact that America "has a far longer list of crimes than Persia," is all the evidence that is needed to show that it is not Christian; but Christianity means freedom from sin. America is no more a Christian nation than Persia is.

But it would doubtless be most galling to the missionary's "patriotism" to make such an answer as that. And that is the trouble with too many missionaries, both home and foreign. A mistaken loyalty to their native country interferes with their loyalty to the Gospel. If they could learn that the true Christian is only a soldier on this earth,-a pilgrim and a stranger even in the land of his birth,-and that his citizenship is in heaven, they would not be embarrassed by such questions as were asked the missionary to Persia. The only country in which they would have a special interest, as a country, would be the heavenly country.

But would not the same charge against the Gospel remain unanswered, namely, that it cannot be as pure as is claimed, or else it would have more influence in diminishing crime in America?-Not by any means. The Gospel cleanses from sin and crime of all who accept it, and no others. If it were less pure than it is, it would be more generally accepted; but then it would be of no use. The Lord Himself gave no warrant for supposing that the majority of men in any nation would accept the Gospel, but on the contrary warned His followers that they must always be comparatively few in numbers, and thus suffer persecution.

The Gospel knows nothing about the natural or artificial boundaries on this earth. It is to be "to all people." It knows nothing about States and Governments. Its mission is to "every creature." Kingdoms may rise and fall, nations may extend their boundaries, and others may be absorbed, none of these things concern the ambassadors for Christ. They are the representatives of no country but heaven, and are accredited to no earthly government, but to the world as a whole, and to the whole world considered as individuals, who are to be transformed by it, and made to live a different life as individuals. When all of Christ's ambassadors fully realise this truth, then will their mission be clothed with a dignity and power befitting its exalted origin.

"A High Calling" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

When Peter, in his boat on the Sea of Galilee, saw the power of Jesus of Nazareth over the sea and its inhabitants, he fell down before the Lord, saying, "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord." Luke v. 8. It was the same feeling that prompted Isaiah, when he saw the same Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up, to exclaim, "Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." Isa. vi. 5.

It is worthy of note also, that both these men who thus confessed their sinfulness, were at once accepted as workers. To Peter, the Lord said, "Fear not; from henceforth thou shalt catch men;" literally, "thou shalt be catching men alive." But Peter had to be converted before he could strengthen the brethren; and likewise the coal from off the altar had to touch the lips of Isaiah, and purge his sin, before he could say, "Here am I, send me," to the call, "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" and could be told, "Go."

Herein is a hope and a wondrous calling for every sinner. Christ came not to call the righteous, but sinners

195

to repentance. He receives and saves sinners, and then, having received them into His confidence, He sends them forth as His representatives, to carry His message of mercy to other sinners. He takes us as associates with Him. He was made flesh, and took the nature of fallen humanity, in order to save men; and so He commits the work not to angels, but to those who have felt the power of the sins that oppress those to whom they are sent. To thus work with Christ is the highest honour that the universe can bestow.

"One Lawgiver" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

One Lawgiver.-"The true Church," says a Roman Catholic writer, "like the true State, is ever on the alert to detect and condemn error. She makes new laws, new definitions, to meet new errors. What should we say of a State that never legislated for three hundred years? Why, that it was no State. So of a church." But the true church never legislates at all. "There is one Lawgiver who is able to save and to destroy." James iii. 12. "For the Lord is our Judge, the Lord is our Lawgiver, the Lord is our King; He will save us." Isa. xxxiii. 22. The true church never usurps the place of its Head, by presuming to make laws for itself. And the difference between the laws which the Lord has laid down for the church, and those which men make, is that while the latter require continual amending to meet new conditions, the former, coming from Him who sees the end from the beginning, are never out of date. Nothing can possibly arise that has not been foreseen and provided for in the Bible.

"Church and Stage" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

Church and Stage.-The theatre may be a place for refined worldly people to go to for amusement, but simple folk may be excused if they are unable to see how Christians can patronise the stage, and still follow the rule of doing all they do in the name of the Lord. However, at a recent debate in the London Y.M.C.A. (Aldersgate-street), a vote was carried that theatre-going was not to be condemned. Another pronouncement comes from an Irish Theological Society Assembly's College, where by a large majority it was noted that the Church should give up her attitude of antagonism to the stage, and ally herself with it. Yet, notwithstanding the increasing patronage which the stage is receiving from the church, we fail to see, if theatrical announcements and news are to be depended upon, that there is any less of frivolity, sentimentalism, and whimsical passion acted out for the edification of theatre-goers than formerly. "Lovers of pleasures" desire these things, but what about "lovers of God"?

"The Healing Touch" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

One of the most striking of the miracles of Jesus is told in the following few words:-

"And it came to pass when He was in a certain city, behold a man full of leprosy; who seen Jesus, fell on his face, and besought Him, saying, Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me a clean. And He put forth His hand, and touched him, saying, I will; be thou clean. And immediately the leprosy departed from him." Luke v. 12, 13.

Leprosy was one of the most loathsome diseases known to the ancients, and the one the most dreaded. The leper was an outcast, compelled to keep away from even his own family. The disease was a slow, progressive death, the victim's members dropping off one after another until death ended his misery.

No other disease more aptly illustrates the defilement of sin; and this man, who was full of leprosy, very closely resembled the description given of the people, by the prophet Isaiah: "The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint, from the sole of the foot even unto the head, there is no soundness in it; but wounds and bruises, and putrefying sores; they have not been closed, neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment." So as we study the miracle of the cleansing of the leper, we may know that we are to learn how we can obey the direction, "Make you clean."

In the first place, the leper had confidence in the power of the Lord to heal him. He said, "Thou canst make me clean." That is a great point. Very few really believe that Jesus Christ can cleanse them from sin. They will admit that He can save from sin in general,-that He can save others,-but they are not convinced that He can save them. Let such learn a lesson from the power of the Lord. Hear what the prophet Jeremiah said by inspiration of the Holy Spirit:-

"Ah Lord God! behold Thou hast made the heavens and the earth by Thy great power and stretched out arm, and there is nothing too hard for Thee." Jer. xxxii. 17.

He who brought the heavens and the earth into existence by the power of His word, can do all things. "Our God is in the heavens; He hath done whatsoever He hath pleased." Ps. cxv. 3. "His Divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness." 2 Peter i. 3. "He is able also to save unto the uttermost them that come unto God by Him." Heb. vii. 25. Christ has been given "power over all flesh." John xvii. 2.

So much for His power. Of that the leper was assured; but he was not sure that the Lord was willing to cleanse him. He said, "Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean." We need not have so much hesitancy as that. We know that He can, and He has given us ample assurance of His willingness. Thus we read that Christ "gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father." Gal. i. 4. It is the will of God that we should be sanctified. 1 Thess. iv. 3.

Christ comprises everything. He is "the power of God, and the wisdom of God." 1 Cor. i. 24. All things in heaven and in earth are in Him. Col. i. 16, 17. Therefore the Apostle Paul says: "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?" Rom. viii. 32. The willingness of God to cleanse us from sin, is shown in the gift of His only begotten Son for that purpose.

"These things have I written unto you, that ye may know that ye have eternal life, even unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God. And this is the boldness which we have toward Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He heareth us; and if we know that He heareth us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions which we have asked of Him." 1 John v. 13-15. R.V. So we may "come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need" (Heb. iv. 16), knowing that "if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

But the most striking feature of this miracle is the fact that Jesus touched the leper. There was not another person in all the land, who would have come within a yard of him. But Jesus "put forth His hand, and touched him." With that touch the hateful disease vanished.

It is worth noting that in very many

196

cases Jesus touched those whom He healed. When Peter's wife's mother lay sick of a fever, Jesus "touched her hand, and the fever left her." Matt. viii. 15. That same evening, "all they that had any sick with divers diseases brought them unto Him; and He laid His hands on every one of them, and healed them." Luke iv. 40. In His own country the people were so unbelieving that "He could there do no mighty work, save that He laid His hands on a few sick folk, and healed them." Mark vi. 5.

In Matthew we are assured that this healing of the sick was "that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our diseases." Matt. viii. 17, R.V. We know that healing went from Him to the suffering ones who thronged round Him to touch Him (Luke vi. 19); and this Scripture assures us that He received into His own person their diseases, in exchange for His healing power.

Now we have the blessed assurance that although He is "passed into the heavens," He has not lost His sympathy with us, but is still "touched with the feeling of our infirmities." He comes close to us in pity, because "He knoweth our frame; He remembereth that we are dust." In all our sin and degradation, we may have the inspiring thought that Jesus does not despise us, and is not ashamed to come into the closest companionship with us, in order that He may help us.

The prophet, speaking of God's dealing with ancient Israel, said, "In all their afflictions He was afflicted." Isa. lxiii. 9. Even so it is now. As an eagle bears her young on her wings, so the Lord puts Himself under His people, bearing all our sin and sorrow. He takes it upon Himself, and in Him it is lost, by the same process by which at the last "He will swallow up death in victory."

Christ took upon Himself the curse, in order that the blessing might come upon us. Gal. iii. 13, 14. Although Him knew no sin, He was made to be sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. 2 Cor. v. 21. He suffered the death to which we were doomed, that we might share His life. And this exchange is made when we come into touch with Him, by confessing that "Jesus Christ is come in the flesh." How much we lose by holding Jesus off as a stranger, or by regarding faith in Him as a theory. When we know that He identifies Himself with us in our fallen condition, taking upon Himself, and from us, our infirmities, how precious becomes the assurance, "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world."

"The healing of the seamless dress
Is by our beds of pain;
We touch Him in life's throng and press,
And we are whole again.

"A Demoralising Agency" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

In another item will be found a brief comment on the "Church and Stage," and the increased patronage which the former is giving to the latter. It is no secret that professed Christian people are in these days much less strict in regard to amusements than they were once; religious papers of high standing are favouring the theatre and the opera, and the number of ministers that countenance them is increasing. Of course the body of the people will not be slow in following the leaders in that direction. What effect this will have on the church can be no better indicated than by quoting a portion of some comments on a new opera, in one of the leading religious journals.

The paper in question is of high standing, and is noted for its interest in missions, containing probably more missionary correspondence than any other paper in the world. It has, however, a regular department devoted to "Music," and in this "high class" operas are regularly discussed by an editorial contributor.

In the column now lying before us, an Italian tragic opera, entitled "I Pagliacci" is under consideration, and is commended without reservation. It is said to contain "some of the most positive and soundest principles of Italian and German art," and that "the process augurs well for the future of music in the land where its decadence has been so lamentable." That this is at least a fair sample of opera, may be learned from the statement that "when under especially Wagnerian influences, young Italy proposes to write music-dramas intelligently, sincerely, and forcibly, the results ultimately ought to be the best article of the sort anywhere practicable." The piece, which is said to be well known in Europe, was received in New York, even in the summertime, "with an enthusiasm which amounted to ovations for the work and for the artist concerned in its presentation," by audiences which "included a large part of the town's most discriminating and zealous musical people."

And now for the description of the plot of this most wonderful opera, to which thousands of church-going people have listened, and which is a fair specimen of what the church is urged to patronize:-

The libretto of the "Pagliacci" (which title may be translated "The Buffoons," or less literally, "The Strolling Mountebanks") is full of tragedy's power. The headmime of a handful of poor, wandering peasant comedians, who arrive at a Calabrian village one evening, has a pretty, heartless, deceitful wife. The woman clouds and spurns an old lover, another zany of their cart and booth. She is tired of him. Spying upon her, he discovers his new rival. In his jealous fury, he brings the husband on the scene. The disclosure drives the miserable pagliaccio to frenzy. Within an hour, before the rude audience, which is at first bewildered and then terrified, he turns into earnest the little burlesque play in which he and his wife and her slighted admirer, as usual, are acting-stabs the woman to the heart, in a tempest of vengeful jealousy, and then leaping down among the spectators kills the lover. From the stage, the cold-blooded instigator of such summary justice, gaudy in his paint and flour and yellow coat, calls out cynically to the horror-stricken peasants, "The play is ended"-and disappears. And that is all. Nothing, however, could be more effective, condensed, brutal, repulsive-and yet natural. In the management of the piece, in the abrupt appearance of one of the main actors in it before it begins, to sing its remarkable vocal prologue, and the suggestion of only a narrow demarcation between the fictitious and the actual audience of this play within a play, there is a frank reversion to primitive drama that is most striking.

And this is "high class" opera; it is one of the best products of the stage, with which the church is urged to ally herself!

Again and again both secular and religious papers contain stirring articles on the danger to the rising generation from the great amount of cheap, sensational baubles that are published, and which they eagerly devour. But surely no "penny dreadful," in which the errand boy becomes absorbed to the neglect of his duties, ever surpassed in emptiness, in impossible combinations, and in gore, this opera which enraptures the souls of the elite of so-called Christendom. If the "lower classes" are being depraved by vile, worthless literature, what shall be said of the "higher classes"?

We make no criticism of the religious paper which gives publicity and praise to this bloody play set to music. Neither do we criticise the church members who patronise it. But the world must be allowed to know that Christianity has nothing in common with the stage at its best. And professed Christians must warn of the danger of such places of amusement. He who would look upon such a play as described above with delight, would applaud a gladiatorial contest or a bull-fight, if it was conducted amid the enchanting scenes of stage settings, under the glare of electric

197

lights, and accompanied by fascinating strains of music.

When the church allies itself with the stage, then indeed may be written upon it "Ichabod," for the glory will then have departed.

"Is the Gospel Weak in Victoria?" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

The severest arraignment of religion in the colonies that we have ever read we find in the report of a lecture by Rev. J. Gillies, late of Scots Church, Melbourne, delivered before the St. Cuthbert's Y.M.C.A., Edinburgh. If it came from a hostile critic we could hardly credit it; but it is from one who ought to be able to speak understandably, and who is himself fully in sympathy with those whom he represents. The following digest we clip from the Presbyterian:-

The subject of the lecture was "Marvellous Melbourne," and Mr. Gillies, in the course of this lecture, spoke of the view in which the Australian colonists regard the Disestablishment agitation in Scotland. He had discussed the question with many ministers and laymen of all the Presbyterian Churches; and all over the colonies he had found not one in favour of Disestablishment. A successful minister of the Free Church had told him that he and many of his denomination had gone out as disestablishers. If they came back, with their experience of Voluntaryism pure and simple, he thought that every one of them would support the old Church as vigorously as possible. A minister of the United Presbyterian Church, in a flourishing colonial charge, informed him that to his certain knowledge nine at least out of every ten of his brethren had modified or completely changed their opinions since coming out, and been brought face to face with the seamy side of Voluntaryism. He had no hesitation in saying that if the leading Presbyterians of Victoria-he might safely say of the colonies generally-were asked their opinion on the subject of disestablishment in Scotland, 90 per cent of them-perhaps 99 per cent of those who had been many years in the colonies, and had felt all the practical difficulties of Voluntaryism, would not only refuse to destroy the national recognition of religion in Scotland, but would throw the whole weight of their influence into the scale to retain and support it. In this country people did not know what Voluntaryism meant yet. They did in Victoria. They had to fight against it every day of their lives. He could tell them what some of these difficulties were. He could tell of the struggles which some of the churches had over great parts of the country to keep themselves in life. He could tell them how the ministers were often handicapped in their usefulness by having to think so much about the collection plate. He might tell them how the sparsely peopled districts of the country, and even the thickly populated poorer parts of the city were unable to support church ordinances, and were in danger of drifting rapidly into irreligion. And these were the fruits of Voluntaryism where there was nothing else.

Think of it! The church of Christ is founded on the voluntary principles; because Christ really gave Himself that men should be free. "Whosoever will," is the appeal from first to last in the Gospel. And as for the support of Gospel work, the Lord says: "Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity; for the Lord loveth a cheerful giver." "Freely ye have received; freely give."

Yet it is declared that the voluntary principle is a failure! If churches have to struggle "to keep themselves in life," it is not money that they need, but life. The church has no life in itself, and cannot have. But if it abide in Christ, as a branch abides in the vine, it must have life.

The apostles had a Gospel that put this life and vitality into men, and preached a Gospel of Voluntaryism too. There is nothing more sure than that a preacher who finds it impossible to "live by the Gospel" ought either to work with his hands, as Paul did when occasion demanded, or he should lay hold of the Gospel of Christ, by which God ordains that the minister of the Gospel shall live.

Something is wrong with the message a man carries, when he asks the State to force people to pay for Gospel work which they will not support voluntarily. Men do not always look at such questions from the right point of view, and so we must separate persons and places from the argument; but, in principle, it is a shameful libel of the Gospel, to imply that it needs in this day any other than converted hearts and willing hands to make it known to the world that lies in sin. The Gospel is still the power of God, and the Lord drafts no unwilling subjects into His Kingdom.

We have heard much in recent months about the increase of irreligion in Victoria and the Australasia colonies. It has usually been charged that this is due to the fact that religious instruction is not included in the curriculum of the State schools. It is evident, however, if Mr. Gillies correctly represents the situation, that one of the causes of irreligion in the rising generation of Victorians is to be found in the condition of the churches and the ministry which he speaks for. It is of the deepest concern to every living Christian that it should be preached to the people that the Gospel has not power to maintain itself save in alliance with the world. Those who have "tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come" know that this is not true; and the Lord will show again to the world that His Gospel can triumph in the face of the opposition of all the powers of the world.

"The Great Gift" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

DIVINE ARITHMETIC

"Grace and peace be multiplied unto you," says the Apostle Peter, "according as His Divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness." 2 Peter i. 2, 3.

Have we, then, all things that pertain to life and godliness? If we believe that, there isn't the like of it anywhere in the world as to possession. It discounts everything. "All the things that pertain unto life and godliness." They are all ours.

I can claim it all, and note it is mine, and yet not rob you in the least. It is all yours too. Grace is not divided; it is multiplied, the apostle says. It is not, "Grace and peace be divided among you." The Lord's arithmetic is always in progressive ratio. Having His grace and righteousness, we may take for the multiplier just as many people as there are in the world, so that every one of us has the whole of it.

Not only so, but it is multiplied to every individual as well. How can anybody believe that and be gloomy, or despondent and discouraged? He has given to you by His power all things that pertain to life and godliness. If you believe that, and always believed it, there will be steady progress in Divine life.

PRAYER WITH THANKSGIVING

All the time is the time to believe the Scriptures. But many professed Christians do not believe the Scriptures when they pray. They go to the place of prayer, and leave the promises behind. They go to the bank, and leave the cheque book at home, and then wonder that they get nothing. "He that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that seek after Him." Heb. xi. 6. His Divine power hath given unto us all things, and they are ours to possess now.

He who believes that he has been given all things, righteousness and life, and holds to that belief, finds in it righteousness. That is our victory; for "this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith." The man who believes this word will never go to the Lord and be disappointed. All that he has to do is to take, and take, and keep taking.

By this we can understand what the apostle says, "In everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving

198

let your requests be made known unto God." Phil. iv. 6. How can a person who believes the word of God contain himself for thankfulness? It cannot be otherwise than that thanksgiving will accompany every prayer of faith; and that which is not a prayer of faith is useless.

We have as good a title to life and godliness as the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, because it is His by divine right, and He gives it to us. He has as good a right to give it to us as He has to possess it. Then we have as good a right to it as He has. No one can convey to another a better title that he himself has; but in this case the Lord has given us Himself, and so we have His right and title.

We do not come to the Lord, then, in an uncertain, halting way, to ask for we know not what; not as the Samaritans, of whom Jesus said to the woman, "Ye worship ye know not what." "We know what we worship." Instead of coming to the Lord, and praying and going away without knowing that we have received anything, feeling as in a fog, we can walk in the sunlight all the time, thanking God in all of our petitions that He has given us all things, and finding strength in our knowledge of the fact.

But there are so many professed Christians who are always living in a fog bank. Clouds are always over them. They do not know whether they have anything or not, and are always talking about how needy and helpless they are. But it is a true and faithful saying that God's Divine power hath given us all things pertaining to life and godliness. Then take of the Lord's free gift.

EXCEEDING GREAT AND PRECIOUS PROMISES

The Apostle Peter goes on from the words with which we began, "Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the Divine nature." Oh, the wonder of the promises of God! We take the promises and by them become partakers of the Divine nature. All we have to do to be partakers of the Divine nature is to believe that He has given it to us.

How can there be any dull thankless prayers? How can there be any half-hearted lifeless testimonies? Every heart that believes must sing for joy, for this same apostle says that, believing, we "rejoice with joy unspeakable, and full of glory." We have been groping in darkness, wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked, and He comes to us with all things, and says, "All are yours. Take them. Buy without money." It is because the things that He gives cannot be purchased with money. They have been bought by the precious blood of Christ.

"Unto you that believe He is precious;" because His promises are precious. All the promises of God are in Him; and so believing His promises we are simply laying hold upon Christ. Christ dwells in the word. "Christ liveth in me," is the cry of the believer. There is power in that to put the devil to flight. Maintain it in the face of the enemy, and that Name that is above every name,-that power that has spoiled principalities and powers,-dwelling in you will accomplish the same thing for you that it did before the world. That is resisting the devil steadfast in the faith; and when we resist, he flees.

"Holiness and 'Holy' Week" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

There are two sources from which holiness-real or supposed-becomes in the popular mind attached to places and times of earth. One source is God; the other source is tradition.

True holiness, like all else that is good and desirable, has but one source, which is God. God is the Creator of all things, and all things as He created them were good. It is sin that has marred the work of God's hands and divested of its perfection that part of God's creation in which we live. It is the evil touch of sin that brings unholiness. It is the touch of God, on the other hand, that makes holy.

When God spake to Moses from the burning bush, He told him that the place whereon he stood was holy ground. It had not formerly been different in this respect from other ground upon which Moses trod, but when God stood upon it, it became holy. It was made so by His presence. God is holy, and whatever He touches has imparted to it His holiness. And this is the only way in which anything can become holy. So also the ground on which Joshua stood before the Captain of the Lord's hosts, was made holy; and Mount Sinai likewise, from whose quaking summit God spoke the words of His law. For a like reason the mount of Christ's transfiguration is called by Peter, "the holy mount."

In a similar way God has made holy a certain portion of time. This He did at the close of creation. We read that "on the seventh day God ended His work which He had made, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it, because that in it He had rested from all His work which God created and made." Gen. ii. 2, 3.

By resting upon the seventh day, God made it a Sabbath, a rest day. Then He blessed and sanctified it; which, as He is the only source of blessing and sanctification, could only have been done by imparting to that day in a special manner His own blessed and sanctified presence. Thus the seventh day became holy, and remains unto the present day holy time.

But the idea has permeated the religious world that holiness can be imparted by mere association with certain sacred events, and that therefore a certain portion of the year, corresponding approximately to that in which over eighteen centuries ago occurred the events of the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ, has become sacred time. From whence did this idea come? Not from the word of God, for that word recognises no sacredness as belonging not to any portion of time except the seventh day,-the Sabbath. What God has made holy, is holy by virtue of the act of God imparting to it His holiness. And as God has not, so far as His word informs us, imparted any holiness to the period of time under consideration, it is evident that whatever sacredness belongs to it has been derived from another source; that is, from tradition.

When we stand upon tradition, we are standing upon the ground of the Roman Catholic Church. That Church is the recognised custodian of the traditions which have influenced religious belief and practice from the first centuries of the Christian era down to the present time. Whatever of these traditions have been incorporated into the beliefs of Protestants, have been either brought or borrowed from Rome. Rome had them first, and she is best qualified to speak with authority regarding their origin and meaning.

This, it is not surprising to find, it is the doctrine which Rome herself asserts. She claims the right and the power to impart holiness by her own decrees. The "Abridgement of Christian Doctrine," a standard Catholic work, speaks as follows:-

"How prove you that the Church hath power to command feasts and

199

holy days?" Ans.-"By the very act of changing the Sabbath into Sunday." See p. 57.

Certainly, if the Roman Catholic Church had power to change the Sabbath, which is holy time, she has power to institute holy days and to invest with sacredness certain times and seasons such as the period which has recently terminated. And when Protestants allow that the Sabbath has been changed to Sunday without any Scriptural command or warrant, and observe it upon the authority of tradition, they justify Rome's blasphemous claim of the possession of such power; and it is only consistent with such folly that they should pay increased attention year by year, as they are doing, to other times and observances which rest upon tradition and the authority of the Church.

The effect of tradition is to make void the word of the Lord. So it was in the days of Jesus of Nazareth, and so it is to-day. See Matt. xv. 3-6. It is most unwise to engage in religious observances which God has not commanded. The Christian faith knows no such doctrine as that of works of "supererogation." The Gospel commission is, "Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, . . teaching them to observe all things, whatsoever I have commanded you." Matt. xxviii. 19, 20. Only that is included which He has commanded, and whatever He has not commanded, does not pertain to the Gospel. We read also that "His Divine power," (which is the power of His word) "hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness." 2 Peter i. 3. Whatever therefore His word has not commanded is to be shunned, as not pertaining unto life and godliness, whatever fair appearances it may present. "Add thou not unto His words, lest He reprove thee, and thou be found a liar." Prov. xxx. 6. Neither observe that which He has not commanded, lest you meet at last the crushing rebuke, "Who hath require this at your hand?" Isa. i. 12.

"The Milk of the Word" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

The Milk of the Word.-"As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby." 1 Peter ii. 2. The Bible speaks also of giving meat; and yet we never grow so old in Christian life that we can't get along without this sincere milk. We grow by that all the time. Those words are to the most mature Christian, as well as to the new convert. In the natural life the child lives by its parent, its mother; before birth its mother breathes for it, and afterward it derives its nourishment solely from her. That which is true of the infant and its life by the mother, is true as concerns man and God. "In Him we live, and move, and have our being." Christ says, "As the living Father hath sent Me, and I live by the Father; so he that eateth Me, even he shall live by Me." John vi. 57.

"England and the Virgin Mary" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

A writer in the Saturday Review speaks thus of the adoration of the virgin Mary:-

It is the peculiar happiness of the English Church that she at least has never varied one jot or tittle in any authoritative utterance from the Catholic doctrine of the theotokos. We have added nothing and we have detracted nothing. We still worship in churches dedicated to St. Mary the Virgin; we still celebrate her in our calendar, and not as in the case of other saints, by a simple commemoration, but on the anniversary of five different events in her life; we read in our lectionary all the few and striking records of her most amiable personality, and every English Churchman who knows what Churchmanship means speaks of her by the simplest and most gracious appellation accorded to any being, human or divine, that is, of "Our Lady." We leave familiarity and tawdry, fancy titles to others, as we leave to others yet all insolent and irreverent disrespect. For we do not consider the one more appropriate than the other to the Mother of God.

No wonder that The Catholic Times feels that Rome is gaining ground in England. It says:-

The most remarkable feature presented by these words is the simple fact that the Saturday Review considers them acceptable to its readers. And in that light these words bring home to us a feeling of gratification impossible to resist. A great, a stupendous change has taken place when such words as these are received by the readers of a secular journal in England. The love and honour paid to Our Lady has been the sore point with Protestants; their insults and incomprehensible hatred has been the sore point with us. Shall we say that this line of separation is being blotted out? Certainly these words are an index of a great change, of a great grace poured out over England.

"They Need Editing" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

They Need Editing.-Many people who do not acknowledge the difference between a form of words and the living word of God, that has power in it to put into the life that which it speaks, make much of the so-called sacred books of Eastern religions. But even though the heathen writers sometimes spoke beautifully of morals and truth, they had no knowledge of any power to put the morality and righteousness into the life. Consequently the tendency of their teaching was to unrighteousness. The man who tries to get righteousness out of himself always gets unrighteousness; because there is nothing else in self. This inherent wickedness of self is revealed in all the "sacred" writings of false religions, and apologists of the heathen cults are obliged to cover up the wickedest portions in order to plead their cause with any degree of confidence. A writer in the Dawn takes Professor Max M¸ller to task for omitting large portions of the originals in his editing of "Sacred Books of the East," without indicating the omissions in any way. "When challenged, he frankly admitted that he had left out portions for the very sufficient reason that if he had translated them as they exist in the originals he would have been prosecuted for publishing an obscene literature."

"By Bread Alone" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

By Bread Alone.-"Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God."

These are the words of Christ, and their application is as universal as the term "man." It is for each one of us to ask ourselves whether we find life in the word of God, or whether we live merely by physical food. If the latter, we are certainly not living as God designs that we should.

Some of us spend much time thinking about what we shall eat and how we may contrive to obtain it. Certainly then we should welcome any additional means of life that is placed within our reach, and endeavour to appropriate all that it has for our benefit.

God is the Author and Sustainer of all life, and He wants man to recognise this fact. He it is that gives all living creatures their food. But He sent the Israelites manna direct from heaven, that they might recognise that behind

200

all the operations of nature are God and His word, without which those operations would instantly cease.

But while there is not life for man in everything that grows, there is life for him in every word spoken by God. He gets that life by faith. Simple, perfect belief, united to the smallest word of God, constitutes the "faith as a grain of mustard seed," which is able to remove mountains. God is life, and faith connects us with God; and he who is connected with God cannot die until God wills it; and even then he simply "sleeps" for a season, having still eternal life in Christ.

"The Good Shepherd" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

"I am the Good Shepherd: the Good Shepherd giveth His life for the sheep." John x. 11.

You cannot live in both light and darkness at the same time. If you choose to have darkness, the light must be shut out.

It is just as impossible to live in both righteousness and sin at the same time. If you choose to live in sin, then righteousness must be shut out; and it is sin that shuts it out.

Since all righteousness is from God, and all sin is from Satan, then, do you not see? when you choose sin you shut yourself away from God, and in with Satan.

The Bible says that sin separates you from God like a "thick cloud," so that you cannot see His face, and so that He cannot hear you when you call upon Him. Indeed, it is so very thick and so high, and it is so utterly impossible for you to get through it, that in another place God calls it a "wall of partition" between you and Him.

No wonder, then, that man (and that means all men, and all women, and all children) had "no hope, and was without God in the world" when, long ago in Eden, sin was chosen in place of righteousness, and Satan's ways in place of God's ways.

We all were as completely lost and shut away from God and the heavenly fold, as a sheep is lost and shut away from its shepherd and its earthly fold when it wanders away among the sharp stones and thorns, and falls bleeding and torn over some steep mountain wall into the ravine below.

What does a shepherd do when one of his sheep wanders off? Does he say, What a silly sheep! It is all its own fault and I'll not trouble myself at all about it; it might have known better? Oh, no, he is not like a hireling that "careth not for the sheep," but he loves his sheep, and knows them all by name, and he cannot rest a moment when one of them is missing. He straightway leaves "the ninety and nine in the wilderness," and no matter how rough the way, or how thorny the path, he goes "after that which is lost, until he find it."

"And when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders rejoicing," the waywardness of the sheep and the trouble of finding him all forgotten.

"And when he cometh home, he calleth together his friends and neighbours, saying unto them, Rejoice with me; for I found my sheep which was lost."

Now, do you suppose that the righteous God cares less for His children than a poor sinful shepherd does for his sheep? No, no; "He careth" for them; He knows them all by name; the very hairs of their heads are "all numbered;" not one of them falls to the ground without His notice; it is not His will that one of His little ones should perish.

Therefore no sooner had man wandered off and shut himself away with the thick dark wall of sin, than God missed him, and yearned for him, and was willing to leave all of His obedient children, and, "to seek and to save that which was lost." He did not stop to say, It's his own fault, I fully warned him; let him go. He loved him too well for that.

But He would not pick him up and carry him back whether he wanted him to or not, as the shepherd with his sheep, for God had made man to know more than a sheep. He had made him to know what was right, and to be perfectly free to choose between good and evil. All He could do for him, then, was to open up the way through the dark wall of sin, and go where he was, and entreat him to come back with Him. If men would not do that, then he could do no more for him; for a person cannot be forced to feel right and do right, any more than you can be forced to love someone by his whipping you.

No one but God can break down the wall of sin, for He alone has righteousness, and nothing but righteousness can destroy sin.

But righteousness, we are told, is the life of God. Therefore God Himself could not break through the dreadful wall that men had built up without giving His own precious life. His life alone could swallow up sin and death. He alone could lay down His life and take it up again.

And this wonderful Life is just what He did give in the life of His only begotten Son when He died upon the cross, for "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself."

Though we all like sheep had gone astray, and had turned every one to his own way, and were shut away from God and His life by an impassible wall of sin, and were altogether without hope, thanks be to His unspeakable love, He came in Jesus Christ, the Good Shepherd, and gave His life for His sheep, and broke down the wall of sin and opened the way,-a "living way,"-back to the heavenly fold into Himself!

What is the "way"? Jesus says, "I am the way."

Where is the "door"? Jesus says, "I am the door of the sheep." "By Me if any man enter in he shall be saved."

No matter, then, how far away from God you have been, no matter how hateful and sinful, through Jesus you can come back to the Father. If you yield up your way and your very self to Him He will lead you gently like a shepherd, back to the fold. He knows the way, and He alone has power to destroy it and take away the naughty sins that shut you away from God. Like the shepherd that has found his sheep, "He will rejoice over thee with joy; He will joy over thee with singing."

And He promises that He will one day, "cause the evil beasts to cease out of the land:" and then His people, which are the sheep of His pasture, shall all "dwell safely in the wilderness, and sleep in the woods. . . . and none shall make them afraid." And they shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; neither shall the sun light on them, nor any heat, which for Jesus

206

shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters.

What a happy time that will be! Do you not want to be among His lambs then? You may be if you now will follow Jesus, the Good Shepherd, every day.

1. Can you live in both light and darkness at the same time?

2. If you choose darkness, what must be shut out?

3. Can you live in both righteousness and sin at the same time?

4. If you choose sin, what must be shut out?

5. Where does all righteousness come from? Matt. xix. 17.

6. Where does all sin come from? 1 John iii. 8.

7. Then when you choose sin, from whom do you shut yourself away?

8. With whom do you shut yourself in?

9. What is sin like?-"A thick cloud," and "a wall." Isa. xliv. 22; Eph. ii. 12-14.

10. How completely does sin shut us away from God? Isa. lix. 1, 2.

11. Then when sin was chosen by man in Eden in place of righteousness, in what condition were we all? Eph. ii. 12.

12. Like what had we all gone astray? Isa. liii. 6.

13. What does God call us? Ps. c. 3.

14. What does a true shepherd do when one of the sheep wanders off? Luke xv. 4-6.

15. Does God care as much for His children as a Shepherd does for his sheep? 1 Peter v. 7; 1 Tim. ii. 19; Matt. x. 37: Matt. xviii. 14.

16. As soon as man wandered off and shut himself away with the wall of sin, what was God ready to do?

17. Did He go and pick him up and carry him back, like the shepherd does his sheep, whether he would or not? Why not?

18. What only could He do for him?

19. Could not someone else open a way through sin for man to get back? Why not?

20. What kind of way did God open? A "living way." Heb. x. 20-22.

21. Who is this "way"? John xiv. 6.

22. Where is the "door"? John x. 7, 9; Eph. ii. 18.

23. Is there no other way to get back to God and be saved? John xiv. 6; Acts iv. 12.

24. Because the Lord gave His life to seek and to save that which was lost, what does He call Himself? John x. 11; Luke xix. 10.

25. Is He able to take your sins away and take you back to the Father? Heb. vii. 25.

26. What does the shepherd do when he returns with his lost sheep?

27. What will Jesus do if you repent and yield to Him, and let Him take you back to God? Zeph. iii. 17.

28. What promise does He make to all who will follow Him? Eze. xxxiv. 25, 28; Rev. vii. 16, 17.

29. Can you truthfully say with David, "The Lord is my shepherd"? Ps. xxiii. 1.

30. What else was lost when man was lost?-His dominion and everything that he had.

31. Then since Jesus came to seek and to save that which was lost, what else will He save beside man? Micah iv. 8.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

-A Frenchman has produced artificial marble by immersing stone in metallic solutions.

-The Ministerial crisis in Chili, due to the victory of the Liberal party at the recent election, still continues.

-It is reported that a secret treaty between Russia and China will shortly be concluded relative to the Pamirs and Corea.

-A Cape Town telegram reports that a proclamation has been issued declaring the Sovereignty of Queen Victoria over Pondoland.

-Heavy snowstorms, lasting sixty hours, are reported from Silesia, Austria, and Northern Bohemia. Great damage has been done.

-The discovery of petroleum in Somersetshire has led to further search, revealing its existence in fifteen places within a radius of five miles.

-Storms of exceptional severity are reported from Arkansas and Northern Texas. Twenty persons are said to have been killed, and 100 others injured.

-Twenty-seven conspirators implicated in the plot to blow up the king and ministers of Cores have boon arrested, and will, it is said, be beheaded.

-Don Idiarte Borda, the Government candidate, has been elected President of Uruguay by forty-seven votes. This result was not obtained until after the Chambers had voted twenty-seven times.

-More trouble is anticipated with the dervishes of the Soudan. According to a report current at Cairo, great activity prevails among the dervishes at Dongola, while a strong force is collected at Abu Ahmed.

-The Pope has, it is said, hinted that he will shortly create another English Cardinal. He has not, however, designated the new member of the "Sacred College," who is believed to be Mgr, Stonor, Archbishop of Trebizond.

-"Queen" Liliuokalani of the Sandwich Islands, has, it is said, accepted an offer which was made her to travel through the United States on a lecturing tour. She is to make her appearance on the platform in her royal robes.

-According to an official telegram from the Viceroy, the Indian Budget shows a heavy deficit, which it is proposed to meet by the new import duty, the suspension of famine insurance, and contributions of provincial governments.

-So many Anarchists are now in custody in Paris that there is no more room in the prison for suspects. The Anarchists, it is said, received money from wealthy people, who imagined that their donations would insure them protection.

-A magnificent Koran, encased in a massive casket of gold and silver, has been presented by the Ameer of Afghanistan to the famous shrine of Imam Ruza, at Meshed. The Ameer's object in making this gift was to appease the Persian clergy.

-Another inflammatory manifesto has been issued by the Irish National League in America. It speaks of Mr. Gladstone as having betrayed Ireland, and calls him a traitor, while it hints, not obscurely, that a policy of violence should be adopted in place of argument.

-The French Statesman M. Naquet has taken up the question of the diminution of the population of France, which be proposes to deal with by the institution of rigid sanitary measures, the increased surveillance of children sent out to nurse, and by offering greater facilities for naturalization

-The impediment that has come to Mr. Gladstone's sight is stated to be of very recent occurrence. Less than a year ago, it is asserted, his vision was remarkably clear and good, and hopes are entertained that an early operation may result in a full restoration of visual power.

-The Spanish authorities will shortly begin the trial by court-martial of the Anarchist Pallas, and the other persons concerned in the attempt on the life of Marshal Campos. Since the explosion in the Liceo Theatre, no fewer than 302 persons have been arrested on suspicion of being Anarchists.

-A crisis exists in Belgium, owing to the members of the Cabinet having tendered their resignations in consequence of the rejection of the Proportional Representation Bill by the sections of the Chamber. The Ministers, however, will continuo to carry on public affairs until the return of the King.

-A German tailor has invented a bullet-proof coat which he has succeeded in inducing the German Government to test, the trial resulting satisfactorily. Owing to its weight, however, it will probably not come into general use; other-wise there would be a new occasion for increasing the burden of taxation.

-The United States Government is fitting out an expedition under Professor Langley to explore once more the region of the north magnetic pole. This spot, which lies on the western point of the Isle of Boothia Felix, near Cape Adelaide, has only been described once, in 1829 when Ross's expedition discovered it.

-The aged Hungarian patriot, Louis Kossouth, died at Turin, on the evening of March 20 His decease is generally mourned throughout Hungary, and by decision of the Hungarian Diet, his body will be taken to Budapest and buried beside those of his wife and daughter, which will be exhumed for the purpose from the Protestant cemetery at Genoa.

-In spite of the most sinister rumours concerning the action of Russia and Austria, King Milan is taking every step to establish himself again at Belgrade. His divorce from Queen Natalie has now been formally annulled by the "Holy Synod" of the autonomous Servian Church, and the Skupshtina have only to repeal the expulsion.

-The long-sought entrance to the mysterious brick pyramid of Dashoor, Egypt, has been found. After numerous borings, twenty-seven feet below the surface, a gallery 230 feet long, cut in the rock, was discovered. Fifteen chambers have thus far been explored, containing, amongst others, the sarcophagus of a queen who died 2,000 years before Christ.

-A story to which, if true, the Lobengula hunt and the Wilson massacre form a terrible sequel, comes from South Africa. The King, it is said, sent three messengers with a present of ?1,000 and a promise to surrender if the pursuit were stopped. Neither message no money reached Major Forbes, and suspicion has fallen on two troopers of having 'intercepted' both.

-The Cunarder Lancania, has recently made the fastest passage from New York to Queenstown, the distance of 2,894 miles occupying five days, thirteen hours, eleven minutes. The fastest passage from Canada to Liverpool has also recently been made, the 2,680 miles occupying seven days, eighteen hours. For the first time oil has been successfully used as fuel on an Atlantic liner.

-The Foreign Relations Committee of the United States Senate is considering a new treaty with China to superdsede the Scott Exclusion Act and the Geary Law, and to permit the restricted admission of Chinese into the United States. The treaty provides that Americans going to China shall be registered and photographed in the same way as Chinese entering the United States.

-While several men were engaged in removing the dynamite from the hulk of the Cabo Machichaco, which blew up at Santander in November last, another explosion occurred. As the explosion occurred at night the quays were nearly deserted, but several men engaged in the work of removing the dynamite, seriously estimated from five to ten, were killed, and some twenty others injured. Great alarm was caused in the town, and a riotous demonstration directed against the authorities occurred.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

A telegram from Rome states that the Archbishop of Florence will pay a visit to Queen Victoria, who is now stopping in the latter city, to thank Her Majesty in the name of the Pope, for the full liberty accorded to Roman Catholics in Great Britain. The Pope declares that he desires no better regime for Catholics to live under than that of England.

The New York Times recently reported an interview with a trustee of the Brooklyn Tabernacle, where Dr. Talmadge preaches, in which he defended the proposed scheme of charging a ten-cent admission fee at the Sunday services, in order to relieve the church of its crushing debt, he said, "I cannot see any difference in principle between charging at each service, and receiving an annual pew rent." It would puzzle many others to detect the real difference between charging a fixed sum for each Sunday, and charging a fixed sum, much larger of course, for the entire year.

"In those days," said General Booth to an interviewer, speaking of the beginning of the Salvation Army, "there was a great deal less interest in the East-end than there is now. Fewer agencies by many, were at work, and slumming had not become a fashionable diversion. While there has been an infinite increase in their efforts to rescue the East-end, there has also been an increase of its squalor and suffering." This does not mean that efforts made have been useless. Sin is the cause of all the evil, and the preaching of the Gospel by word and deed is the only remedy. The difficulty always has been and always will be, the great mass of men do not want to be saved from sin and selfishness. The work of offering the message of salvation must go on, however, if by any means it may "save some."

Five Roman Catholic "Sisters of Mercy" have been installed as teachers in a public school at Pittsburgh, U.S.A. They will bear the garb of their order, but not the rosary, while in the schoolroom. The fact that Roman Catholics are accepted as teachers in public schools, would not be worthy of notice; for they have as good a right to occupy such places as have the adherents of any other religious body. But the fact that they are allowed to advertise their order by their peculiar dress, is very significant as showing the strides the Roman Catholics are making toward supremacy in America, not as citizens merely, but as Roman Catholics.

"Irish Disestablishment" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

Irish Disestablishment.-The strength of a church depends upon the faith that it holds, and not upon the patronage of the world. A veteran minister of the Church of England, Mr. Acworth, of Bath, urges that Protestants in that Church shall give up the attempt to combine the spiritual and secular, and gives figures to show that disestablishment in Ireland has been a distinct gain to the Church. He says:-

I was once, with almost every other person, full of fear that religion might suffer in Ireland from the disestablishment of the Church, but I learned from the best authority that she is now putting forth her best energies to spread the Gospel, and circulate the Bible, in a way which was quite unknown before her disestablishment. The amount of money contributed by her in 1870 to foreign missions was ?13,969, and in 1892, ?16,857. For ten years previous to the disestablishment, from 1860 to 1869, she contributed ?60,885 to the Irish Church Missions, and from 1888 to 1893, ?88,825. And beside this, she has established two University Missions, one in China and one in India. "Whoso is wise will ponder these things."

"Was It Oppression?" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

Was It Oppression?-Mr. Bunting, the contributor to the Methodist department in the Review of the Churches, tells of the case of a child of Methodist parents who was re-baptised by a country vicar, who represented that the Wesleyan baptism was invalid. "It is not often," says Mr. Bunting, "that a glaring case of oppression like this occurs." There is too much real oppression in the world to make it profitable to manufacture fancied grievances. If a Baptist should convince the parents that sprinkling was not baptism, and should-if the child is old enough to believe on the Lord-immerse the child, where would the oppression come in? The Committee on Privileges has been considering the case of the vicar, and the matter is to go to the Bishop. All this is only the affair of the ecclesiastical authorities, and the attention which has to be given to the action is a penalty the Church has to pay for Establishment. But as long as men are free to speak and act their own religious convictions let no one talk of oppression.

"The 'Greater Responsibility'" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

The "Greater Responsibility."-The Ritualists of advanced ideas is apparently glad to see one of his fellows go over to Rome fully, and sorry to see him return. A clergyman of the English Church who not long ago joined the Roman Church, recently returned to the Anglican body, and published his recantation in Church papers. This reminds a clerical correspondent of the Church Times of the "wise and fatherly advice" given to a friend of his who wrote to his Bishop telling him that he had returned to the Bishop's fold after a short time in the Church of Rome. The Bishop, who is described as "one of our most saintly and honoured Bishops," wrote to the returned wanderer as follows:-

I have received your important announcement. In leaving the Church of England you took upon yourself a great responsibility. Again, in leaving the Roman Catholic Church, you have taken upon yourself a very much greater responsibility. And now, I can only counsel you to spend the rest of your days in "lowliness of spirit" and in penitential quietness.

"A Timely Rebuke" The Present Truth 10, 13.

E. J. Waggoner

A Timely Rebuke.-Leeds has been considered agitated by the determination of certain ones to prosecute the Mayor and other citizens for encouraging the Sunday Lecture Movement, by their personal efforts. It is encouraging to learn that this threat of adding physical force to moral suasion has been rebuked by Canon Bramwell, who emphatically protests against the action of the Lord's Day Observance Society as unfair in itself, and calculated to do more harm than good. He said that while he could not himself approve of some of the lectures and entertainments, he would rather see the people at a lecture than in the streets or public-houses, and it was for himself and other ministers of religion to make their services so attractive by the earnestness of their preaching that they might draw the masses to them.

April 5, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 14.

E. J. Waggoner

"Thus saith the Lord, Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches; but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth Me, that I am the Lord which exercise lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth; for in these things I delight, saith the Lord." Jer. ix. 23, 24.

Note well, and remember, that it is the knowledge of God Himself, in which we are to glory. We are not to glory in any knowledge that we possess, even though it be the knowledge of the Bible. While knowledge of the Bible is necessary, when we take pride in such knowledge, or glory in it, we are really glorying in ourselves; and knowledge which leads to that, is not knowledge of God.

It is possible for a person to backslide, and to be grievously deceived while diligently studying the Bible. Not because the Bible is at fault, but because self, instead of the Holy Spirit, guides in the study. "Knowledge puffeth up, but love buildeth up." "Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge; . . . and have not love, I am nothing." That study of the Bible which does not lead to the shedding abroad of the love of God in the heart by the Holy Ghost, makes Pharisees, but not Christians.

"The Drink Curse" The Present Truth 10, 14.

E. J. Waggoner

The Drink Curse.-Workers in all departments of reform work find the drink evil to be the main cause of the troubles which they seek to relieve. It is at the root of the poverty and over-crowding in our cities. It leads many to the immoral life, and very generally it is drink that fortifies the victim to endure the life of shame, and the loss of all self-respect. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children finds intemperance the main cause of the cruelties practised upon the young, whether in the homes of rich or poor. It is the king of evils.

"The Sin of Witchcraft" The Present Truth 10, 14.

E. J. Waggoner

When the children of Israel were travelling from Egypt to Canaan, the Amalekites came out to oppose their progress by arms. This was nothing less than an act of armed rebellion against God, under whose guidance the Israelites were marching, and therefore God said, "Because the hand of Amalek is against the throne of the Lord, therefore the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation." Ex. xvii. 16, marginal reading.

The Amalekites filled up the measure of their iniquity, and the Lord chose the Israelites, in the days when Saul was king, to be the instruments by which He would execute judgment against them. Accordingly the prophet Samuel came to Saul with the following command from the Lord:-

"Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy it all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, box and sheep, cattle and ass." 1 Sam. xv. 3.

So Saul departed on his mission, and smote the Amalekites; "but Saul and the people spared Agag, and the best of the sheep, and of the oxen, and of the fatlings, and the lambs, and all that was good; but everything that was vile and refuse, that they destroyed utterly." Verse 9.

This, it will readily be seen, was in direct violation of the express command of the Lord; yet so deceived was Saul, that he thought that he had obeyed the Lord; for when Samuel came to meet him, "Saul said unto him, Blessed be thou of the Lord; I have performed the commandment of the Lord." Verse 13.

Samuel, however, was not deceived. The evidences of Saul's disobedience were too numerous; the cattle themselves proclaimed the fact. And so, to Saul's protestations of obedience, the prophet said, "What meaneth then this bleating of the sheep in mine ears, and the lowing of oxen which I here?"

To this pertinent question Saul replied, "They have brought them from the Amalekites; for the people spared the best of the sheep and of the oxen, to sacrifice unto the Lord thy God; and the rest we have to utterly destroyed."

It will be seen from this that Saul had so far recovered from his deception that he was willing to excuse himself from any connection with the disobedience, and to lay the entire blame upon the people. Yet he excused the act as a righteous one, inasmuch as they designed ultimately to kill all the cattle that they had taken. He seemed to think that so long as they were finally destroyed, it would make no difference how or when it was done. Indeed, he seemed to think that offering them as a sacrifice to the Lord, would more than make up for the disobedience; for upon Samuel's reproving him for his arrogant

210

disregard of the Lord's commandment, Saul again replied:-

"Yea, I have obeyed the voice of the Lord, and have gone the way which the Lord sent me, and have brought Agag the king of Amalek, and utterly destroyed the Amalekites. But the people took of the spoil, sheep and oxen, the chief of the things which should have been destroyed, to sacrifice unto the Lord thy God in Gilgal."

Even this did not make any difference; the disobedience was too evident, and the prophet of the Lord said, "Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is says iniquity and idolatry." 1 Sam. xv. 22, 23.

The reader will notice that the words "is as" in the verse last quoted, are in Italic, indicating that they do not occur in the original Hebrew, but are supplied by the translators. The Hebrew language is brief, and a simple connective is often omitted when it would necessarily be understood. In reading, "Rebellion, the sin of witchcraft; and stubbornness, iniquity and idolatry," it would be most natural to supply the copula "is," but there would be no necessity nor warrant for supplying "as." So that we may understand the prophet to say, as given in the Jewish rendering, that rebellion is indeed the sin of witchcraft, and that stubbornness is inquity and image-worship. Wherever therefore we find rebellion, there we find the sin of witchcraft.

This idea is expressed by the Apostle Paul when writing to the Galatians, who were turning away from the purity of the Gospel, and disobeying the truth of God. Gal. i. 6, 7; v. 7. To them he exclaimed, "O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth crucified among you?" Gal. iii. 1.

A PARALLEL INSTANCE

"The deceitfulness of sin" is proverbial. There is a magic charm about sin that bewitches the senses, and leads one to think that he is doing right when he is openly transgressing a plain and well-known commandment. A most striking illustration is furnished in the case of Saul, and a perfect parallel to that case is found in the excuses which men give for observing Sunday instead of the Sabbath, in professed obedience to the fourth commandment. Let us briefly trace the parallel.

The Lord Himself came down upon Mount Sinai, and said:-

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy works; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; and it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it." Ex. xx. 8-11.

This commandment is of universal obligation, for it is based upon creation, which concerns the whole human race. "The Sabbath was made for man" (Mark i. 17), without respect of nationality, or age of the world. It was made when there was but one man and one woman on earth. At the close of the six days of creation, immediately after the creation of Adam, God rested on the seventh day from all His work, "and God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it; because that in it He had rested from all His work which God created and made." Gen. ii. 2, 3. Therefore this commandment is spoken to everyone who is descended from Adam.

It is very definite, requiring the observance of the seventh day of the week, because the women who saw Jesus crucified and buried, "returned and prepared spices and ointments, and rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment" (Luke xxiii. 56), and "when the Sabbath was past," they came to the sepulchre early on the first day of the week. Mark xvi. 1, 2; Luke xxiv. 1. The day immediately before the first day of the week must be the seventh day of the week, and that is "the Sabbath day according to the commandment."

The commandment requiring the observance of the seventh day of the week is part of the law, of which Jesus said, "It is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail." Luke xvi. 17. Heaven and earth have not passed away, therefore the law remains unchanged.

It is one of the commandments of the law, which Jesus said He came not to destroy, but to fulfil (Matt. v. 19); and it is one of those which He kept. John xv. 10. "He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself also so to walk even as He walked." 1 John ii. 6. We are "saved by His life," and by that only.

The seventh day is the day that is always called "the Sabbath" throughout the Bible,-the New Testament as well as the Old,-showing that God designs that it shall always and everywhere be known by that name. It is never called anything else but the Sabbath, except in Rev. i. 10, where it is called simply "the Lord's day," which is what the fourth commandment declares it to be.

So much for the commandment. Yet, plain as it is, we find that it is very generally disregarded by professed Christians. That is, they profess to keep the commandment, by keeping another day than that named in the commandment. No one claims that there is anywhere in the Bible any mention of a change in the commandment, or that the Bible says one word about the observance of Sunday; for it is admitted that the substitution of Sunday for the Sabbath did not occur until after the days of the apostles, and that "the change from the seventh to the first appears to have been gradually and silently introduced, by example rather than by express precept."-Dr. Scott.

We have before us a tract written by a clergyman of the Church of England, in which it is stated that the change in the day was made "when Christ's life on earth was ended, and He had ascended to heaven." It is claimed that this change was made in obedience to the will of Christ, yet the writer adds that "we are not told of any words of His in which He gave this direction." Indeed we are not.

The excuse most commonly given for the change from the commandment, is that the people generally do it, and that since the first day is kept "in honour of Christ," it must be acceptable to the Lord; that the intent of the commandment is met, inasmuch as one day of the seven is observed. Precisely the way in which Saul persuaded himself that he had obeyed the commandment of the Lord. He said, "the people spared the best of the sheep and the oxen." It was as easy for Saul, as it is for men now, to imagine that whatever "the people" do is all right.

Moreover, the cattle which God had said should be "utterly destroyed" were saved to be sacrificed to the Lord. Surely the Lord ought to be

211

satisfied with such a bribe as that! What difference did it make when the animals were killed, so long as they were sure to be killed sometime; Saul thought that it would honour the Lord more to slay them in sacrifice, than to slay them in any other way; just as people think that the Lord will be honoured more by Sunday observance, than by the observance of the day which He has commanded.

There is not an excuse given for keeping Sunday instead of the Sabbath, which is not paralleled by Saul's excuse for not destroying the spoil of the Amalekites. But in the case of Saul the Lord said that it was rebellion, which is the same as the sin of witchcraft. Since the same God now lives, and changes not, what would He now say of the liberties that His professed followers had taken with His fourth commandment?

THE ROOT OF THE MATTER

Having seen that plain violation of one of God's commandments is the sin of witchcraft, no matter how specious is the excuse, let us now go to the root of the whole matter. Writing to the Corinthians, the Apostle Paul said: "I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ." 2 Cor. xi. 3.

It is evident that in every attempt to beguile men from the truth as it is in Jesus, the devil has used the same arts with which he succeeded in deceiving Eve. Let us therefore see by what means she was deceived. Read the account in Gen. iii. 1-6.

God had commanded Adam and Eve not to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, saying, "in the day ye eat thereof ye shall surely die." The serpent came with artful insinuations against God, intimating that God was unjust in giving such a commandment. "Is it so that God hath said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? Can it be possible that He would be so arbitrary as that?" This prepared the way for a bolder strike in response to Eve's statement that God had said that they might eat of every tree but one, but that they should die if they ate of that. The serpent said:-

"Ye shall not surely die; for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as God's [literally, like God], knowing good and evil."

Then the record says that "when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her, and he did eat."

But the fact was that the tree was not one to be desired; neither, since God had prohibited it, was it good for food. It was poisonous, as has been amply demonstrated; for it was,

-"the tree whose mortal taste
Brought death into the world, and all our woe."

How then did the woman see that the fruit of the tree was good for food, and to be desired?-She saw it through the representations of the tempter. He caused her to see it by means of his magic arts. She was bewitched. She saw that which did not exist, just as has been the case with many people since, when they have been under the spell of the conjurer. It was witchcraft and magic that caused the sin from which all other sins have sprung. And thus we see why it is that rebellion is the sin of witchcraft.

But what was the magic by which the tempter induced Eve to transgress the express commandment of the Lord?-It is all summed up in one sentence, "Ye shall not surely die." It was the belief of this lie that caused the first sin and all the sins that have followed in its train. It is by the subtlety by which the serpent beguiled Eve, that our minds are in danger of being corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. The false prophets and teachers are threatened with punishment by the Lord, because, as He says:-

"With lies ye have made the heart of the righteous sad, whom I have not made sad; and strengthened the hands of the wicked, that he should not return from his wicked way, by promising him life." Eze. xiii. 22.

THE SPIRIT OF ANTICHRIST

This is the spirit of antichrist, for since Christ "was manifested to take away our sins" (1 John iii. 5), it is evident that everything which tends to oppose His work,-to keep men in sin,-is the work of antichrist. It is the work of "that old serpent, called the devil and Satan." Rev. xii. 9. Let us look a little more closely at this principle of evil.

Satan induced Eve to sin by saying, "Ye shall not surely die." He induced her to commit an act of open rebellion against God,-an act which would separate her from Him,-casting off entirely her allegiance to Him, and following her own way; and this he did by making her believe that it would not cut short or diminish her life. But the only ground on which one could expect to have life under those circumstances, that is, in separation from God, and rebellion against Him, would be that he already possessed life in himself, independently of God. The devil, therefore, caused Eve to believe that she had life in herself, so that she could not surely die, and be utterly destroyed, even though she utterly rejected God. He with lies induced her to sin, by promising her life; and false prophets and teachers have strengthened the hands of the wicked, that they should not return from their wicked way, by promising them life.

NATURE OF MAN

The Scriptures give us in simple terms the nature of man. Let us read something of what they say. "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." Rom. v. 12. The nature of man is sinful, and mortal because sinful. "The soul that sinneth, it shall die."

"From within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness." Mark vii. 21, 22.

"The works of the flesh are manifest, which are these: Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like." Gal. v. 19-21. And the same writer, after naming over the same things in Rom. i. 29-31, says that the judgment of God is that "they which commit such things are worthy of death." All men have sinned, and so all men are mortal, because "to be carnally minded is death." In sinning man lost life, just as God said he should.

CHRIST'S WORK

Christ came "to seek and to save that which was lost." This He does by supplying to man that which has been lost. And what does He supply?-Life. Read the following texts:-

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." John iii. 16.

212

"As the living Father hath sent Me, and I live by the Father; so he that eatheth Me, even he shall live by Me." John vi. 57.

"The thief cometh not but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy; I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." John x. 10.

"Father the hour is come; glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee; as Thou hast given Him power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as Thou hast given Him. And this is life eternal, that they might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent." John xvii. 1-3.

Christ has "abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel." 2 Tim. i. 10. He has abolished sin and death in His own flesh (1 Peter ii. 24; Gal. iii. 13; Eph. ii. 15); therefore it is abolished only in those in whom Christ dwells by faith. He has brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel; therefore none can see life and immortality except those who accept Christ and the Gospel. "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life." John iii. 36.

LIFE AND RIGHTEOUSNESS IN CHRIST

It is in the Gospel that life and immortality are brought to light; because the Gospel is "the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth;" "for therein is the righteousness of God revealed." Rom. i. 16, 17. It is by the Gospel that we are saved. But we are "saved by His life" (Rom. v. 10), because His life is righteousness. Righteousness cannot be found except in the life of God. Jesus, who is the manifestation of God to men, said, "None is good, save one; that is, God." Luke xviii. 19. And God alone has life in Himself. With Him is "the fountian of life." Ps. xxxvi. 9. So we find that life and righteousness, alone from God, are inseparable; because His life is righteousness. Christ is our righteousness, because He is our life.

The same thing may be shown in another way. Thus: "All unrighteousness is sin." 1 John v. 17. "Sin is the transgression of the law." 1 John iii. 4. Therefore all unrighteousness is the transgression of the law. But the law was, and is, the life of Christ, because out of the heart are the issues of life (Prov. iv. 23), and Jesus said, "I delight to do Thy will, O My God; yea, Thy law is within My heart." Ps. xl. 8. All unrighteousness, or transgression of the law, is therefore opposition to the life of God in Christ; for His life is the perfection of righteousness, or of obedience to the law.

This being the case, it is evident that whoever claims that life may be had apart from Christ, is claiming that righteousness may be had apart from Him. When the serpent told Eve that if she ate of the forbidden tree she should not die, but should be like God, and he really assured her that it would be right to do what God had forbidden. In other words, he made her believe that her way was right, and that she was the proper judge of her own actions; in short, that she was essentially God.

It is evident, therefore, that the teaching that men will live to all eternity, even though they do not accept the Lord Jesus Christ, is the work of antichrist. It must be so, because it is a positive denial of the words of inspiration, that he that hath not the Son, hath not life. It is a denial of the work of Christ, which is solely to give life, and to give righteousness through His life. Moreover, it is shown to be the work of antichrist, in that the devil himself, the great enemy of Christ, is the one who originated the teaching that even sinners cannot die.

MODERN SPIRITUALISM

This teaching is all summed up in what is known as Modern Spiritualism. Most people have a very vague and incorrect idea of what Spiritualism is. They think that it means simply rapping, table-tipping, and other more or less extravagant manifestations. But the whole of Spiritualism is summed up in the teaching that man has a conscious existence in death,-that, in fact, there is no death, because man has life in himself, regardless of his relation to God and the Lord Jesus Christ. Let Spiritualists themselves tell us what Spiritualism really is. We quote from standard Spiritualist publications:-

The central idea of modern Spiritualism is the keystone of the religious arch. That is, a continued existence.-Golden Gate.

Spiritualism per se is a science; it is the demonstration of certain facts relative to the nature of man; it explains the psychical phenomena which have transpired in the past, and the mysteries which have surrounded us as spiritual beings. It demonstrates the fact of man's continued existence after death, and enlightens us in regard to the matter of that existence.-Ib.

The very central truth of Spiritualism is the power and possibility of spirit return, under certain conditions, to communicate with those in the material form.

The phenomena that a company Spiritualism are simply the means by which it is sought to demonstrate the idea of man's continued existence. As Satan made Eve "see" that what he told her was so, although it was an infamous lie, so he still proceeds to cause people to "see" that there is no such thing as death, by giving them pretended communications from the departed, and by showing them their forms. For be it known that the devil and his angels, and not the spirits of the dead, are the authors of all the communications and phenomena of Spiritualism.

MAN'S CONDITION IN DEATH

The Scriptures tell us man's condition in death, and assure us of the impossibility of anybody's taking any part in the affairs of this life, after he has died. Let us read a few texts:-

"Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help. His breath goth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish." Ps. cxlvi. 3, 4.

"The dead praise not the Lord, neither any that go down into silence." Ps. cxv. 17.

"For the grave cannot praise Thee, death cannot celebrate Thee; they that go down into the pit [grave] cannot hope for Thy truth. The living, the living, he shall praise Thee, as I do this day." Isa. xxxviii. 18, 19.

"For the living know that they shall die; but the dead know not anything, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten. Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy is now perished." Eccl. ix. 5, 6.

"Man that is born of woman is a few days, and full of trouble. He cometh forth like a flower, and is cut down; he fleeth as a shadow, and continueth not." "For there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that the tender branch thereof will not cease. Though the root thereof wax cold in the earth, and the stock thereof die in the ground; yet through the scent of water it will bud, and bring forth boughs like a plant. But men dieth, and wasteth away; yea, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he? As the waters fail from the sea, and as the flood decayeth and drieth up, so men lieth down, and riseth not; till the heavens be no more, they shall not awake, nor be raised out of their sleep." "His sons come to honour, and he knoweth it not; and

213

they are brought low, but he perceiveth it not of them." Job xiv. 1, 2, 7-12, 21.

"For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little season, and then vanisheth away." James iv. 14.

From these texts it is evident that the phenomena of Spiritualism cannot be produced by departed men. That they are the production of demons is evident from the fact that they are wrought for the purpose of giving colour to Satan's great falsehood, "Thou shall not surely die," and that both Satan and his angels are able to transform themselves into angels of light, and therefore have the power to personate the dead. Modern Spiritualism is but ancient Paganism; and of that the Apostle Paul wrote, "But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils." 1 Cor. x. 20.

SAUL AND THE WITCH

The truthfulness of the words of the prophet-"rebellion is the sin of witchcraft"-was fully demonstrated by Saul himself before he died. He had rejected the Lord and therefore the Lord had of necessity rejected him. "When Saul enquired of the Lord, the Lord answered him not, neither by dreams, nor by Urim, nor by prophets." 1 Sam. xxviii. 6. How could He, when Saul had despised His word, and turned to Him now only through fear?

"Then Saul said unto his servants, Seek me a woman that hath a familiar spirit, that I may go to her, and inquire of her." To appeal to one that has a familiar spirit, is to appeal to the dead, as we learn from Isa. viii. 19, "And when they shall say unto you, Seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto the wizards, that chirp and that mutter; should not a nation seek unto their God? on behalf of the living should they seek unto the dead?" R.V. But to have professed dealings with the dead, is to have actual dealings with the devil, since the dead know not anything, and the devil personates them. This is witchcraft, and the beginning of it in Saul's case, as in every other, was in turning aside from the word of the Lord.

Now let us read the interview between Saul and the woman with the familiar spirit, or, as she would be called in these days, the Spiritualist medium. After her fears as to her safety had been calmed, she said:-

"Whom shall I bring up to thee? And he said, Bring me up Samuel. And when the woman saw Samuel she cried with a loud voice; and the woman spake to Saul, saying, Why hast thou deceived me? For thou art Saul. And the king said unto her, Be not afraid; for what sawest thou? And the woman said, I saw gods ascending out of the earth. And he said unto her, What form is he of? And she said, An old man cometh up. . . . And Saul perceived that it was Samuel, and he stooped with his face to the ground, and bowed himself."

Saul "perceived" that it was Samuel, just as Eve "saw" that the forbidden tree was good, and to be desired. He saw it through the representations of the devil. Whether or not Saul actually saw anything is uncertain, and is immaterial. In either case it was the devil who was deluding his senses.

Then followed the conversation, in which the spirit told him of his approaching doom. This the devil could easily do, as Saul was now entirely in his power. And this is the lesson to be learned from this narrative, that he who rejects the word of the Lord, rejects the Lord Himself; and he who rejects the Lord, must of necessity put himself into the devil's power. Rebellion is the sin of witchcraft. Whoever rejects the word of the Lord in one particular, has no safeguard against believing any sort of error. All the wickedness of Spiritualism is wrapped up in rejection of God's word.

DENYING THE ATONEMENT

We have seen from the Scriptures that to teach that man has life in himself is to teach that he has righteousness in himself,-that he himself is the standard of right,-and that he is, in fact, God. It was thus that the serpent beguiled Eve, saying, "Ye shall not surely die;" "Ye shall be like God." Now see how this is borne out in Spiritualism. In the Banner of Light, one of the leading Spiritualist journals of the world, we read:-

I believe that man is amenable to no law not

214

written upon his own nature, no matter by whom it is written. . . . By his own nature must he be tried-by his own acts he must stand or fall. The, man must give an account to God for all his deeds; but how?-Solely by giving account to his own nature-to himself. Feb. 6, 1864.

In line with this is the following editorial statement in the Golden Gate of July 2, 1887, another leading Spiritualist journal:-

The spirits also teach us that there is no atonement or remission of sin except through growth; that as we sow, so also must we reap. They have not found God, and never will, except as they find Him in their own souls.

Once more we quote the words of another leading Spiritualist teacher:-

We believe that God does not pardon sin, as is represented in the Scriptures; and we also believe that sin is as much a necessity as righteousness so-termed; that sin in the evolution of Nature's (God's) laws is converted into righteousness.

Let the reader turn to the texts previously quoted, which showed the nature of the unregenerate man, and he will see that such teaching as this must inevitably tend, when believed, to all manner of wickedness. Since it is the teaching of the devil, it must produce deviltry. That it is anti-Christian it is evident from the fact that it contradicts both what the Scriptures say of man's nature, and what Christ says of His mission, and that it tends to sin. But it is the legitimate result of the doctrine that there really is no death.

But some will say that the Spiritualists are ungodly men who make a profession of belief in the Bible, and that their unchristian utterances are to be attributed to this, and not to their belief in continued existence in death. Let us then see how that doctrine affects those who profess to love the Lord Jesus Christ, and to revere His word.

THE DEAD AS SAVIOURS

We quote from a Sunday-school paper which, although edited by a Methodist Doctor of Divinity, is undenominational, circulating among all denominations. Although the paper had an "Open Letter" Department, in which correspondents were free to express their opinions, no word of dissent ever appeared, against the editorial from which the following was taken, but, on the contrary, it was highly commended. Under the heading, "What Our Dead Do For Us," the editor wrote:-

Much of the best work of the world is done through the present, personal influence of the dead. And in our estimate of the forces which give us efficiency, we ought to assign a large place to the power over us, and in us, of loved ones whom we mourn as wholly removed from us. When death takes away one on whom we leaned. . . . the temptation to us is to feel that his work for us is done, and that henceforth, while we live on here, we must live on without his presence or aid. Yet, as a practical fact, and as a great spiritual truth, our dead do for us as constantly as they could do for us if they were still here in flesh; and they do for us very much that they could not do unless they were dead.

Some of the saintly faces of fathers and mothers, which are a benediction to all who look at them, could never have shown as now with the reflected light of heaven, unless they had been summoned to frequent upward lookings through the clouds, and loving communion with their children in heaven. There are manly and womanly children, who are more serious and earnest and devoted in their young life struggles, because of the constant sense of the overwatching presence of their dead parents. . . . And so the dead live on here, for, and with, and in, those who mourn and remember them as gone hence for ever.

Our living friends do much for us, but perhaps our dead friends do yet more.

The object of this extract is to show the natural result of the doctrine that the dead do not really die. Notice (1) that the dead are put in the place of Christ, as the agency that works in men for good; and (2) that the glorification of saints is attributed to communion with the dead, and not to communion with Christ. When it is said that faces "could never have shown as now with the reflected light of heaven, unless they had been summoned to frequent upward lookings through the clouds, and loving communion with their children in heaven," it is evident that the influence of Jesus Christ is discounted. The dead are exalted to His place. It is as much as to say that the dead do that which Christ Himself ought to. And yet the men who wrote that would be shocked at the suggestion that he did not perfectly honour the Lord. It was by his subtlety that the devil beguiled Eve, and the words, "Ye shall not surely die," still undermine trust in Christ in the most subtle and unperceived matter.

Perhaps the following from a published sermon by a most prominent D.D. of the Presbyterian denomination may serve to indicate (since it is but one out of scores of similar utterances) how much trust is put in the dead for salvation, by many who would spurn with indignation the charge that they are Spiritualists, and who would in the strongest terms condemn Catholic saint-worship:-

Oh, may the dead ever be with us, walking by our side, taking us by the hand, smoothing the tears from the troubled brow, and pointing us upward to the regions of everlasting light and peace!

FAITH IN THE DEAD

The following extract from a story in another religious journal (Presbyterian) shows still more strikingly how the doctrine that the dead do not really die deposes Christ from His rightful place, and puts human beings in His stead. Whether the story professed to be a narrative of facts, or was simply imagined in order to illustrate a theory, makes no difference. The influence of the belief in the conscious existence of the dead is shown just the same in either case. The story opens with a conversation between a mother and her little daughter, and runs thus:-

"Mamma, are you thinking of Jessie?"

"Yes, dear, she seems to be very near me to-night."

Bertha drew a low stool to the window by mamma's side, and asked in hushed tones, "Do you indeed think that sister Jessie can sometimes be with us in this room?"

"I cannot doubt it," was the reply. Mamma's hand was laid caressingly and soothingly upon the bowed head, for Bertha had not yet learned (alas, how few in this weary world do learn!) the quiet repose and steadfast hope of a perfect faith.

After a moment's silence Mrs. Grey continued: "I have been sitting here alone thinking of Jessie's life among the angels. How happy she must be in her beautiful home! I often wonder in just what way the hopes and aspirations, that made her earth life so pure and true, are finding their perfect realisation in the unrestricted possibilities of spiritual life."

"But, mamma, what comfort do you find in that?" cried Bertha. "I want her here; she was older and so much wiser and better than I, and she would have helped me so much."

"But that is a selfish grief, dear Bertha; is it no comfort to know that Jessie is safe and happy? She knows how much you need help, and can guide you far more truly now in her perfect knowledge of the good and true, than she could have done in her earthly existence."

"But I cannot see her; I cannot hear her. How can she help me now?" and Bertha sobbed with the unreasoning abandon of a grief that would not be comforted.

"But quiet, my child; Jessie does not wish to mourn for her in this rebellious way. It can be a help to you always to think what way your angel sister would rejoice to have you think, and speak, and act. If you seek to do those things that merit her approval, it would surely feel her guiding power. Jessie can both see and hear you; but her spirit is released from its earthly fetters, because the loving Father had need of her among the angels. We cannot hear her voice, but we may feel the holy influence of her angelic presence; we cannot see her face, but we may be cheered and comforted by the thought that her bright spirit is nearest, and that she loves us with a love that is purer and holier than earth-love, even as her life in its changed relations is purer and holier."

The story goes on to tell how Bertha was seduced and comforted by this talk, and how her heart was filled with an "unspeakable joy" by the thought that her dead sister "might always be unto her an invisible guardian, an intangible, loving presence." Then follow an account of a dream which he had, in which Jessie appeared to her, and when she awoke, "its calm influence entering into her heart, taught her that death is indeed life," etc.

215

Is it possible to read the above and not see that Jesus is entirely ignored, and His rightful place filled by a dead girl? The Bible tells us that Christ is the Author and Finisher of faith; that is, that true faith centres in Him alone. But in this story "the quiet and steadfast hope of a perfect faith" is nothing else but belief in the presence of the dead. The Scriptures tell us that there is not salvation in any other than Jesus; but this makes a dead friend the chief saving agency. Instead of seeking to "walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing," the little girl is taught to seek to do the things that merit the approval of her dead sister. Peter tells of "joy unspeakable and full of glory," which comes to those who love and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ; but the doctrine under consideration makes the unspeakable joy come from the belief in the presence of the dead. Instead of saying to the Lord, "Whom have I in heaven but Thee? and there is none on earth that I desire beside Thee," the belief in the continued existence of the dead relegates Jesus to the background, and deifies the dead.

THE DEAD AS JUDGES

The next extract is from a Baptist paper. It is from a report of anniversary services held in memory of a Dr. Parker, at which the wife of the minister read a "tribute" to the departed. Following is a portion:-

Another soul has taken its place among the great cloud of witnesses, and to-day looks on with clearer, juster, kindlier vision than earth can know at the battle you and I are still waging. Have you thought with what loving interest he is watching our work and lives? Not with the imperfect edition of men, and with the unjust judgments of earth, but with a clear and just discrimination of Heaven we are seen by him to-day as we in turn shall see.

There is for us who meet in Parker Chapel a new tie binding us to Heaven, and there is just as surely a new motive for more earnest, more worthy, more holy living and work on earth. If there be any incentive to worthy endeavour in the thought that the great and good of all ages are witnesses of our efforts, then the knowledge that he who so recently was with us has taken his place in the great host of heavenly witnesses, should be a fresh motive for us to lay aside every weight, and run our race with patience.

"Do we indeed desire the dead
Should still be near us at our side?
Is there no baseness we should hide?
No inner vileness that we dread?

"Shall he whose applause I strove,
I had such reverence for his blame,
See with clearness some hidden shame,
And I be lessened in his love?

"I wrong the grave with fears untrue;
Shall love be blamed for want of faith?
There must be wisdom with great Death;
The dead shall look us through and through.

"Be near us when we climb and fall.
Ye watch, like God, the rolling years
With larger, other eyes than ours,
To make allowance for us all."

When we read how the ancient Greeks and Romans deified their dead heroes, we call it Paganism. But thousands of men, including many preachers, have read these verses, and have applauded the author's clear grasp of "Christianity." But who can tell the difference? There is none. The serpent said to the woman, "In the day that ye eat thereof, ye shall be like God, knowing good and evil," and the inevitable result of believing the doctrine, "Ye shall not surely die," is still to exalt the dead to the place of God, and make them the judges of mankind. Surely such teaching is none other than the work of antichrist, inasmuch as all judgment is committed to the only begotten Son of God.

THE DEAD AS TEACHERS

One of the most prominent ministers in the world, who regularly preaches to congregations numbering several thousand, and whose name is known, and whose sermons are read throughout the world, has preached a published sermon entitled "The Employments of Heaven," in which he pictures dead physicians as still carrying on their work, and attributes to their unseen touch some of the mysterious recoveries of patients who have been given up to die. Then, speaking of himself, he said:-

When I get to heaven-as by the grace of God I am destined to go to that place-I will come and see you all. Yea, I will come to all the people to whom I have ministered the Gospel, and to the millions of souls to whom, through whom the kindness of the printing press, I am permitted to preach in this land, and in other lands. . . . I will visit them all. I give them fair notice. Our departed friends in the ministry are engaged in that delectable entertainment now.

Thus is the devil using his first falsehood-"Ye shall not surely die"-to pave the way for the reception of many others. For we know from the Scriptures that no man is able to know or do anything when he is dead, and that when they seem to come back, and to communicate, it is only the spirits of devils. Now see for what purpose he is getting the people accustomed to the idea that dead ministers can come back and teach. Some years ago a Baptist minister left his pulpit, and became an avowed Spiritualist. Writing of his experience, and of the spirits who were his familiar visitors, he said:-

Nearly half a score of old Baptist preachers, with whom I have been associated in the past, have already come to our home, and explained wherein their former preaching was erroneous. The whole system of Biblical interpretation is far away from the truth, as everyone will find when they enter the spiritual world.

Without attempting to defend anybody's "system of Biblical interpretation," we may learn this fact, namely, that when the devil personates dead ministers, and begins preaching, it is only for the purpose of undermining faith in the Bible. And those who have so far wandered from God's word as to believe Satan's fiction that there is no death, despite God's word to the contrary, will, if they do not forsake that error, fall easy victims to all the false doctrine with which the agents of Satan will flood the world.

A few years ago there was a representative gathering of the Congregationalists in London, from all parts of the world. Of course the new "criticism" came in for discussion. Some had pleaded for holding to "the faith of the fathers," when one man said, "But who knows what the faith of the fathers is now?" This was thought to be a particularly happy bit, and was the most applauded of any remark made during the convention. Thus the way is rapidly preparing for Satan to fill the minds of professed believers in Christ with all manner of false doctrines, and to fill the churches with wickedness. And then will the words go forth from heaven: "Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird." Rev. xviii. 2. And the preparation for this was made by Satan in Eden six thousand years ago, when he said, "Ye shall not surely die." How fearfully the Apostle Paul's forebodings have been realised, for as the serpent beguiled Eve, many thousands of minds have been corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.

TRUE COMFORT

"But are we not to be comforted with the thought of meeting our loved ones again? Are we to think of them when they die as lost for ever?" No; the righteous dead are not lost, but the promise is that "they shall come again from the land of the enemy." Jer. xxxi. 16, 17. Read these soul-cheering words:-

"But we would not have you ignorant, brethren, concerning them that fall asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as the rest which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which are fallen asleep in Jesus will God bring with Him. For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we that are alive, that are left unto the coming

216

of the Lord, shall in no wise precede them which are fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we that are alive, that are left, shall together with them be caught up in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words."

Yes; if we truly believe the Lord we shall meet the ones who have departed, for "together with them" we shall be "caught up"-"to meet the Lord." But even the joy of meeting friends and kindred will be overtopped by the joy of meeting with "the chiefest among ten thousand, and the One altogether lovely." "He will swallow up death in victory." To Him alone will every eye be turned, and will every tongue ascribe praise. "Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood," will all honour and glory be given. And since that will be the occupation of the redeemed in heaven, let the redeemed on earth beware of anything that tends to eclipse His glory now.

"Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. For in Him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. And YE ARE COMPLETE IN HIM."

"Life and Death" The Present Truth 10, 14.

E. J. Waggoner

"He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." 1 John v. 12.

When you skip with a rope, or roll your hoop, or play with your dog or cat, or help your father or mother, do you ever stop to think who gives you the power to skip and run and shout? Who filled you so brimful of life and activity? And who keeps you alive during the long nights when you, as well as your father and mother, are sound asleep? Think a moment, and see if you cannot remember.

We have learned that "In Him [the Lord] we live, and move, and have our being," and that "it is He that hath made us and not we ourselves," for "with Him is the fountain of life."

Well, then, since we live in Him, and there is no other fountain of life, suppose we should shut ourselves away from Him, what would happen to us?

Yes, we should surely die, for we have no life of our own at all. We cannot live without God any more than the grass or the trees or the beasts can, for from Him flows "the life of every living thing."

Then can you not see how hopelessly lost we were when man in Eden shut himself away from God by the "thick cloud," or "wall," of sin? And can you not see how hopelessly lost we are now, if we do not accept Jesus as our good Shepherd, and allow Him to take our sins away and bring us back to God?

As we learned last week, Jesus is the only "door" and only "way" to God, the fountain of life. That is the reason that God says, "He that hath the Son hath life, and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." Jesus is our only hope, our only salvation.

By sin we have shut ourselves away from all right to the life that God gave us, and which He now lends us but for a little while that we may have time to learn of Jesus, and to take Him for our Saviour. We shall soon die and return to dust, just as God said we should, and just as Adam and Eve did long ago.

If we have accepted Jesus, we have accepted His life, and we need not fear, for we shall live again, never to die anymore. While we sleep in the grave Jesus will safely keep for us His own eternal life which we have accepted, and He will come in a little while and wake us up to receive it again.

But if we will not accept Him and His life now, we shall have no life then to be hid with Christ in God, and therefore we shall have to be awakened to everlasting destruction instead of to everlasting life.

Satan knows this, and so he does everything that he can to keep us away from Jesus. He knows that if we have Jesus, we have life, and He does not want us to go to Jesus that we may have life. He wants to make us believe that we can live without God just as well as with Him, and that we cannot die no matter how wicked we are. If he can get us to believe that, he knows that we shall not feel any need of Jesus, for we shall think that we have life in ourselves; thus he will be able to keep us away from the only One who can save us.

Whenever, therefore, we are tempted to disobey God and commit any naughty sin, Satan whispers to us just as he did to Eve, "Fear not; it will not do any harm; ye shall not surely die, even though you do disobey God, and shut Him away with your sins; there is no such thing as death; even though you appear to die it is not death, and so you can never die."

Though with our own eyes we may have seen our friends die, and lie perfectly still and helpless, and deaf to all our cries, yet he has said, "Ye shall not surely die; this is not death, but another and better and more beautiful way of living; your friends are not dead but alive, and they hear every word you say, and are watching over you and thinking about you all the time, and they can help you to live as you ought."

He is so very anxious to have us believe this, and thus lead us away from seeking Jesus for help and life, that he and his angels sometimes cause themselves to look like people who have died, and then they come and show themselves and say that they are the friends who were supposed to be dead. They look so much like them, and talk so much like them, that people are easily deceived, and believe that they are really talking with their dead friends.

Satan has also written messages to people in the handwriting of their dead friends, thus causing them to think that their friends were alive and writing to them.

Although we are told that Satan will soon work "with all power and signs and lying wonders," we need not fear that we shall be deceived if we know and love and really believe God's word. He has told us very plainly all that we need to know.

God said to man, If thou eatest of the tree, "thou shalt surely die." In Ezekiel we read, "The soul that sinneth, it shall die." Notice, God does not say that it shall appear to die, but that "it shall die."

Again, God says, "Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help. His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish."

How plain that is! "The soul that sinneth, it shall die," and in the very day that he dies, "his thoughts perish." He cannot be thinking about us, then, can he?

In another place we read, "His sons come to honour, and he knoweth it not; and they are brought low, but he perceiveth it not of them." No wonder that he does not know what happens to his children after he is dead, for God says that "his thoughts perish."

But here is another word of God which is still plainer; "The living know that they shall die; but the dead know not anything."

Notice the difference between God's word and Satan's: Satan says, They shall not surely die; God says, They shall surely die. Satan says, They are thinking about us; God says, Their thoughts perish. Satan says, They know as much or more than they did before; God says, They know not anything.

Then let us believe God even though Satan appears to us, looking and talking to us like our friends who have died, and even though He sends us writing that looks just like theirs. We may be sure that Satan is just trying to fool us, for God says the dead cannot think, or know, or do, for they are dead. They, therefore, cannot help us, and they cannot harm us.

Jesus is the only One that can save

222

us from our sins and bring us to God that we may have life. Without Him we shall have no life and no hope of life. Oh, let us not believe Satan, but let us come to Jesus now that we may have life.

1. Who made you? Ps. c. 3.

2. By the power of whose life do you live and move? Acts xvii. 28.

3. With whom is the only fountain of life? Ps. xxxvi. 9.

4. Then if we should shut ourselves away from God, what would happen to us?

5. How much do we need God?-As much as the grass and beasts.

6. Why? Job xii. 10, margin; Eccl. iii. 19.

7. Then happened to man as soon as he shut himself away from God by sin?-He was doomed to death. Gen. ii. 17.

8. How many of us have sinned? Rom. iii. 23.

9. Is there, then, no hope for us? John iii. 16; 1 John v. 12.

10. What did Satan say to Eve when she was tempted to sin? Gen. iii. 4.

11. What does he say to us when we are tempted to sin?-The same thing. 2 Cor. xi. 3.

12. How else does he try to make us believe that there is no death?

13. Why is he so anxious to have us believe that we can sin and yet live?

14. What does God say about the soul that sins? Eze. xviii. 20.

15. And what takes place the very day that a man dies? Ps. cxlvi. 4.

16. Then can a dead man know what his children are doing? Job xiv. 21.

17. How much can he know? Eccl. ix. 5.

18. Is it necessary to be deceived by Satan when God has spoken so plainly?

19. If we do not have Jesus, what else do we not have? 1 John v. 12.

20. Then who is our only hope? Acts iv. 12.

21. If we accept Jesus now, what will be safe even though we sleep in the grave a little while? Col. iii. 3, 4.

22. But if we will not accept Him now, to what shall we be awakened? John v. 29.

23. Then can we afford to grieve away the only One who can give us life?

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 14.

E. J. Waggoner

-Six months imprisonment is the sentence recently pronounced upon a Berlin editor for writing an article "inciting to class hatred."

-The State of Wyoming, U.S.A., has recently been visited by a severe storm, in which immense numbers of cattle are said to have perished.

-In the recent explosion of dynamite in the sunken hull of the Cabo Machichaco, at Santander, eighteen persons were killed and twenty-three injured.

-The Brazilian insurgents are still holding out in one or two of the southern provinces of Brazil, but it is not thought that they are capable of resisting long.

-Mr. Vanderbilt is spending two millions sterling in building himself a house in New York to rival the moat splendid palaces in Europe. Over 600 men have, been employed two years in its erection.

-It is stated in official quarters at St. Petersburg that the Russian Minister of the Interior proposes shortly to introduce several administrative measures for improving to a certain extent the position of the Jews in Russia.

-The State Council of Switzerland has unanimously adopted the Bill approved by the Federal Council imposing penalties ranging from ten years' imprisonment to penal servitude for life on persons making criminal use of explosives.

-It is stated at Washington that President Cleveland has decided to veto the bill recently passed by Congress for coining the silver seigniorage,-a step which will probably disrupt the Democratic party in the Western States.

-France has just been placed in direct telegraphic communication with New Caledonia, through the completion of the cable between that colony and Australia. The tariff between France and New Caledonia is fixed at 9f. 35c. per word.

-An extraordinary story is told of the Crown jewels of King Theebaw, having been seized and hidden by two British soldiers during the war with Burmah in 1885. It is stated that, with the sanction of the authorities, one of the soldiers is now on his way to Burmah to discover the hidden treasure.

-A despatch from Rome states that the Emperors William and Francis Joseph have telegraphed their thanks to the Pope for his encyclical to the Poles. Russia, on the other hand, is very dissatisfied with the publication of the encyclical, and M. Isvolski, the Russian semi-official agent to the Holy See, has not returned to Rome.

-Information comes from Buenos Ayres to the effect that four cannons have been purchased there by the secret agents of a proposed revolutionary movement in Uruguay. Other munitions of war are now being negotiated for by the same persons. The movement is said to be in sympathy with Admiral de Mello's insurgent party in Brazil.

-A party of 334 trained boys and lads from Dr. Barnardo's Homes, the first for the season, left London recently for Liverpool, en route for Canada. Including these Dr. Barnardo has now sent out 6,805 boys and girls to the Colonies, of whom 98 per cent. have hitherto acquitted themselves satisfactorily. Ninety of the present party are lads of over seventeen, who will go as settlers upon the industrial farm of 10,000 acres in Manitoba, now being developed in connection with the homes.

-It is reported from San Salvador that ex-President Vasquez of Honduras is about to leave San Salvador, where he took refuge after his defeat by General Bonilla, for the United States. General Bonilla, the now President, is trying to organise the government on a firm basis.

-A telegram from Warsaw announces a terrible disaster at a coal mine near Kaszeloff. One of the shafts collapsed, burying the miners who were at work below. Up to the present eleven bodies have been recovered, and a large number of men have been rescued in a seriously injured condition.

-At the sitting of the Austrian Socialist Congress in Vienna a resolution was adopted in favour of the principle of a general strike, on the ground of universal suffrage, the measure of franchise reform proposed by the Government being declared to be insufficient. It was further resolved to leave the initiative in the agitation for an eight-hours day to the miners.

-Private intelligence from Odessa states that numerous arrests continue to be made in that city, of students and others suspected of Nihilist tendencies. The arrests are always made at night. Domiciliary visits are frequent, especially to the lodgings occupied by the students of the university. At St. Petersburg, also, many arrests have been made for similar reasons.

-A very stringent law as to the sale of intoxicants is in force in Nebraska, which provides that "the person licensed shall pay all damages that the community or individuals may sustain in consequence of such traffic; he shall support all paupers, widows, and orphans, and the expenses of all civil and criminal prosecutions, growing out of or justly attributed to his traffic in intoxicating drinks."

-Cannibalism prevails, it is said, to a frightful extent on the right bank of the River Ubango, Africa. A priest reports that native slaves are brought to the market, and sold like butcher's meat. Persons unable to purchase a whole slave buy an arm, or a leg, or the head, and mark it off with a piece of chalk, and when the whole of the unfortunate victim has been selected, he is killed, and the several portions distributed to the customers.

-A letter from Kief to a correspondent of a London journal states that the official appointed to crush Stundism in the province of Kief, is actively engaged in hauling Stundists to trial. At his instigation, a peasant named Sylvester Mouzh, has been arrested, imprisoned, and sentenced to deprivation of all rights, and banishment to the Caucasus. Previous to his trial he was subjected to most barbarous treatment in prison. He was confined in a subterranean room or dungeon, in which lime had been scattered about. Lime is also said to have been placed in his food. His sufferings are described as terrible.

-The Chronicle says: "The principal members of the new American Arctic expedition have reached this country, on their way to Norway. Their real departure for the "Frozen North" will be from Norway, and the route by Spitzbergen. The idea is to squeeze the undertaking into the space of one season-a "dash for the Polo." At present the eternal desire to fathom the northern secret seems to have bred almost an epidemic of expeditions. Peary has gone into the ice from the American side, and Nansen in his Fram is somewhere under the aurora borealis. An English effort is to he headed by Mr. Jackson, so that altogether there will be four Arctic expeditions to occupy attention about the same time."

-Mr. Naoroji, M.P., in a recent address to a crowded audience on "The wants of India," said that the complaint of the people there was that they were not treated with the measure of justice which they as British subjects were entitled to. This was, he said, fully proved by the history of the last fifty years. In 1833 the people of India received a charter which expressly stated that they were to be treated as British subjects without any difference of creed, race, or colour. However, the Executive, or Board of Directors, instructed to carry out this proclamation, disregarded it altogether, and the position of the youths of India who were prepared to enter public offices was just as unsatisfactory as before. In 1845 another unsuccessful attempt was made to reinforce the pledges which had been so cruelly broken. The Indian people yearned for British citizenship, and until they became fully admitted into all its privileges and responsibilities, they would never remain satisfied.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 14.

E. J. Waggoner

"Our noisy Protestants" is the way in which an organ of the High Church phrases its contempt for the other wing of the Church of England.

The latest thing in societies is a "Society for Obtaining Apostolic Power." The minimum subscription is only one shilling a year. "Apostolic power" at a shilling a year is decidedly cheap; that is, the power is cheap; the price is too much.

It has been decided by the Pittsburg (U.S.A.) Board of Education that the wearing of any dress distinctive of any religious order by any of the teachers in the schools, during school hours, is sectarian, and as such is forbidden by the Constitution of the State. In consequence of this, the nuns who had been appointed as teachers, have resigned.

It is stated on what is claimed to be good authority, that Queen Margherita "attributes most of Italy's misfortunes to the sacrilege of despoiling the Sovereign Pontiff of his possessions and authority in Rome, and earnestly desires to see a reconciliation take place between the Vatican and Quirinal." Whether the statement is true or not, it is certain to be made the most of towards restoring the Papacy to its former temporal power.

And the eunuch desired Philip that he would come up and sit with him, and explain to him the Gospel; but Philip said, "You must excuse me; I should like very much to preach to you, but I left home in a great hurry, and have no surplice with me;" and so the eunuch went on his way in ignorance of Christ.

That was not the way that Philip the evangelist did, but here is what we read in one of the letters of Phillips Brooks, written from Trichinipalli, India:-

This morning I went to an early service and saw the grave of Bishop Heber in the chancel. I was going to preach for the minister this evening, but he could not find a surplice of decent length, and it had to be given up.

When Paul wrote, "Be instant in season, out of season," he did not mean that Timothy should always have a surplice in his bag, but that he should always have the word of God in his heart. Those who cannot preach except in clothing of a certain style, lack something of being perfect followers of Him who preached from a fisherman's boat, and by the wayside.

In all the praise of Neal Dow's temperance principles, there is one point that is not much spoken of. Thirty-five years ago he was in the habit of drinking strong tea, and at that time he suffered, very naturally, from severe headaches. He gave up the tea, and his headaches vanished. Why is it that the temperance people who are justly praising his temperant life, do not note his abstinence from alcoholic liquor? Is it because tea is a stimulant that they are more partial to than they are to alcohol?

In writing of Nebuchadnezzar's fury at the three Hebrews who would not worship his image, Alexander McLaren has well said: "He is not the only instance of apparent religious zeal, which is at the bottom nothing but masterfulness. 'You shall worship my god, not because he is God, but because he is mine.' That is the real meaning of a great deal which calls itself 'zeal for the Lord.' The zealot's own will, opinions, fancies, are crammed down other people's throats, and the insult in not thinking or worshipping as he does, is worse in his eyes than the offence against God."

"Child Slaughter" The Present Truth 10, 14.

E. J. Waggoner

Child Slaughter.-In the Review of the Churches, Archdeacon Farrar appeals in behalf of the work and funds of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. The slaughter of children is the most heart-chilling practice in civilised or uncivilised paganism. The testimony of coroners, justices, and workers among the poor is that the system of child insurance is a fruitful source of crime against children. It has been asserted, and the Archdeacon credits it, that a thousand children a year are murdered for insurance money. Added to this is the neglect and cruelty not due to monetary considerations. Under this head the rich as well as the poor are offenders. In the Society's annual report it is stated as follows:-

The habitations of the poor, as a class, do not one whit more deserve to be called "habitations of cruelty" than do the habitations of the rich; and never does the drunkard surpass, seldom is he deliberate enough to equal, in diabolical inventiveness the cruelties of the sober. The society's work has rendered it clear that education, rank, and practice of religious rites are fully compatible with even fervour and devotion in cruelty to children.

The last sentence reminds one of the third of 2 Timothy, where the Apostle Paul mentions the sins which were to be especially prominent in the last days, even among professors of religion, "having a form of godliness." "Without natural affection," "fierce," are terms which officially describe the unnatural parents who torture the little ones.

"A Worthy Ambition" The Present Truth 10, 14.

E. J. Waggoner

A Worthy Ambition.-It is a fact that we are exhorted in the Scriptures to be ambitious. The word ambition is very generally associated with an evil disposition. We think of an Alexander or a C?sar, thirsting for dominion, or a Hildebrand grasping for combined ecclesiastical and temporal sovereignty. The ordinary ambition is simply the clamour of self and passion. It aims to secure place or wealth, or to be thought well of by men, or to be the leader of a regiment of followers, however small and insignificant.

The ambition recommended in the letter to the Thessalonians is of a different character. "But we exhort you, brethren, that ye abound more and more; and that ye be ambitious to be quiet." 1 Thess. iv. 10, 11, margin of R.V. This is a rare ambition, and very often we need a great deal of it in order to rest in quietness and confidence. The person who would advance Christ's kingdom in the cause of truth, must learn how to be quiet in season, as well as how to speak in season.

April 12, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

"Teach me Thy way, O Lord, and lead me in a plain path, because of mine enemies." Ps. xxvii. 11. "Show me Thy ways, O Lord; teach me Thy paths." Ps. xxv. 4. This is a prayer that all need to utter continually, because "It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps;" and God's way, which is infinitely higher than man's way, or his comprehension, is the only right way.

We are so ignorant, and so dull of comprehension, that we have need to pray with emphasis, "Make Thy way straight before my face." Well for us is it that we have a Teacher who is very considerate, "who can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way." Even though we have neglected, or even despised, previous instruction, He is still patient to give wisdom, "and upbraideth not."

Here are some good promises for our encouragement: "What man is he that feareth the Lord? him shall He teach in the way that He shall choose." "The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him; and He will show them His covenant." Ps. xxv. 12, 14. "If any man willeth to do His will, he shall know the teaching." John vii. 17. "The meek will He guide in judgment; and the meek will He teach His way." Ps. xxv. 9. Moses was the meekest man, and "He made known His ways unto Moses." Who can estimate the favour of being taught the way of the Lord, and being allowed to share His secret?

But there is one indispensable requisite to gaining this knowledge, and that is meekness. "Be clothed with humility; for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace unto the humble." 1 Peter v. 5. Who has this clothing?-Nobody, for meekness and humility are foreign to human nature. All men are by nature "wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked." But God provides white raiment, and He Himself will take away the filthy rags, and clothe us with "change of raiment." That is, the Lord teaches His people, and Himself provides the clothing necessary for attending the school.

"The Greatness of His Gentleness" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

In the words of Hosea the Lord says, "I will be as the dew unto Israel." The figure conveys the idea of gentleness, refreshing, and strength. Fresh every evening, the dew wets the fields, and gives the real reviving, refreshing, and strength which vegetation needs for the growth it must make with each day's sun.

Thus it is with grace, and the mercies of the Lord. "They are new every morning." There must be daily growth, and every day we must have the refreshing and reviving from the Lord. He reveals Himself to the believing heart as gently and noiselessly as the dew distills upon the blade of grass; but there is strength in His mercies, that fortifies the soul in distress of sin, and in the heat, "when the blast of the terrible ones is as a storm against the wall."

There is so much lost to many because they are not content to rest daily in the Lord, and drinking in of His quiet presence. When Job, in his time of affliction, spoke of the days of his strength, when he was eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame, and the blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon him, he said: "My root was spread out by the waters, and the dew lay all night upon my branch. My glory was fresh in me." Chap. xxix. 19. The message to every believer is, "Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee." This glory seen upon the Christian, as fresh and glistening as a dew-bespangled meadow in the morning sun, is the testimony of the Christian life.

The Lord often uses the figure of the dew and the rain to describe the nature of His word,-the word by which we are born again, and grow, and are sanctified. He says by Moses: "My doctrine shall drop as the rain, My speech shall distil as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as showers upon the grass." Deut. xxxii. 2. "For as the rain cometh down. . . so shall My word be." Isa. lv. 10, 11.

It is a divinely appropriate simile. Faraday showed that there is stored in a dew drop sufficient electric force to rend a rock. Each drop of dew or rain is bringing life and power into vegetation; and thus the force that would shatter the rock, if pent up, is working itself out in perishing delicate tissues, and carrying the water of life to all animate creation.

So it is God's word. "No word from God shall be void of power," said the angel to Mary; and the Lord says, "Is not My word. . . like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces?" The power of the word is the almighty power of God. And there is in it the same combination of power and gentleness, carried to an infinite degree. All the power is for the faint and the weary, and the word comes as a still small voice to the soul. In the heart of the believer it becomes a well of

226

water springing up unto everlasting life. It is everlasting strength, and everlasting consolation.

This mingling of gentleness and strength that is in the word, reproduces itself in those who take the word in its fulness. "I will be as the dew unto Israel; he shall grow as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon." Hos. xiv. 5. The glory of the Lord is risen upon the believer, and he will reflect the beauty and the grace of Jesus' character. In His meekness and humility, and Divine beauty of soul, He was "the Lily of the valley;" and to those who take Him He brings the same life that He lived. They are made partakers of the Divine nature.

Then there is the infinite strength of His character, which He also shares with those who are His. The life, for beauty, is as the lily, but for the strength, it casts forth its roots as the cedars of Lebanon. It is rooted and grounded in love, rooted and built up in Him. The firmness and constancy of the character that is rooted in the Lord cannot be shaken though all the world is removed. It is a rare combination, this blending of consummate gentleness and grace with unflinching firmness and unyielding strength. It can only come as the gift of God.

The Lord works this in the believer; for it is His own way of dealing with His children. His providences may appear otherwise to the natural heart and eyes, but in the end every soul that is subdued wholly to God will recognise His infinite tenderness in all His ways. David's was a rough and stirring school of instruction, but in the end he was able to say, "Thy gentleness hath made me great."

"The World in Wickedness" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

The World in Wickedness.-It is true to-day, as the apostle wrote in the early centuries, that "the whole world lieth in wickedness." The same Gospel is needed now that the apostles preached, calling men to a change of heart and life, and to something separate from the course of this world. The course of this world is evil, and it is as impossible to drift along with it and still be in the service of the Lord, as it was in the apostles' days. Many things are labelled Christian that are not, and many courses of conduct are sanctioned by professedly Christian sentiment that are utterly opposed to Christ and His life. The nations of Christendom are arming for war as never before, and still we hear about Christian nations. The fact that no nation can exist in this wicked world without the employment of physical force and all the refined developments of the fighting art, shows that there can be no such thing as a Christian nation in this present evil world. The citizens of Christ's kingdom are told by their Lord to love their enemies, bear patiently with the oppressor, and suffer violence, if need be, without retaliation. It is thought by many nowadays that the principles which Christ taught are not applicable to the practical affairs of life. But He lived them in His days, and the same life is the Christian life to-day.

"Easter in Jerusalem" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

All through the year, the Turkish soldiers are on the alert to prevent violent hostilities between the fanatical followers of the Roman and Greek Churches, who dispute with one another the possession of the so-called holy places. This long-standing rivalry shows to what lengths of unreason men may go when they do not know the spirit of the Master, and follow externals and traditions. The flesh verily profiteth nothing. The Mohammedans of Syria are excusable for their belief that Christianity, as they see it misrepresented, is idolatrous worship. What could be in greater contrast to pure Christianity than the exhibitions of Easter week in Jerusalem? A correspondent gives this description of the ceremonies which are supposed to be to the honour of Jesus of Nazareth:-

The one spot in the world which presents the unique spectacle of two Easter days in the year is the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem, the Greek Church, reckoning by the old calendar, is celebrating its Palm Sunday when the Latins are singing their Eastern hymns. As both churches share in the possession of the tomb, and as the rivalry between them is intensely hot, the precincts of the burial place of the "Prince of Peace" more suggest a bear-pit than anything else, unless the soldiers of another faith-that of Islam-are on guard to keep the peace. When the Latin Easter services are in progress, and the Greeks, issuing from their chapel in the Procession of Palms, pass the door of the former and sing hymns at the top of their voices (they have no instrumental music). The Latins promptly retort by singing louder, or by playing on their organ-with every stop out. The Greeks have the larger rights of the tomb, and on their Easter Saturday are able to have all light extinguished to await the coming of the "Bishop of Fire." The gallery for Europeans and the one above it for women have been crowded for hours, and the space about the tomb is packed with the devotees, drunk with religious frenzy. They leap and howl, they clamber on to each other's heads like acrobats, they spin round and round, shrieking-"Behold the tomb of Jesus Christ!" and by the time the first wild notes of the chant which heralds the coming of the Bishop of Fire are heard, the place is a pandemonium. At the Bishop's appearance the Mussulman soldiers clear a path for him and his train. Three times they circle round the tomb, and the Bishop enters it alone. There is an awful silence. Then a light, supposed to be kindled from heaven, appears at an orifice in the side of the tomb. There is a shout-a rush-and instantly the pilgrims have lighted their tapers from it, bundles of candles let down from the galleries are set burning, and the place is ablaze with Holy Fire. The pilgrim's bathe their faces in it, tear open their shirts and hug it to their naked breasts, all men stripped for running, speed away to carry it to Bethlehem and adjacent villages.

"Counting the Cost" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

No person can be a Christian who is unwilling to be accounted peculiar.

Popularity, the praise of men, the worship and support of the majority, political power, and all those things which contribute to world distinction, can never be realised in the experience of a Christian or of the Christian church. However contrary this may be to appearances which the Christian world presents, it is the truth, declared and upheld by the word which cannot be broken.

Everyone who would be a Christian, therefore, may expect at the start to part with all those things which are to be reaped from the treasure fields of the world. He may expect that his career will be counted anything but successful from a worldly point of view. He may expect to identify himself with a company of people who are humble, few in number, and looked down upon by the majority with scorn and derision. He may expect that his whole life will be one of self-denial,-of turning away from those pleasures and repeated benefits for which the human heart naturally longs.

It is wise for such an one to sit down at the outset and count the costs. There are, as we are told in one of Christ's parables, a certain class of persons who, when they hear the word of God, at first receive it joyfully, but soon, under the pressure of difficulties and persecutions, become offended and turned back to the world. Matt. xiii. 20, 21. They start out apparently with no thought but that the way is smooth and easy through to the end; but when it becomes rough and difficult their courage fails them. They have not counted the cost. And no man, said Christ, who puts his hand to the plough and then turns back, is worthy of the kingdom of God.

It is as true to-day as it ever was in the past, that the way to life is strait, and is travelled by but few. It is as true to-day as it was in the days of Paul, that "we must through much

227

tribulation enter into the kingdom of God." Acts xiv. 22. Whatever occasion the present age may be furnishing for boasting, it has not progressed beyond other ages in smoothing the pathway of the pilgrim to Mount Zion. The devil hates Christians to-day as much as he did in the days of Huss and Ridley and Latimer, and his power over men in general has become no less. There are martyrs to-day, as there were martyrs then. It is true now, as it ever was, that "all who will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution."

To count the cost we must see with the eye of faith; otherwise our choice will be made without any just conception of the interest which it involves. Only with the eye of faith can we see those spiritual things which balance up the scale of the world's prizes and pleasures. Spiritual things must be spiritually discerned. 1 Cor. ii. 14. The choice that is made with the natural eye will always be the wrong one, because the natural eye can see only the things that are earthly and temporal. But the eye of faith can see the "far more exceedingly eternal weight of glory." By faith-which is belief of the word of God-we understand that the path to eternal life leads in this world through tribulation; but knowing this, we do not hesitate to choose that path, because we also know that in comparison with the glorious and eternal things to come, all these are light afflictions, which are but for a moment. 2 Cor. iv. 17. And we are able to see that even in this present world the Christian pathway is full of light and joy, and that it is better "to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season." Heb. xi. 25.

If therefore we have come to a point where the voice of conscience and duty bids us to take a course that will separate us from all worldly honour and popularity and that which commands the attention of the world, and identify ourselves with those who are few and despised, whom the world reckons to be either great or wise, we need not think that conscience is at fault or that we have been called to do some strange thing different from that which the followers of Christ have been called to do in the past. "By faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter," but chose to identify himself with a nation of slaves, "esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt." Heb. xi. 24, 26. It has been the same choice that has been made by God's children all the way through. It is not a more difficult one that you are called to make to-day. And by the eye of faith you will be enabled to esteem the choice a wise one. For placing ourselves on the side of God, we are on the side of the majority, on the side of wealth and honour that never end, of happiness in life eternal, and of "a crown of glory, that fadeth not away." 1 Peter v. 4.

"The Authority of Christ" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

The full title of a small pamphlet which has been sent us with a special request for notice and review is "The Authority of Christ over the Individual, the Church, and the Nation." It is a lecture delivered in Belfast at the closing of a session of the Theological Hall of the Reformed Presbyterian Church, "by the Rev. James Dick, M.A., Professor of Hebrew, Biblical Criticism, and Pastoral Theology." The Reformed Presbyterian Synod's "Committee on Covenant Renovation and National Reform" unanimously requested Professor Dick to place the manuscript of the lecture at their disposal for publication, in order to its extensive circulation; and so we have it.

Although the Presbyterian denomination was the only non-episcopal body resulting from the break with the Pope, which was formed on the basis of a full and complete union of the Church and the State, and although only certain branches of that body are still pledged to it, yet the essential principles of such union are fast permeating almost all religious bodies; and therefore the question which we are requested to review is a very live one.

About thirty years ago the Reformed Presbyterians in the United States organised what was known as the "National Reform Association," the object of which was to secure such an Amendment to the Constitution as would give "all Christian laws, institutions, and usages" the backing of civil law. The Association was for a long time very feeble, except in its published list of names, yet such is the natural tendency of ecclesiastical bodies to grasp civil power, that to-day, although the National Reform Association is practically lost sight of, the object for which it was organised is quite generally endorsed, and is practically attained. The same thing is insensibly moulding the churches this side of the Atlantic, and therefore a warning is most urgently needed.

The zeal and sincerity of those who advocate this sort of "National Reform" cannot be questioned. At the same time the evil which must necessarily flow from its success can be described only by repeating the history of the Dark Ages. In our review, therefore, we shall deal with the subject itself, rather than with the particular statement of it in a lecture before us, following only its three-fold division. Accordingly we shall consider the authority of Christ.

OVER THE INDIVIDUAL

Here there is scarcely any room for difference. The Scripture is very clear on this point. "I would have you know," says the Apostle Paul, "the head of every man is Christ." 1 Cor. xi. 3. This is true as to the individual members of the church, and is no less true of those who make no profession, although they do not acknowledge the truth of the statement. The obligation to obey God rests equally upon every man in the world. The fact that many do not profess to serve the Lord, abates not one jot of their obligation to obey Him. If it were true that none are under obligation to serve and obey God except those who acknowledge such obligation, the same principle would absolve anarchists from all allegiance to the State. All that would then be needed to justify any one in disobeying the laws, would be the statement by him, "I do not profess to regard the laws of the State."

Christ is "the firstborn of every creature; for by [or in] Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth." Col. i. 15, 16. Christ is therefore the head of every man by virtue of being Creator. This is that which places all men equally under obligation to serve the Lord. "Know ye that the Lord He is God; it is He that hath made us, and not we ourselves." Ps. c. 3. "The sea is His, and He made it; and His hands formed the dry land. O come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord our Maker. For He is our God; and we are the people of His pasture, and the sheep of His hand." Ps. xcv. 5-7.

This applies as well to those who are not professed Christians as to those who are. All were created by Him, all are equally dependent on Him for support, and all are equally in duty bound to serve Him.

Moreover, all men are Christ's by right of purchase. It was the will of the grace of God that He should "

228

taste death for every man." Heb. ii. 9. "Christ died for the ungodly" (Rom. v. 6), and thereby "the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life." Verse 18. He is "the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world." John i. 9. "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners." 1 Tim. i. 15. The rightful authority of Jesus Christ over individuals, therefore, is universal. Not a sole man is exempt from His jurisdiction.

This is shown, too, by the statement of Christ concerning His coming. "Behold, I come quickly; and My reward is with Me, to give every man according as his work shall be." Rev. xxii. 12. "For the Son of man shall come in the glory of His Father with His angels; and then He shall reward every man according to his works." Matt. xvi. 27. See also Rom. ii. 5-11, where we learn that God "will render to every man according to his deeds," and this rendering will be "tribulation and anguish for every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first, and also of the Gentiles; but glory, honour, and peace, to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile; for there is no respect of persons with God."

God does not make any distinction in individuals because of their profession. Both Christians and heathen will be judged by the same standard. One law is for all. The Scriptures above quoted show that there is ample authority for Professor Dick's statement that Christ's authority is "supreme over every man, in every relation, in every circumstance, in every place, and in every period of life." The Lord does not require anything of Christians that He does not require of sinners. In the following text the language is addressed to man without any limitation whatever: "He hath showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God." Micah vi. 8.

This being the measure of God's requirement of every man, the duty of man is thus well stated by the pamphlet under consideration: "The duty of the sinner is to look humbly to Him, and to receive humbly from Him a free salvation. The further duty of the sinner saved by grace is to receive every word of instruction that Christ speaks, to believe and embrace every doctrine that Christ reveals, to maintain inviolate every principle of Christ's truth. His acceptance of Christ's authority must be the same in substance as that which found expression in the words of Israel's covenant of old-'All that the Lord hath spoken we will do.' God requires nothing less than was thus promised, and will not approve of anything less." This obedience, however, it must not be forgotten, can be rendered only by that faith which "God hath dealt to every man." Rom. xii. 3.

Let us therefore hear the conclusion of the whole matter: "Fear God, and keep His commandments; for this is the whole duty of man." Eccl. xii. 13. And the commandments of God, which are addressed to every man, and which are "not grievous," are thus summed up: "Thou [each individual] shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself."

This division of the subject necessarily runs into the other two divisions, and will be considered there as well; so we will proceed to a brief consideration of Christ's authority.

OVER THE CHURCH

This portion of the subject is also very simple. A few texts of Scripture settle it completely. The passage where Christ is declared to be the firstborn of every creature,-the One in whom all things are created and all things consist, says that "He is the head of the body, the church; who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things He might have the preeminence." Col. i. 18.

The same apostle also declares by inspiration that God put all things under the feet of Christ, "and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fulness of Him that filleth all in all." Eph. i. 22, 23. In the church, therefore, Christ is supreme, not simply as to the faith to be professed, but as to the organisation and government thereof. That which He has ordained, it is the duty of the church to obey; and that which He has not ordained, is a sin to practise.

This authority of Christ over the church is not that of an earthly ruler over a kingdom, but that of the head over the members of the body; it is not the rule of one who is distinct from that which is ruled, but it results from the vital connection existing between them. The church is His body. It derives its existence from Him; He is its life. He has purchased it with His own blood (Acts xx. 28), and in so doing has imparted to it His own life. But the church is composed of individuals, and the authority of Christ over the church as a whole is simply the measure of His acknowledged authority over the individual members thereof. "I am the true Vine, and My Father is the husbandman. Every branch in Me that beareth not fruit He taketh away; and every branch that beareth fruit, He purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in Me." John xv. 1-4.

With these Scriptures the pamphlet under review seems to be in substantial agreement. The author says:-

God's will supreme was the principle of the first creation; God's will restored in Christ to supremacy, is the principle of the new creation; and the church exists to exemplify before the moral universe the blessed working of this principle. In the church, if anywhere, self-will must be utterly abolished, that God's great purpose may be accomplished altogether in His own wise way. The Scriptural conception of the church is that of the kingdom of heaven in which God's will is done, and the authority of God's Son is recognised by every mind, and found in every institution. "What things soever I command you, observe to do it; thou shalt not add thereto, nor diminish from it," was the rule of the church in the wilderness. "Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you," is the precisely similar and equivalent rule for the church of the New Testament in the more extended wilderness of the disordered kingdoms of the world. Not the very smallest allowance was made in the Old Testament for either addition or diminution in the case of His institutions. Nor is the New Testament different in this respect, unless as its corporate revelation of Christ's gracious authority increases the obligation of the church to obey. For instruction and government, as well as for the bestowal and sustaining of life spiritual and eternal, Christ is the sole Head of the church."

Whenever it is desired to know what the church should be and do, we have only to examine the Book which contains the record of the life and words of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is "head over all things to the church, which is His body." Wherever we find the life and words of Christ deviated from to any extent, there we find, to that extent, the apostate churches. There is more involved in this principle than is perceived by very many who acknowledge it.

We cannot better close this division of the subject, and introduce the next, than by quoting a sad truth that is briefly summarised in the pamphlet

229

before us. Having shown the steps of the apostasy of Israel, which culminated in the crucifixion of Christ, the author says:-

If they had been in the days of their fathers they would not, they thought, have stoned or killed the prophets. But these self-complacent rebels against God took the very Prince of life and with wicked hands crucified and slew Him. So the New Testament church quickly followed in the wake of the transgressors of old. The simple ordinances of spiritual worship did not satisfy. The mystery of iniquity began to work. Concessions were made to carnal tastes and desires, and so the great body of the early church became the anti-Christian Church of Rome. At every stage in the growth of that bloated system of self-will and corruption, transgressors would doubtless look back self-righteously, and condemn the transgressions of Israel of old in departing from the Lord. No thought of the possibility of their being transgressors themselves would arise to disturb their complacency. And so the history of backsliding Israel repeated itself in backsliding Christendom.

And with this we proceed to discuss the principle which was responsible for this development of the mystery of iniquity into the "man of sin." That principle was nothing other than the false idea of the authority of Christ.

OVER THE NATION

"There is no power but of God; the powers that be are ordained of God." Rom. xiii. 1. Therefore it needs no argument to prove that God is above all nations. "The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein." Ps. xxiv. 1. "The Most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever He will." Dan. iv. 25. He even "setteth up over it the basest of men." Verse 17. "Wisdom and might are His; and He changeth the times and the seasons; He removeth kings, and setteth up kings." Dan. ii. 20, 21.

He says "I have made the earth, the man and beast that are upon the ground, by My great power, and by My outstretched arm, and have given it unto whom it seemed meet unto Me." Jer. xxvii. 5.

The authority of God over the nations is just the same as His authority over individuals; because a nation is composed of individuals. There is no such thing as a nation apart from the aggregation of men composing it. A nation is not a person, but a collection of persons. The State as a distinct entity, having a personality of its own, has no more existence than the memory of a dream. It is not even the shadow of a substance.

Now while it is true that God is supreme Ruler, it is as certain that His rule is one of love, and not of force. While He is an absolute monarch, existing and ruling solely by His own will, and answerable to none, He is not a despot. Earthly monarchs, though they be the farthest removed from despots, do not say, "All day long have I stretched forth My hands unto a disobedient and gainsaying people;" but that is what the Lord says. He says, "Come unto Me, all ye that labour, and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light." Matt. xi. 28-30.

Who may come?-All who will. "The Spirit and the Bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." Rev. xxii. 17. But what about those who will not?-God gives them the liberty of staying away, and eating of the fruit of their own way, and being filled with their own devices. "For the turning away of the simple shall slay them." See Prov. i. 20-23. Christ said, "If any man hear My words and believe not, I judge him not; for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world." John xii. 47.

Let it be remembered that "the servant is not greater than his Lord; neither is he that is sent greater than He that sent him." John xiii. 16. That which Christ did not do, no man has the right to do. Remember that Christ and He alone is the head of every man. To those who would presume to exercise authority in Christ's stead, the Divine word comes: "Who art thou that judgest another man's servant? To his own master he standeth or falleth." Rom. xiv. 4.

The pamphlet before us says: "Where any man goes, be he friend or enemy of Christ, the authority of Christ follows him. The Christian, the Atheist, the Jew, the Romanist, the infidel, the libertine, are all equally bound to bow before God's Anointed. The Christian bows and kisses the Son; the others, if they fail to do this, must bow and lick the dust."

All very true, if regard is had to the proper relation of things. Two things must be remembered. One is, that God has not committed to men the work of compelling people to acknowledge His authority, because He does not do that Himself. And the second is that the time when rebels against God will bow in the dust before Him is at the second coming of Christ, at the end of the world. These points involve a consideration, necessarily brief in this case, of the kingdom of Christ as contrasted it with the kingdoms of this world, or what is commonly known as the

RELATION OF CHURCH AND STATE

This might be settled in one sentence, namely, there is no matter of relation between them. The proof of this is sufficiently stated in the following passage:-

"And they sent out unto Him their disciples with the Herodians, saying, Master, we know that thou art true, and teachest the way of God in truth, neither carest Thou for any man; for Thou regardest not the person of men. Tell us therefore, What thinkest thou? Is it lawful to give tribute unto C?sar, or not? But Jesus perceived their wickedness, and said, Why tempt ye Me, ye hypocrites? Show Me the tribute money. And they brought unto Him a penny. And He saith unto them, Whose is this image and superscription? They say unto Him, C?sar's. Then saith He unto them, Render therefore unto C?sar the things which are C?sar's; and unto God the things that are God's." Matt. xxii. 16-21.

By this we learn that C?sar, that is, civil government, has no connection whatever with God. All men are in duty bound to be subject to the State, and not to resist its authority, but they may be mindful of all their obligations to the State, and still be unmindful of God. No Christian can ever rise in rebellion against the government, no matter how base the men by whom it is administered, because the Lord forbids it, and because as a subject of the Prince of Peace must of necessity keep the peace. A Christian cannot be an anarchist, nor rail against rulers, because it is forbidden by the Lord. See Rom. xiii. 2; Titus iii. 1; 1 Peter ii. 13-17.

It is not necessary to go into a statement of the proper sphere of civil government. It is sufficient to say that it is utterly impossible for it to administer the law of God, because "the law is spiritual." Spiritual things are only spiritually discerned, and consequently the State has no power even to so much as comprehend the law of God, much less to enforce it. Civil government is a necessity, and will be a necessity so long as this present evil world exists; but it is not a necessity to true Christians. It is necessary in order to restrain the violence of ungodly

230

men; but Christians have and acknowledge the restraining power of the Spirit of God. Their submission to the authority of the State is not because of benefits that it confers on them, because the governments of earth never have and never can confer any favours on the true church of Christ; on the contrary they have always persecuted it, and always will. See Gal. v. 29; 2 Tim. iii. 12. But the Christian's subjection to civil government is because he is to "do violence to no man," to "be gentle to all men," and not to resist evil that is done unto him, but to "follow peace with all men."

It is evident, therefore, that the State can exercise no rightful authority over the true church; for the true church is the body of Christ, and Christ is superior to the State. As a general thing the church members of all denominations would repudiate the idea that the State should control the church; and yet that is what they virtually plead for when they ask for State support. What they are more apt to claim, however, is that the church should control the State to a greater or lesser degree. This is, in fact, the shape that a voluntary union of Church and State always assumes. When officers of the government enact laws concerning religion, it is under the advice and direction of the ministers of the church. And when the union is complete, the church assumes the prerogative of dictating to the State in everything. But this is no better than for the State to control the church. If there be any difference it is worse.

The servant is not greater than his Lord; they that are sent are not greater than the one sending them. The body cannot act without the head, nor go where the head does not go, nor do what the head does not approve of. What did Christ do? He lived on this earth, most zealous to perform His Father's business, and to advance the interests of the kingdom of heaven, yet He never once appealed to the civil authority, nor presumed to interfere with it. This of itself should be sufficient to settle the matter with all followers of Christ.

When one said to Jesus, "Master, speak to my brother, that he divide the inheritance with me," Jesus said, "Man, who made Me a judge or a divider over you?" Luke xii. 13, 14. The idea that the church should control secular affairs, is purely Papal. While it is true that the Most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, it is not true that He has any viceregent on earth, to execute authority in His stead. Herein Catholics are consistent while professed Protestants are inconsistent. For the Catholic Church believes that it should rule over the kings of the earth, and boldly claims that the Pope is Christ's vicar; while Protestants repudiate the Pope, and the idea of a vicar of Christ, and yet claim that the church should rule. Wherever you have the church domination, there you have the Papacy; for when the church presumes to interfere in the least with the affairs of State, it is putting itself above Christ. Whether you have one Pope or many thousands of them, makes very little difference.

The National Reform idea is that the nation ought as a nation to recognise Christ's authority as dispensed by His ministers. The tract before us gives the statement of what would follow in such case:-

First of all, every enemy of Christ would be deprived of vote or other exercise over national affairs. Then every law on the statute book would be tried by the Divine law, and brought into harmony with it or expunged. Then Christian morality would regulate every national and international transaction. Then efforts would be made to right every wrong and to reform every abuse, to repress all tyranny, and to succour the weak and helpless and oppressed. Then the nation would feel it to be a duty and privilege to promote the interests of Christ's spiritual kingdom by the influence of its legislation and resources, that through the accompaniment of His gracious purposes in the church men might be blessed in Him, and all nations might call Him blessed. And over all would be Christ's excellency and the sunshine of His blessing.

Very pretty and very plausible, but fortunately we are not left to speculate as to the result. The resources of the State, which are to be placed at the service of Christ's spiritual kingdom, are its armies and policemen,

231

and in times past these have been at the full disposal of the church. The result was not the sunshine of Christ's blessing, but the blight of desolation, as seen in Piedmont and Provence. Henry IV. standing barefoot in mid-winter, at Canossa, is another example of the result of the attempt to deprive all the enemies of Christ of all power over national affairs. England languishing under the interdict of Innocent III. and the Pope's legate showing the authority of his Master by contemptuously spurning with his foot the King of England's crown, is another instance. Even the Covenanters themselves furnish an example. They will doubtless say, "But we were not the enemies of Christ." Ah, but "the church" said that you were; and when it is conceded that men may sit in judgment and decide who are enemies of Christ, then it is conceded that the will of "the church" that is in power is always right.

Christ is not now on this earth in person. In His absence His followers,-the whole church,-are His representatives. He has no vicar on earth, but each individual member of the church is to be His representative, by showing forth in his life the excellencies of Christ. But Christ is infinite, and men are finite; therefore it takes the whole family of God to be the perfect representative of Christ.

Now since the church as a whole is Christ's representative on earth, it follows that to say that Christ is now ruling, or ought to rule over the nations of earth, is to say that the church ought to rule over the nations of earth. But the assumption of power by the church is nothing but the Papacy. Men think that the evil of the Papacy is in its corruption; but its connection with earthly affairs is what made it corrupt. In the beginning the church was pure; it became corrupt only when it departed from the Master's principles, and began to reach out for the control of worldly affairs.

The National Reform idea, no matter in what denomination it appears, is nothing but the Papacy as it has existed from the days of Constantine. When professed Protestant denominations become imbued with the idea that the church is to rule the world, then will they be fully identified with "Babylon the great," the harlot "which reigneth over the kings of the earth" (Rev. xvii.), and will receive of her plagues.

THE KINGDOM OF CHRIST

When Christ was before Pilate He said, "My kingdom is not of this world, if My kingdom were of this world, then would My servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now is My kingdom not from hence." John xviii. 36. Christ did not refrain from fighting because His following was too small to cope with the Roman Government, because each one of His loyal disciples, together with Himself could have had a legion of angels at his back. Matt. xxvi. 53. But His kingdom was not of this world, and could not use earthly power. The using of force would have been His ruin, for He Himself said, "They that take the sword, shall perish with the sword."

There was a time when the disciples and all the people were going to take Jesus by force to make Him king, and if He had consented the whole Jewish nation would have flocked to His standard; but He would not listen to the proposition. Surely if the kingdom of Christ could be advanced by civil power, then was the time to make use of it. The fact that Christ would have nothing to do with it, shows what He expects of His followers. By allowing Himself to be betrayed into the hands of wicked men, and suffering the cruel death of the cross, Christ showed how only His kingdom can be gained and advanced. Because of the suffering of death, He was crowned with glory and honour. Let none of the professed servants of Christ think to gain the kingdom in a different matter. To make such an attempt is to deny Christ, and to make His sufferings of no account.

Men have nothing to do with giving Christ His kingdom. All they are called upon to do is to yield themselves to the Holy Spirit, that they may be fashioned into a fit subject for the kingdom which the Lord God will give unto Him. True, "the government shall be upon His shoulder," but it is "the zeal of the Lord of hosts" that is to give it to Him. Isa. ix. 6, 7. The Father has sworn to give unto Him the heathen for His inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for a possession (Ps. ii. 7, 8); but when He receives them it is that He may dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel. But He will do it in person, and not by deputy.

Christ Himself showed how and when He was to receive His kingdom. He spoke a parable for the benefit of those who thought that the kingdom of God should immediately appear. He likened Himself to a nobleman who "went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and to return." "And it came to pass that when He was returned, having received the kingdom," etc. Luke xix. 11-27. Christ has now gone to that far country to receive the kingdom. The receiving of it is described in Dan. vi. 13, 14. When He comes the second time, He will come in His kingdom. Then He will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, in flaming fire, taking vengeance upon them that know not God. 2 Thess. i. 7-9. Then will those that would not have Him to rule over them be slain before Him,-"punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of His power." And when He shall have destroyed all the wicked, "then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father." Matt. xiii. 43. "Who hath ears to hear, let him hear."

Christ is now sitting upon His Father's throne (Rev. iii. 21), reigning as a priest, and devising peace for His people. Zech. vi. 12, 13. He is the "one Mediator between God and men." 1 Tim. ii. 5. He is Mediator between God and men, not between God and nations. Moreover His authority as Mediator is not that of compulsion, but that of love and entreaty. "Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any man hear My voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me." Rev. iii. 20.

Christ's ministers are ambassadors, not judges nor officers in earthly kingdoms. The ambassador who should presume to interfere in the affairs of the country to which he is sent, or who should even express his opinion about the politics of that country, would at once lose his position. Christ's ministers are sent as ambassadors to the whole world. They are to know nothing of nations as nations, but only to deal with individuals. Whether those individuals be in a palace or a hovel, makes no difference. Princes and peasants are all the same to them, so far as their mission is concerned, only they acknowledge constituted authority wherever they are. Of the affairs of nations, they have no opinion to express, for they are not sent to judge the world, but to save the world.

The sum of the whole matter therefore

232

is, that while Christ is supreme over everybody and every thing. He is to be left to exercise His supremacy in His own way and time. No men, not even His own followers, are to presume to exercise authority in His stead. He is indeed "The Prince of the kings of the earth," but no man nor body of men is authorised to be His deputy in exercising dominion. Only Divinity can exercise Divine power. Christ Himself uses no force, neither over men as individuals, nor over nations, and therefore none of His followers can do so. He judges no man now, although all judgment has been committed to Him; because there is a day appointed when all shall stand before His judgment seat. Therefore His followers are to "judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come." Until that time they are to be content to be in this world even as He was-despised and rejected, pilgrims and strangers.

"Looking at Others" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

Among the various reasons alleged by individuals for disregarding some of the requirements of God as set forth in the Scriptures-as for example, that of Sabbath observance-one quite frequently heard is, that many thousands of Christians in past times lived lives that were guided by the Holy Spirit, and yet did not observe the seventh day, which the Sabbath commandment requires. If I do as well as they, says the objector, God will accept me as He did them.

But hold! You are not doing as well as they; for they lived in harmony with all that they knew of God's requirements, and this you are not willing to do. Before the Reformation started, the good men who afterward espoused its cause were in the Church of Rome, holding and practising its erroneous doctrine; and from that day to this there has been a continuous unfolding of Divine truth which had been covered up by the rubbish of Romish traditions and dogmas; for the Reformation was not all accomplished in the days of Luther, but is yet going on in the proclamation of the Bible Sabbath, and in calling the attention of men to God's word as the only infallible guide in all matters of Christian faith. The same issue is joined to-day that brought the conflict then; viz., the Bible against tradition, but-the power of God's word against the power of man.

But again; the Christian must not look to man, but only to God. The life of Christ is the example by which he is to shape his own life. Christ speaking through the prophet said, "Look unto Me and be ye saved, allthe ends of the earth" (Isa. xiv. 22), and we are exhorted further to "run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of faith." Heb. xii. 1, 2. To whom, then, are you looking? Whatsoever is not in the life of Christ does not belong to Christianity; and whatsoever is in that life should be accepted by the Christian without any question. And such is Sabbath-keeping; for Christ kept the seventh-day Sabbath.

"'Backward and Romeward'" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

Under the above heading The Christian Commonwealth gives the following account of some of the doings in English churches on Easter Sunday. Whether the churches indulging in such heathenish ceremonies have gone backward or not, we cannot tell; but one thing is certain, and that is that if they have not gone backward, then they were never separated from Rome except in name. And while all this is going on, the majority of Protestants are laughing at Cardinal Vaughan's expectation of some day seeing England brought back to the Roman Catholic Church. We do not see anything to laugh at.

"The trumpet blasts of Archdeacon Farrar and the few other brave Protestant Church dignitaries seem to have evoked little interest. At any rate, the movement back to Rome goes steadily on all over the country. Are the English people being bewitched by the mummery, the millinery, the gewgaws, the mumbo-jumbo show, the vestments, the music, and the incense? It begins to appear that such is almost the case, for the High Anglican organs are making a very proud show of the Easter doings in a vast number of churches. And to what do these tend? Let anyone judge who exercises judgment at all.

"At Chester Cathedral the Bishop 'celebrated,' and was vested in cope of cloth of gold and mitre. Only last week a correspondent of a London evening paper protested indignantly in view of a notice of a presentation of a 'magnificent cope of stamped red velvet, richly embroidered with gold, and bearing figures of saints and of the Annunciation.' A 'morse' given with it, is set with large carbuncles and amethysts, the probable cost being ?500.

"At Hammersmith high celebration and procession at 11 o'clock, the priest was vested in a magnificent cope, attended by two acolytes in red cassocks and lace surplices. The high altar was covered with flowers, and looked very beautiful, with the large cross (lately presented to the church) and the numerous candles. Solemn evensong and procession was at 7, the church being again so full that people were obliged to sit in the chancel. It is evident enough that plenty of people can be found to enjoy such a sensuous display. The blunder is in supposing that there is any token in it all of a revival of religion.

"At Harlesden a white silk chasuble was used for the first time. At St. Peter's, London Docks, on Palm Sunday, High Mass was celebrated. The Bishop of Lebombo 'assisted pontifically.'

"At Notting Hill the high altar, with its tall 'office' lights, choice flowers, and small tapers, gave, it is boastfully said, 'a thoroughly Catholic appearance to the church.' So much the worse for the Protestantism of the Church in that London parish!

"Much is being said of the Oxford Mission in poor parishes. But the true character of that sort of mission begins to be seen in the report from Poplar that at St. Friedswide's, the Christ Church (Oxford Mission), after the great events of Holy Week were duly solemnised, the great feast of Easter was ushered in at the 8.30 P.M. Evensong, when the blessing of the Paschal Candle took place-a high candle standing on the north side of the altar. The decorations were profuse, embracing the altar, chancel-screen, font, and the large picture of Our Lady. The celebrations of the Holy Communion were at 6, 7, 8, 9.45 and High Celebration at 11 A.M.

"These are a few samples out of very many such records. They are ominous of progress the wrong way."

"The Lamb of God" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

"Ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold. . . but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot." 1 Peter i. 18, 19.

All the gold and silver in heaven and earth could not redeem man, or buy him back, after he had once sold himself to Satan. Nothing but the precious life of God in His only begotten Son could do it. His blood alone could cleanse from sin; His life alone could swallow up death.

The promise that He would come and die to free man from the power of Satan, was the only hope of a lost world. His was the only name under heaven given among men, whereby we could be saved.

All who would believe this promise, and confess their sins, and every day trust in the blood of Christ to cleanse them from sin, and in the power of His life to keep them from sin,-they should be the free sons of God, and finally have everything restored to them that they had lost.

The pure, gentle, lovely Son of God had given Himself to die for ungrateful man,-the just for the unjust, the innocent for the guilty. Not a spot of sin could be found upon Him, not a blemish, or fault, of any kind. He was to be brought "as a lamb to the slaughter." Guilty man was to be redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, "as of a lamb without blemish and without spot."

God did not want men to forget this wonderful promise, for if he forgot it, it would do him no good. He could never be saved unless he remembered it and really believed it and confessed his sins.

God therefore gave him something to do that would continually and most vividly remind him of the Saviour. If he did it just as God told him to, it would also show that he believed the promise and accepted God's Son for his Saviour.

God told him that he should build an altar of earth, or rough stone, lay wood upon it, kill a little lamb that was without spot or blemish, and lay it upon the altar and offer it up as a burnt offering,-and confess his sins. And God would hear him and cleanse him from sin, not with the blood of the lamb that he had slain, but with the blood of the Lamb of God in whom he had shown his faith. The little innocent lamb that lay bleeding before him could not save him, but it reminded him of the Lamb of God who could save him, and who was to be slain because of his sins.

How sad Adam must have felt when he first raised his hand to take the life of an innocent lamb, and realised that his sin was going to take the life of the spotless Lamb of God! Never before had he looked upon a scene like that. Never before had death visited the fair new earth. And never could it have come to man or beast if he had obeyed his Creator's voice. He must have realised then as he never had before the greatness of his sin, and the awfulness of death.

But oh, as he raised his eyes to heaven and remembered the promise that the blood of God's Lamb was to save him, how his heart must have thrilled with joy and how he must have bowed in wonder and adoration before the One who had loved him enough to give His own life to redeem him from eternal death!

And you, my dear child, have as much reason to be glad and thankful as Adam had. The promise was for you as much as for him. Look up, and think often of the "Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." Whosoever will believe and yield to Him may at last stand before the throne of God with the happy company to have washed their robes from all sin and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

If you confess your sins and turn away from them with all your heart, He says that "He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

Will you let Him cleanse you and give you His own pure life of righteousness?

1. To whom did men belong when he was first placed upon the earth? Luke iii. 38, last clause.

2. Describe him, and tell what belonged to him. Gen. i. 26; ii; Ps. viii. 5-9.

3. To whom did he sell himself? 1 John iii. 8.

4. How did he sell himself to Satan? Rom. vi. 16.

5. Did he better his condition in any way? Isa. lii. 3; Gen. iii. 16-24.

6. Must he always stay in that hopeless condition?

7. Who promised to buy him back, or redeem him? Gen. iii. 15;1 Cor. vi. 19, 20.

8. How much did He promise to pay for him? 1 Peter i. 18, 19; Acts xx. 28.

9. Would not gold or silver do? Why not?

10. Could not some other person do it? Acts iv. 12.

11. What made him willing to pay so much? John iii. 16.

12. Like what was He to be led to the slaughter? Isa. liii. 7.

13. Like what kind of lamb? 1 Peter i. 18, 19.

14. In what way was He like a lamb that had no spot or blemish?

15. What did God tell man to do that he might not forget about this precious Lamb of God, and that he might show his faith in Him?

16. Would anything else do for this offering as well as a lamb?

17. Why would not fruit or grains do as well?

18. Was man to offer this, as the heathen do their gods, to coax Him to feel kindly toward him?-No, for He already loved him, and was giving His life to save him.

19. If when he did it just as God said, confessing his sins and believing that the blood of Christ cleansed him, what blessing would come to him while performing this service?

20. Was it the lamb that cleansed him from sin? What, then?

21. How do you suppose Adam felt when he offered his first lamb? Why?

22. What had caused death to come into the world? Rom. v. 12.

23. But how must he have felt when he remembered the promise that the blood of God's Lamb would save him from eternal death?

24. Had Adam any more reason to be glad and thankful that you have? Why not? Heb. ii. 9.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

-The ministerial crisis in Chili has been ended by the formation of a new Cabinet.

-In China recently a man who killed his father was executed, and with him his school-master for not having taught him better.

-Women station-mistresses have been substituted for men at 200 stations in Victoria. The men received ?150 a year; the now station-mistresses will only get ?20.

-According to a telegram received at Cape Town from Dr. Jameson, the gold prospects in Matabeleland exceed expectation, and the pannings brought to Buluwayo are described as marvellous.

-The total revenue of the United Kingdom for the financial year ended March 31, 1894, amounted to ?98,297,362. As compared with ?97,609,579 for the previous financial year, this shows an increase of ?687,788.

-A fire broke out on April 3, in Shanghai, and speedily assumed alarming proportions. All through the night the flames continued to spread, and before they could be subdued, 1,000 houses had been destroyed.

-It is announced by the New York Herald that the Freemasons of Argentina have appealed to the Prince of Wales, to President Cleveland, and to Marshal Peixoto of Brazil, on behalf of the Brazilian insurgents.

-The Berlin Kreus Zeitung learns that as a result of the famous Hanover trial, in which gambling on a large scale was shown to exist among officers of the army, fifteen officers have been dismissed the service.

-Colonel Sir Francis Scott, Inspector-General of Constabulary, has returned to Accra at the bead of the Ashantee Expeditionary Force. The objects of the expedition have been attained and the British flag has been accepted.

-Serious strikes have broken out among the brick makers employed at the kilns at Hoboken, Rumpet, Niel, and Hemlxem, in the neighbourhood of Antwerp. The centre of the agitation is Hemlxem, the burgomaster of which place has asked for troops.

-In the Spanish Cortes a Bill has been introduced for the suppression of Anarchism. It provides that all attempts against persons or buildings by the use of explosives will be punishable by death or penal servitude for life, where loss of life or injury to person results. Proportionate punishment is provided for in other cases.

-A riot occurred in Kansas City on the 3rd inst., between the members of the American Protective Association and the Roman Catholics. One of the latter was killed by a deputy constable, who, as well as another Catholic, was shot dead. Several other persons were hurt.

-A rupture has occurred between the two highest officials of the Theosophical Society, Col. Olcott and Mr. W. Q. Judge, over an alleged misuse by the latter of "the names and handwriting of the Mahatmas." The offender has been requested to resign, but refuses to do so.

-The marriages in England last year numbered 218,261, the births 914,189, and the deaths 569,923. The males born exceeded the females by 16,845, although in London there were more females born than males, while the male deaths in the metropolis were 2,108 more than the female.

-It is telegraphed from New York that the Brazilian Cabinet is discussing a proposal to confiscate the property of Brazilian citizens and foreigners who have aided the insurgents. A decree is said to have been issued announcing that the insurgent refugees if surrendered will be shot.

-Another bomb explosion; has occurred in Paris, at a fashionable restaurant just opposite the Paris Senate. A painter, M. Taillade and a lady who was with him were seriously hurt, and several persons sustained bruises or slight injuries. A man who was seen running away was stopped and taken into custody.

-A telegram from New York reports a very serious strike among the coke workers of Western Pennsylvania. Outbreaks have taken place at various places in the district. In one case the strikers came into collision with armed deputy-sheriffs, and a workman was mortally wounded, while in another an engineer was killed.

-A crisis has been reached in governmental affairs in Newfoundland, the Premier, Sir W. Whiteway, having ordered the Govern or to dissolve the Legislature owing to the circumstance that seventeen members of the Legislature have had petitions for bribery and corruption brought against them. The Governor has not yet given his decision in the matter.

-The Provisional Government of Hawaii has passed a Bill to elect a convention for drafting a new constitution. The convention is to consist of the Provincial Council and eighteen delegates. The voters for the latter are restricted to residents of one year, who take oath to support the Government, and oppose the restoration of the Monarchy. The election will take place on May 2.

-The use of carrier-pigeons has increased to such a degree that the French Government has decided to impose severe penalties upon all persons found keeping them without a licence, and to prohibit the importation of foreign-born pigeons, even when merely destined for pie purposes, the object being to prevent any possible carrying of news with regard to French military matters, should there be necessity.

-The convention embodying the decisions of the International Sanitary Conference was signed in Paris on April 3, by the plenipotentiaries of Great Britain, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Belgium, Russia, Spain, the Netherlands, Italy, Greece, Denmark, Portugal, and Persia. The United States representatives agreed to the convention with certain reservations, while the Ottoman, Norwegian, and Swedish delegates accepted it ad referendum.

-There has been serious rioting in South Carolina, attended with loss of life, owing to the Governor's action in closing the illicit drinking shops, and the situation is still regarded as somewhat critical. The State authorities have control of the telegraph wires, and no telegrams are allowed to be sent off except such as are approved of by the Governor. Several counties are under martial law, and the Governor, in addressing the Militia, announced his determination of enforcing the law at all hazards.

-There is growing distress among the labouring population of Audalusia, Spain. At San Lucar, near Cadiz, where riots occurred recently, bands of famishing workpeople pillaged the bakers' shops, and their demeanour was so threatening that the few available police gave way before them. At the old town of Ecija, on the River Genil, in the province of Seville, there was rioting in the streets, and the municipality had to distribute 3,000 bread tickets in order to calm the mob. At Tarifa, near Gibraltar, 2,000 workpeople went to the town hall to demand work.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

One of the latest of the late features combining religion and entertainment, is a "sacred smoking concert."

While Papal encyclicals have lately been enjoyed upon Catholics in France and Russian Poland the duty of submission to the civil authority, the Vatican has never been more outspoken in its refusal to submit to civil authority in Italy than at present. It was to the church in Rome that the apostle wrote "Let everyone be subject unto the higher powers." But he wrote to a church whose kingdom, like that of its Master, was not of this world.

The Independent (New York, U.S.A.), a journal and no reader of which would be likely to accuse of unfairness to Roman Catholic interests, publishes a table giving a comparison between Catholic and Protestant countries of Europe in the matter of school attendance. The comparison takes as a whole the Catholic countries France, Ireland, Belgium, Spain, Austria, and Hungary, and the Protestant countries England, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Scotland, and Switzerland, and shows a ratio of 97 to 79 in favour of the latter. A comparison between Protestant and Catholic countries in America would show a much greater disparity in the same direction.

A writer in the Journal of the German Palestine Society has been conducting investigations with a view to ascertaining where the "ten lost tribes" are, and has come to the conclusion that the ten tribes were never lost. He arrives at his conclusion "from the standpoint of modern Old Testament criticism, and data gleaned from the cuneiform literature of the Euphrates-Tigris valleys." But this cannot be claimed, as the Christian Commonwealth thinks, as a victory for modern criticism. Thousands of people who know nothing of the "higher criticism" except the name, and who know no more of cuneiform inscriptions than they do of Chinese, have known from the simple reading of the Bible in the old-fashioned way, that there never was in reality any such thing as the lost tribes of Israel.

"An Expensive Process" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

An Expensive Process.-It is well known that titles are sometimes bought by living persons; but it is not so generally known that it costs a large sum of money to secure the title of "Saint" from the Roman College for an individual who may have been dead for years or centuries. A Catholic magazine writer tells how expensive the process is.

Testimony must be taken of facts in his life, secretaries hired, postage and telegrams paid, judges selected and requited for their services, a vast amount of correspondence done, printing, travelling, etc. You know how costs mount up in ordinary legal matters. Well, this is a legal matter, and of the nicest, most exact nature. There's a great deal of evidence taken, and discussion without end, before a miracle can be proved and accepted as such; and all this must needs have doctors, priests, and other specialists to deliver their opinions in the most technical and formal way. In short, the expense reaches tens of thousands.

"In the Minority" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

In the Minority.-It is a very human trait to feel a certain satisfaction in the belief that we are right and someone else is wrong. Now and then-and sometimes oftener-we find an individual who glories in the idea that he is in the minority, and that he alone knows the truth. Granting even that he has the form of doctrine, and that he is among the few that have it, he is yet fully with the great majority, who are pleased with themselves. The Christian always has been and always will be in the minority in this world. But he can glory only in one thing-that he knows the Lord. When one passes from this to glorying in the thought that he knows more of the Lord than some others, he manifests only his utter ignorance of the Lord. The believer who has really apprehended a truth unknown to others, knows that he has it not because of any superiority of his, but only as a gift of God to pass on to others.

"The Crucifixion of Jesus" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

The Crucifixion of Jesus.-The Jew hater who thinks he hates Jews because his fathers crucified Christ would himself have joined in the cry, "Crucify Him!" had he lived then; for it was an ignorant hatred that inspired it. But the Jewish people have suffered heightened persecution for the deed of their fathers, and it is not unnatural that they should wish to shift the responsibility from their father's shoulders. In the Jewish journal Menorah, a writer says of the Jew:-

He has only one important request to make of Christian teachers and preachers-namely, that they desist from teaching their schoolchildren and congregations the prevailing error that the Jews have crucified Jesus of Nazareth. Because of this error, the believing world look upon the Jew through an imperfect medium, it is this error which has caused so much prejudice, bitter hatred, and unjust persecution. If it were once corrected, the way would be opened for the correction of many other errors. Let the truth be told that not the Jews but the Romans crucified the great Nazarene teacher.

It is a pitiful protest against that declaration of the Jewish populace, "His blood be upon us, and on our children." The accursed legacy has been a heavy load. Only a few days after the resurrection the rulers were ready to deny their awful responsibility. They commanded the disciples to be silent and said, "Ye have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine, and intend to bring this man's blood upon us." The Lord sent the word of pardon to those who were red-handed in the guilt, and by this same word He speaks peace to us all; for we all have had a partnership in the cruel death. Those who hate the Jews for his father's sake should remember that there is such a thing as crucifying the Son of God afresh.

"'Honourable Woman'" The Present Truth 10, 15.

E. J. Waggoner

"Honourable Woman."-It is somewhat remarkable that the Catholic Times, professing a regard for the rights of men, should glory in the fact that a Protestant church in Madrid has been closed by the authorities. The Spanish correspondent of this journal tells how it was done. "The continued energetic protest of the aristocratic ladies of Madrid have borne fruits." The Ministry held out against them for a time, yet "they still laboured and left nothing undone to foil the designs of the proselytisers, working within the constitution and the articles of the Concordat with our Holy See." So it was with the apostles at Antioch. The "devout and honourable women" were stirred up by the Jews, and Paul and Barnabas were expelled.

April 19, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

The only way we may know what Christ would do if He were on earth in the flesh in the nineteenth century, is by studying what He did when He was on earth in the flesh in the first century.

"I say unto you, That ye resist not evil; but whosoever shall smite thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." Matt. v. 39. These are the words of the Lord Jesus Christ, and therefore are to be followed by Christians. The fact that it is not easy or natural to do so, does not affect the case a particle.

Christ Himself, in His own actions, has given us all the comment upon the above text that is necessary. "I gave My back to the smiters, and My cheeks to them that plucked off the hair; I hid not My face from shame and spitting." Isa. l. 6. "Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow His steps; . . . who, when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He saw suffered, He threatened not; but committed Himself to Him that judgeth righteously." 1 Peter ii. 21-23.

But the word of God reaches to the thoughts and intents of the heart, as well as to the actions; so that the commandment, "Resist not evil," means not only that we are not to strike back, but that we are not to wish to do so, nor to indulge in harsh, bitter thoughts. Love "thinketh no evil," or "taketh not account of evil." Christ was oppressed and afflicted, and was led as a lamb to the slaughter; yet He opened not His mouth, except to say, "Father, forgive them." That was the illustration of His own precepts. The words may be learned by anybody; the example can be followed only by those in whom the Spirit of Christ dwells.

"The Hearing Ear" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

"He that hath an ear to hear," said the Saviour, "let him hear."

All persons have ears, but not all have "an ear to hear." All have ears to hear the words that are spoken by men, but few, comparatively, hear the words of God.

Yet God speaks to all persons, individually; for He is not partial, like one who has a few favourites to whom he speaks while passing others by unnoticed. God is no respecter of persons. He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth on Him might not perish, but have everlasting life; and His voice has spoken and still speaks the invitation, "Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely."

The reason why men do not know the will of God and the mind of the Spirit is not that God does not speak to them, but that they do not hear Him. The reason why men are not wise unto salvation is not that the voice of wisdom is silent, for we know that "Wisdom crieth without, she uttereth her voice in the streets; she crieth in the chief place of the concourse, in the openings of the gates; in the city she uttereth her words." Prov. i. 20, 21. But their ears are not open to hear what wisdom says. It is possible for men to stop their ears from hearing the words that are spoken to them by the voice Divine; and they very often do so, in order that they may not hear what is to them an unwelcome sound. Although that voice speaks only words of love and mercy, wisdom and life, men deliberately put them aside, and choose rather to listen to the dictates of the natural heart.

It is sin that shuts out from men's ears the sound of the voice of wisdom. Sin makes the ears dull of hearing to all words of spiritual truth. They are stopped up with self, a medium that transmits only such words as appeal to the selfish nature. The evil that is in all men by nature, if not removed by the free operation of the Divine Spirit, will so deaden if it does not wholly intercept the sound of the Divine voice that they will not be able to understand the words it speaks.

In all the daily walks of life, that voice is speaking to us, and if we could but hear it, our steps would be taken in wisdom and our course would not be marked by frequent foolish and disastrous mistakes. And we could hear it, if we would earnestly seek by God's help to get into the right condition. Other men have stood where they could hear and be guided by it, and God is no less desirous of this for us than He was for them. He is as ready to open the ears of men to-day, without respect to persons, as He has ever been in the past. The pious child Samuel heard the voice that was inaudible to the unfaithful Eli; and when the prophet came to anoint one of the sons of Jesse to be king, he did not make a mistake and anoint the wrong one, although the circumstances were favourable for him to do so, because God spoke to him words of guidance, and his ears were open to hear them. So also when Philip went down toward Gaza and met the eunuch returning from Jerusalem, he was in no perplexity to know what he should do, but went immediately at the direction of the Spirit, and joined himself to his chariot,

242

and instructed the eunuch in the knowledge of Christ. Philip's ears were open to hear the words of the Spirit, and when an opportunity came to him to lead a soul to Christ, he saw it and knew immediately how to improve it.

But how often is it the case with us that the opportunity comes and passes without being even discerned; or that we find ourselves in perplexity as to its nature and the way to improve it. We are not quite sure whether it is an opportunity or not; yet an impression comes to us and something seems to say to us that a chance is before us to say or do something that will advance-we know not how greatly-the cause of Christ; and while we are pondering and settling the matter in our own minds, the opportunity is gone! And perhaps just an instant too late, we discern its nature, and see the advantage that we might have gained by its means and the line of that for which we are working. The brightest opportunities, ofttimes, require to be most quickly seen and seized.

If we were only where we could hear, and hear clearly, the voice of the Spirit, we should not at such times have the mortification and sorrow of seeing golden opportunity slip through our fingers. And may we not come into that condition where, like God's servants of old, we shall hear and know what His Spirit says to us, as well as what is said by the spirit of evil? We have no difficulty in knowing the promptings of the latter. If self predominates in our natures, when the opportunity for temptation comes we have no trouble in knowing what evil thing it is that we are urged to do. Then if self is subdued and we are led by the Spirit, should we not be able just as readily to discern the promptings of the Spirit in opportunities that come to us from God?

The sons of God are led by the Spirit of God. Rom. viii. 14. And as God never chains the will, those who are led by the Spirit must see the path and choose to follow in it. It is the office of the Spirit to reveal truth. It is the Spirit's work to bring all things to our remembrance which God has spoken unto us. And therefore if we would be led by the Spirit,-if we would be able to discern and know how to improve the fleeting opportunities of our daily lives-we must be familiar with the word of God. The Spirit of God will never ignore that word, and if we choose to ignore it we cannot be led by the Spirit.

Holy Scripture assures us that we may hear and understand the words that God speaks to us day by day, to guide our feet into the way of righteousness and peace. It is sin that separates a man from God so that the voice of God is not heard. Sin may even prevent God from hearing the words that man addresses to Him. Isa. lix. 2. "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me." Ps. lxvi. 18. It is not strange, then, if at such times we cannot hear the voice of heavenly wisdom speaking to us. But if we confess our sins and turn from all our iniquities, then the promise is, "Thine ears shall hear a word behind thee saying, This is the way; walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left." Isa. xxx. 21.

"Protection and Coercion" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

In the United States Senate a bill has been introduced entitled, "A Bill to protect the first day of the week, commonly called Sunday, as a day of rest and worship," etc.

"Protection" to-day is a much more taking expression than coercion of men, yet both mean the same thing. The only way in which a day can be "protected" as a day of rest and worship, is by prohibiting everybody from labouring, and by compelling all to attend worship on that day.

For example, here is a field that is to be protected from trespassers. Now it is no protection to the field, if none are prohibited from crossing it save those whose inclination does not lead them that way, and if those who wish to cross it, or to play upon it, are allowed full liberty to do so. So a day cannot be "protected" from being used for labour or recreation, except by forcibly compelling some to pay regard to it against their will.

"Well, is there not of necessity the element of compulsion, or forcible restraint, in every law?" Certainly, and that is all right when the law is just; but we are not discussing the quality of law, but the propriety of a certain specific act of legislation. If it were within the province of civil government to legislate concerning Sunday or any other day, as a day of rest, then nothing could be said; but no law is a just law if by any reasonable application of it, it can possibly work injustice to anybody; and a law which declares men to be criminals for doing on one day that which is lawful in itself, and which the law allows on any other day, is unjust and inconsistent.

It will be asked, "Do you then deny the right of government to appoint certain days as holidays?" By no means; but be it remembered that laws concerning holidays are merely permissive, and not mandatory. That is a law making a certain day a national holiday, gives people permission to rest, and find recreation, without danger of losing their situations, but does not compel any to cease from labour. On any holiday people who do not wish to rest are at liberty to work; but no Sunday law contemplates anything of that kind.

The wise man has said that "Whatsoever God doeth, its shall be for ever." Now in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, and rested on the seventh day, which day He blessed and sanctified. So we read, "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy works; but the seventh is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; and it thou shalt not do any work." Just as surely as God commanded that the seventh day of the week should be kept holy, so surely He commanded that the other six days should be regarded as working days. Not that people are obliged to work every hour, but that the first six days are days in which people may work without sin. What God has permitted no man has a right to forbid.

"The Sabbath was made for man." Man was made first; the Sabbath was made for his aid and protection. The Psalmist, speaking to the righteous in the time of trouble, says, "His truth shall be thy shield and buckler." Ps. xci. 4. The Sabbath is the protector; not the thing to be protected. The Sabbath needs no laws for its protection. When a day which men call the Sabbath, is "protected," and men are coerced, then the day is put above the man. The Sabbath was made for man; but Sunday laws regard man as made for the Sunday.

Such laws show a total lack of comprehension of what the Sabbath is, not simply as to the day of the Sabbath, but as to the principle of Sabbath observance. No man can injure the Sabbath of the Lord, sacred as it is, by working on it. The injury is to

243

himself,-to his own soul. The Sabbath is just as sacred, just as valid, as though it had not been trampled upon by millions of people. It does not need protection. It is not like a glass vase, but is the very principle of life. If professed Sabbath-keepers should ask for, or be able to secure, laws against Sabbath-breaking, they would show that they knew nothing of the truth, life-giving character of God's holy days; and when men ask for a law to "protect" Sunday as a rest day, they show that it has not in itself any of the characteristics of the true Sabbath of the Lord.

The Bill in question makes an exception in favour of "works of necessity and mercy, and work by those who religiously observe Saturday, if performed in such a way as not to involve and disturb others." It is strange that men think such provisions in a Sunday law to be evidences of liberality and breadth of mind. On the contrary, they are the very things which emphasise the wickedness and inquisitorial nature of the law.

How can that be? Look at the matter for a moment. In the first place, the law provides for an inquisition concerning one of the Christian graces,-one of the fruits of the Spirit, mercy which distils as the gentle rain from heaven. Here is a man who is arrested for doing work on Sunday. He claims that it was an act of mercy; his accuser contends that it was not. It is the motive of the heart, rather than the act itself, that determines whether or not it was a merciful act. And so the court, in order to a perfect execution of the law, must take the place of God, to judge the thoughts and intents of the heart. You say, "They can't do that." Of course not; and that shows the wickedness and folly of a law which makes the attempt necessary.

Again, another man is acquitted, although he has also worked on Sunday, because it is decided that his work was a work of mercy. Yet the man may have been actuated by the basest and most selfish motives. How many professedly charitable deeds are performed by schemers, who are working only for gain to themselves. The apostle tells of some who suppose that gain is godliness; and it is very easy for a man to be deceived in that way. But a Sunday law usually provides that fallible men shall be judges of secret thoughts.

Those are exempted who "religiously observe Saturday." But who is to tell whether a man has observed the Sabbath religiously, or whether he has abstained from labour on that day because his surroundings are such that he can work to better advantage on Sunday? So we see that in order to carry out even the most "liberal" provision of the law, a man's religious character must be the subject of judicial investigation.

Let it therefore be understood that any Sunday law, consistently carried out, involves a revival of the Inquisition. Why cannot Protestants who decry Church establishment see that civil laws enjoining religious duties are the perfection of Church and State Union?

"True and False Spirits" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

"Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God; because many false prophets are gone out into the world." 1 John iv. 1.

This Scripture has just as true an application to the present day as it had to the time of John. To-day, there are many false spirits gone out into the world. Not that there are in the world some strange and singular personages whom we may designate as false prophets, and whom we are to avoid; the spirits do not usually manifest themselves in that way. The manifestation of the evil spirit is most commonly simply the teaching of false doctrine, by the human agents whom the spirit employs. It may be a popular doctrine, and advocated by men of learning and culture, and yet emanate from a spirit not of God. The spirits must be tried before being believed, and the test to be applied is not the determination of the number or reputation of those who believe the spirit, after the wisdom of this world. It is a test provided by God Himself.

What this test is we are told in the two verses following the one we have quoted. "Hereby know ye that the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God. And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God. And this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world."

Every spirit that is of God, then, will confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. That this test is a plain and simple one will be evident when we consider the meaning of the phrase, "come in the flesh."

In this simple expression is contained the whole Gospel. The very essence of the plan of redemption is the coming of Christ in the flesh. It is seen in the meaning of His name, "Immanuel"-God with us. "There is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus." 1 Tim. ii. 5. Without Christ in the flesh-"the man Christ Jesus"-there could be no Mediator for man. All that Christ is to us, as sinners, He is by virtue of the fact that He has come in the flesh. All that He does for us, He does by virtue of this fact. Christ is the ladder of Jacob's dream, with one hand resting upon the earth, and the other reaching to the highest heavens, thus symbolising united God and man; while the angels, those "ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation," descended and ascended upon it. Thus the whole work of God for the redemption of fallen man centres in the one mighty fact of the union of Jesus Christ with human flesh.

To confess, therefore, that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is to exalt Christ as the Saviour of men; since He is their Saviour only by virtue of this fact. So we may read the text in 1 John iv. in this way; Every spirit that exalts Jesus Christ as the Saviour of men is of God; and every spirit that exalts not Jesus Christ as the Saviour of man is not of God. And this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world. Here is the test which God has given us. The true prophets, and the true teaching, will exalt Jesus Christ; all the false will not exalt Him, but will aim, either by open denial or by subtle insinuation, to turn the attention of men away from Christ to something else.

The devil will never exalt the Son of God. His rebellion in heaven, which caused his fall and made him the devil, was due to his jealousy of Jesus, because the latter was exalted above himself. And his whole aim since that time-object for which all his energies have been bent-is the pulling down of Christ and the exaltation of himself. This he aims to do, and very largely has done, in the minds of men, by false teaching. By means of false doctrines he has turned the eyes of the vast majority of men away from the only Saviour, Jesus Christ, to something else; and always, in that something else, either openly

244

manifested or disguised, is himself. He can appear as a demon, or as an angel of light (2 Cor. xi. 14), and he adapts his work to the intellectual and moral conditions of the different races and peoples of the earth.

"The things which the Gentiles sacrifice," says Paul, "they sacrifice to devils and not to God." 1 Cor. x. 20. And all men, insofar as they depart from God, are worshippers of the devil; for it is the devil who causes them to look away from Christ, in order that they may look to and worship him. Satan has no difficulty in deceiving people so that they look to him, if only he can get them, through the reception of some false doctrines, to look away from Christ.

Through the papal system of religion, the devil has turned the eyes of men away from Jesus Christ to the priest, the Pope, and the virgin Mary. Through Spiritualism, and through the doctrine upon which it rests,-the consciousness of the dead-He turns men's eyes away from Christ to the supposed spirits of the departed. And while professing to look to these agents for salvation and help, men are really looking to Satan and paying to him their homage; for the exaltation of man (the Pope and the priest and the virgin Mary and the "saints") in the place of God, which is the central idea of the Papacy, is really but the exaltation of Satan in the place of God; for Satan is the originator of self-exaltation, and the one who, in men, prompts them to seek to be exalted in the place of God. And he is who, with his fallen angels, impersonates the spirits of the departed and holds intercourse with deceived men.

By the doctrine of the Sunday Sabbath, also, he has turned the eyes of vast multitudes of professed Christians away from the Author of the true Sabbath, the seventh day; for in looking to a day upon which Jesus Christ, as Creator, did not rest, and away from the day which He sanctified and blessed, people must inevitably look away from Him as their Saviour. This will be evident when we consider that Christ is the Saviour of men through His power as Creator, redemption being but a work of creation,-making men new in Christ. Eph. ii. 10; 2 Cor. v. 17.

We may apply this test to any and every doctrine that comes before us. Whatsoever teaching does not exalt Jesus Christ as the Saviour of men, or which detracts in any degree therefrom, is not of God; and that teaching which does exalt Him as the Saviour of men, is of God. But remember that Christ can be exalted as the Saviour of sinners only by virtue of the fact that He has come in the flesh. Not what men may imagine to be an exaltation of Christ, but what God in His word has pointed out as the true exaltation-that which makes manifest His power to save-must be our guide in applying this test for detecting the true and false.

"Your Crown" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

In the third chapter of Revelation we find this inspired exhortation: "Hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown." Verse 11.

Most people would be greatly surprised if some person whom they knew to speak with authority should talk to them as though they possessed a crown. Nevertheless he would not be misstating the facts. You have a crown,-not a figurative one, not a fanciful something like the corona which tradition places around the heads of "saints,"-but one which is real, visible, tangible. You cannot see it, but nevertheless it exists, just as actually as any crown that was ever placed on the head of king or queen. It is a long way removed from you now, but it is no less real for that, and the day will come when you will see it and wear it if you are willing to accept the gift.

Had you ever thought of that crown in taking account of your possessions? It is an exceedingly valuable one. It is of finer material and adorned with more precious gems than that now worn by the richest potentate of earth. And it represents to you far more than ever a crown represented to an earthly king. It represents not only that which is of greater intrinsic value, but that which is eternal instead of temporal. It represents everything that is truly worth possessing.

That crown is "a crown of righteousness." 2 Tim. iv. 8. It represents the righteousness of Christ, which is the righteousness of God,-the only righteousness that the universe affords. That righteousness is as bright as the sun and endures eternally; and accordingly we are told that this crown of righteousness is "a crown of glory, that fadeth not away." 1 Peter v. 4. It represents royalty,-the royalty of sons and daughters of the eternal King; the royalty of those who shall reign with Christ upon His throne.

That crown is now "laid up" for you in the royal courts above, and it is for you to say now whether you will make your present hold upon it good for all eternity. Not all persons will ever come into the realisation of this priceless possession. It will be given, visibly and tangibly, to certain ones,-to those who love the appearing of Jesus Christ. 2 Tim. iv. 8. Those who love the appearing of Christ are those who love Christ Himself,-those whose sins have been pardoned and who are prepared to meet him by having on His robe of righteousness. They are those who choose in this world to walk by faith, and not by sight, reason, or feeling; those who choose to suffer with Christ, rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season.

If you have never believed or realised before that this treasure is yours, believe it now. God is no respecter of persons. He has given to you just what He has given to all, and that is His only begotten Son, and with Him, all things. The reason why men have not, is not because God has not given, but because they do not take. They pass through life seeking for wealth and counting over their possessions and planning how to get more, and never realise that they are heirs to a crown such as no king of earth ever saw, and to all of the eternal riches which it represents; planning what use to make of their possessions, taking no account of that part which is beyond all comparison most valuable and most enduring. This you cannot afford to do. And therefore it becomes you to heed now, if you have not heeded before, the words of the all-wise Counsellor, "Behold, I come quickly: hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown."

"Springing Up Again" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

Springing Up Again.-The gardener who tries to remove the weeds from his field by cutting off the tops will find the noxious growth springing up again very shortly. The roots must be dug up and destroyed. Just so when the Reformation started to root out the evils of Catholicism. The Reformers drove the Roman power out of Northern Europe; but instead of keeping on in the work of reform until the apostolic purity and simplicity of the truth was reached, the children of the Reformers were content to leave many of the old roots of the papal system, and traditions received from the corrupted church. Ever since, these roots have been sending out shoots, and gradually-now swiftly, the field is being won back. A newspaper says:-

245

Roman Catholicism is spreading rapidly in the three Scandinavian kingdoms, which have been regarded ever since the days of King Gustavus of Sweden, as the stronghold of Protestantism. So great is the number of proselytes that the Vatican has just placed Denmark, Sweden and Norway under the pastoral care of three bishops. As usual, a feature of the work of propagation is the establishment of parochial schools, where the younger generation of Scandinavians are being educated in accordance with the doctrines of the Catholic Church.

"Formalism in Prayer" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

There is not a hint in the whole Bible favouring such a thing as formalism in prayer. The scriptural idea of prayer forbids such a thing; as it is but the communion of the believer with his Lord, as a child would converse with its parent and ask for the thing desired, or give expression to the love and thankfulness that springs up in the heart.

Where there is love and confidence it would be very unnatural for a child to approach the parent with set phrases and unvarying forms of speech. This, too, is not the true attitude of the believer in communion with God; for he belongs to the household of faith, and is talking with his Father. There is confidence without irreverence, and simplicity without familiarity. But there is nothing of formalism. The worship must be in Spirit, and the Spirit of the Lord must direct it.

The Saviour said to the disciples, "When ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do." When He gave them a manner of prayer, the Spirit of the Lord inspired writers who recorded it to give it in different language, showing that no form of words was to be followed. It was only a model in the manner of asking for the simple means of daily life. If one does not know what to pray for, it is the Spirit that must teach him. No other man can put into his mouth the words which express the language of his heart. The words are shaped from the heart, and not the feelings of the heart inspired by the words. "Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh." The publican who prayed, "God be merciful to me a sinner," prayed from the heart a prayer that justified him, short though it was. The manner of the Gentiles, of which the Saviour warned us is recorded in history. Duruy says of the ancient Roman religion:-

But what belongs more particularly to the Roman religion is its formalism. There is no fervour or Divine aspiration, still less philosophic reflection in its piety. The words, attitudes and gestures are ordered by the ritual. To leave the established rule, even to be generous to the gods, was to go beyond what was proper, and to fall into superstition. . . For the ceremonies, all was settled before hand, even to the prayer, which should only rise from the heart, and soon they began to pray in forms which are no longer understood. In the time of the Antonines, the brotherhood of Arvales chanted songs which is dated back perhaps from Numa. It was needful, too, to repeat these ancient compositions with religious care, for a peculiar virtue attached to the very expressions. By the omission of one word a sacrifice became useless, a prayer vain . . . . When a consul had a religious formula to pronounce, he read it from the ritual, for fear of omitting or transposing a word. A priest followed the reading in a second book, in order to be sure that all the sacramental phrases were said aright.

From this sketch of the ancient Roman forms of worship and prayer, we can readily determine the source of the ritual and formalism which was brought into the church when that "falling away" came. In the Latin prayers recited to the ears of those who cannot understand them, and in the repetition of the same prayers year after year, we have in the Roman Church of the present day the counterpart of the ancient pagan worship. And some of these things are clinging to communions which were supposed to have come out from Rome in Reformation days. It is a return to New Testament faith and simplicity and power, and to the word of God that is needed.

"The Jewish Rulers and Their Deeds" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

It is a popular fallacy, into which many fall quite unconsciously, that the Jews in the days of Christ's flesh and of the early church were an exceptional class of men-more wicked and murderous than men are nowadays. The Bible teaches us, however, that the works of the flesh pertain to the flesh, and not to the times. Human nature is the same in all ages, and it manifests itself in a very similar manner under similar conditions.

One thing those Jews shared in common with quite a proportion of human kind in the present generation: they denounced the wickedness of their fathers, and looked upon former ages as barbarous. They built the tombs of the prophets, and said, "If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them of the blood of the prophets."

But when the Saviour came, He taught the people not as the scribes-"book-men" as the Anglo-Saxon version puts it-speaking only the word of the Father. The practice of following the word of God, and rejecting the traditions of men, made His ways very unpopular with the rulers. Their errors of life and teaching were exposed, and the truth was undermining their very existence as religious leaders of the people.

We read the lesson badly when we fail to see that the story is one of men of the ordinary kind of flesh, who, having rejected truth and its Author, while professing loyalty to truth, were led on to the commission of the very sins of which they condemned in their fathers. It was not because they delighted in bloody deeds more than other men, but as He was challenging their authority, and unsettling the minds of men as to the forms and traditions of the elders, established by common consent and usage, they easily deceived themselves into a belief that they were acting for the good of society and the nation in crucifying Jesus. John xi. 50.

Saul the persecutor was evidently not a man who delighted in cruelty. His whole manner of life forbids such an opinion of him. He thought he was doing God's service, and his case exactly illustrates the lengths to which a man of naturally cultured and not unkindly disposition may go when he is deceived by the idea that God commissions men to advance truth or put down error by employing force, either by personal violence or by the forms of law; for there is no difference.

The Sanhedrin that murdered Stephen was not composed of men who had no regard for a reputation for mildness and justice. Archdeacon Farrar gives an interesting sketch of the ordinary methods of this body in his "Life and Work of St. Paul." He says:-

Generally speaking the Sanhedrin were not a sanguinary tribunal. They shuddered at the necessity of bloodshed, and tried to obviate its necessity by innumerable regulations. So great was their horror at putting an Israelite to death, that any means of avoiding it seemed desirable. Simeon Ben Shatach is the only conspicuous Rabbi who, for his cruelty in deciding causes, is said "to have had hot hands." Josephus expressly marks it as disgraceful to the Sadducees that, unlike the rest of their nation, they were savage in their punishments. We are told that if even once in seven years-a Sanhedrin inflicted capital punishment it deserved the opprobrious title of "sanguinary." The migration of the Sanhedrin forty years before the destruction of Jerusalem from their "Hall of Squares," which was beside the great Court of the Temple, to the Chanujoth or "shops," which were under two cedars on the Mount of Olives, is expressly stated to have been due to their desire to get to a greater distance from the sacred precincts, in order that they might not feel it so sternly incumbent upon them to inflict the strict punishments of the law. But if, after strict and solemn voting, a man was

246

condemned to any of the four capital punishments, the utmost care was taken to remove from the punishment all semblance of vindictive haste. . . .

On pronunciation of the sentence the condemned was handed over to be Shoterim or Lietors of the Sanhedrin, and led to the place of execution. An official stood at the door of the Judgment Hall holding in his hand a handkerchief; a second on horseback was stationed just inside of the first, and if, even at the last moment, any witness could testify to the innocence of the condemned, the first shook his handkerchief, and the second galloped at full speed to bring back the accused, who was himself allowed to be led back as many as four or five times if he could adduce a single solid proof in his own favour. Failing this he was led on with a herald preceding him, who proclaimed his name, his crime, and the witnesses on whose testimony he had been condemned. At ten paces distance from the place of death he was bidden to confess, because Jewish no less than Roman law valued the certainty derived from the "confitentem reum" and the Jews deduced the story of Achan that his punishment would be, as regards the future world, a sufficiently complete explanation of his crime. A bitter draught containing a grain of frankincense was then given to him to stupefy his senses and take away the edge of terror. At four cubits' distance from the fatal spot he was stripped bare of his upper garments, and according to the older and simpler plan of procedure was then stoned, the witnesses simultaneously hurling the first stones.

This was not the kind of hearing that Stephen found, when they rose up and slew him in an outburst of fury, just as any mob might do. This body that generally had respect for at least the forms of fairness and justice, by taking one step after another in their opposition to truth, had lost all restraint; and as their conduct was condemned by the truth, they took the course that intolerance always has taken and always will take to silence the reproving voice-they used the power which they had at hand.

No sort of natural disposition is able to restrain from excesses of evil when the spirit of intolerance rules the heart rather than the Spirit of grace. Many times since, sage men, who reprobated the acts of the Jewish rulers, have sat in council and condemned the innocent in the name of Jesus as the Sanhedrin did in the name of God. And whether the victims were innocent or guilty in the religious conduct of their lives makes no difference; for to his own master every man must give an account.

"The Children's Bread" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

The Children's Bread.-Given two men earning the same wage, say the small amount which the ordinary and skilled working man receives, one of them an abstainer and the other not, and it is usually not difficult to tell from the appearance of the home and family which one it is that uses his money for the benefit of his family, and which one for the drink. The money spent at the public-house not only takes away the comforts of the home, and sometimes the children's bread, but the use of intoxicants is gradually undermining the wage-earning power of the man. Greedy corporations are cruel, and grind the faces of the poor, but not less cruel is the drink evil, against which it is in the power of every man to strike forthwith. An American Evangelist remarks: "In Chicago I saw marching a body of working men, 18,000 strong, carrying a banner inscribed, 'Our Children Cry for Bread;' and they marched straight to a picnic ground, and drank 1,400 kegs of beer."

"God's Plan and Man's Way" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

The growth and congestion of the great cities, and the consequent increase of vice and squalor is a serious sign of the times. It is not altogether because of scarcity of land, as we might suppose under the peculiar land laws in this country and in all Europe; for in America, where there is plenty of land, the same process of crowding into the larger cities is going on. A writer in the Humanitarian says there are in London alone 50,000 families who have but one room to each family. This overcrowding, whatever may be the direct cause, is one of the results of sin. When the Creator placed man in a garden, and committed to his posterity the work of making all the earth like Eden, He showed what the Divine plan was. But man chose his own way, and ever since the fall this has been the opposite of God's way.

In the midst of all the perversion, the Lord, by the Gospel, has been working to bring about His original purpose; for the devil has not power to thwart the Lord. The Gospel offers to all men who prefer the Lord's way an inheritance in just such a land as was set before man at the first. It will be the same land purified and renewed; for the Apostle Peter says: "But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also; and the works that are therein shall be burned up. . . . Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness." And the prophet Isaiah says of this new earth and its inhabitants: "They shall build houses, and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them. They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat; for as the days of a tree are the days of My people, and Mine elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands." Isa. lxv. 21, 22.

There will be no overcrowding and poverty in that land. Here is a richer Gospel for the labouring man than was ever devised by a politician or social economist, and the earnest of this inheritance is given now to everyone who will admit that God's way is best, and yield himself to God. It is not an ideal conceived by the mind of man which cannot be worked out in actual life because of sin and selfishness; but it is the Lord's own real ideal, and there is power with Him to take away the sin and selfishness of all who will allow Him to, and bring them into the promised possession.

"The Fruits of the Carnal Mind" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

The Fruits of the Carnal Mind.-It is not practicable to live the life of Christ in the world to-day without letting the natural man die, and yielding the life to Christ for Him to live it in the flesh, the same as He did in Judea and Galilee. It will then be the same life; for "He cannot deny Himself." Therefore it is for the believer of the Gospel to faithfully present to men the message of salvation from sin and self. The evils that are in the world grow out of sin; and so long as there are sinners the one remedy is the word of faith. The old Gospel may not suit the men who want the world managed after their ideas of the right method, but it is the power to save men out of the world, and from the destruction which will surely come upon its sin. No formal profession of Christianity can save the nation; but the life of Christ received by faith can save the believer from the evils that are in the world. The harvest of the earth is ripening. No one knows how long a time will elapse, but we are surely drawing near the time when that voice from the altar will say to the One who sits upon the cloud, "Thrust in Thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe." Some of the indications of the ripening of the field of the world are thus summed up in a leader in the Echo newspaper:-

There are thousands-scores of thousands-in our midst ready to enlist as soldiers, to be taken to Africa or anywhere else to shoot down with machine guns thousands of negroes. There is another class of men so convinced that they are right, and sufficiently fanatical, as to risk their liberties and their lives to war against society.

247

There are hundreds, if not thousands, of these men throughout Europe, inspiring each other, in public or in secrecy, to carry on this war at all hazards; and they have to a considerable degree the accumulated fruits of civilisation at their mercy, not so much, perhaps, by bonds as by other and less hazardous methods of destruction. There is the fact, and it is deplorable and appalling. No one knows what a day may bring forth. The social atmosphere is charged with electricity. The classes are glaring at each other. The Anarchists and the Socialists are ready to strike again society, and society is ready to strike the Socialist and the Anarchist to the dust. Scarcely a day passes without a startling act of violence. And what makes the mischief all the more significant is that the causes and the effects are all most cosmopolitan in character. And this condition of things exists after centuries of Christian preaching and vaunted civilization

"The True Reason" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

The Supreme Court of the State of Michigan, U.S.A., has decided that a law compelling barbers' shops to be closed on Sunday is within the police power of the State. It holds that "the best reason for maintaining the police power of the State to prohibit citizens from engaging in secular work on Sunday, is that experience has shown that one day's rest in seven is necessary to the physical welfare of the individual."

But the fact is that experience has shown nothing of the kind. There have never been any better specimens of manhood, physically, than the ancient Greeks and Romans, who knew nothing of a weekly recurring rest day. In a time when nations existed only by the power of the sword, and fighting was little more than an athletic contest between the individual soldiers of two armies, the physical welfare of citizens was the chief concern of governments; yet no Pagan nation has ever known any such thing as a weekly rest day. That is sufficient to disprove the fallacy so widely spread, that the physical welfare of man is the chief object of the Sabbath rest.

But even suppose it were, why should the State interfere in the matter? It is certain that regular nightly rest is far more necessary to one's physical welfare than a weekly rest, yet no nation thinks of enacting laws requiring that all the people shall sleep from 10:00 P.M. till 6:00 A.M. or from midnight till eight o'clock in the morning. If any legislative body in the world should presume to pass such a law, there would be a general protest against such an arbitrary exercise of power.

But no such law will ever be passed, because, although the securing of a sufficient amount of sleep every night is very essential to the health of the body, it has nothing to do with any system of religion; while Sunday laws are in the interest of religion. The claim that they are a physical necessity is nothing but an excuse that has been devised in America to conceal the fact that Church and State are united there as well as in the Old World.

In connection with the above it may be well to call attention again to the real nature of the Sabbath of the Lord. The fourth commandment gives no hint of its being a physical necessity, as will be seen by the reading of it:-

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy works; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; and it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it." Ex. xx. 8-11.

The Sabbath was given in Eden, before the fall, and would never have been broken but for the fall. But in Eden it was not necessary for physical rest, because there was no such thing as physical weariness. There was labour, but it was sin that made labour weariness. See Gen. iii. 17-19.

Moreover, the Sabbath is to be observed throughout eternity by the redeemed saints in the earth made new, when Eden is restored. Isa. lxvi. 22, 23. This also is positive proof that the Sabbath is not an institution for man's physical welfare.

The true Sabbath is the Lord's rest. But "the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary." Isa. xl. 28. "God is a Spirit," and consequently His rest cannot be physical rest. No; the sole object of the Sabbath is to remind man of God and His great power,-His power to maintain unfallen beings, and to redeem those who have fallen into sin. It is spiritual rest, and the true keeping of it is sanctification and eternal life. See Eze. xx. 12; John xvii. 3.

He who knows what the true Sabbath is, will never suppose that it can by any possibility be a matter for civil legislation. And no one who knows what the true Sabbath is, will give any heed to human attempts to enforce the observance of a false Sabbath.

"'Singular' Facts" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

"It is," says a writer in Christian World, "a singular fact, of which history is, nevertheless, fertile in illustrations, that prisons are apt to get as their occupants two classes of people, the best and the worst:" the reason being, as the writer says, "that these have alike set themselves against the recognised public opinion of their country."

History certainly is fertile in the illustrations of the truth enunciated long ago by the inspired writer, that "all that live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution." And being so fertile in illustrations, it is strange that anyone should account such a fact to be singular. "Which of the prophets," said the martyr Stephen to the Jews, "have not your fathers persecuted?" And it might likewise be asked, Which of the world's great reformers since Stephen's time have not also experienced persecution? For men of this class to escape passing any of their days in prison cells, to say nothing of meeting the worst things, has ever been the exception rather than the rule.

Such facts seem singular to us only because we ourselves become influenced by public opinion, and do not view them in the light of God's word. In reality, they are not singular at all. One of the most important lessons to be learned from Scripture is that things in our Christian experience which seem strange to us from a natural point of view, are really but natural things in the workings of Divine providence. Seen with the eye of faith, the singularity that seems to invest them disappears, and we discover that they are only such things as must needs come in the process of preparation for a home with God.

For instance, we find this word to us in the pages of inspiration: "Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial that is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you." 1 Peter iv. 12. We are prone to look for a pleasant experience in this life, notwithstanding the lessons contained in the lives of others, and when we come to face trial and calamity, it is natural to regard ourselves as singularly unfortunate. Yet from the word of God we learn and are comforted by the fact that ours is but the common fortune of every Christian.

Another thing that we are not to regard as strange is that the emissaries of Satan often appear in the guise of

248

the servants of Christ. Very often it is the case that good people are thrown into great perplexity and almost shaken from their footing on the rock of faith by the sudden revelation of a fact like this. But the apostle speaking of them says, "No marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness." 2 Cor. xi. 14, 15. Viewed in the light of revelation, this becomes not a singular fact but only one to be naturally expected.

We need count it no strange thing if in following the directions of God's word we are obliged to go contrary to public opinion, and share the experience of those who have braved that opinion before us. What Christian, could he have lived in the time of Noah, or of Abraham, or of Elijah, or of Pontius Pilate, would wish his course to have been shaped by public opinion? Nor is public opinion of any greater value to-day. The only opinion that concerns the Christian life is the opinion of God. Taking His opinion and ordering our lives by it, though here we may seem to be alone, we are standing on the side of the eternal majority.

"The Promise Fulfilled" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

"Of this man's seed hath God according to His promise raised unto Israel a Saviour, Jesus." Acts xiii. 23.

Men often make promises that they cannot or do not fulfil. But God's promises are as much better than man's promises as the heavens are higher than the earth. He never promises anything that He cannot do; and He never forgets; and He cannot lie. Therefore when God promises anything, it is just as sure as though it were already done. He may not do it just when we think He will, or in just the way that we suppose He will, but we may be certain that it will be done at the right time, and in the very best way, and exactly as He promised. So do not be afraid to trust Him, though He seem to wait long sometimes; He has not forgotten, and He will surely keep His promise.

Last week we learned of the wonderful promise concerning the "Lamb of God:" God so loved lost and dying man that He promised to send His only begotten Son to die for them, "that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

Thousands of years passed by and God had not yet fulfilled His promise. The Lamb of God had not yet been slain.

Had God forgotten His promise? Could it be possible that God would not keep His word? No, never.

Many thought He would never keep His word, and they stopped looking for Him. But a few faithful ones still believed and watched and longed for the Saviour.

And were they disappointed? Oh, no. God never disappoints those who trust in His word. God had for a long time been quietly preparing the way for His coming Son. It was then time for Him to appear.

Suddenly a glorious light appeared in the sky one night. Bethlehem's plains were lighted up with multitudes of heavenly beings. An angel's voice was heard speaking to the believing shepherds. Listen! What did he say?-

"Fear not: for, behold, I bring you GOOD TIDINGS OF GREAT JOY, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a SAVIOUR, which is Christ the Lord! And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger."

Ah, the long-looked-for day had really come. The promise was to be fulfilled. The innocent Lamb of God was about to be slain. He was already lying a helpless babe, in the manger at Bethlehem!

"Glory to God in the highest" was sung by the angels, and echoed in the hearts of the shepherds; for was not that the best news that could ever come to a fallen world? Man was to be redeemed from the power of Satan and from his cords of sin!

Do you wonder that the shepherds left their sheep and went with haste to Bethlehem? We read that they stopped not until they had found Mary and Joseph, and had seen with their own eyes, their Saviour, the Creator of heaven and earth,-"lying in a manger!" And they returned glorifying and praising God and telling everyone they saw of the glad, glad news which the angel brought.

And the blessed babe grew,-just as other babies grow. And when He was eight days old His name was called "Jesus," because He was to save His people from their sins.

We should be glad to tell you of the joy of Simeon and Anna when they saw Him in the temple of Jerusalem, and of the wise men who came from the far east to worship Him and give Him presents, but you must read that for yourself in your Bible.

Although the few who had believed the promise were filled with unspeakable joy when He came, the many who had not believed the promise, were not glad to see Him; and their hearts were filled with hatred toward the One who had come to save them! King Herod sent his soldiers and tried to kill Him, but Joseph had been warned in a dream and had taken Jesus and His mother and fled by night into Egypt.

After the king's death they returned and lived in a town called Nazareth; and Jesus "increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and

254

man." But He never thought that He knew too much to help and obey His parents. He helped His father at the carpenters' trade, and was subject unto them both in everything.

He came as a little child that He might know all the trials and temptations of a child, so that He might know how to comfort and help you as well as older people. He made it possible for you to be as kind and lovely and perfect a child as He was, if you yield to God's Spirit as completely as He did. Satan tempted Him to be naughty in the same ways that he tempts you, but Jesus never yielded to him once, because He allowed God, His mighty Helper, to stay with Him every minute.

He was so perfect that at His baptism, when He was about thirty years old, the voice of God sounded out of heaven and said, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased."

After His baptism, He was in the wilderness among the wild beasts, without food, for forty days and forty nights tempted of the devil. But though so weak and hungry and tired, His heart was so filled with the precious words of God that He could drive Satan away with them every time. And that shows how we also may drive him away.

And Jesus began to preach, and He went from city to city healing the sick, cleansing the lepers, giving sight to the blind and life to the dead, and doing good to all.

But He was hated and rejected, and cast out of the synagogues, betrayed by one of His own disciples, crowned with thorns, and finally crucified between two thieves! No wonder that the sun hid its face, and the earth shook, and the rocks were rent.

But the fearful price was paid. The Lamb of God had shed His precious blood to redeem us from the power of Satan. A "way" had been opened through the wall of sin back to God. God had "according to His promise raised unto Israel a Saviour, Jesus."

And the joy of it is that this way back to God is a "living way,"-not a dead way. Jesus lives again!

On the third day, angels rolled the stoned away from the tomb and Jesus rose triumphant with the keys of death and the grave; and after forty days He was taken up in a cloud to heaven where He still lives to help and lead us along, like a shepherd, in the right way.

And we have the promise that in the same manner in which He was taken up into heaven, He will come again, to take those who have accepted Him as their Saviour to reign with Him for ever.

Then will He welcome them back to God, back to Eden, and back to everything that they had lost by sin.

When you are tempted to sin, think of the price that Divine love has paid for you, and yield to Him His own, and let Him save you.

"Bees as Anarchists" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

There is, it seems, a way of making bees turn Anarchists. It consists in submitting them to a regimen of alcoholised honey. They, after some time, acquire a liking for it, according to Dr. B¸chner, who has made the experiment. Under its influence they lose two of their normal instincts-that of work and that of hierarchy. They become anti-socialistic, and abandon themselves without scruple to theft and brigandage.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

-A very severe blizzard was reported April 10, in New Brunswick, with snow more than a foot deep.

-The Italian police have been warned that, a large number of Anarchists are likely to visit Italy.

-One hundred and thirty-seven valuable horses were burned to death in a fire at Baltimore, U.S.A., causing a loss of $300,000.

-The Manchester Ship Canal will be opened by the Queen on May 21. The Prince of Wales will open the Tower Bridge about the middle of June.

-It is said that another attempt to legalise marriage with the deceased wife's sister is to be made by the introduction of a Bill in the House of Lords.

-The rival "holy coat"-that of Argenteuil-is to be exhibited, after being concealed from view since 1680. The priests declare that it is none other than the seamless robe of Christ.

-According to information which has reached Berlin the Brazilian insurgents have bombarded the city of Rio Grande. Ten Government war-vessels have been despatched to oppose the insurgents.

-Continued dry weather in Germany is causing some uneasiness for the winter sowings. Scarcely any rain has fallen in the provinces and the winter sowings have suffered considerably, especially the rye crops. Long-continued drought in France is beginning to cause disquietude in the agricultural districts.

-A Ministerial crisis is believed to be imminent in Bulgaria, owing to a difference between M. Stambouloff and the Minister of War.

-In the Lower House of the Hungarian Diet the Bill for the introduction of obligatory civil marriage has been adopted by 281 votes against 100. The result was received with great enthusiasm.

-It is reported from Madras that the Mussulman fanatics who recently attacked the Hindoos in the Malabar district fiercely resisted the British troops, and thirty-three Mussulmans ware killed and two wounded.

-A general strike has been ordered by the United States Mine Workers' Convention, to begin on the 21st inst. In the coke region of Pennsylvania troubles have again broken out, riots and raids having been caused by the strikers.

-The latest development of the crisis in Newfoundland is the resignation of the Ministry, the Governor having refused their request to dissolve Parliament. Mr. Goodridge, leader of the Opposition has undertaken to form a Government.

-Turbulent demonstrations have taken place at Valencia, in Spain, in connection with the departure of pilgrims for Rome. The pilgrims were attacked, but repulsed their assailants, who were finally dispersed by the police and civic guards.

-On April 11 ratifications of the International Convention against the sale of spirituous liquors in the North Sea were exchanged at The Hague between the Governments of the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Great Britain and Germany.

-A Ministerial crisis is believed to be imminent in Bulgaria, owing to a difference between M. Stambouloff and the Minister of War.

-In the Lower House of the Hungarian Diet the Bill for the introduction of obligatory civil marriage has been adopted by 281 votes against 100. The result was received with great enthusiasm.

-It is reported from Madras that tho Mussulman fanatics who recently attacked the Hindoos in the Malabar district fiercely resisted the British troops, and thirty-three Mussulmans ware killed and two wounded.

-A general strike has been ordered by the United States Mine Workers' Convention, to be-gin on the 21st inst. In the coke region of Pennsylvania troubles have again broken out, riots and raids having been caused by the strikers.

-The latest development of the crisis in Newfoundland is the resignation of the Ministry, the (lovernor having refused their request to dissolve Parliament. Mr. Goodridge, leader of the Op-position has undertaken to form a Government.

-Turbulent demonstrations have taken place at Valencia, in Spain, in connection with the departure of pilgrims for Rome. The pilgrims were attacked, but repulsed their assailants, who were finally dispersed by the police and civic guards.

-On April 11 ratifications of the International C'rvention against the sale of spirituous liquors in the North Sea wore exchanged at The Hague between the Governments of the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Great Britain and Germany.

---From St. Petersburg it is announced that the Russian Minister of Education intends to restrict the number of Jewesses attending the Russian gymnasiums, on the ground that they exercise an unfavourable influence on the Orthodox students.

-A destructive fire is reported from M ilwankee, U.S.A., the disaster having originated in the Davidson Theatre. 'When the fire seamed to be under control the roof suddenly fell in, carrying with it over twenty firemen. Of this number nine were killed.

-On the night of April 10 five separate firms occurred in the town of Boom, near Antwerp. 1L is believed that they were the work of f,hc brick-makers on strike in the place. The attitude of the strikers became so threatening the next evening that the gendarmes were ordered to charge them as they were pillaging a shop.

-News has reached Shanghai of soother at-tack upon foreign missionaries and their c'.hristis,c followers. Tho French mission house, at I f sianfu, in the Province of Shensi, have boon horned, while the priests have been maltreated and imprisoned. The French Legation in Pekin has demanded redress for this outrage, from the Chinese Government.

----The Queen has loft Florence for Coburg, in view of the approaching marriage of her grand-children, the Grand Duke of Hesse and Princess Victoria of Edinburgh. The bride's cake stands six feet in height and weighs 1501bs. A German superstition prohibits the bride from wearing pearls on her wedding day, the pro7erh being, "The more pearls the more tears."

---Further startling and enormous discoveries of gold have just been made in the vicinity of Imthamhli, on Unguzu River, and prospectors declare that the richness and permanency of the fine is probably unparalleled in gold mining. Dr. Jameson reports from Buluwayo, confirming the news of immense new discoveries, and the consequent excitement among the prospectors is very great.

--It is authoritatively stated that in the inter-views between the Emperors William and Francis Joseph at Abbazia, and in that between the Emperor William and Ring Humbert at Venice, the question of a general disarmament was raised and discussed, although the only conclusion their Majesties appear to have come to was that it would be a matter of extreme difficulty to find a solution for it.

-The Berlin papers announce that, in spite of the prohibition of the police, scale experiments were made April 2, within closed doors, with the coat invented by the tailor. Herr Dowc, which he claims to be bullet proof. Herr Dowe, it is etatod, put on the garment, and allowed himself to hn shot at, with the result that the be let proof capacity of the coat was fully demonstrated, tits wearer sustaining no injury.

-A Ministerial crisis is believed to be imminent in Bulgaria, owing to a difference between M. Stambouloff and the Minister of War.

-In the Lower House of the Hungarian Diet the Bill for the introduction of obligatory civil marriage has been adopted by 281 votes against 100. The result was received with great enthusiasm.

-It is reported from Madras that tho Mussulman fanatics who recently attacked the Hindoos in the Malabar district fiercely resisted the British troops, and thirty-three Mussulmans ware killed and two wounded.

-A general strike has been ordered by the United States Mine Workers' Convention, to be-gin on the 21st inst. In the coke region of Pennsylvania troubles have again broken out, riots and raids having been caused by the strikers.

-The latest development of the crisis in Newfoundland is the resignation of the Ministry, the (lovernor having refused their request to dissolve Parliament. Mr. Goodridge, leader of the Op-position has undertaken to form a Government.

-Turbulent demonstrations have taken place at Valencia, in Spain, in connection with the departure of pilgrims for Rome. The pilgrims were attacked, but repulsed their assailants, who were finally dispersed by the police and civic guards.

-On April 11 ratifications of the International C'rvention against the sale of spirituous liquors in the North Sea wore exchanged at The Hague between the Governments of the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Great Britain and Germany.

---From St. Petersburg it is announced that the Russian Minister of Education intends to restrict the number of Jewesses attending the Russian gymnasiums, on the ground that they exercise an unfavourable influence on the Orthodox students.

-A destructive fire is reported from M ilwankee, U.S.A., the disaster having originated in the Davidson Theatre. 'When the fire seamed to be under control the roof suddenly fell in, carrying with it over twenty firemen. Of this number nine were killed.

-On the night of April 10 five separate firms occurred in the town of Boom, near Antwerp. 1L is believed that they were the work of f,hc brick-makers on strike in the place. The attitude of the strikers became so threatening the next evening that the gendarmes were ordered to charge them as they were pillaging a shop.

-News has reached Shanghai of soother at-tack upon foreign missionaries and their c'.hristis,c followers. Tho French mission house, at I f sianfu, in the Province of Shensi, have boon horned, while the priests have been maltreated and imprisoned. The French Legation in Pekin has demanded redress for this outrage, from the Chinese Government.

----The Queen has loft Florence for Coburg, in view of the approaching marriage of her grand-children, the Grand Duke of Hesse and Princess Victoria of Edinburgh. The bride's cake stands six feet in height and weighs 1501bs. A German superstition prohibits the bride from wearing pearls on her wedding day, the pro7erh being, "The more pearls the more tears."

---Further startling and enormous discoveries of gold have just been made in the vicinity of Imthamhli, on Unguzu River, and prospectors declare that the richness and permanency of the fine is probably unparalleled in gold mining. Dr. Jameson reports from Buluwayo, confirming the news of immense new discoveries, and the consequent excitement among the prospectors is very great.

--It is authoritatively stated that in the inter-views between the Emperors William and Francis Joseph at Abbazia, and in that between the Emperor William and Ring Humbert at Venice, the question of a general disarmament was raised and discussed, although the only conclusion their Majesties appear to have come to was that it would be a matter of extreme difficulty to find a solution for it.

-The Berlin papers announce that, in spite of the prohibition of the police, scale experiments were made April 2, within closed doors, with the coat invented by the tailor. Herr Dowc, which he claims to be bullet proof. Herr Dowe, it is etatod, put on the garment, and allowed himself to hn shot at, with the result that the be let proof capacity of the coat was fully demonstrated, tits wearer sustaining no injury.

-From St. Petersburg it is announced that the Russian Minister of Education intends to restrict the number of Jewesses attending the Russian gymnasiums, on the ground that they exercise an unfavourable influence on the Orthodox students.

-A destructive fire is reported from Milwaukee, U.S.A., the disaster having originated in the Davidson Theatre. When the fire seemed to be under control the roof suddenly fell in, carrying with it over twenty firemen. Of this number nine were killed.

-On the night of April 10 five separate firms occurred in the town of Boom, near Antwerp. It is believed that they were the work of the brick-makers on strike in the place. The attitude of the strikers became so threatening the next evening that the gendarmes were ordered to charge them as they were pillaging a shop.

-News has reached Shanghai of another attack upon foreign missionaries and their Christian followers. The French mission house, at Hsianfu, in the Province of Shensi, have been burned, while the priests have been maltreated and imprisoned. The French Legation in Pekin has demanded redress for this outrage, from the Chinese Government.

-The Queen has left Florence for Coburg, in view of the approaching marriage of her grand-children, the Grand Duke of Hesse and Princess Victoria of Edinburgh. The bride's cake stands six feet in height and weighs 150lbs. A German superstition prohibits the bride from wearing pearls on her wedding day, the proverb being, "The more pearls the more tears."

-Further startling and enormous discoveries of gold have just been made in the vicinity of Imthambli, on Unguau River, and prospectors declare that the richness and permanency of the fine is probably unparalleled in gold mining. Dr. Jameson reports from Buluwayo, confirming the news of immense new discoveries, and the consequent excitement among the prospectors is very great.

-It is authoritatively stated that in the interviews between the Emperors William and Francis Joseph at Abbazia, and in that between the Emperor William and King Humbert at Venice, the question of a general disarmament was raised and discussed, although the only conclusion their Majesties appear to have come to was that it would be a matter of extreme difficulty to find a solution for it.

-The Berlin papers announce that, in spite of the prohibition of the police, scale experiments were made April 2, within closed doors, with the coat invented by the tailor. Herr Dowe, which he claims to be bullet proof. Herr Dowe, it is stated, put on the garment, and allowed himself to be shot at, with the result that the bullet proof capacity of the coat was fully demonstrated, the wearer sustaining no injury.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

Someone has wisely said: "The first chapter of Genesis never made an infidel, and no explanation of it can remove infidelity."

The Stundist movement began in Russia in 1865. There are no more than two million Stundists in the empire. It is a Bible reading movement.

It is surely a healthy sentiment that led the Baptist missionaries and delegates in conference in Ceylon to resolve that "we strongly recommend that the title 'Reverend' be discontinued by all the ministerial brethren."

A vicar of the Church of England writes pathetically to the English Churchman, asking what further steps can be taken by way of resistance to Ritualism, which means Romanism. The latter of which the following is a portion, shows the desperate state of the case:-

The efforts which are now being made are very good so far as they go, but I am sadly afraid they will not prove effective. We have lecturing, preaching, distribution of pamphlets, and the very excellent Protestant Van Agency of the Church Association. All these carry out their designed intention of educating the people. So far so good: and let us push them forward to the utmost of our power. But education is a very slow process, and what makes matters worse is that, whilst we are educating in truth, our opponents are educating in error, and from various causes their success is likely to be far greater than ours.

Among the discouraging things in the contest against the growth of Romanism in the Church of England, a clergyman numbers those ministers who hold "the fallacy that the best way to oppose error is to preach the truth." But that which makes the outlook so dismal is the fact that there are so many men in the church who call it a fallacy to think to oppose error by preaching the truth. So long as that idea prevails, Romanism will surely gain ground, for that is the very principle of Romanism. If the early Christians had held fast to preaching the truth, and had not thought that there was a quicker and surer way of combating error, there would never have been any Papacy with its ritualism.

"Spiritualism" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

Spiritualism.-Those who are awakened to the progress of Spiritualism, or "Spiritism" as some call it, recognise the fact that it is an element that must be reckoned with in Christian work. A correspondent of the Record writes a long letter showing that it is making headway in Church of England circles. He says it "seems to have received a fresh impulse and to be making most mischievous progress." He speaks of a number of clergymen, who, to his personal knowledge, have fallen fully into the delusion.

"How to Kill Gorillas" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

How to Kill Gorillas.-In the Pall Mall Magazine Mr. R. C. Garner, who spent some months in West Africa studying the habits of animal life in its native haunts, tells of the death of a young guerrilla which he had caught, and which had become much attached to him. The animal had some traits quite human-like, and was quite a companionable pet in the lonely days and nights which Mr. Garner spent in the iron cage in which he made his home in the forest. One day the guerrilla exhibited signs of sickness. Mr. Garner consulted with the native about the symptoms. "He assured me," he says, "that it would die, and asked me if I drank tobacco, which is the native expression for smoking; when I replied in the affirmative, he informed me that tobacco smoke was absolutely fatal to a gorrilla, and many other natives confirmed the statement." The animal exhibited symptoms of gastric poisoning, and shortly died-killed by inhaling tobacco smoke. It is fortunate that tobacco smoke does not serve all animal life in the same way; but is it reasonable to suppose that smoke that poisons a gorrilla in a few days is harmless to life and children or others, even though evil may not be apparently traceable to it?

"A Wise Answer" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

A Wise Answer.-When John the Baptist was preaching in the wilderness, the soldiers came to him among others, and asked him, "What shall we do?" His answer was, "Do violence to no man." A man with less of the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, might have said, "Leave the army at once," and thus have got them into trouble, and got himself branded as a mover of sedition. But John did not presume to take upon himself the responsibility of telling them how they should act, but gave them a simple Gospel precept, throwing the responsibility upon them. Soldiers who "do violence to no man," will soon find a place outside the ranks. The Christian soldier is the man who never fights with carnal weapons, and whose only sword is "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God."

"The Laughter of Children" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

The Laughter of Children.-In the window of a public-house in the City we noticed the other day a card proclaiming the virtues of a certain brand of whiskey, in which, it was stated, would be found the odour of June meadows, the singing of birds, the laughter of children, etc. Walking but a few steps further, one found children playing about the narrow streets whose ragged clothing and pinched and hardened features told all too plainly the fact that the means and the strength which were their due from the parents who had brought them into the world were dissipated at the liquor shop. The sorrowful features of the poor little victims of intemperance, who hardly know what the healthful, hearty laughter of childood is, give the lie to the picturesquely worded advertisement.

"Habitual Drunkenness" The Present Truth 10, 16.

E. J. Waggoner

Habitual Drunkenness.-According to figures furnished by the records of the Liverpool courts, the liquor habit, when once firmly established, has a stronger hold upon women than upon men. They either have less power to resist the appetite, or have less constitutional strength to bear up under the continued use of liquor. A letter in the Times shows that the number of individuals apprehended once only during the time covered by the records was: men, 3,487, women, 1,922; apprehended twice, 185 men, 257 women; three times, 73 men, 82 women; four times, 11 men, 42 women; five times, five men, 21 women; six times, 1 man, 10 women; seven times, 2 men, 11 women. This is the highest number of apprehensions of men, but the number in the case of women runs up to twenty-four apprehensions.

April 26, 1894

"Discrediting the Lord" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

Discrediting the Lord.-Many do not think the Lord is as good as they are. They are willing to give up everything for the Lord, but do not believe the Lord is willing to give up everything for them. When they give themselves to the Lord they do not take Him, and the fact that they do not take, shows that they do not believe that He has given everything.

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

"Judge not, and ye shall not be judged; condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned; forgive, and ye shall be forgiven." Luke vi. 37. The one whose disposition is such by grace that he never judges and never condemns, will of necessity not come into judgment and condemnation. Such an one has passed from death into life, because it is only by becoming a new creature, that men can refrain from pronouncing judgment on others.

"The Difference" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

The Difference.-When Christ the Holy One was on earth, He touched the outcast and the lepers, and mingled with those whom the He came to bless. He was not ashamed to call them brethren, and the needy were not ashamed to come to Him. This was the holiness of God manifested to the world. When men assume a spurious holiness, however, it is always a barrier between themselves and others. A few weeks ago the high priest of Kyoto, Japan, an aged man, fell in the open court in plain sight of the attendants; yet so holy and sacred was he counted the poor man lay half an hour on the ground before any one of sufficiently high rank to touch him could be summoned.

"Christianity Not Penance" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

The grace of God, which bringeth salvation, and hath appeared unto all men, teaches us "that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; looking for the blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ." Titus ii. 12, 13.

Other texts of like import, of which there are many, teach us that the Christian life is one of self-denial, one which involves a daily cross, and demands nothing less than the surrender of the heart and of all that the individual counts as his, into the hands of Him whom he would serve.

To the unconverted heart, all this means a great sacrifice. The carnal mind can view it in no other light. To one who has not exchanged this mind for the mind of Christ, the Christian life seems to be but a life of penance. As he views it, that which Christianity demands is done for the purpose of inducing God to bestow salvation upon the individual, or to earn it from Him, as if He had bargained with men to give them eternal life in His kingdom in return for a life of self-denial here. And this religion of penance is the religion of human nature; for human nature is fallen, and knows not how to find the path to righteousness and life. Penance is an essential element of all religions which have sprung from another source than God. And all works done to earn salvation are of the nature of a penance. The effort to fulfil the requirements of God,-to refrain, in desire and act, from theft, adultery, Sabbath-breaking, covetousness, etc., may be somewhat less disagreeable than wearing pebbles in one's shoes, but it is no less truly a penance to the natural heart.

It is impossible for the natural heart to comprehend the purpose and the meaning of the Christian life of self-denial. "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." 1 Cor. ii. 14. The natural man must become the spiritual man, before he can discern the true necessity for that which the Christian life demands.

The spiritual heart,-the heart that has been touched and renewed by the Holy Spirit,-realises the great truth that Christianity has nothing to do with penance. In the first place, God has not to be appeased, or in some way induced to regard the sinner with favour. He has always regarded the sinner with favour; not because he is a sinner, but in spite of it. When all the world were sinners, "God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." John iii. 16. Christ, "the Lamb of God," was "slain from the foundation of the world;" and in Him, all sinners are accepted with God and always were accepted since the day when Adam fell. If it were not in the very heart of God to regard the sinner with favour, nothing that any man could ever do could put it there; for what inducement could man offer to an omnipotent and omniscient God? What could men do that would in itself alone possess the least degree of value in His eyes?

No man could do anything to induce God to bestow salvation upon him; nor could he do anything to earn it;

258

and therefore penance has no place in the life of the Christian. "By grace are ye saved, through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast." Eph. ii. 8, 9. Salvation is God's free gift. Rom. v. 15-18; vi. 23. There is no intrinsic value in any man's works. There is nothing pleasing to God in mere sacrifices and burnt offerings of bullocks and rams. The sacrifices which God accepts are not sacrifices of human energy or wealth in the form of works; but "the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart, O God, Thou wilt not despise." Ps. li. 17. The ancient Hebrews had so perverted the worship of God that they imagined there was virtue in the sacrifices which they offered upon their altars, losing sight of the great truth that only as the works of men are connected with what God has Himself provided for man's salvation have his works any value whatever; that the intrinsic value is in the thing which God has provided, and that the value of works is but derived from connection with this. The thought is well expressed in the words of Christ, "Sacrifice and offering Thou didst not desire; Mine ears hast Thou opened; burnt offering and sin offering hast Thou not required. Then said I, Lo, I come; in the volume of the book it is written of Me, I delight to do Thy will, O My God; yea, Thy law is within My heart." Ps. xl. 6-8.

Here, then, is the source of our righteousness; not in our sacrifices and offerings, not in any of our works, but in the life of Him who had the law of God within His heart. This God desired and accepted. The life of Christ is righteousness, being the perfect keeping of the Father's law. And this righteousness comes to us not by sacrifices, not by penance, not by works, but by the gift of God, given because He loves us.

How true, then, are these words of Christ to us, "I am way, the truth, and the life; no man cometh unto the Father, but by Me." John xiv. 6. The Christian life is the life of Christ. It is therefore not the life of self. With Christ living in us, the works of the flesh and the natural heart are not performed. Self is renounced; and this is self-denial. But it has nothing of the nature of penance; for the language is, "I delight to do Thy will, O My God." It is only the natural heart that does penance; and whenever the service of God becomes in any degree a penance, it is conclusive evidence that the natural man is not yet dead. While the natural man lives, the attempted service of God cannot be anything else but a penance; but when he is dead, that service can be nothing else but a joy.

"'The Word Only'" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

It was customary for the Saviour as He went about healing the sick throughout Judea, to come and lay His hand upon them, or allow them to touch Him, and thus impart to them the healing virtue which restored their strength; and as we read the narrative of His ministry among the sick and afflicted, we naturally receive the impression that the miraculous blessings which He bestowed upon the people came through their personal contact with Him. We think that if we but had the chance to secure personal contact with the visible, tangible Jesus of Nazareth whom they knew, our opportunities of being blessed as they were would be much greater than they are.

But there was one miracle performed by the Saviour, the account of which leads the thoughtful mind toward quite another conclusion. We refer to the healing of the centurion's servant. The event is thus related by Matthew:-

"And when Jesus was entered into Capernaum, there came unto Him a centurion, beseeching Him, and saying, Lord, my servant lieth at home sick of the palsy, grievously tormented. And Jesus saith unto him, I will come and heal him. The centurion answered and said, Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed. For I am a man under authority, having soldiers under me; and I say to this man, Go, and he goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh; and to my servant, Do this, and he doeth it. When Jesus heard it, He marvelled, and said to them that followed, Verily I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel." "And Jesus said unto the centurion, Go thy way; and as thou hast believed, so be it done unto thee. And his servant was healed in the selfsame hour." Matt. viii. 5-10, 13.

Jesus did not come near the centurion's servant; the latter neither touched Him nor saw Him; yet he was healed as effectually as were any upon whom Christ laid His hands. The centurion said to Jesus, "Speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed," and the Saviour put the stamp of truthfulness upon the utterance by saying, "I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel."

"The word only"! That is sufficient, and this is the language of faith. Those words, and not "I will come," spoke the necessity of the occasion. Then cannot we speak them with the same assurance, and do we not stand upon a level with the centurion in relation to the healing power of Christ? How far off from the needy one must the Saviour be for His word to lose its power? Farther, we may be sure, than heaven is from the earth.

And this is what we read in another scripture. For it is declared that "the righteousness which is of faith speaketh this wise, Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into heaven (that is, to bring Christ down from above)? or who shall descend into the deep (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead)? But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in by mouth and in time heart,-that is, the word of faith which we preach; that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." Rom. x. 6, 9. And this is the same word by which Christ healed all diseases.

"Religious Pugilism" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

It is not an edifying spectacle to see men fighting and wrangling about religion. The absurd inconsistency of a heated discussion about Jesus Christ is so apparent that it is marvellous that men should engage in such a thing. But human nature is a marvellous thing. The mystery of iniquity can only be treated as a mystery; we cannot analyse it.

Yet all the way through the history of the world since the days of the Saviour, men have disputed, and contended, and even fought each other to the death about the meek and humble One, and the Prince of Peace! It was because they did not know Him.

They did not fight to maintain the Lord, nor to teach men to know Him, but only to convince others of their own wisdom and prowess. It is impossible for one to be filled with anger and bitterness toward another because that other does not acknowledge the Lord. His bitterness is all on his own account, and the Lord has no partnership with him in it.

259

The fighting spirit is born in man, and thus it seems impossible for some to hold any form of truth or doctrine without seeing in it something about which to contend and strive. They think they believe it so thoroughly that it awakens a great variety of emotions when others oppose them. It is only because they so thoroughly believe in themselves.

When we fully believe the Lord, it follows that the contentious and selfish spirit is subdued. "The servant of the Lord must not strive." He has no feelings to be offended; because the Lord has taken away the old nature, and the new man is being renewed day by day after the image of Him that created him. There is a battle to be fought, but it is the good fight of faith, not of feelings. Love is the motive power, not animosity.

When a person finds himself agitated and impatient when someone differs from him, he should flee to the Lord; for it means that he needs a deeper acquaintance with Him. The life of Christ is the strength of every doctrine or truth, for all the truth is in Jesus only-and the life is not something that can be contended about. It can be lived, it can be spoken; but men must necessarily have the life out when they wrangle over it.

One may hold a perfect form of a given truth, but he lets the life out of it and holds it only in unrighteousness when he carries it into the arena of contention and strife. He thinks he knows it, but to such an one the words of Scripture apply, "If any man think that he knoweth anything, he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know."

Paul's letter to Timothy was written at a late date, when many who had been attracted to the Gospel had lost the power of the life, and were entering upon that career of disputation and strife which bore all the evil fruits of discord so soon after apostolic days. The apostle tersely sets out the fact that the wranglers were fighting over something that they did not know. He speaks of those who had "missed the mark"-had failed to grasp the real life of the Christian doctrine-and had "turned aside unto vain jangling; desiring to be teachers of the law; understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm."

Again, he says that such are "proud, knowing nothing, but doting about questions and strifes of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings, perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and destitute of the truth." "From such," he says, "withdraw thyself;" and the only way to withdraw fully from their ranks is to have all the spirit of fight taken out of the heart. We may put it down as a truth, that when we find this spirit in the heart we have the fighter-ignorance of what we are talking about. The form may be according to Scripture, but we have lost the life of it.

"The Vine and Its Fruit" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

Shortly after Jesus began His public ministry, there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, to which He and His disciples were invited. In the course of the wedding feast the wine failed, and the mother of Jesus notified Him of the fact, and then said to the servants, "Whatsoever He saith unto you, do it." The result is thus told:-

"And there were set there six waterpots of stone, after the manner of the purifying of the Jews, containing two or three firkins apiece. Jesus saith unto them, Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them up to the brim. And He saith unto them, Draw out now, and bear unto the governor of the feast. And they bare it. When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was made wine, and knew not whence it was (but the servants which drew the water knew); the governor of the feast called the bridegroom, and saith unto Him, Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine; and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse; but thou hast kept the good wine until now. This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth his glory; and His disciples believed on Him." John ii. 6-11.

CHRIST THE TRUE VINE

The Saviour and said, "I am the true Vine, and My Father is the Husbandman. Every branch in Me that beareth not fruit He taketh away and every branch that beareth fruit, He purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in Me. I am the Vine, ye are the branches; He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit; for without Me ye can do nothing." John xv. 1-5.

The miracle of turning water into wine is an object lesson reality of this statement that He is the true Vine, and that we can bear fruit through being connected with Him, as branches.

All life springs from God through Christ. He is the Creator of all things, and in Him all things are supported. Col. i. 16, 17. It was by virtue of this power that He turned the water into wine. In that miracle He simply hastened the process. Let us trace it. In the instance before us, Christ transformed the water instantly into wine. In the ordinary case, the moisture is absorbed by the rootlets, and is drawn up through the stock, and dispersed to the various branches, where it is stored up in the little sacs which we call grapes. The sunshine has a large part to act in the process of transformation. No one can know how the change is effected; we only know that water, with the element which it holds in solution, is changed in the course of a few months into delicious fruit.

Men call this the working of nature and because the thing is so common they forget that is a miracle. In

260

the miracle which Jesus wrought at the wedding in Cana, He showed that in the ordinary process the water is not changed into wine through any inherent power in the vine, but by His own power, which works in every living thing. This shows that it is not as a mere figure of speech that He calls Himself the Vine, but that it is an actual fact. Because He is the true Vine, He could in a minute change the water into wine. He did in a minute what He ordinarily does in several months through the grape vine.

Now by the same power by which Christ changed the water into wine, and by which He makes all the fruit of earth grow, He is able to make the fruits of righteousness come to perfection in human beings. We cannot know how it is done in any case; we can only know the facts. The Scriptures make use of the mysteries taking place all around us in "nature," to teach us to grasp the mystery of the Gospel of grace. Just as the branch bears rich clusters of grapes, through its connection with the vine, all by the power of Christ the true Vine, so we, being directly connected with Him by faith, may bear the peaceable fruits of righteousness.

RIGHTEOUSNESS AND TEMPERANCE

In the case of the water turned to wine we have the most striking lesson not only in righteousness but also in temperance. The two are combined. The question is often asked, "What kind of wine was it that Jesus made at Cana?" Many assume that it was as a matter of course fermented, intoxicating wine, and urge that miracle as an evidence that Christ sanctioned the use of intoxicating liquor. If we study the miracle as we ought, we shall have no difficulty over this matter.

Whoever does not allow his appetite to becloud his judgment, will readily see that the miracle which Jesus wrought was the exact counterpart of the miracle which is wrought in the storing up of the sap in the grape clusters. He made just such wine as you would get if you should press the juice of the clusters of grapes into a vessel and drink it. This process is described in the dream of Pharaoh's butler: "A vine was before me; and in the vine were three branches; and it was as though it budded, and her blossoms shot forth; and the clusters thereof brought forth ripe grapes; and Pharaoh's cup was in my hand; and I took the grapes, and pressed them into Pharaoh's cup, and I gave the cup into Pharaoh's hand." Gen. xl. 9-11.

But there is another point, which gives us a most practical lesson in both righteousness and temperance. The wine which Jesus made on that occasion, like the clusters of grapes on the vine, was the direct product of His own life. It is not too much to say that the guests who drank that wine were drinking directly of Christ's life. Of the Israelites who drank of the water which flowed from the rock on which Christ stood in the wilderness, it is said that they drank from Christ. 1 Cor. x. 4. Those who did not by faith recognise His life, did not in either instance receive any spiritual life; but the turning of water into wine did become spiritual life to Christ's disciples, for they believed on Him.

There is this difference between fermented and unfermented wine. The unfermented wine is pure food. It is the life of the vine in the most condensed form, and is all nourishing. It tends to build up the system, and is therefore one of the best ways in which to supply nourishment to those who are ill, and who cannot receive a great quantity of food. The unfermented wine,-the juice of the grape, the true fruit of the vine,-supplies a great amount of the nourishment in a small space, and is easily assimilated. But in fermented wine the food elements are so changed that there is scarcely any real nourishment. It is now a stimulant and an intoxicant, instead of a food. Instead of building up the system, and supplying new life and power, it simply excites the power already possessed, spurring it to action. It adds nothing to the one who takes it, but simply stimulates him to use that which he already has.

Now Christ's life is food, and not a stimulant. He did not come to earth to incite men to put into operation power that they already had, but which lay dormant, but to give them power, of which they were destitute. It was when we were "without strength" that Christ died for the ungodly. Rom. v. 6. There is in men no power whatever to do right. "Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God." Rom. viii. 7, 8.

Anyone would say that it is an act of cruelty to beat a poor, lame horse that is almost ready to die, in order to make him work. He has no work in him, and neither whip nor spur can put it into him. The whip or spur may incite a strong animal to use its strength, but they cannot put strength into one that has none. So it would be wicked to try to force a palsied man to work. He has no power to work. There are men who are wicked enough to do such things, but they are moved by the spirit of Satan.

For the work of the devil is to make men think that they can manufacture strength out of nothing. So he induces them to drink alcoholic liquors, and tea, etc., in order to get strength for work, when there is nothing in those substances to supply strength. Taken in certain quantities they only stimulate a man, and cause him to put forth and use up the physical strength that he has. In larger quantities they stupefy and intoxicate. Thus he literally induces them to spend money for that which is not bread, and their labour for that would satisfieth not. By the use of those substances people use up the strength they have, and become prematurely old.

In the same line of work the devil causes people to think that they have in themselves all the power that is necessary for doing right. So he stimulates them with false hopes and promises. He gets them to punish themselves in various ways, for their failures, and to spur themselves up to bring forth the good which they are persuaded is latent in them. And when the individual effort fails, he induces the nation to pass laws with the object of compelling people to be religious. The idea is that they have goodness in them, but that they have to be spurred by the law, and by fear of punishment, in order to bring it out. That is the devil's way. The end, of course, is increased sin, and death.

261

Christ's way is different. He knows that in man "dwelleth no good thing," and therefore He does not give him a stimulant, which would do no good, but which would tend only to excite and wear him out. On the contrary, He feeds man with His own life, which contains all the elements necessary to perfect growth. In Him "all fulness" dwells, and we are made complete in Him. We are "saved by His life."

And so from the miracle of changing water into wine we learn an important lesson in righteousness, and temperance, and the judgment to come, because it is the life of Christ that is to be the standard in the judgment. That which Christ gives to us, is His life, which is real nourishment. His life in the heart produces righteous acts. And so for our physical sustenance He gives us that which is wholesome and nourishing, and not that which adds no real strength, but which dissipates the energy we already have.

"The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance." Gal. v. 22, 23.

SLAIN, YET LIVING

Jesus says, "I am He that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore." Rev. i. 18. He is "the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." Rev. xiii. 8. He is "the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." John i. 29.

For this cause all who believed in Christ as the Saviour of sinners were taught from the beginning to offer a lamb as a sacrifice, in token of their faith. The blood was shed, and the flesh was consumed. Cain, who had no faith, brought the fruit of the ground, while Abel brought from the best of the flock. "By faith Abel offered unto God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous." Heb. xi. 4.

The Passover lamb also represented Christ. Its blood sprinkled upon the door posts caused the destroying angel to pass over the house. Those who offered it, especially the first time, in Egypt, did so in direct recognition of Christ, whose blood cleanses from sin, and who was delivering them from bondage. "Christ our Passover, is sacrificed for us." 1 Cor. v. 7.

But at the Passover immediately preceding His crucifixion, Christ gave His disciples another memorial of Himself. "Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is My body. And He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it; for this is My blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins." Matt. xxvi. 6-8. It was directly after this, that same evening, that Jesus said to His disciples, "I am the true Vine." Hitherto men had shown their faith in the power of His blood to cleanse from sin, by shedding the blood of a lamb. But now the real Lamb was about to shed His own blood. Those lambs that had been slain had utterly ceased to live; but as surely as the Lamb of God was slain He was to live again. It would manifestly be out of place to go on taking the life of beasts in remembrance of Christ after He had died and risen again. And therefore henceforth His disciples were to commemorate the fact that life is obtained through His blood, by taking the fruit of the vine, which sheds its blood for the life of men, and still continue to live.

MANIFESTING THE GLORY

"This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth His glory." Yet the person of Jesus did not shine with any such splendour as when He was on the mount of transfiguration. There was no more beauty in Him, that men should desire Him on that occasion, than on any other; yet He at that time manifested forth His glory. This shows that His glory is in His works. It is by His life that all things on earth exist, and therefore it is that "the whole earth is full of His glory."

"And the glory which Thou gavest Me, I have given them," is what Christ said of His disciples, in His prayer to the Father. He has given us His life, and His works, in which we may triumph; and as we yield to Him to become His workmanship, His glory is stored up in us, to be revealed at His coming.

The goodness which He has wrought out and laid up for them that trust Him, is the glory which He imparts to men. Looking at Him, they are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, or goodness to goodness. Therefore "let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven."

These are some of the lessons to be learned from that first miracle in Christ's earthly ministry. There was a wonderful fitness in the performance of such a miracle at the beginning of His work. It set forth the whole of the Gospel. "And His disciples believed on Him." Let us be among the number.

"Appearance vs. Reality" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

The plea that the State ought to protect the people in the employment of the Sabbath rest, which greedy and unscrupulous employers are wont ruthlessly to invade, is, in appearance, the plea of benevolence and righteousness. But in reality it is something very different. Let us test it.

The Sunday law, by which the State aims at this protection, compels each individual to cease from secular work on the first day of the week. How will this affect the sinner,-who is now, as he never has been, in the vast majority among mankind? The Saviour said, "Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin." John viii. 34. See also Rom. vi. 16, 20; 2 Peter ii. 19. The sinner is in bondage,-a slave to evil habits or passions that rule in his carnal mind, which "is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." Rom. viii. 7.

Now what does the Sunday law do for him? It finds him engaged on that day, as on every other, in the pursuit of either worldly business or pleasure; for a sinner has no other way of spending his time. He is not a Christian, and the Sunday law does not make him one; therefore he wants nothing to do with Christianity. The Sunday law says he shall not occupy himself in worldly business or pleasure; and being a sinner he cannot occupy himself in Christian exercises, for his carnal mind cannot be subject to God. So the law finds him in the bondage of sin and leaves him in increased bondage, by depriving him of personal liberty. This is all that a Sunday law can do for anybody, since it affects only those who would not otherwise conform to what it requires. It finds men bound in soul; it leaves them bound to both in soul and body. It would put men where they could neither play nor pray, work nor worship. A most benevolent thing, truly, for mankind!

This is just the opposite of what is done by the Gospel. The Gospel finds men in the bondage of sin, and it frees them from it. The Gospel gives men perfect freedom, both of soul and body. There is nothing compulsory about it.

262

He who does not choose to serve God, is not compelled to. He may keep the Sabbath or not, just as he likes. But the Christian chooses to keep the Sabbath (which, however, is the seventh day of the week and not the first), and hence his keeping of the Sabbath is to him perfect freedom. So he is free in everything,-free from sin, and free in mind and body.

So then the work of a Sunday law, or of any law enforcing religious observances, directly antagonises the work of the Gospel. It is one of those things in which Satan "is transformed into an angel of light." 2 Cor. xi. 14.

"Afraid of the Lord" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

The ancient Roman conception of the Divine Being is the prevailing idea of all paganism. Of this, Duruy says in its history:-

The Roman knew nothing of Divine love; on the contrary, he trembled before the innumerable deities, capricious and vindictive, and whom he pictured to himself lying in wait everywhere along the path of life; in the words of the most religious of pagans, "Full of affright he entered their sanctuary, as though their temple were the cave of a bear or dragon." Should he by mischance cross the threshold of his door with his left foot first, should he hear the squeak of a mouse, or his glance fall on any object held to be unlucky, immediately he re-entered his house distracted, and could not feel re-assured till he had offered an expiatory sacrifice. He believed in the evil eye, like the Italian of the present day, and like him too he thought to guard against it by a fascinum which he hung round the necks of his children, in his garden and over his hearth.

To a world like this, that was through fear of its gods all the time subject to bondage, the apostles went with the Gospel of a God of love and pity. The pagan was constantly on the alert to propitiate the favour of his gods before they injured him by frustrating his plans or even slew him. What a new revelation to such was the Gospel, showing that it is not God fighting against man, in rebellion against God; and instead of men having to propitiate the favour of God, He in His boundless love gives His own life, His only begotten Son, as a propitiation for men's sins, to reconcile His enemies to Himself. "Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins."

When the Apostle Paul wrote to the Romans, he said, "God commendeth His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him." God was all the while doing all that Divinity itself could do to rescue a man from the wrath-not wrath which He had arbitrarily declared against man, but wrath which was the inevitable consequence of man's voluntarily separating himself from God. So those who accepted the message of pardon received not the spirit of bondage "again to fear," but the Spirit of adoption, bringing assurance of a Father's care and tender pity.

It was a glad proclamation of liberty from the bondage of sin and fear that the apostles carried to the world. It is the same thing that is the glad tidings of great joy to all people to-day. Not only in the so-called heathen lands are men seeking to propitiate the favour of Diety by their sacrifices and attention to details of ritual, but it is the religion of the human nature. Many go through the forms of Christian service who come so far short of knowing the Lord that they are afraid of Him. The thought that He is soon coming, or the thought of death, brings a fear to meet Him. Such need to know God, for He is love, and everyone who knoweth Him knoweth love; for to know Him is to love Him.

As a declining Christianity compromised with paganism in the adoption of heathen ceremonies and the re-christening of heathen ritual, so also it took over the idea of God. Hence, penances and all those things which are supposed to be necessary to secure the favour of God. It is the old idea of the expiatory sacrifice, and of course a denial of the Sacrifice God has made. So also came in the intercession of the saints, who are supposed to argue the Lord into a more merciful frame of mind. It is all paganism; for the mercy of God is infinite and higher than the heavens. Every soul that is lost will be lost because the mercy was rejected, and the salvation provided spurned and refused; not because the mercy of the Lord has failed.

"The Merits Vanish" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

The Merits Vanish.-It is human nature to endeavour to get this goodness out of self, but notwithstanding the resoluteness of the effort there is always the conviction of failure. The very penances and self-inflictions in which men trust, are a confession that they are conscious of not doing as well as they know. "All have sinned and come short," and all trust in self or in the works of man must come short of bringing to perfect rest and peace which is found only in Christ and His merits. With trust in His infinite goodness there is deliverance from every fear; for He has overcome every enemy. The faith He gives already "hath overcome the world," and the knowledge of this in the most trying times does bring the promised rest, while all the confidence placed in self banishes when the trial comes. A French nun, who is still in a convent, recently said to her brother:-

What strikes me more in my nursing ministry of thirty years, always with the dying, is to try and give them comfort. I have two rooms, one where are the dying nuns, but the other where the patients come from without; that means, people belonging to the world. I have never yet seen a nun die in peace, they seem terrified when death is near. All their works and merits seem to vanish, they have nothing to stand in the face of death with all its terrors. In the other room, death does not seem to bring on the same feelings. Many of these smile at its approach. Have they heard of something better than convent work?

"Reason and Faith" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

In the study of the word of God, great care should be exercised that reason is not allowed to usurp the place of faith. This is one of the dangerous forms of self-exaltation, and one of the most dangerous and ruinous. The havoc wrought by it is everywhere visible in the Christian world to-day. It causes men to substitute their own inventions for the institutions of God, thus obliterating true faith in the minds of men, and causing the loss of that power which alone is able to keep them from falling.

This is done when man endeavours by his reason to grasp the mysteries which the word of God reveals, so as to make them comprehensible to the human mind. In this way most of the miracles of the Scripture records have been "explained away." In truth, however, it is not the miracles that have been explained away, but that faith which should have dwelt in the minds of the ones affected by it. The word of God reveals the power of God,-the Gospel which is "the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth." And if that which shows the power of God is accepted by an individual in simple faith, without reference to his ability to comprehend it, the purpose of God in sending His word to him is fulfilled. But if, instead of so accepting it, he goes as far as his reason will take him toward comprehending it, and then declares that that which marks the limit of his reason is the meaning of the text, he frustrates God's purpose toward himself by bringing God's wisdom down to the level of the wisdom of man, and making faith of none effect. The whole value of faith lies in the fact that it

263

brings to an individual knowledge which reason alone could never enable him to get.

It is no more necessary in the spiritual life to comprehend the mysteries that pertain to it, than it is to comprehend the mysteries revealed in nature in order to live physically. He who would refuse to eat bread until he could comprehend the process of growth in the grain from which bread is made, would never eat it at all. The person who would insist upon doing this would be justly counted a fool. Yet many people seem to think it necessary to comprehend the mysteries that pertain to the plan of redemption in order to the successful operation of that plan in their behalf. And this very effort to comprehend the mysterious manifestations and declarations of God's power defeats its operation toward them; for since God's ways are as much higher than man's ways as the heavens are higher than the earth (Isa. lv. 9), after man has gone as far as he can in the process of comprehending, he is still infinitely below the truth as it is known by the mind of God. And therefore when he gives to the words of God a certain meaning which marks the limit of his power toward comprehending them, simply because he cannot understand how they can mean just what they say, he puts a meaning upon them which is infinitely below the truth which God reveals in them to man, and which He designs man to grasp by simple faith.

Man's reason is not God's reason. Man cannot always reason correctly upon physical matters, and much less can he do so in regard to things spiritual. When the mind enters the domain of spiritual truth; it must substitute faith for reason, or it will never proceed very far in the requirement of knowledge. Faith enables us to know that which, if it were obtained by reason, would require that we be omniscient, and able to reason as well as God Himself. We must view faith in the light of this truth if we would prize it at its true worth.

"Every Temptation" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

Every Temptation.-"And when the devil had completed every temptation, he departed from Him." This rendering of the Revision, in Luke's account, brings out strongly the encouragement of the text. Every temptation was tried, every bolt shot, and all failed. There is not a weapon left untried for Satan to bring rattling down upon the Christian armour for a fresh test. That armour has turned aside every device in the artillery of the enemy. It is encouraging to the tempted to know that there has no temptation befallen him, but such as is common to man. But there is all joy and strength in the knowledge that there can come no temptation which was not common to the "Man Christ Jesus." He was tempted in all points like as we, yet without sin; and He gives to us His own faith-"the faith of Jesus"-which is able to quench all the fiery darts of the enemy. It has done it; this faith is already the victory that hath overcome the world.

"The Postal Service" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

The Postal Service.-The Gentleman's Magazine, in an article on the Post Office, gives the following information about the service in the days of Charles I:-

In 1635, Thomas Witherings, who three years before had obtained an assignment of the King's patent of the postmastership for foreign parts, was commissioned by Charles I. to reform the inland posts, which had been so much neglected as to be almost useless. The mails were conveyed by foot messengers who rarely travelled more than eighteen miles a day, so that it took nearly two months to get an answer from Scotland or Ireland to a letter dispatched from London. Witherings established a post-office in the City of London, probably in Bishopsgate-street, for the receipt and dispatch of letters, and arranged trunk lines of posts to the chief towns of the kingdom, with branch posts to less important places. The posts were to travel day and night, so as to cover 120 miles every twenty-four hours, and were dispatched from London at least once a week.

Two hundred years later-within fifty years of our own time-very little improvement had taken place in facilities for communication. In fact, the postal tariff was higher. A letter to Windsor cost 6d., to Birmingham, 9d., and to Liverpool, 11d. Within the memory of those whose age is less than the threescore and ten, the wonderful developments in communication and transit have brought all the world close together. It is impossible to think of these changes without recognising the fact that they have a bearing on the duty of Christians to fulfil the Lord's command to carry the Gospel of the Kingdom into all the world. The world, the flesh, and the devil are not to have the monopoly of these things. It is time for the Gospel to go to every nation, and tongue, and people, and all the facilities at command are to be pressed into service. Yet be it remembered that there is no new road to the Kingdom, no easy nineteenth century method of doing the Lord's work. Not by might nor by power, but by the Spirit of the Lord the work must be done.

"The Christian Sect" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

The Christian Sect.-When the Apostle Paul was at Rome, the Jews came to him and said concerning the believers in Jesus, "We desire to hear of thee what thou thinkest; for as concerning this sect, we know that everywhere it is spoken against." In Paul's day the Christians were plainly a sect; but now, we find it assumed that in some way they have ceased to be such, although the world is as full of other religions to-day as it was then. But the assumption is entirely false; and public money devoted to the furtherance of the doctrines or institutions of Christianity, or State aid rendered for the support of the same, is as truly devoted to sectarian uses as though given to the Methodists, or the Friends, or the Jews. Only by Christianity becoming universal could Christians cease to constitute a sect.

"Religion and Human Nature" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

Religion and Human Nature.-It does not in any wise commend a religion to say that it agrees with human nature. Recently the Catholic religion was alluded to in PRESENT TRUTH as "the religion of human nature;" and the expression was emphatically commended by a Catholic lady. In agreeing with the statement she unconsciously condemned religion as anti-Christian; for human nature has to be changed for the Divine nature before an individual can become a Christian. Human nature is evil, because man is fallen. Catholicism is a religion which appeals to this fallen nature, in common with other heathen religions which, though different in name, are built upon the same essential principles. Christianity makes no appeal to human nature; on the contrary, it cuts directly across it.

"Up with the Times" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

Up with the Times.-The question of what to read in order to keep in touch with the advanced thought of the times, is one that is often raised by active minds, but never satisfactorily settled, for the reason that there is no authoritative source from which it can be answered.

It would be well for those who are anxious not to be left behind in the matter, to pause and consider what it is that is directing the advancing current of the world's best thought. Who is controlling the times? And is it the best always to follow and keep in touch with what the world calls advanced thought? One thing may be known with certainty on this point, and that is that the word of the Lord is always

264

up with the times; and if we would keep abreast of the times and be wise respecting the developments which they disclose we must study that word. The Bible is the one book absolutely necessary to the reader who would not be ignorant concerning the best thought and life of the day. For God, whose "kingdom ruleth over all," holds the times in His hands and Himself directs the unfolding of its thought and life; and what that is to be, both good and bad, He has foretold in His word, together with its true significance. It gives us the world's history in advance, even down to the end of time.

"Religious Stimulants" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

Religious Stimulants.-Christ uplifted before men is the only thing that can draw them in the right direction, and He is lifted up by the preaching of the word of the Gospel in the power of the Spirit. There is always the temptation to try other methods, but only this can do the work. Dr. Pentecost is one who believes that the Gospel is its own attraction, and he has told an interviewer that he thinks there is a danger in the Pleasant Sunday Afternoon movement which many do not realise. He says:-

In most cases the P.S.A. is a stimulant, not a tonic. Its excitements must be increased, and unless fresh attractions are introduced the interest soon wears off. A cup of tea is offered as an inducement, or it may be, a pipe of tobacco. And entertainment, either in the form of music or an address is expected and supplied. Now my firm conviction is, that if we cannot reach and hold the people with the Gospel, we cannot do it with the Gospel plus a bribe. Socialistic addresses, violin and organ solos, tea and tobacco, what are these but so many confessions of failure to bring the people in by a higher means? Soon the novelty wears off, and then the question is, What next?

The Apostle Paul told in his epistle to Timothy of the time coming when men would be lovers of pleasures and would not take kindly to "sound doctrine;" but his only charge for such a time is, "Preach the word."

"Going to Law" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

Going to Law.-"If any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also." Matt. v. 40. If all the professed followers of Christ had followed that counsel, they would have been better off. There is sound sense in it. Many men have gone to law, and spent ten pounds, to recover one. Sometimes a person wins his case, and get justice; but even then his expenses more than amount to what it would have cost him to settle the case without law. To be sure one cannot gratify his desire for revenge in this way, but Christians do not have such a desire. There is sound business sense, as well as Gospel, in the injunction, "Agree with thine adversaries quickly, whiles thou art in the way with him."

"The Bright and Morning Star" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

In the last chapter of the Bible we read:-

"I Jesus have sent my angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star." Rev. xxii. 16.

What does Jesus mean? In what way is He like the morning star? If we go back to the first three chapters of the Bible, and glance over the lessons that we have had, we shall see.

We have learned that, "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." "In six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day." "And God saw everything that He had made, and behold it was very good."

And all things remained good so long as Christ, "the Light of the world," was followed by man.

Christ Himself says, "I am the Light of the world; he that followeth Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of [My] life."

As long as a person follows Christ and goes only where He goes, and does only as He does, he cannot go wrong; for His life is always right.

Because His life is so pure and bright, and so sure to keep its followers in the right way, it is called a light.

You know if a child walks in the day he does not stumble, because he has the light of the sun; so if any child walk with Christ he will not stumble, because he has the light of Christ's life; Christ's life has power not only to show him the right way, but to keep him in the right way.

But if a child walks in the night he stumbles because there is no light with him, and likewise if he walks without Christ he stumbles into all sorts of bad ways, because the light of Christ's life is not with him.

And that is what Adam and Eve did when they rejected Christ's life and chose to follow Satan,-they stumbled and went entirely out of the right way, because they had turned away from the Light.

They so completely shut themselves away from Christ and the light of His life, and away from all that He had given them, that they were like children far from home and lost in the dark. They could not find a way back to their Father. And unless they did get back to Him they were lost for ever, with nothing but death before them.

And that was not all. Not only would Adam and Eve be lost for ever, but we, the children that they were to have, would be lost for ever too.

Sad were their hearts when they realised what a foolish thing they had done. They had been carefully warned by their Father, but like wilful children, they thought they knew enough to take care of themselves. Alas, they had found, as children generally do, that their Father knew best. What would they not give now if they could once more be in the light of their Father's face, and enjoy the countless blessings of their lost home.

But not one thing could they do to save themselves. They had forsaken the Light and turned their backs upon the right way, and were completely surrounded with the dark, dark cloud of sin. They were without God and without hope in the world.

"Lost, lost, LOST! rang through the Father's house. The angel's harps were hushed, and grief filled every heart. The children who had been so blessed and so beloved had disobeyed their Father and were lost!

To be sure it was their own fault that they were lost, but what father stops to think of that when his children are lost? "Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him." He must save them even though it takes His life! And He very well knew that nothing less than the light of His life could pierce the darkness of sin that surrounded them.

"Behold what manner of love!" Suddenly the people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death, light sprang up!

Where did the light come from? From their Father! He gave His only begotten Son to come and save them! It cost Him His life to break through the cloud of sin and let the light of His life shine in. But He gladly did it to save them,-and to save us. In providing a way of salvation for them, He provide a way of salvation for us also, and for "every man that cometh into the world."

Jesus says, "I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on Me should not abide in darkness."

Then if we really believe that Jesus can save us, and follow the light of His life, it will cleanse us from sin, and lead us, like the morning star, out of darkness into the perfect day. It will lead us, as well as Adam and Eve, back to our lost home and into the marvellous light of our Father's presence.

How sad it would be for a lost child to refuse to follow the light that his father had sent to guide him home. Yet is not that what we are doing when we refuse to follow the blessed Light that God has sent to guide us back to Him?

Then "O. . . , come ye, and let us walk in the light of the Lord," let us follow "the Bright and Morning Star."

1. Who created the heaven and the earth? Gen. i. 1.

2. When did He create them? Gen. i. 1.

3. Who created the grass, flowers and trees, and the insects, birds, and animals, and all living things?

4. How long was He in creating all things? Gen. i; Ex. xx. 11.

5. How did He make them? Gen. i; Ps. xxiii. 9.

6. What did He do on the seventh day? Gen. ii. 2; Ex. x. 11.

7. Were all the things that He made just as they are now? How were they? Gen. i. 31.

8. How long did they remain good? Gen. iii.

9. Why would following Christ keep man good?-Because He kept all of His Father's commandments. Ps. xl. 7, 8.

10. What does Christ call Himself? John viii. 12.

11. What does He say those have who follow Him? John viii. 12.

12. In what way is His life like a light?

13. What does a child do when He tries to walk in the night without a light? John xi. 9, 10.

14. What did Adam and Eve do when they tried to walk without Christ? Why?

15. What were they like?

16. Unless they got back to God, what awaited them?

270

17. And if they were lost for ever, what about us?

18. Whose fault was it that they were lost? Why?

19. Could they not do something to save themselves?

20. Who only could save them?

21. Was He willing to? Ps. ciii. 13.

22. What only could pierce through the darkness of sin that surrounded them?

23. What did those who sat in darkness suddenly see? Matt. i. v 16.

24. Where did the light coming from?

25. What was the light? John viii. 12; xii. 46; Rev. xxii. 16; John i. 4.

26. How much did it cost Him to let the light of His life shine upon them?

27. In providing a way of salvation for Adam and Eve, what did He provide for you and me, and for every other person that cometh into the world? John xii. 46; John i. 9.

28. Will every one, then, be saved? John iii. 19.

29. If we follow Jesus, the Light, the Bright and Morning Star, where will He lead us?

30. Would it not be very ungrateful to refuse to follow Him after He has given His life to save us?

"The Real Cause" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

In the reports of terrible accidents, says the Freeman, such as the burning down of a house with a severe loss of life, or overturning of a carriage, it is frequently stated, even in the public prints, that the cause was drunkenness. But when the coroner's inquest is made, this is not inquired into, but attention is directed to some secondary causes, and a verdict of accidental death is recorded. Now, in this we contend that there is a direct violation of oath by the jurors. Our fearful drink system seems to paralyse even our coroners' courts so that they fear to speak the truth. This is an evil which needs to be attacked. If every coroner's inquest had but spoken the truth, and fulfilled the object for which it was designed, there would have been an appalling mass of evidence on the evil of drunkenness as a source of accident.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

-The fishermen at Lowestoft recently struck against, the low prices, 13,000 herrings fetching only a sovereign.

-The Czar is about to go on a journey to the Crimea, and 50,000 soldiers are being sent to guard the railway line.

-A crisis is said to threaten the Spanish Cabinet in connection with the conclusion of commercial treaties with Germany, Austria, Italy and Belgium.

-Wind has been utilised near London as the motive power for the generation of electricity. The motor is fixed on an open iron structure thirty foot high.

-Bills are to be submitted to the Austrian Reichsrath and to the Hungarian Diet, making the manufacture of dynamite and all other explosives a State monopoly.

-The first of the forts to guard the approaches to London has been erected on the heights near Guildford. The next fort of the chain will probably be built at Redhill.

-A telegram from the Governor of the Soudan to the French Government states that the French troops have gained a complete victory over the Touaregs near Timbuctoo

-Some Babylonian tablets which have reached the British Museum are said to prove that faith in one God existed in that part of the world as far back as 3,000 years before Christ.

-Admiral de Mello, the Brazilian insurgent leader, has surrendered to the Uruguayan authorities. The United States Government has unofficially intervened to obtain clemency for the Brazilian insurgents.

-Francis Polti, an Italian anarchist, was recently arrested in London, having in his possession a large cylindrical bomb for which he was unable satisfactorily to account. The arrest is regarded as a very important one.

-At Blackburn three young fellows were recently summoned by the guardians, under an old statute of George III., for having neglected their own health, and thrown themselves upon the rates for treatment. They were sentenced to fourteen days' hard labour.

-The three Austrian towns of Neusandez, in Galicia, Hradisch, in Moravia, and Adler-Kosteletz, in Bohemia, were almost entirely destroyed by fire April 17, the conflagrations having broken out simultaneously in all three towns. It is believed that the fire was the work of incendiaries.

-Strikes in Russia, it is said, are daily becoming of more frequent occurrence. The workmen on the Valdikavkaz Railway have now struck work, demanding higher wages. The Government has, however, ordered the strikers to return to their work until their case has been enquired into by the authorities.

-The Russian Government will this summer probably dismiss 200,000 soldiers from the ranks earlier than usual, with the double object of facilitating harvesting and diminishing the amount of the military Budget. With the latter object it is further intended to hold very few man?uvres this year, while the conscription will be smaller than usual.

-A resident of Tiflis, Russia, states that the leading Baptists there and in other parts of Transcaucasia have just had domiciliary visits paid them by the police, when their books and papers were carefully examined, and a number of them confiscated. It is stated that in those raids the police have captured documents in which the names and addresses of a number of Baptists and Stundists are inscribed, and that many of the threads of the organisation, so far at least as it concerns the Caucasus, are now in their hands.

-The authorities at Washington are beginning to think seriously of the advance of the Labour Army, which is marching to Washington in sections from different districts, and will no doubt be accompanied by disorderly mobs, which, while forming no part of the demonstrate will add to the difficulties of the situation. It appears certain that the main body will reach Washington by May 1 at latest, and the police officials are earnestly discussing the best means of dealing with so largo a body of men and preventing disturbances. The militia and police are being prepared for every emergency, and are exercised in the riot drill daily. It is understood that the Government, as an extra precaution, intends to reinforce the Federal troops quartered in the district. The Committees on Rules of both the Senate and House have arranged to prevent the "Coxeyites" from entering the grounds of the Capitol in bodies, and special precautions are being taken at the White House.

-In opening his Budget, the Chancellor of the Exchequer said he had estimated that the receipts for the year 1893-4 would be ?91,640,000, and the expenditure ?91,464,000, being a surplus of ?176,000. The expenditure had actually been ?91,303,000, and the revenue ?91,133,000, being a balance against him of ?170,000. For 1894-5 he estimated that he would have to meet an expenditure of ?91,458,000, and that his revenue on the basis of existing taxation would be ?90,956,000 so that he had a deficit to meet of ?4,502,000. He reduced this, mainly by an appropriation of the new sinking fund to the liquidation of out-standing debts contracted under the Imperial Defence and Naval Defence Acts, to ?2,379,000. He next proposed a series of radical reforms in the death duties involving not only an assimilation of the duties on realty to those on personalty, but a graduated charge which on sums of over ?1,000,000 would amount to eight per cent. This would give him ?1,000,000 this year and much more later on. He also raised the income-tax from 7d. to 8d., but increased the limit of total exemption to incomes of ?160 per annum, raised the amount of abatement on incomes of under ?400 to 2160, and made an abatement of ?100 on incomes of between ?400 and ?500. The net increased returns on the income-tax would in con-sequence be only ?330,000 this year. Finally he imposed an additional spirit duty of 6d. per gallon and an additional beer duty of 6d. per barrel, which would give him this year ?1,340.000. This gat rid of his deficit and left him with as estimated surplus of ?291,000.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

Whenever Christian work gets associated with political agitation, the results are deplorable. The real Christians in Armenia are suffering much from the indiscretions of political Armenians who are fighting only against the cruel injustice of Turkish rule.

The Pope of Rome having advised the Spanish pilgrims to recognise the legitimate claims of the young King of Spain, the Carlist leaders will publish a manifesto, in which they will lay stress on the fact that the infallibility of the Pope has no relation to politics.

Purity of the water supply is one of the most important considerations for any city or people. It is encouraging to Londoners to hear, therefore, that of 175 samples taken by analysts from the water supplies of London last month, all but five were found to be "clear, bright, and well filtered."

It is a sad misuse of corn, which might be turned into good bread, to make beer out of it by the processes of the vat. A vast quantity is thus misused, however, no less than eleven million bushels of malt and corn having been consumed by London brokers last year. The total for England was 73,250,000 bushels.

The Daily Chronicle in a commendatory notice of the proposal of the British Women's Temperance Association, to establish a number of country industrial homes for inebriate women, shows the necessity for something of the sort. Among other things it says: "Drunkenness among women, especially in the poor and crowded quarters of our great towns, is far more common than it used to be. It seems, indeed, as if the increased sobriety of the men of the labouring class had been accompanied by the reverse process amongst the women."

A certain writer has said, "I never knew any man in my life who could not bear another's misfortunes perfectly like a Christian." By that he meant that men can be philosophical and unmoved at misfortunes which do not affect themselves. But that is not bearing another's misfortunes like a Christian. Christ "went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil." "Surely He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; . . . He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed." Isa. liii. 5, 6. To be a Christian is to be like Christ. Therefore, "Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ." Gal. vi. 2.

The latest phase of the Board School religious controversy is a resolution, passed at the last meeting of the Metropolitan Board Teachers' Association, that the teachers as a body should petition to be relieved from the duty of giving religious instruction at all. The consequences of this, says an Anglican journal, "must be most embarrassing to the majority. On the one hand, the Board cannot well dismiss any large number of its teachers, neither can it well insist on their giving religious instruction which they do not want to give."

Exactly; and neither can it insist that parents should have their children taught ideas of God and religion which they do not believe to be true. It is strange that there are people who cannot see so obvious a lesson as that which this edifying controversy has furnished, nor hear a demand which is made not only by justice and the interests of religion, but by common worldly expediency; namely, that religious questions be kept entirely separate from matters pertaining to any branch of the civil government.

"The Truth in Russia" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

The Truth in Russia.-For many years the Russian authorities have been banishing Stundists and other Protestants to the Caucasus. As might have been foreseen, this has made that province a stronghold of Protestantism; and now at a meeting of the Holy Synod, soon to be held, the head of the Greek Church in the Caucasus is to submit a plan for breaking up the communities of believers and isolating the individual members in villages where they may be under closer surveillance. But wherever the real Protestant goes he carries the word of God, and that is the power to convert men; so that this further dispersal will only scatter the light into regions unentered. Ecclesiastics depending upon numbers and ritual and earthly power never seem able to comprehend the fact that they cannot bind the word of God, nor hinder the progress of the truth by penal legislation.

"Elementary Morality" The Present Truth 10, 17.

E. J. Waggoner

Elementary Morality.-In an address at Liverpool telling of the progress of missions in China, and the difficulties they had to contend with, Dr. Wenyon said that elementary morality was scarcely known in China. In reply to a question whether it was a sin to tell a lie, one of his teachers asked time to consider it, and after studying the problem some time returned with the answer that he did not think it was, if any beneficial end could be served by it. The Chinese certainly have the virtue of frankness. Again we are reminded that all the world is kin, and all men are of one flesh. Evasiveness or untruthfulness for beneficial ends is not unknown outside of China. It is sometimes discussed as a serious question whether a tradesman can get on in business successfully without deception. Of course Christian tradesmen do; but very often they may have to do as one writer in the Economic Review says he did. He purchased a dairy business of a highly respectable and church-going man, but found that so much deception and dishonesty was required to keep on the business, that he sold out at a loss of half its capital. "Truth in the inward parts" is not a natural product, wherever we may go. The green-grocer who piles up the fine apples in front in tempting array, labelled so much per pound, and then fills a bag for the purchaser from the ill-favoured and gnarled specimens in the rear, really reveals his ideas of morality as frankly as the Chinese teacher. Morality is a very simple and elementary thing, after all, and not hard to understand; but in order to practise it we must have it put into us, and the human nature put out of us, by the power of Divine grace.

May 3, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

When a man boasts of what his ancestors did, it may be set down as a pretty sure thing that he himself has never done anything of which one could boast. For the fact that he boasts of his ancestry, shows that he is a boaster, and no boaster will pass himself by for another, except in extreme necessity.

"For What Purpose" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

For What Purpose.-For what purpose are you living here in this world? Not, What purpose have you determined to live for? but, What purpose is your existence here designed to serve? Jesus Christ said, "To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth." John xviii. 37. This is the true purpose of every man's existence, whether he realises the fact or not. We are here to witness to the truth. And what is truth? "Thy word is truth"; "I am the way, the truth, and the life"; and, "Ye are My witnesses." By this will the success or failure of each life here be determined.

"The Great Question" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

The Great Question.-The great question, the question that most vitally concerns each of us, is not, Am I getting wealthy? or Am I acquiring distinction? or Am I rising to a position of power? These are all secondary matters to the one great consideration, which is, Am I seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness? In inspired biographies of men we find this point always made most prominent. We read generally at the commencement that "He did that which was right in the sight of the Lord," or that "He did that which was evil." This sums up the whole case, and the rest is but a narrative of particulars. When all other questions have faded and melted into the mists of time, this question still remains, looming broader and clearer as we near the threshold of eternity.

"Moments with Psalm LXIII" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

"O God, Thou art my God." The man who can say that from the heart, has the victory. "If God be for us, who can be against us?" Our discouragements and defeats come when we forget God, or when, if we remember Him, we forget that He is our God.

"My soul thirsteth for Thee, my flesh longeth for Thee, in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is." God is "the fountain of living waters." Jer. ii. 13. The water which proceeds from His throne is the water of life, for "with Him is the fountain of life." His promise is, "I will pour water upon him that is thirsty." Isa. xliv. 3. "When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst, I the Lord will hear them, I the God of Israel will not for sake them. I will open rivers in high places, and fountains in the midst of the valleys." Isa. xli. 17, 18. This He literally did once (see Ex. xvii. 1-6; Ps. cv. 41), and will again as literally do the same thing. But all this is to teach us how easily He can satisfy with righteousness the soul that thirsts for it.

"To see Thy power and Thy glory, so as I have seen Thee in the sanctuary." Some people think that it is only in the place of meeting that they can see the Lord. That is a mistake. We are not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together; but the soul who does not see the glory and power of God, except when he is in meeting, will have a hard life. God's eternal power is manifested in the things that He has made, and "the whole earth is full of His glory." Therefore not only in the house of prayer, but everywhere, may the earnestly-seeking soul feast his eyes upon the glory of God, and be changed by it into the Divine image.

"Because Thy lovingkindness is better than life, my lips shall praise Thee?" Such language could come only from one who could say, "Whom have I in heaven but Thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire beside Thee." "In His favour is life." "The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love; therefore with lovingkindness have by drawn thee." Jer. xxxi. 3. Because His kindness is everlasting, we may well say, "I will sing of the mercies of the Lord for ever."

"My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness; and my mouth shall praise Thee with joyful lips; when I remember Thee upon my bed, and meditate on Thee in the night watches." And why? Because Christ who is the Word of God, and the life of the written word, in whom is all the fulness of God, is the Bread of God. He who rightly meditates in the word, feeds upon Christ, whose flesh is true food. "The flesh profiteth nothing." If bread could become the actual flesh of the Son of God, it would be of no value; but His words are Spirit and life. So the prophet says: "Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and Thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of my heart." Jer. xv. 16. As cold water and good food cause a famished

274

person to revive, and produce a feeling of joy and satisfaction; so the words of God, when one feeds upon them, must produce praise and thanksgiving. Those who have no words of praise, are the ones who do not feed upon the word.

Let those who refuse to sing,
Who never knew our God;
But children of the Heavenly King
Must speak their joys abroad.

"Because Thou hast been my help, therefore in the shadow of Thy wings will I rejoice." "For Thou hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat, when the blast of the terrible ones is as a storm against the wall." Isa. xxv. 4. "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. . . . He shall cover thee with His feathers, and under His wings shalt thou trust." Ps. xci. 1-4. That is a place of safety where one may rejoice when trouble is raging. What tenderness is represented in the idea of God protecting His children as a hen broods over her young. "As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you." Isa. lxvi. 13. He is "the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort."

"My soul followeth hard after Thee; Thy right hand upholdeth me." That is the reason for rejoicing, because at the right hand of God "there are pleasures for evermore." The right hand of the Lord brings salvation. Ps. xvii. 7. "The right hand of the Lord is exalted; the right hand of the Lord doeth valiantly." Ps. cxviii. 16. "His right hand and His holy arm have gotten Him the victory." Ps. xcviii. 1. "Thou hast also given me the shield of Thy salvation; and Thy right hand hath holden me up, and Thy gentleness hath made me great." Ps. xviii. 35. He who is upheld by the right hand of the Lord, has a sure support. "Now unto Him that is able to guard you from stumbling, and to set you before the presence of His glory without blemish in exceeding joy, to the only God our Saviour, through Jesus Christ our Lord, the glory and majesty, dominion and power, before all time, and now, and for evermore."

"Bought and Paid for, But Not Dedicated" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

An American religious paper speaks of a somewhat famous revivalist, a Mrs. Van Cott, who has just closed the twelfth revival that she has conducted in one place, and says: "As the result of her good work there, a fifty-thousand dollar church has just been dedicated." That is a good deal, but if it is all, it is very little. One cannot help wondering if it is paid for, and if the church who meet in it are also dedicated.

It is a bad combination when a meeting-house that has not been paid for is dedicated by people who have been bought and paid for, but not dedicated.

"Beam and Mote" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

One of the strongest lessons that could possibly be given against criticising, fault-finding, and trying to regulate the conduct of others, is found in these words of Christ; "Why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but perceivest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Either how canst thou say to thy brother, Brother, let me pull out the mote that is in thine eye, when thou thyself beholdest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, cast out first the beam out of thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to pull out the mote that is in thy brother's eye." Luke vi. 41, 42.

But how can a man be sure that his own eye is so clear that he is justified in attempting a surgical operation on his brother's eye? The man in whose eye the beam is, and who sees, or thinks he sees, a mote in his brother's eye, is totally unconscious of the beam in his own eye. He thinks that the fault is all with his brother. So the fact that one is not conscious of a fault in himself, is not therefore any reason why he should think that he has not the fault, and that he can serve as a regulator for his brethren.

Is it then impossible for one man to point out another's fault to him, and to assist him in removing it? No; and here is the rule for doing it: "If a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual restore such an one in the Spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted." Gal. vi. 1.

The one who sees wrong in another must be actuated first of all by the desire to help and restore his brother, and not by any spirit of fault-finding. Then he must be sure that he himself is spiritual. This throws his gaze back upon himself, rather than on his brother; but specially does it direct his gaze to Christ. And then having found the Spirit of God as his own, he may go in the Spirit to his brother, but still considering his own fallibility and infirmities.

No man can be a faithful preacher of the word to others, who does not preach to himself in every sermon that he preaches. No man can be a successful rescuer of lost souls, who does not recognise his own sinfulness. When a man is most conscious of his own failings, is the time when, if he trusts the Lord, he can best help others. No man can deal as he ought with any sinner, who does not see himself in that other's sin, no matter what the sin may be. If he has not committed the same act in detail, he must know that he has the same nature, and that he has done that which is at least as bad, if not worse, when the different circumstances are taken into account.

Such an one will not condemn, but will restore. He will not chill and repel the erring one, but will win him. The reason why Christ is so perfect a Saviour as He is, is because while perfectly sinless Himself, He comes to us as though He were one of us,-as though He had committed all the sins that we have,-perfectly identified with our nature, so that we are not afraid of Him. He is the only one upon whom we should look in our efforts for others. Let Him be the only model.

"The Keeping Power" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

A power that is able to save is able also to keep. The apostle speaks of the believers as those "who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation." 1 Peter i. 5. The faith that does not claim the power of God in the daily stress of sin is not a saving faith. Whenever we fall into sin, it is because for that moment our faith has let go of the Lord, and we are not believing in Him.

For "whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God"-whosoever is believing. It is not a thing accomplished once for all time, but a continual process, if only we were but constant in believing. And while believing, the power of God keeps. For we read, "We know that whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not; but He that is begotten of God keepeth him, and the evil one toucheth him not." 1 John v. 18, R.V.

It is a blessed truth that the one who is believing is shut in by the arms of the Lord, and the evil one cannot touch him. There is refuge, a covert from the storm. Oh, that we might

275

learn to abide in the shelter; for we know well enough by bitter experience that we have not power to keep ourselves-not for one moment.

In a world of sin and wickedness the one who is believing is being kept from the iniquity that surrounds him, that is even in his very flesh ready to spring upon him. When the three Hebrew captives were thrown into the furnace of fire, the fire had no power upon their bodies, "nor was an hair of their head singed, neither were their coats changed, nor the smell of fire had passed on them." There was with them in the furnace One who had said, "I will be with thee," and "when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned."

He it is that is pledged to keep the believing one in the midst of the consuming fire of sin. We cannot endure it alone; we always fall, and the fiery darts strike into the soul. The prayer of David must be ours continually, "Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a constant spirit [margin] within me." Thank God, when our faith has not held Him fast, and we find the enemy has found us and touched us, there is still the promise following the injunction, "sin not." "And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous." He looses and sets us free again. But He sets us free that we may hold steadfastly by a firmer faith to Him. In the bitterness of sin we are taught our own weakness and worthlessness, and in the sweetness of His forgiveness we are taught His power to save.

"Tradition" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

Tradition.-A church paper makes the following comments on one of the tendencies noticeable in Nonconformity to-day:-

Tradition! A remarkable article in a Nonconformist paper upon tradition has the following suggestive sentence: "Mediately or immediately we owe to tradition all that we know of Christianity." Further on, the writer advises Nonconformists to teach their people more about the great Church traditions and the splendid heroisms associated with them. Just so; but what would the writer have said ten years ago about traditions? Truly the Dissenters are moving.

Churchmen or Dissenters moving toward traditions are surely moving in the wrong direction. It is a mistake to suppose that the knowledge of Christianity rests upon tradition. The knowledge of Christ is an actual living experience, and the knowledge that the Scriptures are the word of God is not received by tradition-for the Lord needeth not that any man should testify of Him-but is proved every day in the life of every real Christian. Christianity is not an ecclesiastical formula, but a life. The believer finds actual life in the Scriptures, and needs no testimony of men to tell him that he is living by the word. Ecclesiastical tradition has always led wrong. Christ went counter to the "traditions of the elders," and charged them with making void the commandments of God by their traditions. The Reformers were met everywhere by the cry, "Tradition! tradition!" It is not a move toward tradition but toward the fountain head of truth, the word of God, that is needed now.

"Work of John the Baptist" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

When the angel Gabriel foretold to Zacharias the birth of his son John, he said: "He shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother's womb. And many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God. And he shall go before him in the Spirit and power of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord." Luke i. 15-17. Thus his work was to be one of preparation for the coming of the Lord.

In what way was this preparation to be made? We have the answer in the inspired words of Zacharias, after the birth of John: "And thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of the Highest; for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare His ways; to give knowledge of salvation unto His people by the remission of their sins, through the tender mercy of our God; whereby the dayspring from on high hath visited us, to give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace." Luke i. 76-79. In fulfilment of this, we find that John came "preaching the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins." Luke iii. 3. His message was, "Repent ye; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Matt. iii. 2.

If the word of John the Baptist had ceased with his death, it would have but little interest for us. We should read of it as a bit of history, interesting as an attractive story, but not personally concerning us. This is the way it is too often read. But that is a grave error; for the work of John the Baptist has not yet ended. We do not mean merely that the influence of his work has not ceased, but that the message which was committed to him is a live message still, and is still to be proclaimed by those who are the Lord's servants.

CHRIST'S SECOND COMING

For it should not be forgotten that the mission and work of the Baptist reaches up until the coming of the Lord in glory, to give reward to His faithful people. John came in fulfilment of the "words of Esaias the prophet, saying, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make His paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be brought low; and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways shall be made smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God." Luke iii. 4-6. See also Isa. xl. 3-5.

After comparing the above two passages of Scripture, read farther in the fortieth of Isaiah. Note that the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and that all flesh is to see it together. Compare this with Matt. xvi. 27: "For the Son of man shall come in the glory of His Father, with His angels; and then shall He reward every man according to his works." Also Rev. i. 7: "Behold, He cometh with clouds; and every I shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him; and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of Him." "And then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory." Matt. xxiv. 30. Note also that the voice is to say, "Behold your God! Behold, the Lord God will come with strong hand, and His arm shall rule for Him; behold, His reward is with Him, and His work before Him." Isa. xl. 9, 10. This, compared with Rev. xxii. 12, shows plainly that, although John the Baptist's personal work ended soon after the baptism of Christ, the message which he began to proclaim reaches until Christ's second coming in glory.

For in this study it should be remembered that John the Baptist himself stands for a movement. While he was a man of marked characteristics, he stands not as a single individual, but as a great force-a reformation. This is seen by the quotations

276

in the preceding paragraph, and by the words of John to the messengers whom the Jews sent to ask him, "Who art thou?" John said, "I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as saith the prophet Esaias." John i. 23. If you turn to the book of Isaiah again (chapter xl.) you will see that it is the "voice" that is given prominence. The Saviour said that John was "more than a prophet."

REPENTANCE AND FAITH

Thus we find that John the Baptist stands as the type of those who shall proclaim the second coming of Christ, and his message is the message which is preached to prepare people for that great event. Let us examine it briefly. He preached "repentance" and "remission of sins." "Sin is the transgression of the law." To preach remission of sins, is to preach turning away from sin; and this agrees with the words of the angel, that he should turn the disobedient to the wisdom of the just. That means that he was to preach the commandments of God; and that he did so is shown in his reproof of sin, and in the instruction which he gave to enquirers. But remission of sins is only through faith in Christ, and this John also preached, as we learn from Acts xix. 4. His preaching was therefore the same as Paul's,-"Repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ." Acts xx. 21. And this is the message which prepares for the Lord's return; for those who are waiting for him, are "they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus." Rev. xiv. 12. It is the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ, that is to prepare men to meet the Lord Jesus Christ when He comes.

THE COMMANDMENTS OF GOD

The commandments of God are ten, in which are summed up every other precept of the Bible. They comprise "the whole duty of man." The one which is plainest of all, yet least understood, is the fourth, which reads thus:-

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it." Ex. xx. 8-11.

This enjoins the observance of the seventh day of the week, the day which the Jews professed to keep, and which John and Jesus actually kept. The entire law, including the fourth commandment, is the "way" of the Lord. Therefore those who are the followers of John the Baptist, in preparing the way of the Lord, must, in their preaching of the coming of the Lord, preach the Sabbath of the fourth commandment, the seventh day of the week. Those who truly preach such a message, deserve the name of Seventh-day Adventists. Such was John the Baptist.

INFANT BAPTISM

John preached the "baptism of repentance for the remission of sins." This dictates that he did not baptize infants. His message was, Repent, and believe. Repentance and faith were the indispensable conditions. Without these things none could be baptized by John. But infants cannot repent and believe. They have no knowledge of sin, and no ability to believe. Therefore those who take up and carry on the work of John the Baptist,-the work of preparing a people for the coming of the Lord,-will have nothing to do with the so-called baptism of infants. They will not thus caricature one of the most solemn ordinances of the Gospel.

BAPTISM IS IMMERSION

We said "so-called baptism," in speaking of the ceremony performed on children; for sprinkling, whether applied to infants or adults, is not baptism at all. It is nothing like baptism. The words "baptize" and "baptism" are the original Greek word spelled with Roman characters. They are not translated, but only transferred; so that when we use them we pronounce them very nearly as the ancient Greeks did.

Now by those words the Greeks always meant "to dip in or under water." A Baptistarion meant "a bathing place," or "a swimming-bath," and we have the same word in the form of "baptistery." There is no instance of the use of the word "baptize" by the Greeks, in the sense of sprinkle. We have before us the standard Greek-English Lexicon, by two Churchmen, Henry George Liddell, D.D., Dean of Christ Church, and Robert Scott, D.D., late Dean of Rochester, and Master of Balliol College, Oxford, and they give no hint that the idea of sprinkling ever attached to those words. Those clergymen had doubtless sprinkled many babies, calling the act "baptism;" yet as scholars they well knew that there was no more authority for calling it baptism than for calling it flying. The word Baptistes, which is the word used in the New Testament for Baptist, as John the Baptist, is defined in Liddell and Scott's Lexicon, "one that dips: a baptizer."

John went down into the water with Jesus, and baptized Him, just as Philip did with the eunuch. They both "came up out of the water." This is all in keeping with the meaning of baptism, which is a memorial of the death and burial of Christ. "Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection." Rom. vi. 3-5. "Buried with Him in baptism, and wherein also ye are risen with Him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised Him from the dead." Col. ii. 12.

TEMPERANCE

The forerunner of Christ was strictly temperate, and thus we learn that temperance will be a prominent characteristic of those who are preparing the way of the Lord. His life emphasised his teaching. He was a living protest against extravagant living. Ministers and religious workers who conform to popular customs of eating and drinking, especially drinking, will be accounted "good fellows" by the world, but they will not influence it for good. The world loves preachers whose lives give a silent sanction to worldly habits.

John the Baptist did not compromise with the world, thinking thus to win it to Christ. He preached the plain truth, no matter how unpopular it was, and took the consequences. So those who truly engage in the work which he began, will proclaim the truth, and the whole truth, even though it be unpopular, and though men in the highest positions are offended.

277

It was not the rulers, but the common people, that heard Jesus gladly.

POWER OF THE HOLY GHOST

Lastly, we find the secret of John's loyalty to the truth, in the fact that he was filled with the Holy Ghost. John went before the Lord "in the spirit and power of Elias." "It is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the Spirit is the truth." 1 John v. 6. And so those who are preparing the way of the Lord, by proclaiming the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus, can do so in reality only as they are led by and filled with the Holy Ghost. This is the promise of the Saviour, to fit men to be witnesses for Him. This it is that makes baptism more than a mere form, "For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we bond or free; and have all been made to drink into one Spirit."

"The Senses or the Heart?" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

The use of elaborate ritual in the Roman services is thus defended by Archbishop Satolli in the International Journal of Ethics:-

Eye and ear become the channels of temptation and corruption, and it is only through the senses that images of a higher sort can be awakened, nobler aspirations aroused, and virtuous actions secured. Such notions. . . are amply verified in the history of Protestantism, the positive forms of which are coming back to ritual and liturgical observance.

But our Lord taught the truth that transformed men's lives-and the only truth that can do so-and what sort of ritual could be constructed for the teachings and example of Christ, or of the apostles either? Men do not go to the New Testament for precedents in the ritual, but to later days, when the majority of the church had fallen away from the purity of the truth and compromised with the ritual and doctrines of Paganism.

The teaching of Christ was not dependent on spectacular displays, but appealed directly to the heart; because sin is a malady to the spiritual nature, and not a disorder to the senses. By the teaching of the Gospel men learned that the kingdom of God was not meat and drink, or ritual and dress, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. The Spirit of God convicted of sin and revealed righteousness alike in the cases of the blind who could not see, and the palsied who could not feel.

The fact that there is a "coming back" to ritual among Protestants that encourages Rome, only shows that the same influences are now operating that brought the corruptions into the early church soon after apostolic days. When the word of God is not followed indeed, and the power of the Spirit is not relied upon alone, human nature will always suggest these compromises with natural religion, which by appeals to the senses seek to make men righteous by making them feel religious. The real nature of sin is thus lost sight of, and the true power of the Gospel is not laid hold of.

"The Church and the Word" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

The church of Christ should ever be inseparably connected with the word of God. The church is the body of believers who have been "called out," as indicated by the Greek word "ecclesia." They had been called out by the word; and so long as they adhere to the word, they are led by God, and fulfil the purpose He had in separating them from the world. But when they neglect the word, and turn from it to go in ways of their own choosing, they frustrate His purpose with respect to them, and though preserving the same external appearance, soon cease to stand in a position where God recognises them as His church.

And this is what the church, in all ages of the world, has done. Its history is closely interwoven-so closely as to be almost identical with-a history of apostasy from God. We read of the church that was in the wilderness, when the Angel spake to Moses in Mount Sinai (Acts vii. 38), and note the almost continual acts of apostasy which marked their course down to the time when they filled up the measure of their iniquity by rejecting Christ, as related by the martyr Stephen. And had we the history of the church since that time, penned by inspiration, it would differ from the former only in details, and not in its general tone. There would be seen the same frequency of departure from God, the same hatred and intolerance toward the righteous, and spurning of the counsel of those sent by God to show them their errors. And as the church went further and further into apostasy, the time came when men were called upon to choose between the church and the word, and those who chose to obey God left the church in order that they might be free to worship God in the way that His word directs.

When this took place, there was a reformation in the church; not a reformation of the church, for no church was ever reformed. Reformation and conversion apply to individuals, and not to organisations. There were some good men in the days of Luther who laboured under the impression that the Church of Rome could be reformed. Ere long they discovered their mistake. The Reformation was not a reformation of the Roman Catholic Church, but a reformation of men and women who had been in her communion, partaking of her false doctrines. And thus it has been with all reformations, before that time, and since. The church has continued to exist in outward form and ceremonies, and even to increase in wealth and members, for a church is always popular in proportion as it conforms to worldly standards of life, so that the masses of the world can by an easy step transfer themselves within the supposed portals of salvation. But the love, the truth, the faith, and all those elements essential to the true church of Christ, remained with the individuals who came out of the body which had departed from God; and these then became the church.

As by the word individuals were called out to form the church, so by turning from the word, they go back again to the rudiments of the world. "Take heed, brethren," writes the apostle, "lest there be in any of you and evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God." Heb. iii. 12. Departure from God comes by unbelief. "I know," says the prophet, "that the way of man is not in himself; it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps." Jer. x. 23. But "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." Ps. cxix. 105. The word, and not the church, is our safe reliance in the things that pertain to salvation.

How is it with us to-day? and how is it with "the church"? We are told that "in the last days perilous time shall come, for men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers," etc., "lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof." 2 Tim. iii. 1-5.

The power of godliness, which these deny, is the Gospel,-"the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth."

278

Rom. i. 16. The true church has the power of God; and from those who, though "having a form of godliness," do not manifest its power, we are exhorted to "turn away." The power of godliness is the power of the word of God. The words that Paul spoke were "in demonstration of the Spirit and of power." 1 Cor. ii. 4. "By the word of the Lord were the heavens made," and by the same word are our sins forgiven, and our hearts cleansed.

The church is the body of Christ; but it is Christ, the Head, who speaks. "The church in the wilderness," of which Stephen spoke, "received the lively oracles to give unto us." The oracles were not spoken by them, but by God; and the exhortation is given by Peter, "If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God." 1 Peter iv. 11. When the church forsakes these oracles, and speaks her own words, she loses the power of the word, which is "the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth." And when this is true of men, whether claiming to be the church of Christ, or a part of it, it is time for those united with it to remember the exhortation, "From such turn away." 2 Tim. iii. 5. Turn from the traditions of men to the word of the living God, that you may know His power unto salvation; and He will give you a place among them that are sanctified through the truth. John xvii. 17.

"An Example Worth Following" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

At the recent thanksgiving service held in the Great Assembly Hall, Mile End Road, one of the speakers related an incident that ought not to be passed lightly by. In the village where he was preaching in 1889, a revival was in progress. Some people not religiously inclined got up a ball, which was so well attended that they resolved to repeat it. Those who were conducting the meetings felt that this would be a great detriment to their work, but they had not the authority to stop it. Accordingly they took to prayer, asking the Lord to frustrate the plans of the managers of the ball. On the evening of the ball, they held an early prayer-meeting, and the minister went from the meeting to the ball-room to see the answer to their prayers. He found but two couples present. Prayer had accomplished what nothing else could have done.

We commend this experience to many in these days who are making vigorous efforts to suppress by law everything that is not in harmony with religion, and some things that are in harmony with religion, but not with their ideas of it. Let them leave the matter in the hands of the Lord, and give themselves to the ministry of the word. If the thing to which they object be a sin, God can deal with it better than they can, for He is all-powerful, and He is more opposed to sin than any man can be. "The supplication of a righteous man availeth much in its work." And if perchance the thing to which they are opposed be not a sin, but they themselves are in error, then by leaving it in the hands of God, they save themselves the sin of fighting against Him. There needs to be a fresh study of the words of the Apostle Paul, "The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds."

"The Seventh, or One Seventh?" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

Suppose I call on a friend who is ill, and he asks me to assist him in taking his medicine. He says that on the shelf I will find seven bottles, numbered in order from one to seven, and he asks me to bring him the bottle of quinine, stating particularly that it is the seventh bottle, and in order to make the matter sure, he repeats that it is the seventh bottle, the one numbered seven. I go to the shelf, and bring him the first bottle, from which he takes a dose of arsenic, thinking it to be quinine, and the result is he dies. Am I guilty, or not? Did I obey his instructions, or did I not?

Every one will say, "To be sure you are guilty; he told you plainly which bottle to bring, and you deliberately brought another one." But I have a plea to make in self-defence. I claim that I did exactly as I was told, and the proof I offer is this: "The seventh bottle was evidently one-seventh of the number of bottles on the shelf; when he told me to bring the seventh, it was plain enough that he wanted one out of seven; I brought in the first one, which any one must admit was one out of the seven and one-seventh of the whole number; and therefore I claim that I literally fulfilled his request."

Who would be satisfied with so lame an excuse? Would they not reply: "It is true enough that the seventh bottle was one-seventh of the whole number, and that the first was also a seventh, and so was every other bottle. It is true that your friend wished for only one bottle, which would be only one-seventh of the whole number; but it is also true that he plainly specified which one he desired. He told you to bring him the seventh bottle, and you deliberately disobeyed his instructions." Everybody would agree that I was criminally negligent, nor would they be convinced by my assertion that I carried out the spirit of his instructions, even if I did ignore the letter of them. All would agree that when a man says the seventh, he means that particular one, and not any one-seventh that may be most convenient.

Now the Lord has said, "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour and do all thy works; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." Ex. xx. 8-10. Suppose that instead of resting on the seventh day, I rest on the first day, and say that I am obeying the commandments; that all that the Lord requires is one-seventh part of time, and that the first day is just as much one-seventh part of time as the seventh day is; will those who condemned me in the first instance, justify me in this?

I might say that in keeping the first day I am keeping the spirit of the commandment, instead of the letter; but by that very statement I should convict myself of breaking the commandment. For how can one know what the commandment means, except by what it says? If God had meant us to keep any seventh part of time, would He not have said so, instead of explicitly naming the seventh day? Shall we not admit that God knew how to express the spirit of His commandment in plain words?

Some of our readers have often said, "I believe that we ought to keep one day of the week, but I don't think it makes any difference which one." Now let me ask you a few questions. They are these:-

What makes you think that you ought to keep one day of the week? Why do you not think that you ought to keep one day of the month only? Or, why do you think that you ought to keep any day at all?

You can give no answer, except that the fourth commandment says so. You may refer to custom, but that is against you; for the greater part of the inhabitants of the world are still in heathen darkness, and the heathen know nothing whatever of a weekly rest. No people have any semblance

279

of a weekly rest day, except those who have come under the influence of the Bible. The Bible requires that men should rest at regular intervals, one day in each week, and plainly specifies that that rest day shall be the seventh day, the last day of the week, and not the first.

And now since it is evident that the commandment of the Lord is the origin of the idea that a weekly rest day ought to be observed, how can those who recognise that necessity, excuse themselves from keeping the very day which the commandment of the Lord requires? If my mouth would be stopped because I disobeyed the instructions in regard to the medicine, contenting myself with one-seventh, when I was told to bring the seventh, what will be their condition when they are brought face to face with the law in the judgment?

"Faith and Unbelief" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

"By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain." Heb. xi. 4.

We have learned that God fulfilled His promise. Jesus, the Lamb of God, really came and was slain and raised again, that guilty man might have a way back to God and all that he had lost.

But Jesus did not come until after Adam and many of his children were dead. Yet every one of them that accepted this "Way" that God provided, and believed God's promise, and died trusting in the coming Lamb to save them, is safe; for God's promise was as sure as though it had already been fulfilled. They were cleansed from every sin and will live again with God and angels in Eden, when Jesus comes the second time and calls them from their graves. And the promise is that we, too, may join that happy throng and go with them to be with the Lord, if we also accept the Lamb of God for our Saviour.

The Lord has told us in the Bible about many of those who died in faith, and also of many who died in unbelief. He has told us of the faithful, that we might be encouraged by their victories; and He has told us of the unbelieving, that we might be warned by their defeats. The closer we study the story of their lives, the better we shall know how to be saved ourselves.

The first ones that God tells us about are Cain and Abel, because they were the first children that Adam and Eve had. Cain was the elder and Abel was the younger.

When Adam was created we read that he was in the image of God,-beautiful, glorious, perfect, partaking of all the goodness and life of God. But he lost all of that by following Satan. And when we read of Adam's children we find that they were in Adam's own likeness, and after his image,-weak, frail, sinful, partaking of all the evil and dying nature of Adam. You see he could give to his children only what he had himself.

Cain and Abel, therefore, were in as much need of a Saviour as Adam was, and their only hope of salvation was in Jesus, the coming Lamb of God. If they believed in Him, He would cleanse them from every sin, and keep them from sinning day by day, and finally restore them, with all of the believing ones, to Eden and its joys.

Oh, did they accept the "Way" which God, at such great cost, had provided? Did they have faith in the precious blood that was to be shed for them? Notice carefully, and you will see.

We read in the fourth chapter of the Bible that Abel was a keeper of sheep and Cain was a tiller of the ground.

"And in process of time it came to pass, that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the Lord. And Abel he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering. But unto Cain and to his offering He had not respect."

Why was Abel's offering accepted and Cain's rejected? Was God partial? Did He love Abel better than Cain?

Oh, no, for read that the Lord talked with Cain and said, "If thou doest well shalt thou not be accepted?" He will accept anyone who comes to Him by faith in Jesus.

In Heb. xi. 4 we are told that it was by faith that Abel offered a more excellent sacrifice than Cain.

Ah, now we see why Cain was not accepted,-he tried to come to God in his own way, in place of in God's way. He did not have faith in the cleansing, saving power of the blood of Christ. He thought that some other way would do just as well as the way God had commanded. But without faith in Jesus all the sacrifices in the world could not do him any good, for there was no other way under heaven whereby he could be saved.

Without the blood of Christ there is no remission (pardon) of sin. But Cain showed his unbelief in the blood of God's Lamb by not bringing a lamb and offering its blood as his sacrifice. By bringing an offering of the fruit of the ground, without any blood, he showed that he thought he could be saved without Christ's blood. For God had commanded that all who believed in the blood of Christ should bring the blood of a lamb in their offerings.

Notice: Abel had faith in Jesus, therefore he was careful to obey Him in every little thing; but Cain did not have faith in Him, therefore he was not careful to obey Him in every little thing. Your actions will always show whether you have faith or not. If you really believe God and have faith in His Son you will obey Him. And without faith in Jesus it is impossible to please God, or be accepted, or be saved, no matter what you may do. Why? Because "there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." "Neither is their salvation in any other."

1. What wonderful promise did God make to lost man concerning His Son? Gen. iii. 15.

2. Was the promise ever fulfilled? Acts xiii. 23.

3. When?-Long after Adam and many of his children were dead. Luke ii.-xxiv.

4. Then are they all lost?-No; everyone who believed the promise and died in faith is safe.

5. When will they live again? John v. 28, 29; Heb. ix. 28.

6. If we have faith in Jesus, what has the Lord promised us? Heb. xi. 39, 40; 1 Thess. iv. 13-17.

7. About whom has the Lord told us in the Bible?-Of many of those who died in faith, and of many who died in unbelief.

8. Why has He told us about them? 1 Cor. x. 11.

9. About whom does He tell us first? Gen. iv. 1-15.

10. In whose image was Adam created? Gen. i. 27.

11. What became of all this when he sinned?

12. In whose image were Adam's children? Gen. v. 3.

13. Then what did Cain and Abel need, as much as Adam?

286

14. Did they believe God's promise, and accept Jesus for their Saviour?

15. How do you know whether they had faith or not? James ii. 26.

16. What does faith always lead people to do?

17. What does unbelief lead people to do?

18. What did Abel bring for an offering? Gen. iv. 4.

19. What did Cain bring for an offering? Gen. iv. 3.

20. What had God told them to bring?

21. Then which showed faith, Cain or Abel?

22. Why were they to shed the blood of a lamb when they offered a sacrifice?

23. If they did not do this, what would it show?

24. Could their sins be washed away without the blood of Christ? Heb. ix. 29.

25. Could any one else save them? Acts iv. 12.

26. Then if they did not have faith in Jesus, could they please God, or be accepted? Heb. xi. 6.

27. Whose fault was it, then, that Cain's offering was not accepted?

28. Must we come to the Father now in the same way that they did then? John xiv. 6.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

-It is proposed by the Government to have all general elections take place on Saturday. The Jews have protested against it.

-The Wellman expedition, led by an American journalist, and which will make a rush for the North Pole, has just sailed from Norway.

-Small-pox is unusually prevalent in Chicago, the city pest hospitals being so full that no more patients can be accommodated, although from twenty to thirty new cases are being reported daily.

-Greece has suffered severely from earthquake shocks, a number of villages being destroyed, causing death to 252 persons and injuries to 150 more, and leaving large numbers destitute of food and shelter.

-An extraordinary quantity of wheat has been need as food for live stock in the United States during the past winter, owing to its cheapness. The results are said to have been highly satisfactory.

-A St. Petersburg doctor, for making a wrong diagnosis and unskilfully operating upon a lady patient, has been sentenced to a week's imprisonment, and to pay 1,000 roubles down, and a yearly allowance of 300 roubles to the patient.

-In remembrance of the plague of last year, fruit-growers in Cambridgeshire are waging a war of extermination against queen wasps, to prevent them forming nests. A price has been put upon their heads, a penny being paid for every dead wasp.

-The anarchist Polti who was recently arrested in London, said that pie had intended to kill Inspector Melville and other officers, and place a bomb in the Royal Exchange with the view of destroying as many of the bourgeois and capitalist class as possible.

-A project is on foot for establishing direct water communication between Kherson on the Black Sea and Riga on the Baltic, by way of the Dnieper to Orsha and the Dwina to Vitchsk, and cutting a canal between Orsha and Vitchsk. The cost of the work is estimated at ?3,000,000 sterling.

-Since 1800 the number of those who speak the German language has increased from 30,000,000 to 70,000,000; the Russian started with the same figures and increased in about the same ratio: the French increased from 30,000,000 to 50,000,000, while the English, starting with less than 20,000,000 has grown to 125,000,000.

-The final results of the general elections for the Dutch Second Chamber have been received from ninety-seven out of 100 districts. The party opposed to the Premier, Dr. Tak van Poortvliet, has gained an unexpectedly decisive victory, having obtained fifty-five seats against forty-two secured by the Government.

-Reports received at Columbus (Ohio) allow that the strike of coal and coke workers has affected 8,000 men in Alabama, 5,000 in Tennessee and Kentucky, 2,000 in West Virginia, 5,000 in Indiana, 28,000 in Ohio, 26,00 in Illinois, 1,800 in Iowa, 2,000 in Indian Territory, 1,800 in Missouri, 50,000 in Pennsylvania, and Michigan.

-It is announced that a great strike has been declared in the district of Plotrkow, a great industrial centre in Russian Poland, situated on the German frontier. The miners, ironworkers, and men employed in other industries, have all joined the movement, demanding shorter hours of labour and increased pay. Troops have been sent to the strike centre.

-A telegram from Moscow announces that the extensive Burlly Weaving Mills at Ivanovo-Vosnessansk were almost completely destroyed by fire on the night of the 22nd. Ten persons perished in the flames. Owing to the disaster some 1,200 workmen are thrown out of employment. Property to the estimated value of 1,750,000 roubles was destroyed.

-The tunnel which carries the Colorado Midland Railway through the Rocky Mountains, at Hagerman Pass has just been completed. The tunnel is close upon two miles long, and it is bored through solid gray granite. Its completion involved three years and twenty days' work, each day comprising twenty working hours. The tunnel is 10,890ft. above the sea level.

-Serious agrarian riots have taken place at Hodmezˆ-Vasarhely, in Hungary, owing to a dispute between the labourers and the landlords, who mostly belong to the nobility, consequent on the refusal of the latter to grant an increase of wages and a reduction of hours. Finally the rioters came into collision with the troops, sixty of the former being wounded and one killed.

-Cholera has made its appearance in Lemberg, Galicia, and "cholerine" is raging in Lisbon, Portugal, where there were recently 104 cases and three deaths in twenty-four hours. At the Spanish frontier stations of Valencia, Alcantara, Badajoz, and Tuy, stoves have been erected far the disinfection of the clothing of persons arriving from Portugal. Strict watch is also kept upon the whole of the Portuguese frontier.

-Jabez Balfour having obtained a medical certificate that his health would not permit him to remain longer in prison, a judge in Argentina has authorised his removal to a private house, where he is now kept prisoner, pending the decision respecting his extradition. Balfour's lady friend has rejoined him, and is said to be well provided with money. The press being on his side, his escape is regarded as certain.

-The conveyance of messages by pigeons will, in the opinion of experts, form an important feature in the naval war of the future. Some of the Whale Island birds were tried when the Hero was at Portland, and they all made the flight in remarkably quick time. As a result, a homing establishment has been formed at Plymouth in addition to that at Portsmouth.

-The Welsh Disestablishment Bill has at last been introduced by Mr. Asquith into Parliament, accompanied with an interesting speech from that official. It fixes Jan. 1, 1806, as the date of commencement of its operation, allows full compensation for life interests of incumbents, and provides for the retention of fabrics of churches, parsonages, chattels, etc., in the hands of the disestablished sect; the nationalisation of cathedrals; glebes and burial-grounds for the parish; permanent concessions; and for disestablishment by it slow process, not complete till the death, or retirement under the annuity, of all the present incumbents.

-Telegrams from America indicate that the national authorities are becoming apprehensive as to the progress of the Coxeyite movement. Instructions have been sent to various local officials to employ State troops to prevent the mob from obtaining possession of railway trains. Collisions have already occurred between the Coxeyites and the police at several places. Fresh bands of men, however, continue to be formed all over the country, although the prospect if any considerable number of them reaching Washington seems to be becoming more remote, and dissensions are reported from some of the Coxeyite camps. Mr. Coxey is said to have organised the movement with a view to getting himself nominated as Populist candidate for the Presidency.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

To meet the call made for the article, "The Sin of Witchcraft," which appeared in this paper a few weeks ago, the matter has been reprinted as a tract. See the announcement on the preceding page.

Raising snails for the market is becoming a profitable industry in America. The most of the snails consumed as yet, however, come from France and Switzerland, where snail farming is said to be a great deal more lucrative than wheat growing in England.

The Roman Catholic authorities have just decided that Joan of Arc is henceforth to be known as "Venerable." Inasmuch as the Maid of Orleans was born nearly four hundred years ago, she might and doubtless would have been called venerable, by general consent, two or three centuries ago, if she had only been alive; but since she was murdered when she was twenty years old, the ceremony which took place in Notre Dame, Paris, was but a ridiculous farce. "The dead know not anything," yet people in this "enlightened" age continue to pray to them.

It is stated positively that the German Emperor has submitted a scheme of disarmament but only to the King of Italy, and the Emperor Francis Joseph, but also to the Czar. A conference was to be called by the Czar, to meet in St. Petersburg, but the Czar declined. "M. Barthelemy Saint Hilaire declares in an interview that the first appeal in favour of disarmament must come in general terms from the Pope. The influence of the Vatican and its hierarchy would be sufficient to engender an instinct of peace among nations, which might bring them to the threshold of disarmament." Really, the Pope seems to have become already the biggest man in Europe. How long will it be before the old man of the Vatican will be dictating the policy of the different nations?

One of the anarchists (an Italian) recently arrested in London for manufacturing dynamite bombs, said that he meant to use the bomb at the Royal Exchange. When asked by the police why Italians should come here to do such things, he said:-

England is the richest country, and at the Royal Exchange there would be more rich people together than at any other place. I would have thrown my bomb and escaped if I could; if not I should have been taken. I am taken now, but I should have blown up a good number of the bourgeois and capitalists in the exchange. It would only be execution for them after all. We do not ask English people to come to Italy every year. Yet they come with the money made by the workers here. For us there is no frontier. The bourgeois are the same all the world over. Riches means robbery. If I have failed, others will take my place. One or two have failed, but the third will succeed. I have no religion, but am set upon carrying out my idea. If we do not succeed by one method we will adopt others, but succeed we shall, and in two or three years there will not be a Government in existence either here or elsewhere. This is my religion.

The Church Family Newspaper speaks as follows on the point of the popularity of Easter as a season for holiday making:-

Its popularity goes far back into the history of England; for, before our Saxon ancestors were converted to Christianity, they were in the habit of keeping high festival at this time of year in honour of Oster, the goddess of the Spring. The Church, when it got the upper hand, substituted the Festival of the Resurrection, and gave a mistaken interpretation to those feelings and beliefs about the "revival of nature," which Paganism had connected with the season of bud and blossom. And herein, we think, is to be found the explanation of the holiday-making and excursion-taking which we have noted as so specially characteristic of Easter rejoicing.

That is the exact truth; it shows that the Easter festival is essentially Pagan, and that the presence in the professed church of Christ is due to that spirit of compromise which led the church to adopt the heathen customs and ceremonies, in order to swell the conquests of the church, thinking to make ample amends by giving a mystical interpretation to those customs. By so doing they made "Christians" of the heathen, but they also made Christianity appear to be only an adaptation of Paganism. But true Christianity is not in any way allied with Paganism. It is not the reform or remodeling of Paganism, since the temple of God has no agreement with idols. What an anomaly it is, that a form of Christianity that is based on Paganism should set about trying to convert the heathen. "Can the blind lead the blind? shall they not both fall into the ditch?"

"Force a Failure" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

Force a Failure.-The writer of a series of papers on "The Peoples of Europe" in the Leisure Hour, deals with Germany in the April number. One paragraph shows how futile it is to try to make people religious by official interference and legal enactment:-

Notwithstanding all the Emperor's efforts, a religious spirit has not grown up in Germany; it is still the land of freethought or religious indifference. Since Sunday closing has been made obligatory, the public-houses are now more frequented-that is the only difference.

"The Opium Revenue" The Present Truth 10, 18.

E. J. Waggoner

The Opium Revenue.-The immense sum which is obtained in revenue from the opium traffic has been, of course, the only reason why this trade has been cultivated and encouraged by successive Governments, and why wars have been fought to gain an entrance for the drug into China. But the revenue derived from a vice encouraged is a staff that is sure to pierce the hand that leans upon it. The revenue in every land from beer and spirits is far less than is required to partially relieve the misery and poverty caused by drink, and to take care of the criminals who are led into crime by intemperance. So the testimony of those who know is that the opium habit is demoralising the habitual users of the drug, and is impoverishing them. And now the revenue is going down. According to statistics just published, the opium revenue is now sixty million rupees, while ten years ago it was eighty million. And yet the use of the drug increases. The market value has gone down because China is self-supplying in the interior, and even exporting to Siam and other states, while Persia is competing successfully for the coast trade. Meanwhile the wealth-producing capacity of all these peoples is being reduced by the curse.

May 10, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

The words of inspiration by the Apostle Peter are, "Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time; casting all your care upon Him; for He careth for you." 1 Peter v. 6, 7.

How few there are who do this. Some do not seem to realise that God cares for them. David knew it, for He said, by the Spirit, "But I am poor and needy; yet the Lord thinketh upon me; Thou art my help and my Deliverer." Ps. xl. 17. And Jesus said, "Are not five sparrows sold for two farthings, and not one of them is forgotten before God? But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not therefore; ye are of more value than many sparrows." Luke xii. 6, 7.

God not only knows our need, and cares for us, but He is able to do whatever His love prompts Him to do. Happy the man who can say with Job, "I know that Thou canst do all things, and that no purpose of Thine can be restrained." Job xlii. 2. Or with Paul, "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day." 2 Tim. i. 12.

"Casting all your care upon Him," means therefore to put it upon Him, and to leave it there with the assurance that He will see to it. "Roll thy way upon the Lord; trust also in Him; and He shall bring it to pass." Ps. xxxvii. 5, margin. When we go to a railway station, we deliver our luggage into the hands of a porter, and then go our way, thinking nothing more about it, confident that it will be taken care of. Surely we ought to trust the Lord more than we do a man.

But the trouble with so many is that they deal with the Lord just as they do with the railway porter. They deliver their luggage-their cares-into His hands, and then after a while they take it from Him again. We are to cast our cares on the Lord, and leave them there for ever, receiving His peace as our surety, and not to take them again as the traveller does his luggage. He says, "Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Matt. xi. 28.

In the first book of Samuel we have an instance of this rolling the burden upon the Lord, and trusting Him. Hanna was greatly troubled. Her childless condition had been a reproach to her. She had suffered hardship because of it. So she prayed to the Lord for a son. Eli, misunderstanding her, had reproved her, and she said, "I am a woman of a sorrowful spirit; I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but have poured out my soul before the Lord. Count not thine handmaid for a daughter of Belial; for out of the abundance of my complaint and grief have I spoken hitherto." 1 Sam. i. 15, 16. Thus we see how greatly she had been burdened.

"Then Eli answered and said, Go in peace; and the God of Israel grant thee thy petition that thou hast asked of Him. And she said, Let thine handmaid find grace in thy sight. So the woman went her way, and did eat, and her countenance was no more sad." 1 Sam. i. 17, 18.

Young translates the last clause thus: "And her countenance hath not been sad for it any more." A strictly literal rendering is, "And her face was not to it again." That is, she had thrown her burden upon the Lord, and she left it there, and went her way, thinking no more about it. She did not resolve that she would thinking no more about it; but her trust in the Lord, that He would bring her desires to pass if according to His will, was so great that she could not worry about the matter any more, and her face, as a natural consequence, ceased to be sad. From the above precepts and example let us learn how to trust God.

"Tell It to Others" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

"Sacredness does not mean secrecy. Many persons suppose that sacred things are profaned by the violation of their secrecy. There is truth in this sometimes. But there are souls to whom the utterance of some of our most sacred thoughts or experiences would be a life blessing. The question is, Sacred to what, or to whom? Every high and holy experience ought to be sacred to a high and holy purpose, and that purpose is not always to be attained by burying an experience utterly out of the sight of men."

The Scripture admonishes us to tell others what we have seen and heard from the Lord. "Come and hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare what He hath done for my soul." Ps. lxvi. 16. "Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another; and the Lord hearkened and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon His name." Mal. iii. 16. God blesses

290

men not for their own sake, simply, but that they may be a blessing to others. Let the language of every lover of the Lord be, "O Lord, open Thou my lips; and my mouth shall show forth Thy praise."

"What to Tell" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

What to Tell.-Jesus said to the disciples of John, "Go your way, and tell John what things ye have seen and heard." Luke vii. 22. That is all that any Gospel worker has to do. He has not to strain himself to make a learned discourse; he has not to theorise and speculate; he has only to tell what he has seen and heard. Not what he has heard men say, but what he has heard from the Lord. The command is, "Hear Him." Tell only what you know from personal acquaintance with Jesus. This was the source of the apostles' power. They had been with Jesus, and they said, when forbidden to teach, "We cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard." Acts iv. 20. You may not have heard and seen very much, but that little will be as effective as the greater amount that another has seen and heard. But do nothing to add to its effectiveness by adding something that you do not know from personal knowledge. That will weaken the whole. The testimony of the man in court, who knows only one thing about the case, and who sticks to that one thing, is as useful as any man's testimony could be. But he throws discredit on what he does know, as soon as he begins to tell something that he does not know. This wonderfully simplifies Christian work, and provides a place for every one. "Go your way, tell those things which ye have seen and heard." "Continue thou in those things which thou hast learned, and hast been assured of, and knowing of whom thou hast learned them."

"The Gospel Does Not Depend Upon Man" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

Whenever a man apostatises, the scoffers set up a shout, as though the Gospel had been greatly weakened. Even many Christians are sometimes thrown into perplexity. They lose courage, and are almost in doubt as to the truth, because some have turned from it. Such need to learn that the Gospel does not depend on man. They must know that it rests on the unchangeable word of God. Paul knew whom he believed, and therefore he could write without a shade of discouragement or doubt, "This thou knowest, that all they which are in Asia be turned away from me." 2 Tim. i. 15. What if all the professed Christians in a province apostatised, and his work seemed to have been entirely in vain? "Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure." The truth is no more true because many men, and even great men, believe it; and it is no less true because many reject it. Jesus was just as much the Son of God when all forsook Him and fled, as He was when the multitude followed Him, shouting, "Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord."

"'Intolerant of Evil'" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

At the fiftieth annual meeting of the London Y.M.C.A. one of the speakers, the head master of Harrow, said in this course of his address:-

If a Christian would be like Christ, he must be strong and even fierce in character. He must be intolerant of the things that are wrong; he must not suffer them, must not endure them for an instant.

Just think what influence might be exercised by this great meeting if we were all resolved that in public and in private life we will be intolerant, as intolerant as Christ was, of things that are evil, and base, and vile. Talk about public men and public opinion! We are public opinion. It is in our power to say, as Christian men and women, what we deem to be right; and, depend upon it. If we stick to that which we deem to be right in Christ's name, there is no power on earth that can stand against us.

Unfortunately, that idea is very common. This very statement was highly eulogised by a daily paper that is prominent in the ranks of reform, and most people would read it without thinking of its real tendency, which is the worst sort of persecution. It means that every professed Christian is to make his ideas of right and wrong the standard of everybody else, and then to do the best he can to force others to come to that standard. Of course people working singly in such a way would accomplish nothing, and would be regarded as nuisances; and so they must unite and agree on certain points, and then by their combined power and influence compel other people to come to the same standard. There is in human nature enough tendency in that direction, without clergymen teaching it as a Christian duty.

The only way in which a man can rightly be intolerant of evil is to be intolerant of it in himself. The Christian is represented as a soldier, and the Christian's life is a warfare, but not against men. "For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh; for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." 2 Cor. x. 3-5.

Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God. He was strong, He resisted even unto blood, striving against sin; but by no means could He be called intolerant. Fierceness is not a characteristic of a lamb. He was the light of the world, which means that He enlightened the world in respect to righteousness. He "condemned sin in the flesh," both by His life and His words; yet He did not presume to condemn men. He said, "If any man hear My words, and believe not, I judge him not; for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world." John xii. 47.

And so He instructed His disciples. "Behold, I send you forth as lambs among wolves." Luke x. 3. It is the wolves and not the lambs that are intolerant. Christ's followers are simply to bear a plain testimony, leaving the Holy Spirit to impress it upon the people, and the Lord himself to deal with those who will not accept it.

This was made very clear by the parable of the wheat and the tares. When the servants of the husbandman told him that tares had appeared in the wheat, and asked it they should root them out, he replied: "Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest; and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them; but gather the wheat into my barn." Matt. 13:29, 30. In the same chapter the Saviour explained that "the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels." The end of the world and the coming of the Lord is the time when evil is to be rooted out by force. And it is to be done only by the Lord and His angels.

The spirit of intolerance is the spirit of the Papacy. It is a most insidious evil. The intolerant one persuades himself that he is actuated solely by righteous zeal for the Lord, when he is in reality moved only by zeal for his own opinions. He opposes an evil, not so much because it is evil, but because it seems to defy him, or, in other words, "it outrages public sentiment." And he seeks to enforce something that he judges to be right, simply because he judges it to be right, and not because the word of the Lord commands

291

it. If he knew the commandment of the Lord, he would know that it is love, and that force and intolerance are a violation of it, because "the servant of the Lord must not strive; but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient, in meekness instructing those that oppose themselves; if God peradventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth." 2 Tim. ii. 24, 25.

"'Complete in Him'" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

The only way for any man to attain completeness-that for which all men seek-is to put on the Lord Jesus Christ. "In Him," writes the apostle, "dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily; and ye are complete in Him, which is the Head of all principality and power." Col. ii. 9, 10.

The mission of Christ is to set men free; and the freedom that He gives is complete. The Gospel is the only power in the world that takes hold of body, mind, and soul, and restores each to a condition of holiness, or wholeness. That this is the mission of Christ appears from the words in which He announced it in the synagogue at Nazareth, and from the works which He performed during His ministry. It is set forth in these words of the prophet Isaiah, which He quoted: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He hath anointed Me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind; to set at liberty them that are bruised." Luke iv. 18.

Looking at the work of Christ, we find that this is exactly what He did. He touched men, and restored their bodies to health and strength; He restored the insane to their right mind, and He gave power to as many as believed on Him to become the sons of God, free from the bondage of sin. And this is the work to which He commissioned His disciples; for when He sent them forth He said, "As ye go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils; freely ye have received, freely give." Matt. x. 7, 8.

This is the work done by the Gospel, wherever it has gone. This is what the Gospel does to-day; and therefore it is the one thing which all men need. Man at his best estate, without the Gospel, is a slave. Men count liberty as a most valuable thing, even when it means no more than freedom to come and go, to think and act, without arbitrary restriction from their fellows,-liberty merely in that which concerns the temporal things of this life. But how much more valuable is that liberty through which we lay hold on things eternal,-which unfetters the soul and gives man access to the highest sphere of existence. This liberty comes through the Gospel alone; and without the Gospel all liberty of every kind must eventually be lost. But with the Gospel we are sure of all,-that which is highest and most valuable now, and the rest after we have for God's glory suffered awhile, and been made perfect.

"A Dangerous Mixture" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

The editor of an evening newspaper having been asked why he published sporting news, since he declared that he disapproved of it, replied:-

The plain truth is, that it would greatly limit the area over which the teaching of the paper has influence.

To the question if it is not a fact that the sporting mania is increasing, he replied:-

Undoubtedly-spreading down to the very lowest strata of society from the Prince of Wales down to the crossing sweeper.

And then, to the suggestion that the responsibility of newspaper proprietors and amateurs who foster the sporting media is very serious, he replied:-

Truth. But as things are, the publication of this kind of news is a condition of a newspapers' reaching many thousands whom it wants to influence. To sum it up, if we did not publish racing news, we should have a smaller circulation and the result would be that the teaching for the social good, which we give the people, would not get into nearly so many hands.

Unfortunately, this plan of doing evil that good may come has not been always confined to the non-religious world. It was this sort of reasoning which led the professed Christian bishops of the early centuries to multiply rites and ceremonies so as to compete with the splendours of Paganism, and to indulge the heathen customs of their so-called converts, in the vain hope that they would by and by outgrow their heathenism. They thought that they must by any means whatever bring as many as possible within the sphere of the church's teaching, and so they compromised truth with error, with the result that error prevailed, truth was rooted out, and the church became Paganised.

At the present time too many churches are endeavouring to compete with the world in presenting attractions to the people. They think to rival the attractions of the music halls, by presenting some of the same features, trusting that the truth which they have will counteract the evil. But the plan will fail. In order to compete with the world on its own lines, the church must outdo the world on those same lines; and when this is done, the church and the world are one. The union of a clear stream and a muddy one, results in one muddy stream. The clear water does not purify the impure. One of the most effective ways of serving the devil is that, which so many well-meaning people fall into, of combining error with truth, and of pandering to the evil desires of the people to whom it is desired to teach truth. Poison combined with wholesome food is far more dangerous than when enclosed in a bottle by itself, and labelled, "Poison." In the former case even the otherwise wholesome food becomes poison.

"Reasoning Together" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

If a man is asked why he keeps Sunday, he will promptly answer that he keeps Sunday because Christ rose from the dead on that day. This is almost invariably the first answer that is given. There is scarcely a church-member in the world who would not, if asked to give a Bible reason for Sunday observance, immediately turn to the passage which speaks of the resurrection of Jesus on the first day of the week.

Without questioning the fact that Jesus rose from the dead on the first day of the week, we would ask, Where do we find any commandment requiring people to observe the first day of the week? or even a hint in the Scriptures, that the resurrection of Jesus should be commemorated by a day of rest? The invariable answer to this question is that the Scripture nowhere contains any express statement in regard to Sunday observance, but that there must be good ground for it, since the custom is so general. Thus custom is substituted for Scripture.

Some will say, "We believe that one day in seven ought to be observed as a sabbath, but it does not make any difference which day it is." If asked why they think that one day in seven ought to be kept, they can give no other reply than that the fourth commandment requires it. But for the

292

fourth commandment, known either from the Scriptures or by word of mouth, no man on earth would ever have had any idea that any day ought to be observed as a Sabbath. People who know nothing of the Bible, know nothing of the Sabbath day.

But when we read the fourth commandment, we learn that the Lord is particular as to the day to be observed,-so particular that He has very definitely specified the day. It is none other than "the seventh day." The commandment says, "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour and do all thy works; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work." Ex. xx. 8-10. Whoever therefore knows that the Bible requires the observance of one day in seven, has no valid excuse for not knowing that the seventh day, and that only, is the particular day to be observed.

Does somebody suggest that the commandment does not specify the seventh day of the week, and that therefore we are left at liberty to select which ever seventh day we wish? The reply is that there is but one seventh day, and that is the seventh day of the week. Because the week is the only period of time consisting of exactly seven days. The week is composed of seven days, designated in regular order as first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh. In the Bible the days are always designated by number, and not by name, with the exception of the seventh; for none of the days except the seventh has a name. The name of the seventh day of the week is "Sabbath."

But we are plainly told that the commandment requires the observance of the seventh day of the week. In the record of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, we are told that He was crucified on "the preparation day," when "the Sabbath drew on." Luke xxiii. 54. Of the women who followed, and saw where He was buried, it is said that "they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment." Verse 56. The very next verse, namely, the first verse of the next chapter, says that "upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared." Mark tells us that this was "when the Sabbath was past" (Mark xvi. 1), and Matthew (xxviii. 1) tells us that their coming on the first day of the week to anoint the body of Jesus, was immediately after the Sabbath.

What do we learn from these statements?-Simply this: that "the Sabbath day according to the commandment," immediately precedes the first day of the week. Now there are but seven days in the week, and therefore the day immediately preceding the first day of the week must invariably be the seventh day of the week. Therefore, according to the words of inspiration, the Sabbath day "according to the commandment" is the seventh day of the week.

And now comes the strangest thing of all, and that is, that having gone thus far our friend says that we cannot certainly know which is the seventh day of the week. He says that just as likely as not the day we call Sunday is the seventh day! Strange that he did not think of this before. And still more strange that he should say so now, after having started out with the statement that he keeps Sunday because Christ rose from the dead on that day, the first day of the week. No one thinks of questioning the fact that Sunday is indeed the day on which Christ rose from the dead. Then surely it is easy enough to know for a certainty that the day before, commonly called Saturday, is the seventh day of the week, and the Sabbath according to the commandment.

It is certain that Christ did not rise from the dead on the seventh day of the week. Therefore whoever suggests that possibly the day known as Sunday may really be the seventh day of the week, must at once throw up the idea that he keeps it in memory of the resurrection. There is no question, however, but that the day known as Sunday is the first day of the week, the day of the resurrection; and therefore it follows that whoever keeps it must do so in the face of the fourth commandment, which requires the observance of the seventh day of the week.

But it will be asked, "Shall we ignore the resurrection of Christ?" By no means. But commemorate it in the way which the Bible presents, and not in a way which is no commemoration. If the Lord had desired us to celebrate the resurrection of Christ by observing the day on which He rose, He would have told us so plainly. "Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation; so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation." Since the Bible does not mention the observance of Sunday, that is sufficient evidence that God does not wish to have men observe it.

How then shall we commemorate the resurrection of Jesus? "Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death? Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection." Rom. vi. 3-5.

Baptism,-not sprinkling, but the likeness of Christ's burial and resurrection,-is the memorial of Christ's resurrection. It is of Divine appointment, and the fitness of it is apparent. Christ "was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification" (Rom. iv. 25); and baptism is "for the remission of sins."

But some may say that baptism is something that occupies but a few moments, and is then past, whereas we ought to keep the resurrection in mind continually. Exactly, and God has provided that it shall be kept in mind continually. "If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God." Col. iii. 1-3. Baptism marks the beginning of a new life in Christ, and renewing of that life day by day (2 Cor. iv. 16) is the making known of the "power of His resurrection." Phil. iii. 10. The working of God in man "both to will and to do of His good pleasure," is the working of "the mighty power which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead." Eph. i. 19, 20.

And now we ask each reader: Are you a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, and do you take His word and life as the rule of your life? If not, why not?

"Not Knowledge but Power" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

In the field of morals it is plainly evident that knowledge is not power. Knowledge is glorified in these days, but all men know better than they do, naturally. What is needed is what the apostle cried out for, a power to perform the good that is known.

This is the need in the great heathen world abroad, as well as with all men in professedly Christian lands. Some have thought that as knowledge increased among the heathen peoples, intellectual culture would pave the way for the reception of the Gospel. But the apostle was speaking of men of education and culture when he said that the world by wisdom knew not God. And it was just because of their worldly wisdom that they did not know God. Because vain in their own imaginations and reasonings, these cultured philosophers were led into the grossest wickedness.

Mr. J. P. Graham, a missionary who has spent many years in India, at first supposed that a course of secular study would undermine the superstitions of the natives. So, in common with a large number of missionaries in those days, his first work was to teach English, logic, history, etc., in connection with religious teaching, in a school for the higher castes. He now writes that he is convinced that he made a serious mistake in supposing that the Hindus needed such training to prepare them to receive the Gospel, or that such training does actually make them more susceptible to the preaching of Christ. He says:-

Such a supposition takes it for granted that the Hindu has an honest conviction of the truth of his own religion, and that his depravity is due to its rites and teachings. But if our observations lead us to this conclusion, and in the end I do not think they will, it would still be wiser to take our stand on the testimony of God's word, and that will lead us to an opposite opinion. The primary cause of the Hindu's depravity is not his religion, but, on the contrary, his religion is only the outward expression of his desire to conceal the true nature of his original depravity-the common heritage that he shares with all the rest of mankind, a carnal mind which is enmity against God. His religion is simply the worthless garment of fig leaves in which he has chosen to clothe himself in the vain attempt to hide his nakedness. A vain attempt, indeed, for he cannot succeed even in deceiving himself, except for so long a time as he is permitted to remain in the dark. When a Hindu is brought into contact with the light of God's word by the preaching of the Gospel, it is not a conviction of the truth of Hinduism that leads him to hold to his religion, but the deliberate choice of what is agreeable to him, notwithstanding he knows it to be evil. It is as literally true of him as of other impenitent men elsewhere, that he "loves darkness rather than light" because his "deeds are evil."

The Gospel is the power needed, and men are "without excuse" if they refuse it.

"Livingstone and the Gospel" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

In the laying the foundation stone of a cottage hospital to be built in memory of Dr. Livingstone, Mr. H. M. Stanley said that Livingstone's hands were free from violence as his lips were from guile. Dr. Livingstone travelled over the whole of Central Africa unarmed, and found no trouble. And yet people, even some Christian ministers, are telling us that the slaughter of whole tribes is a necessary preliminary step to the spread of the Gospel in Africa. We are not yet ready to believe that maxim guns are "the preparation of the Gospel of peace."

"The Power of the Tongue" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

Men are usually very careful in handling things that have great power. A steam engine or an electric dynamo is not a thing to be set going by any careless, inexperienced novice. A case of dynamite is not usually tumbled about in a careless manner, and left to come into chance contact with external forces. A lion is not turned loose to roam through the streets at large. The helm of a ship is not left to be manipulated haphazard by crew or passengers. But in the use of the tongue, people throw aside all thought and all restraint, and let it do its work as it will. Yet "death and life are in the power of the tongue" no less than in dynamite or the steam motor or the beast of prey.

Doubtless more care would be exercised in the use of the tongue if individuals realised the extent to which their own interests, as well as those of others, are affected by their words. An individual's words are the measure of his worth. They measure his character, not only in the eyes of men, but of God; and therefore the Scripture says, "By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned." Matt. xii. 37. And James writes, "If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body." Jas. iii. 2. But if the tongue is evil, the body cannot be good. The whole body is affected with this one member. Though the result be not immediately seen or felt, it is registered on the soul, and sooner or later must be taken into account. As well might a person allow his body to be maltreated at the will of some reckless tyrant as to indulge a thoughtless and reckless tongue. The effect in either case would be very much the same in the end.

God has invited men to take Him at His word; and He in like manner expects to take men at their word. Therefore it behoves every person to abide by his word, and to tell the truth. Just what our word is worth, that we are worth. With what confidence could we approach God, if His word had ever failed? If such a thing should occur, He would at once sink down from the place of Deity. The throne of Omnipotence would be vacant. By His word He upholds all things, and His eternal power and Godhead stand or fall with it. And when a man utters that which is not true, or which he fails to fulfil, he lowers himself to the level of vanity and foolishness. He marks up the measure of himself, which God will use in the judgment.

The Psalmist writes, "Lord, who shall abide in Thy tabernacle? Who shall dwell in Thy holy hill? He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart. He that backbiteth not with his tongue, nor doeth evil to his neighbour, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour. . . . He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not." Ps. xv. 1-4. As the helm controls the ship, so the tongue controls and carries with it the whole body. A lying tongue will go into the lake of fire, but it will take the body with it. Rev. xxi. 8. While some men may view lying as an occasional necessity, it is not so in the eyes of the Lord. While men depend upon Him, the same power that upholds Him in the truth will uphold them. Men are not to speak idly, without particular thought of the truthfulness or import of their words. He who trifles with the tongue, trifles with life and death.

The power of the tongue is one which affects the individual who wields it more than it can affect anyone else. Though it may shoot barbed arrows that cause pain and sorrow in other hearts, their deadliest poison is imparted to the place from whence they came. No greater folly can actuate the mind than that which leads a person to seek revenge on others by poisonous words. They may cause some injury to the one against whom they are spoken, but they must inevitably be more injurious to the speaker. What folly to roil the stream from which we think others must drink, by stirring up filthy and mire within our own minds!

Moses made the greatest mistake of his life when, at the rock at Horeb, he "

294

spake unadvisedly with his lips." Ananias made the greatest mistake in his when, in reply to Peter's question, he dared to utter a lie. Such examples might well be kept before the minds of the people of this generation. "What man is he that desireth life, and loveth many days, that he may see good? Keep thy tongue from evil, and thy lips from speaking guile." The tongue is a mighty power for good when it is used in the cause of truth. By the blood of Christ and the word of his testimony the Christian overcomes Satan, witnessing as Christ did before Pilate, "a good confession," for "with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." This is the use appointed the tongue by its Creator.

"For Pious Purposes" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

The evil doctrine that the end justifies the means is very far from being confined to the principles and practice of the Jesuits. Very often we find people who profess to be Christians, venturing out a little from the pathway that God has marked out in His word, and sometimes venturing out a long way, for the purpose, as they think, of honouring God! It would be well for such to stop and ask themselves what constitutes the honour of God, and how it is that man can honour Him.

For instance, consider the matter of Sabbath observance. People observe the first day of the week, as they say, in honour of the resurrection of Christ. They seem never to entertain a doubt but that in so doing they are honouring Him. And although they pay no attention to the seventh day, which God has distinctly specified and commanded to be kept, they have no thought apparently but that their course is just as acceptable and pleasing to God; for is not the purpose of it all to honour Him?

But stop a moment. Who is to say what is to the honour of God and what is not? Has this been left for man to decide? Has it been left for him to choose his own way of serving and honouring God, or has God reserved that right to Himself? Is God particular, or does He allow men some latitude to suit their own tastes and their own ideas? God was particular with Nadab and Abihu; He was particular with Saul, although that king had spared the sheep and cattle of the Amalekites for the pious purpose of sacrificing unto Him. Has He changed, so that He is less particular with men now?

And how can men honour the Lord? Can they create some honour to put upon Him? Evidently, they cannot. The thing created cannot take something of its own and thereby put honour upon the Creator. Only through the means God Himself has provided, can man honour Him. That only is honour to Him which He has Himself made to be such, independent of man's ideas and inclinations. In honouring God man merely steps into his proper place in the fulfilment of God's appointed plan. And that place is always the pathway of obedience. "Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices [or any other forms of worship] as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken, than the fat of rams." 1 Sam. xv. 22. The very essence of the worship of God, by which He is honoured is obedience; for when men disobey God, through disregard or neglect of His word, he steps out of his appointed place in God's purposes and disconnects himself from them, so that his worship and his honour become self-made and therefore worthless; for nothing that man himself can make or do is worthy of being offered to God.

All that man does of himself must necessarily have the stamp of his own finite, fallen, and evil natures; and to offer such a thing to God would only be to offer an unclean thing to a Being infinitely pure and holy. The impropriety of such an act is beyond the power of words to describe.

Apply this to the keeping of Sunday,-an act which men offer to God for the purpose of honouring Him. God has never said that such an act would honour Him. He has never commanded men to do any such thing. It is an act of man's own devising, bearing only the stamp of human wisdom. And disobeying the commandment of God, which says, "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. . . the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God," and observe the first day which He has nowhere commanded men to observe, thinking thereby to honour Him,-as if they could not only create honour to put upon God, but could put such great honour upon Him as to make up for an act of disobedience! Can God accept such worship? Verily, not. He can never allow men to usurp the place of Himself.

Not all worship is true and acceptable worship. There is a kind of worship that the Saviour has pronounced to be "vain." Of those who made void the commandments of God by their traditions, He said, "This people draweth nigh unto Me with their mouth, and honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. But in vain they do worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." Matt. xv. 8, 9. Very pious they were, apparently, and very zealous for the glory of God; and they worshipped Him, in their own way, with great ceremony and pains. But all their worship was vain, as is all worship which is not based upon obedience.

Not every one that saith, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but those that do the will of the Father in heaven. To some who have been zealous worshippers after the manner which they conceived to be to the glory of God, and have done great works and taught much people in His name, it will be said at last, "I never knew you; depart from Me, ye that work iniquity." Matt. vii. 22, 23. All work iniquity who do not strictly obey the word of the Lord. Are you seeking to honour God in your own way? Then be admonished by the inspired words of the prophet, "To obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams."

"The Great Reality" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

It is a sad truth, yet in the light of Scripture not a strange one, that the great majority of people in all lands are unable to distinguish, in the objects for which they are seeking, between realities and shadows. This is so because man, in his fallen condition, with his understanding darkened, does not perceive the relation of the spiritual to the real. Spiritual things are to him but fancies and vanity; and leaving the spiritual out of his calculations, he is shut up to that which is elusive and transitory, and incapable of affording the satisfaction for which he longs. There is nothing real that is not made so by its relation to and dependence upon the spiritual.

Jesus Christ is the great reality. This is the fundamental truth which lies at the very beginning of all knowledge of real things. He is the reality of all good things. And He has not withdrawn Himself from men; He will be in our lives, if we will but let Him. Having Him, life is a grand reality; but without Him, we have nothing that is truly real. Without Him, there is nothing that is truly good, or enduring, nothing that can give a permanent peace and satisfaction.

Jesus Christ is not a myth or a fancy, or a figure of speech. Many speak of Him as if He were; many, even of His professed followers can give no proof that He is anything more than this. They convey to the world the impression that the good represented as coming from Him is fancy rather than fact. But this does not alter the truth. No person, act as he may, can make or unmake truth. But he can demonstrate truth; and many have demonstrated the truth of the reality of Christ as the Saviour of men, and the reality of that which He gives to men here in this life. It only remains for each one to take Christ as his Saviour and demonstrate the matter for himself.

Christ is, indeed, the reality of all things real. The word of God declares that all things were made by Him, and that "He is before all things, and by Him all things consist." Col. i. 16, 17. Not only did He create all things, but He upholds all things by the word of His power. Heb. i. 3. So then whatever is real is so because it is upheld or maintained by the word of Christ. Take that word away, and things would disappear back into the original void.

All created things will, therefore, when viewed aright, speak to us of Christ. They are, as it were, a shadow of Him who is the substance, pointing us to Him as the shadow points to that which casts it. In all created things God speaks to man, and reveals Himself to our race. The heavens declare His glory, and the whole earth is full of it. Ps. xix. 1; Isa. vi. 3. The reason men do not see it is because they refuse to see God in His works. They refuse to believe what God has said of His works. They prefer to see with their own eyes, and to put their own interpretation upon things rather than the Lord's.

There is a voice that is continually calling to men, and those who will heed it will know the pathway of peace and happiness, and walk therein. "Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the streets; she crieth in the chief place of concourse, in the openings of the gates; in the city she uttereth her words, saying: How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning? and fools hate knowledge? Turn you at My reproof; behold I will pour out My Spirit unto you, and I will make known my words unto you." Prov. i. 20-23.

This voice is the voice of God; for His voice alone is truly the voice of wisdom. The wisdom of the world is foolishness, and God alone has true wisdom, being Omniscient. 1 Cor. i. 20. It is God's voice that speaks reproof, and says, "Turn you at My reproof." He speaks to those who by their lives show that they are "simple," choosing the chaff rather than the wheat, delighting in "scorning," and hating knowledge; missing the rest and grasping after shadows and delusions;

296

and He invites them to turn from these vanities unto that which is of enduring worth.

Hear what His voice is saying: "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters; he that hath no money, come ye, buy and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labour for that which satisfieth not? hearken diligently unto Me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness." Isa. lv. 1, 2.

What shall we eat? For answer turn to the words of Christ: "I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever; and the bread that I will give is My flesh, which I will give for the life of the world." "Whoso eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day. For My flesh is meat indeed, and My blood is drink indeed." John vi. 51, 54, 55.

The unbelieving Jews, to whom these words were spoken, queried how the Saviour could give them His flesh and blood; but Jesus explained it by saying "The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life." Verse 63.

God spake those words in Christ, for Christ said, "The words that I speak unto you I speak not of Myself; but the Father that dwelleth in Me, He doeth the works." John xiv. 10. Eating His word, they ate the flesh and drank the blood of Christ; for He is the word of God. John i. 1, 14; Rev. xix. 13.

Here, then, is the reality of life,-to live by the word of God. He has given us His word so that all may have it, in the sacred Scriptures. He that will believe, so that He builds upon that word, will show that every word of God has life in it, so that man may not live by bread alone, but "by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." God's word is the primary source of all life, the bread being but the word in visible form. To such a one life will be full of glorious realities, and the invitation is, "Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." Rev. xxii. 17.

"The Church's Duty Is to Provide for the Church" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

In The Church Times we find this statement that "the church's duty is to provide for the church, not for the world." The first thought that might arise in the minds of some would be, "If the church devotes its entire attention to itself, how can the people of the world ever be brought in?" But this question is answered when we remember that in a Church and State combination, the State's portion of the business is to whip the people into the Church, where they can be taken care of. Far different is this from the Spirit of the Master, who gave Himself and His life for the world, and who sent His disciples out into the world, with instructions to shine as lights. The only reason for the existence of the church of Christ on earth, is that its members may labour for the salvation of souls not in the church. A church that is devoted only to itself is as useless as a candle under a bushel.

"The Word Alone" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

The Word Alone.-Even at the Church Association meeting, there was considerable stress laid upon the intention of those who made the Prayer Book. "The Prayer Book, the whole Prayer Book, and nothing but the Prayer Book," was called for. But one speaker spoke with effect against the effort to "whitewash" the Prayer Book, as though Christians, with the word of God in their hands, needed to settle what certain men may or may not have intended when they made a Prayer Book, or drew up certain statements. That is a truth every Christian Churchman ought to see; that every emphasis placed upon preserving the work of uninspired men as though it could not be altered or were binding upon Christian consciences is begging the whole question of the authority of tradition. Ritualism is rampant because it is the natural growth wherever men are allowed to define and set bounds about truth, beyond which the Spirit of the Lord cannot lead their successors.

"The Minimum of Belief" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

The Minimum of Belief.-We learn from a contemporary that some candidates for the ministry are raising the query, "How little is a man compelled to believe?" Very little indeed, if we take the word that comes to us from some teachers. It is quite in keeping with the present discussion of fixed standards, that the minimum of belief should be fixed by those who know just how little religion will ensure entrance into the kingdom. Lovers of the word will agree that the minimum of belief is thus defined, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ." But this is the maximum of belief also; for He is the Truth, and in Him is all the fulness, and all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. The Apostle Paul preached Jesus as the sum of all belief, and he therefore believed "all things which are written in the law and in the prophets." Acts xxiv. 14. Believing in Christ is not believing a little, but believing all truth. The man who thinks he is believing on the Lord, and who yet rejects any word of the Lord, believes nothing. Belief, with a Christian, is not a burden, of which he wants as little as possible; it is an uplifting power which grows stronger as it brings the Lord nearer.

"The Bible God's Word" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

The Bible God's Word.-"God, having of old time spoken unto the fathers in the prophets by divers portions and in divers manners, hath at the end of these days spoken unto us in His Son." Heb. i. 1, 2, R.V. That which God has spoken is most assuredly God's word. The statement here is that God himself spoke in the prophets. Not only so, but we are also told that "God hath spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began." Acts iii. 21. Let no one therefore for a moment believe the statement made by those "higher critics," that the Bible does not claim to be the word of God. It claims to be nothing else than the word of God. Whoever studies the Bible with a fixed assurance that it is the living word of the living God, will not be troubled with "apparent discrepancies."

"Hidden Leaven" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

Hidden Leaven.-"The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened." Matt. xiii. 33. Leaven is not seen, but its influence is felt. Even so it will be with the work of God on earth. "The kingdom of God cometh not with observation." It is not always the work that looks the largest, that accomplishes the most good. No one can know how rapidly the work of God is progressing on earth. Even those who are doing the best work, are unconscious of the greater part of it. The kingdom of glory will be ushered in at a time when even Christ's most faithful followers and workers will think that much remains to be done; because they will not know the influence of their own lives and work, and they cannot know what other hidden agencies God has at work. This should serve to admonish us never to think that the coming of the Lord is far off, since we can see comparatively little done, and to encourage us to be content to work in quietness.

297

Although men may not sound the praise of our work, and even we ourselves may think that it is fruitless, we have the assurance that our Father "seeth in secret."

"Without Christ and with Christ" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

"Without Me, ye can do nothing." John xv. 5.

Cain and Abel were the first two brothers that ever lived upon the earth.

Like all the other brothers who have lived upon the earth, they were of a weak and sinful nature because they partook of the sinful nature of their father Adam.

They were also tempted by Satan, just as brothers and sisters are tempted to-day. But they did not need to yield to Satan then, any more than you need to yield to Satan now, for God had provided a Way of escape. He had given His only Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not be overcome by Satan and perish, but should gain the victory over Satan, and have everlasting life. Then, even as now, the words of the Son were, "Without Me ye can do nothing."

Abel, as we learned last week, believed this with all his heart, and showed his faith by bringing the offering that God had commanded. But Cain did not believe it. He thought that his own way was just as good as God's way, and that he did not need Christ to save him from the power of Satan. He showed his unbelief by not bringing a lamb, as God had commanded.

We see, then, that Abel chose to live with Christ, and Cain chose to get along without Christ, for we are told that Christ dwells only in the heart of the one who has faith in Him. Let us study carefully that we may see which made the better choice.

In the first place, we read that Abel's offering was accepted by the Lord, and Cain's offering was not accepted.

Of course not, for Christ says, "No man cometh to the Father but by Me," for "I am the Way" and "I am the Door." Since Cain would not consent to use the only way and the only door to God, he should not have expected to reach Him, any more than you should expect to reach a garden if you refuse to use the only entrance to it.

Here was an Almighty Friend, then, for Abel, that Cain could not reach because he was without Christ. And was it not a Friend worth having? "If God be for us, who can be against us?"

And when Cain saw that his brother was accepted and he was not, he was very angry with his brother, and drew his face down until it looked just as yours does when you are very angry; and he said sharp, cruel words to his brother.

The Lord talked with him and tried to show him that he would be accepted as quickly as Abel if he would come in the right way. But Cain refused to accept Christ as Saviour, so he had no way of escape from the temptations of Satan.

"And Cain talked with Abel his brother: and came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother and slew him"!

And why did He slay him? Had Abel done anything to harm Cain?

No, he had not so much is said one unkind word, even when Cain had spoken so cruelly to him.

Then why did Cain kill him?

In 1 John iii. 12 we are told that it was "because his own works were evil, and his brother's righteous"! It was because he had yielded to Satan's mind instead of to Christ's mind.

Satan always hates those who have the mind of Christ. And so he puts this same hateful mind into every one who will yield to him. This is why every one who will live godly must suffer persecution.

But remember this: It is better to be dead with Christ than to be alive without Him; for the one who is alive without Him will soon be dead, and the one who is dead with Him will soon be alive.

Look at the one who is alive without Christ, who yields to Satan and allows him to put his own selfish, hateful mind within him-

"Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him;" "He that pursueth evil pursueth it to his own death;" "The Wicked shall perish, and the enemies of the Lord shall be as the fat of lambs; they shall consume; into smoke shall they consume away."

But hear the promises to the one who is dead with Christ:-

"Whosoever shall lose his life for My sake shall find it;" "Blessed are ye when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man's sake. Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in heaven;" "Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life;" "Your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with Him in glory."

Then, never mind, if your brothers or sisters or playmates or friends are angry with you for not joining in their disobedience. Be kind and gentle, and walk bravely on with Christ, and though you suffer now, your reward will be great by and by.

It is not enough for your father or mother or your brother or sister to have Christ; you must have Him for yourself. Abel's having Christ did not save Cain.

1. Have you a brother?

2. Who were the first two brothers that ever lived on the earth?

3. In what way were they like all the other brothers and sisters who have lived on the earth?

4. By whom were they tempted?

5. But did they need to yield to Satan when he tempted them? Why not?

6. Was the "Way" of escape for them alone? 1 Cor. x. 13.

7. To how many has God given it? Heb. ii. 9; John xiv. 6.

8. Then do you need to yield to Satan when he tempts you?

9. What could brothers and sisters do then, and what can they do now, without Christ? John xv. 5.

10. Is there no other way of getting rid of all our sins and of coming back to God? Acts iv. 12.

11. Did Abel believe this?

12. Did Cain?

13. How do you know that Abel had faith in Christ? Gen. iv. 4; Heb. xi. 4.

14. How do you know that Cain did

302

not have faith in Christ? Gen. iv. 3; James ii. 18, 26.

15. In whose heart only does the Lord dwell? Eph. iii. 17.

16. Then whom did Abel choose to have with him?

17. And whom Cain choose to get along without?

18. Which, do you think, made the better choice?

19. What are you asked to do to-day? Josh. xxiv. 15.

20. What was the first difficulty that Cain got into because he was without Christ? Gen. iv. 4, 5.

21. Suppose we should gain the whole world and yet not have God on our side, what would it profit us?

22. Then did not Cain miss something that was well worth having? Rom. viii. 31.

23. How might he have gotten out of this difficulty and been made acceptable in the sight of God, if he had chosen to do so? Gen. iv. 7; 1 John i. 9.

24. What was the next difficulty that Cain got into because he was without Christ? Gen. iv. 5, last part.

25. Does it do any harm to get angry? 1 John iii. 15.

26. Why does it keep one from having eternal life? Because it is yielding to Satan who brings death, instead of to Christ who is our life.

27. How did this mind of Satan, to which he had yielded, lead Cain to look? Gen. iv. 5.

28. How did it cause him to speak?

29. How did it make him act? Gen. iv. 8.

30. What did it cause him to tell, when God asked him where Abel was? Gen. iv. 9.

31. How did it cause him to regard his brother?-"Am I my brother's keeper?"

32. And what did it cause him to become? A wanderer, with no true happiness in this life or hope of any in the life to come. Gen. iv. 11-15; Prov. xi. 19; Ps. xxxvii. 20.

33. Did it pay for Cain to choose Satan?

34. Did Abel get angry, and look cross, and speak harshly, and strike? 1 John iii. 12.

35. Don't you suppose he was tempted to when Cain spoke so cruelly to him?

36. Then why did he not do it?

37. Did it pay for Abel to choose Christ when he was hated, and reproached, and cruelly treated, and killed?

38. What has God, who cannot lie, promised? Matt. xvi. 25; Luke vi. 22, 23; Rev. ii. 10; Col. iii. 3, 4.

39. When will God fulfil these promises to Abel and to all who, like Abel, bravely walk with Christ and suffer with Him? 1 Thess. iv. 13-15; Heb. xi. 39, 40.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

-A great fire has destroyed 300 houses at Tokio.

-A fire in the Mourillon arsenal, Toulon, caused a loss of 2,000,000f.

-Five employees were killed and thirteen injured by a railway accident in Upper Egypt.

-A famous turtle in Ceylon, well-known to be over two centuries old, has just died in Colombo.

-Five of the nine Barcelona anarchists lately on trial have been sentenced to death, and the remainder to hard labour for life.

-The United States Consul at La Libertad has telegraphed to his Government that a revolution has broken out in Western Salvador.

-Labour troubles have occurred at Cleveland (Ohio) and Birmingham (Alabama), U.S.A., as a result of the strikes existing at those places.

-An accident to the landing stage at Ibralia, on the Danube, precipitated a crowd of people into the river, eleven of whom were drowned.

-In twelve months no fewer than 21,889 persons died in India from snake bite, and over half-a-million of snakes were destroyed during that period.

-In view of the defeat of the Government in the recent election in Holland, the whole Ministry have tendered their resignation to the Queen-Regent.

-The season at Monte Carlo is said to have been a very indifferent one. Still the year's profits of the gambling-saloon amounted to ?880,000.

-The "oldest tree in the world" is still growing in California. A section of the trunk recently reached the British Museum, and experts declare that it has existed for 1,330 years.

-Canadian vessels are loading corn at Toledo (Ohio) for direct shipment to Europe. Three million bushels will be exported during the spring, and 5,000,000 bushels of wheat early in the summer

?Advices received at San Francisco from China report a disastrous conflagration in Shanghai, by which 1,500 houses and 2,000 bamboo huts were destroyed, entailing a loss of 4,000,000 dollars.

-A fissure in the Paris aqueduct will it is said deprive the French capital of proper drinking water for several days, obliging the inhabitants to use Seine water with disastrous results to health.

-After further investigation into the nature of the disease prevailing at Lisbon, the doctors have confirmed their first report that it is epidemic cholera morbus of a very mild form, and bids fair speedily to disappear.

-The press censorship in Austria has been modified so that no guarantee need nor be deposited before beginning publication, and upon seizure the publisher can by inquiry learn the cause of the Government's action.

-The visitors to the Zoo last year numbered 662,649, nearly 22,000 more than in the previous year, owing so the sunny weather. The number of animals was 2,522, including 1,400 birds and 356 reptiles. The income was ?26,278, and the expenditure ?25,278.

- A terrible disaster is reported from the Bois du Luc coal mine, near Mons, Belgium. As a cage containing sixteen men was descending into the pit, the cable broke, and the miners wore, precipitated to the bottom. Only three of then, escaped with their lives, the remaining thirteen being killed on the spot.

-An Athens telegram, dated April 29, gives a detailed account of the recent earthquake shocks in Greece. The consequences of the diaster are shown to have been even more serious than was at first reported, and many thousands have been left homeless and destitute. The number of the victims is not stated, but in Locris alone there have been 300 killed and at least as many injured.

-A provisional modus vivendi on the Pamir question which was concluded recently between the Russian Government and Tching Tchang, the Chinese Minister, embodied considerable concessions made by Russia to China, including an engagement on the part of the Russian Government not to let the Russian troops push on to the portion of Pamir territory claimed by China pending the conclusion of a final agreement.

-Considerable uneasiness has been caused at Vienna by the action of King Alexander of Servia, in rescinding the decree of expulsion issued by the ex-Regents and the Government of the kingdom against ex-King Milan and Queen Nathalie. It is confidently expected that further high-handed acts will follow, and that ex-King Milan will be appointed to the command of the army. King Alexander will, it is expected, make an extended tour through Europe.

-May Day demonstrations took place in all the principal Continental countries, although apparently the cessation from work was not so general as in previous years. There were a few minor scuffles in one or two places, but nowhere was there any serious collision between the demonstrators and the police. For the most part the day was devoted to processions and meetings, usually under cover, at some of which resolutions were passed in favour of an eight-hours day and other reforms.

-A disastrous flood has occurred at St. Anne, not far from Quebec, Canada. On April 28 there was a great landslip, and a dam was formed by the debris across the River Noir. In a short time the river overflowed its banks and spread over the adjacent country. Several farm houses were carried away and their occupants drowned. The exact loss of life is not yet known, but it is feared that twenty persons have perished. Hundreds of horses and cattle were overtaken by the flood, and many mills and bridges were destroyed.

-Pope Leo is soon to issue another encyclical, which, it is said, may be taken as in some measure his political testament. Its interest will extend far beyond the bounds of the Catholic Church. In it the Pope will review the chief events of his Pontificate, beginning with the gradual and patient negotiations concerning the "Kulturkampf" in Germany. He will also refer to Irish questions, to his action in the United States, both in reference to the Knights of Labour and to the mission of Mgr. Satolli. Another important passage will be devoted to the approbation given to the French Republic and to his pastoral guidance of French Catholics. A hope for religious peace and the growing prosperity of the nations will conclude the document, which is expected to be a triumph of the Latinity of Joachim Pecci, but will, of course, be simultaneously translated into all languages.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

The Catholic Times says of the Disestablishment Bill: "All things considered, the State is making a fair offer to the Church. It is doubtful if the Churchmen can obtain such terms, say in ten years more, when the power of the Democracy increases, and Radicalism is in the ascendant."

Following are the main provisions of the Welsh Disestablishment Bill: The church is to cease to be established on Jan. 1, 1896. At that time all patronage rights will cease, all ecclesiastical corporations will be dissolved, the ecclesiastical courts will no longer have jurisdiction, and ecclesiastical law, as law, will be abolished. Clergymen appointed in the meantime will have no vested interests. The Welsh bishops will lose their seats in the House of Lords, but English bishops now excluded are to take their places. Every one holding a freehold office in the church, is to retain that office, and to receive his present emoluments, on condition that he discharges his present duties. If he prefers to return, he may do so on a pension. The clergy are to retain their parsonages, and the church buildings, except cathedrals, are to be kept by the church. The local authorities are to have control of the churchyards, and the county councils are to control the tithe.

We read a statement recently about "the human character of our Lord Jesus Christ." That was a grave error. Christ took human nature but not human character. His whole life on earth was for the purpose of showing how the character of God may be manifested in the midst of human weakness. He was in all things "made like unto His brethren," yet He "knew no sin." "Tempted in all points like is we are, yet without sin." Thus He is able to succour them that are tempted, and to bring them to God.

In view of the Welsh Disestablishment Bill now before Parliament, an appeal for ?20,000 to be used in the campaign against it has been issued by the Church Defence Institution. The Archbishop of Canterbury commends the subject of this appeal to the Church of England, as "the greatest issue that has been before it since its planting." The Duke of Westminster has also called for ?25,000 to be used exclusively in Wales. It does not seem to occur to these people that the same voluntary effort by which they carry on the Church's political campaigns, would do the spiritual work for which alone it has any reason for existence.

It should be kept in mind that the controversy in the London School Board is not as to whether or not the Bible shall be taught in the Board Schools. The Bible is not now taught in the Board Schools, probably never had been taught, and it is very certain that those who are so zealous that their ideas of the Christian religion should be drilled into the children, do not desire that the Bible itself shall ever be taught in them. As another sample of the kind of teaching that does pass muster, we have the statement recently made by a teacher, that John the Baptist went about sprinkling people! Everyone who reads the Bible knows that it does not say so, and that it does not intimate anything of the kind. If the Bible were really taught, there would be such a change as none of the School Board ever contemplated.

At a vast meeting of the Catholic Social Union, recently held in St. James's Hall, and presided over by Cardinal Vaughan, the chief speaker of the evening, "Father" Bernard Vaughan, said: "More souls have been received into the bosom of the Church throughout England in the year gone by, than in any other year since the so-called Reformation."

"How to Understand" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

How to Understand.-There is only one way to understand the truths of Christianity, and that is by faith. "Through faith we understand." Heb. xi. 3. It is common to hear individuals say, "I understand" (thus and so), putting some construction upon the word of God; but no knowledge of truth can ever be gained in this way. It is not the human understanding that is to cast light upon the word, but the word that is to enlighten the understanding.

"Not by the Sword" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

Not by the Sword.-In reply to those who, strange to say, talk as though the interests of the Gospel and the progress of Christianity demands a war now and then with uncivilised peoples, the Bishop of Mashonaland says:-

I absolutely repudiate any sympathy with those who speak of Christianity or missions being aided by fighting. Whatever was the political reason for the war is no business of mine, but I intensely dislike the theory that the success of missions or the spread of Christianity can be assisted by the sword.

The "sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God," is the only weapon the Christian can use in the warfare of the faith.

"The Ritualistic Tide" The Present Truth 10, 19.

E. J. Waggoner

The Ritualistic Tide.-It is flowing fast and furiously according to the address of the Chairman of the Church Association, which represents the Protestant wing of the Church of England. Not a sign of encouragement, it was stated, could be seen in ecclesiastical affairs, and all the speakers at the annual meeting, held the other day, agreed that the Ritualists were having their own way and waxing worse and worse. Only two bishops in the whole of England were considered Protestant, and few bishops, it was declared, keep up even an appearance of fairness in their administrations. None too soon has the Association decided that it is useless to appeal further to law, and determined on a new departure, as one speaker put it, namely, to evangelise the masses, and appeal to the religious conviction of the people of England. That is the only thing to do for any church, and only as the Gospel is received in the hearts of believers can Romanism be shut out. The effort to "defend the faith" in any other way than by the preaching of the word-with no admixture of tradition-is but playing into the hands of the enemy of truth.

May 17, 1894

"Jesus and the Storm" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

Jesus and His disciples were on the Sea of Galilee, when so furious a storm arose that their boat was almost swallowed up by the waves. The tempest raged, and the waves tossed the little craft, and the disciples were helpless with terror; but Jesus was "in the hinder part of the ship asleep on a pillow." Mark iv. 37, 38.

At last the disciples came to Jesus, and awoke Him, saying, "Master, Master, we perish." Luke viii. 24. Some even said reproachfully, "Master, carest Thou not that we perish?" Mark iv. 38. It seemed to them, in their blind fear, that Jesus was almost selfishly indifferent about them. They felt that they had been neglected.

The Master never turned away from a cry of distress, and He at once arose, saying to them as He did so, "Why are ye so fearful?" Then He rebuked the raging winds and the boisterous waves, saying, "Peace, be still." And immediately there was a great calm.

What a wealth of instruction there is for us in this short narrative of facts! Note first the power of Jesus over the elements. His word had brought them into existence. Ps. xxxiii. 6; John i. 1-3. By His word their existence was maintained. Col. i. 13-17; Heb. i. 1-3. And the same word could control their fierceness. He rebuked the winds and waves, just as a mother rebukes her children when they become too boisterous in their play. The words, "Peace, be still," are identical with, "Hush, be quiet." It was but a trifling thing to Him. But it was a mighty act, nevertheless, and the ease with which He did it, shows His greatness. No wonder the disciples wondered, and said, "What manner of Man is this! for He commandeth even the winds and the water, and they obey Him."

"Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever." Heb. xiii. 8. His message to us is, "All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth;" and, "Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." Matt. xxviii. 18, 20. We may know, therefore, that He is as actually with us in all times of need, as He was with the disciples in the boat on the Sea of Galilee, and that His power to protect and deliver is the same now as then.

This being the case, what calm confidence we may have. In the height of the storm He said to the disciples, "Why are ye fearful?" There was no cause for fear as long as He was with them. He hath said to us, "I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my Helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me." Heb. xiii. 5, 6. He speaks peace, and He is Lord of all (Acts x. 36); if we listen to His word, it will give us peace, no matter what our trouble may be.

The boat could not go down with the disciples without taking Jesus down too. But it is impossible for us to conceive of His being swallowed up by the sea which He Himself had made. So instead of saying that He was in the same danger that they were, we should rather say that they were as safe as He was. They could not go down while in the same boat with Jesus; so none of us can perish while we have His presence with us.

He slept in the midst of the storm. It was not the sleep of indifference, but of confidence. That sleep is not recorded for our curiosity, but for our learning. If the disciples had really known the power and love of their Lord, they would have been as calm as He. There was no reason why they should not be, as He Himself implied by His words, "Why are ye fearful?" From this calmness of Christ, therefore, we are to learn how calmly we are to trust in all times of danger, knowing that He is with us. "Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him." Ps. xxxvii. 6. "In quietness and confidence shall be your strength." Isa. xxx. 15.

"The Gospel to the Poor" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

"To the poor the Gospel is preached," were the words which Jesus sent to John, to convince him that He was indeed the Christ. He was anointed with the Holy Spirit for the express purpose of preaching the Gospel to the poor. Luke iv. 18. But in these days it is thought that the poor need something else. Professed ministers of the Gospel are devoting much of their time to discussing "the living wage," and to devising legislation whereby the condition of the poor may be bettered. "Well," says one, "do you not sympathise with work for the poor?" Most certainly; but we are convinced Christ knew and practised the best way. No man can improve on His method. The object which "labour reformers" have in view is very often all right, but the method which they employ for the accomplishment of that object is more often all wrong. It

306

does not seem as though the preaching of the Gospel would help the poor; but it will. They have never been permanently helped by any other means. All the propositions for bettering their condition by means of the State, have been tried many times, and have failed. Rome tried it, and instead of diminishing poverty, increased it. The Gospel of Christ, which is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth, is the only hope of the poor.

This does not mean that the starving are to be fed with a sermon, nor the naked clothed with religious tracts. The Gospel is not in word only, but in power. "Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world." James i. 27. He who does not sympathise with the poor and needy, and help them to the utmost of his ability, does not know the Gospel of God. Christ "went about doing good;" He did the good Himself, and they who know Him will do likewise. But personal help seems too slow a way; one man can do so little, and the dismal results are so small, that men seek to do the work by wholesale. Just as personal labour with sinners seemed so slow a way of saving them, that people seek to accomplish the result in a mass, by means of general law. But it will not do. That help which does not come from and as a result of the preaching of the word, will be like salt thrown into the ocean.

"The Preparation of the Gospel" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

The Preparation of the Gospel.-It is supposed by some that commercial enterprise is the handmaid of the Gospel, opening up heathen countries and preparing the way for the missionary. Nothing could be further from the truth. The pioneer is the missionary, and the field needs no preparation before him. He carries the "preparation of the Gospel of peace." It would be well to remember that there is no preparation for the Gospel, either at home or abroad, it is the power to save and lift up the lowest, and the only power to save to the uttermost. The commercial spirit has been the curse of missions. The cannibals of many of the islands of the new Hebrides have turned from their former ways unto the Lord, but now that the white man dares to set his foot in the group he is demoralising the natives. Dr. Patton, who went over there thirty years ago, and has seen the change accomplished by the Gospel, said last week that "the great drawback and curse to the whole work was that no sooner were the islands civilised, or partially civilised, than the white men, who before had avoided the islands, brought brandy and opium and demoralised the natives." The real influence of what is falsely called "our Christian civilisation" is a curse to-day to the ignorant and weak. It is not our civilisation, but the Gospel which civilisation talks about but does not obey, that can do good to the nations that sit in darkness.

"A Spectacle unto Angels" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

The believer who first of all counts the costs, and decides that the Christian life is worth the price, need not be troubled at every new step by thoughts of what the world will say, or what friends will think. If he follows the Lord, yielding to His word, he will assuredly be called peculiar by the world; but Christ gave Himself for us that He might purify unto Himself a "peculiar" people. The person who is unable to bear the reproach of unlikeness to the world, really shrinks from bearing the glory of the likeness unto Christ.

The seriousness of the Christian life will overcome this thought of what people may say, if the follower of the Lord will constantly remember it. That actor playing on the stage to amuse the audience, or the man engaged in any exercise for money or applause, very naturally thinks of the approval of the spectators. But one having the very life at stake has no thought for his surroundings. Then with more than this life at stake, with eternal life as the thing to be laid hold upon, who that thinks soberly of the issue can let the opinions of the world, and the fear of man's disapproval or contempt, weigh for a moment in deciding to follow that which the Lord declares to be truth?

It is true that the Christian is a spectacle to the world, but it is encouraging to remember that we are also a spectacle to angels. 1 Cor. iv. 9. Let that soul that hesitates in deciding for the Lord because of the words or taunts of men, think of the heavenly spectators rather than the earthly. The approval of heaven is to be weighed against the applause of the world.

The Christian life is a wonderful stage. The Lord is working out through simple men the mystery of His Gospel, and by the power of that Gospel enfeebled, fallen beings, and fallen angels are learning more and more of the mystery of God. The Gospel is proclaimed "to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in the heavenly places might be made known through the church the manifold wisdom of God." Eph. iii. 10. The church of Jesus Christ, and every follower of Jesus, is to be a revelation to the angels of the power of redeeming grace. No wonder, then, that, the apostle should say, "I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called." Eph. iv. 1.

It is a tremendously responsible calling to stand forth as an object lesson, in this life's span of ours, to show to principalities and powers the glory of the Lord, who hath called us out of darkness for this end. One who lives in the conscientiousness of this will not ask what the world will think, but only what God says. In Christ's day the great majority, even of those who professed the service of God, "loved the praise of men more than the praise of God." Every believer who finds the light that is sown in the word for the righteous will continually have to choose between between these two; but what are the praises of men to the praise of God? Forget the presence of men in the sacredness of God's presence, and instead of acting for the pleasure of men, think of the host of angels that excel in strength and power, who yet are watching these lives of ours to see the operation of the Gospel. Oh, it is a wicked thing to be ashamed of God, and deny His power because the path He points out leads us out of the broad way along which men delight to go.

"Untrustworthy Armour" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

Untrustworthy Armour.-When David offered to go out to fight Goliath, Saul clothed him with his own armour. He had a helmet of brass, and a coat of mail, just as the giant had. None of the men of Saul's army supposed that Goliath could be destroyed except with weapons like his own, and that was their mistake. If David had gone in Saul's armour, he would have been defeated; for the giant was more expert with such weapons than any of the men of Israel. If David had depended on Saul's sword, he would have been obliged to come into close contact with the giant, whose armour was much more powerful. So David went forth with only a sling and a few smooth stones. It seemed a foolhardy

307

thing to do, and the giant derided him; but he gained the victory, because he went in the strength of the Lord. Let this be a lesson for all who have to meet the unconverted, the boasters, and the blasphemers. Do not think that you can conquer the world with worldly weapons. Do not spend time learning worldly tactics. "Put on the whole armour of God." We do not need to study error, when the only thing which can successfully meet it is truth.

"The Nature of Sin" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

The Nature of Sin.-The nature of sin can be correctly judged only in the light of Calvary. The Son of the infinite God expiring in agony upon the cross, the darkened sun, the quaking earth,-these and all the dreadful tokens of that day proclaimed the nature of sin. All these came as the result of sin, and one sin alone would have made them necessary, since but a single sin would have brought death to the Son of God, if the sinner was to be redeemed. Every sin that a person commits is an act fraught with the fearful realities of that dark day in the history of old Jerusalem,-realities that must be met and experienced by the impenitent at the day of Judgment.

"Taking the Name in Vain" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

Taking the Name in Vain.-Men are naturally religious, and so, just as the ancient pagan appealed constantly to the gods, it is very common for men who do not yield themselves to God, men of the world, to appeal to the Lord of all to emphasise their pleas. For instance, at a recent meeting of the liquor trade to protest against the increased tax on beer and spirits, the chairman closed with the words, "You must close your ranks and stand with a united and bold front, and I say, May God defend the right." He was undoubtedly as sincere in his sentiment as those who justify war and bloodshed undertaken for commercial or mercenary bands by appeals to God and the right. It is a sentiment, merely, just as the Italian or Mexican bandit asks the Virgin Mary to favour him in his plans, the glib way in which politicians very frequently quote or misquote Scripture, to point a joke or strengthen a partisan thrust, is another manifestation of the spirit which prevails so largely to cheapen the word of God. The religious teacher who, to escape obligation to obey truth and duty, devotes his ingenuity to the effort to show that the Lord does not mean what He says, is also taking the name of the Lord in vain; for the Lord has set the seal of His name to His word. He says He has exalted His word above all His name. We are not, therefore, to use that word as a creature of our own, to turn and manipulate it to our own ends. The gods of the heathen are creatures of men, but our God is the Creator and we the creatures. He speaks to tell us His ways, and not that we may use His word to justify our ways. Such use is vain, and when men do that they take the name of the Lord in vain. The coarse blasphemer is not always the one who most frequently breaks the third commandment.

"'The End of the Law'" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

Upon no point of Christian faith is it possible for men to err more seriously than in that which defines the relation of mankind to the law of God. That holy law, spoken from Mount Sinai amid scenes of the most awful and solemn grandeur, and sacredly guarded for long ages in the ark of the testament that was kept in the "most holy place" of the sanctuary where God dwelt among His people, would seem by the circumstances of its history to have been made for ever safe from the suspicion of faultiness or of secondary importance in the purposes of God toward men. Yet we find men professing the Christian faith who seriously hold and advocate the view that that law has been abolished, and that consequently its claims are no longer binding upon mankind!

For this view they profess to find Scriptural warrant. They read that we "are not under the law, but under grace," and that "Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth" (Rom. vi. 14; 10:4), and from these and some similar texts draw the inference that the law of ten commandments is no longer the standard of righteous living. But we are cautioned by Peter that in the writings of Paul are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unstable and unlearned wrest to their own destruction. 2 Peter iii. 16. When men draw inferences from certain scriptures which other scriptures clearly will not warrant, and then wrest the latter to endeavour to make them harmonise with their views, they place themselves in the class of which Peter speaks, and set their feet in a path which leads to certain destruction. The only safe way is to interpret one scripture in the light of others; for all scripture is harmonious.

There is no scripture which says that the law of ten commandments has been abolished, or any which warrants such an inference; while there are scriptures which plainly state the contrary. But let us examine for a moment the statement that "Christ is the end of the law for righteousness;" since an understanding of this text will make clear the import of all texts from which any inference of the abolition of the law can be drawn.

Turning to the eighth chapter of Romans, we find that there was something which the law "could not do," in that it was "weak through the flesh" (verse 3); and that what the law could not do, God, by the sacrifice of His Son, did do. The law, by reason of man's fall, became unable to fulfil the purpose of God toward man, and that purpose was fulfilled by a crucified and risen Saviour. But this fact did nothing to change the law. It was no less perfect after man fell than it was before. The change was not in the law, but in the man.

The purpose of the law was life. The commandment "was ordained to life." Rom. vii. 10. It testified that the man who kept it was righteous, and therefore entitled to life; for death comes only by sin. Rom. v. 12. But when a man sins, it can no longer testify to his righteousness, but instead, by it is the knowledge of sin. Rom. iii. 20. It then calls for death to him, instead of for life, as the apostle says, "The commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death." Consequently, if man is still to live, a new means must be provided by which the right to life may be given him. If the law could make a sinner righteous, it could give him life, for the just reward of righteousness is life. But this the law could not do; this was not its purpose; and we are told by the apostle that "if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should be been by the law." Gal. iii. 21. Death comes by sin, and life by righteousness, and that which can give life, can give righteousness. The law testified to man's righteousness while he retained his innocence, and prohibited death from touching him; but when man fell, by transgression, the law could no longer do this, having become "weak through the flesh"-the carnal nature, which is not subject to the law of God, and merits only death.

308

Man had lost life, and what he wanted was to gain it again. This the law could not give him, and therefore it must be provided in some other way, if at all. And it was provided by the death and resurrection of the Son of God; so that now, "He that hath the Son of God hath life." 1 John v. 12. And Christ being the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world," the provisions of His sacrifice have extended to all men since Adam fell. In all ages it has been true that "he that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life."

Christ therefore being "the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth," is not an abolisher of the law, but the means by which life,-the ordained purpose of the law-is still retained to men. By putting on Christ, man attains to His righteousness, that being imputed to him through faith; and that righteousness is the righteousness of the law, for "now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe." Rom. iii. 21, 22. So without the deeds of the law men are justified, or made righteous, and the law witnesses to that righteousness, showing that it is the righteousness of the law. And men thus made righteous, they are entitled to life; and thus the purpose of God toward men is fulfilled.

This appears also from the language of Christ in the fortieth Psalm, which is prophetic of His first advent to earth: "Sacrifice and offering Thou didst not desire; Mine ears hast Thou opened; burnt offering and sin offering hast Thou not required. Then said I, Lo, I come; in the volume of the book it is written of Me, I delight to do Thy will, O My God; yea, Thy law is within My heart." Verses 6-8. The life of Christ was the perfect keeping of His Father's law. His righteousness was therefore the righteousness of that law; and this righteousness being imputed unto us, by putting on Christ, we attain that righteousness without the deeds of the law, for by the deeds of the law we could not attain it. But do we then disregard the law? By no means; for it is only through Christ living in us His life of perfect obedience to the law, that we are justified. And the law stands now, as it did before man fell, a witness to the righteousness of the Christian, and to his right to eternal life.

"Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid; yea, we establish the law." Rom. iii. 31.

"Civilisation and Evangelisation" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

Even many Christian people seem possessed with the idea that "civilisation" prepares the way for the introduction of the Gospel among native races. In the meeting of the Baptist Missionary Society, the Rev. R. Darby, of the Congo Mission, gave a little idea of the way "civilisation" prepares the way for the Gospel. He said:-

I went out by a steamer that traded along the coast and stopped at various ports, and the cargo we landed at every port was in green cases-gin-old flint-lock muskets, the barrels looking as if they were old, defunct gas-pipes, and barrels of gunpowder, half of it dirt. These are the civilising agencies. I came down to the coast about nine months ago to see my wife off, and we brought with us a boy from the interior who had never in his neighbourhood been able to buy any European liquor. He had never tasted it; but one day he came to me and said, "Please, sir, we have had no fish to eat for two days." I said to him, "I am very sorry, my boy," and gave him two francs to buy some fish at the trading-house or in the market-place. He went, and soon came back, and said, "This money is no good." "Indeed," I said; "that is the money which the Government have made for us to buy goods with." "Oh," he said, "I can't buy nothing in the market-place unless I have got gin." And that poor boy had to take the two francs, go to the trading-house with them, buy gin, and take the gin on to the market-place to buy the fish with.

The Gospel is the power of God unto salvation, and it is dishonouring to God to suppose that it depends in any degree upon the power of man. "Civilisation" without the Gospel is nothing but polished heathenism. It is not civilisation that unenlightened heathens need, but evangelisation. With evangelisation, every needful thing will come.

"What Does It?" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

What Does It?-That veteran missionary, Dr. John G. Paton, the apostle of the New Hebrides, is visiting London, and has been an inspiration on missionary platforms, as he has told of what the Lord has done in the islands. It is worth remarking that missionaries who have been spending their lives among savage races, and have seen the power of the Gospel changing savages into Christians, and introducing a "civilsation" which makes the islands more peaceful and honest than our home cities or towns, are not the men who discuss higher criticism, and minimise the authority of portions of the word. When Dr. Paton tells of the changes he has witnessed, he says it is all due simply to the reading of the word. This is the testimony from every place where the power of the Lord is allowed to operate. We need not go to distant fields, either, to learn the power of the word to change the life and give actual strength. The trouble is, that so many at home who read the word do not believe it, or do not think the Lord means what He says. Putting their own, or some man's interpretation upon it, it becomes only the word of men, and then they find no life in it, and must search for "Christian evidences" to prove that the word is true. And thus they are troubled over the findings of worldly science and the work of the critics. The man who believes the Bible never has to look outside of his own life for evidences of its authority. The reason why the change that comes over some of these heathen and savage communities is so marked, is that the people are just simple and childlike enough to believe the word.

"Resisting unto Blood" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

At one of the May meetings no little time was spent in apologising for members of churches who found it impossible to do as they believed they ought, because of the demands of their business. Much sympathy is assuredly due those who allow the affairs of this life to interfere with their duty to God; but, for the honour of the Gospel, let no minister of Christ talk as though it is too great a hardship or sacrifice for men to serve the Lord. The preaching the world needs is that of Christian manliness and trust in God; in fact, the preaching of the Gospel. There is too much stress laid on the idea that the way must be made easy in order to enable men to walk in it. So there must be legislation of all kinds, it is sometimes said, to make it possible for men to be Christians. Christian manliness and courage are not manufactured in this way.

Dr. Mclaren, of Manchester, sounded an encouraging note a few days ago in a sermon on the text, "Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin." He said:-

I remember an old church, on the slopes of one of the hills of Rome, which is covered over on all its interior walls with a set of the most gruesome pictures of the martyrs. There may be an unwholesome admiration and adoration of these. I think modern Christianity, in its complacency with itself, and this marvellous nineteenth century, of which we are so proud, would be all the better if it went back sometimes to remember that there were times when "young men and maidens, and old men and children," had to resist to blood; and when they went to their deaths as joyfully as a bride to the altar.

Ah, brethren, you Nonconformists in this generation,

309

who have an easy-going religion, do not always remember how it was won. Think of George Fox and the Friends. Think of the early Nonconformists, hunted and harried, their noses slit and ears cropped off, their pillories and exile. And then be ashamed to talk about the difficulties that you have to meet. "Ye have not yet resisted unto blood."

The world has become partially Christianised, and the principles of Christianity have, in a certain imperfect way, infiltrated themselves through the mass, so that the antagonism is not quite as not as it once was. And the church has dropped its testimony and largely adopted the maxims of the world. So why should the world persecute a church which is only a bit of the world under another name? But let any man for himself honestly try to live a life modelled on Christ's maxims, . . . and he will see whether the old antagonism is not there yet. What a chorus of select epithets will immediately be discharged.

"Man's Authority" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

Man's Authority.-In an address on obedience to authority Mr. Croke Robinson, a London priest, said to his audience, "Wives obey your husbands, and husbands make your wives obey. Let it be done kindly but firmly." No doubt he meant all right, but a priest could not be expected to know very much about the exercise of the husband's authority. The end he has in view is not to be gained if attempted as bluntly as he puts it in his address. It makes all the difference in the world how the authority is asserted. The Apostle Paul gives the counsel in much better form, saying, "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord. Husbands love your wives, and be not bitter against them." Too many men read their commission about as the priest put it-"make your wives obey"-and become petty tyrants over the home, rather than husbands, or "housebands," as the word signifies.

"A Frank Admission" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

A Frank Admission.-Here is what one religious paper says about the observance of Sunday:-

We do not observe the first day of the week as a day of thankful rest, as in any way observing the fourth commandment of the Jewish law, but because it is a good and proper thing to do. If it is of Roman Catholic origin, as we believe it is, i.e., in its establishment as a day of rest, we are not so bigoted as to deny that that Church did us and the world thereby a good service.

That is frank, at any rate. When professed Protestants will come out and acknowledge that they have no reason for keeping Sunday, except the authority of Roman Catholicism, the issue will be very clearly defined. The question will then be resolved into this: "Shall we obey the Lord, or the Papacy?" It might be asked how it is known that to observe Sunday is "a good and proper thing to do," and also how it can be made to appear that the Roman Catholic Church did the world a good service in establishing Sunday as a day of rest, instead of the Sabbath of the Lord; but that would be useless, since those who accept the authority of the Roman Catholic Church are not supposed to know any reason beyond the authority of the Pope.

"Your Dwelling" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

Not the least important problem pertaining to this temporal life is that of a suitable place of abode. An individual's health and comfort depend very largely upon his surroundings. Frequently it is worth all but life itself to a person to be able to change his location for one affording greater security against internal or external foes. Rich men have spent fortunes in the search for an earthly paradise where nature would afford them in some shape a tree of life or fountain of perpetual youth, but they have not found it. There never was but one such paradise on the earth, and that was removed before the flood, and is now by the throne of God in heaven. Wherever men live on earth, they encounter essentially the same evils and succumb in the same manner when the allotted span of life is run. Many places on this earth are uninhabitable, or liable suddenly to become so, and even the most desirable places of abode are menaced by many foes of life and health and happiness.

Paradise was once the home of man. It is the place in which God intended man to live, free from care and pain and sorrow, and beyond the reach of death. It is not the Creator's fault that man is not living there now. But when man became a sinner, it became necessary that he should be excluded from paradise, lest he should put forth his hand to the tree of life, and eat and live forever. Gen. iii. 22. An immortal sinner would be an eternal stain upon God's universe. Nevertheless He, in His love and mercy, has not left man to dwell by himself in the dreary abode of sin. Man has been exiled from his Eden home, but God has gone with him into the place of exile. Because man could not stay in the place of holiness, God consented to dwell in the place of sin, that men might not be separated from Him. And so we read that He is "not far from every one of us, for in Him we live, and move, and have our being." Acts xvii. 27, 28.

And this is not all; for while He dwells thus in the midst of sinners, who know Him not, He has provided a special dwelling place for those who love and obey Him. The Psalmist mentions this. "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High, shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty." Ps. xci. 1. And through Isaiah also God has said: "I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit." Isa. lvii. 15.

An earthly potentate will sometimes open to the public some of the apartments of his dwelling for a very brief inspection; but the King of heaven has opened to sinful mortals His holy and secret place, His private apartments, as it were, for them to dwell in! Such is the condescension and love of the eternal Father. His "secret place" is the most holy apartment of His sanctuary in Heaven, into which we have access by the blood of Jesus. Heb. x. 19. Dwelling there, we abide under the shadow of the Almighty, away from the attack of every possible foe.

There is no more desirable dwelling place in the universe than this; and you may make it your abode as soon as you will. The choice is yours; the transfer is attended to by God. Do you say, This is only imagination,-a mere spiritual picture, without any practical value? Not at all; it is real, for all spiritual things are real. Only spiritual things will endure for ever, and the things which are so real to our natural senses, will soon pass away. Nor will it be long until the intensely real and practical character of this privilege of dwelling with God will be made manifest. For we are living now in the last days, and the power of God's judgment (Rev. xiv. 7), when the prophetic exhortation is given, "Come My people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut the doors about thee; hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast. For behold, the Lord cometh out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity; the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain." Isa. xxvi. 20, 21.

How differently this terrible event will affect the righteous and the wicked may be seen from the Psalmist's words. "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. . . . He shall cover thee with His feathers, and under His wings shalt thou trust; His truth shall be thy shield and buckler. Thou shalt not be afraid for the

310

terror by night, nor for the arrow that flieth by day; nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness, nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday. A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee. Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked. Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the Most High, thy habitation, there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling. For He shall give His angels charge over thee, to keep thee and all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone." Ps. xci. 1-12. When the seven last plagues, to which reference is here made, are poured out upon the earth, men will not despise the invitation now given to hide under the shadow of the Almighty; but all who would be hidden then must accept the invitation now.

In view of these things, the desire of our hearts may well find expression in these other words of the Psalmist: "One thing have I desired of the Lord; that I will seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in His temple. For in the time of trouble He shall hide me in His pavilion; in the secret of His tabernacle shall He hide me; He shall set me up upon a rock." Ps. xxvii. 4, 5.

Do you inquire the way to enter into the temple of the Lord? The answer is, "I am the way, . . no man cometh unto the Father but by Me." John xiv. 6. "Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which He hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, His flesh; and having an High Priest over the house of God; let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; for He is faithful that promised; and let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works; not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another; and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching." Heb. x. 19-25. This will be the occupation of those who dwell in the secret place of the Most High, and will be hid from trouble in the day of God.

"God Not an Enemy" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

God Not an Enemy.-No greater mistake could be made by any man than to think of God as his enemy. God is not the enemy of man, the creature of His hands. He is not the enemy of any of His creatures, not even the hardest sinner. But He is the enemy of sin and death; and sin and death are man's enemies. These God hates; but man, the sinner, He loves. "While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." God is the great Friend to whom, in our struggle against sin, we may confidently look for help. The attitude of God toward the sinner is not that of stern Justice with uplifted sword ready to strike, but of Mercy with mighty arm outstretched to help.

"Missing the Point" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

The English Churchman of May 3, takes strong ground in regard to the Welsh Disestablishment Bill. While regarding that Bill as in reality a Bill for the establishment of

311

the Church of England, it has no enthusiasm for Church defence, although it holds that an establishment is scriptural. Here is its statement of the position which it takes:-

"Believing that the principle of the establishment is scriptural, and that the Church is thoroughly sound in respect of her standards of doctrine and ritual, our sympathies are necessarily with her defenders, whether we regard the question in its political or its ecclesiastical aspects; and a few years ago we should have pressed forward with an ardent desire to render substantial service in their ranks. But we cannot ignore the fact, that, in utter disregard of the Protestant character stamped upon the Church of England at the Reformation, the bishops, with very few exceptions, and a growing section of the clergy, are actively engaged in promoting an unscriptural sacerdotalism, claiming for themselves an authority which the word of God does not sanction, and imposing on the laity, for doctrines of the Gospel, the commandments of men.

"The tendency to play with 'the trinkets of Rome' is not confined to Ritualistic curates. We observe with much pain, evidence on every side that members of the clergy seem to have lost their belief in the power of God to add to the Church such as shall be saved, and to keep in the Church those in whose hearts He begins the work of faith. And, sad to say, the clergy are encouraged in this mistaken practice by the bishops and Convocation assembled.

"The report of their Lordships' proceedings on Wednesday and last week states that the Bishop of Lichfield moved a 'special resolution,' which was unanimously adopted, inviting the attention of the clergy to the opportunity afforded by Act of Parliament, and especially by the Local Government Act of 1894, for the provision of such permanent counteracting agencies to the social attractions of the public-house, as free libraries, reading-rooms, recreation-grounds, allotments, parish halls, and the like.

"The Gospel ought to be the 'counteracting agency.' It is God's remedy for the recovery of fallen man. If the preaching of the clergy proved ineffectual as a counteracting agency, it is most desirable that the bishops should inquire into a cause. We are very confident that the failure is not in the Gospel: but it is by no means impossible that the clergy are preaching 'another Gospel,' or, as the Revised Version renders the passage, 'a different Gospel, which is not another;' a Gospel very different, indeed, from that which the apostles preached.

"This state of things damps the ardour of would-be Church defenders. We ask ourselves what is it that we are called upon to defend? and that answer is 'A Church in which a large section of the clergy is in open revolt against her standards of doctrine, and is encouraged therein by the bishops.' . . .

"We cannot avoid looking upon the present attack on the status of the Church as a judgment, or a warning of judgment, upon an unfaithful witness, upon a Church that 'suffereth'-note the expression-that is particeps criminis because she 'suffereth that woman Jezebel to teach and to seduce the people to commit [spiritual] fornication;' and we are confident that we give expression to the sentiments of multitudes of Churchmen, who are thoroughly dissatisfied with the present aspect of affairs, when we say that, if the Church of England once become identified, in respect of her standards of doctrine and of her lawful ritual, with sacerdotalism, we shall feel our efforts for her defence utterly paralysed. To work for reform in the hope that by the mercy of God the bishops and clergy may retrace their steps, is one thing; to defend an institution whose rulers persistently revel in the catholicity of error is difficult."

It is encouraging to know that there are many men in the Church who protest against Pagan Romanism labeled Christianity; but it is a sore fact that they do not recognise the cause of it. They cling to the idea of a State Church, not realising that it is the secret of the corruption against which they protest; that it is the fornication, of which the practices which they condemn are only the fruit. Wycliffe and Tyndale did indeed put the stamp of Protestantism upon the Church in England, in that they led it to the Bible; but the stamp of Romanism never departed from the Church of England, in that it never cast off its unlawful union with the State. The fact, however, that the practices of Rome are detested by many, must lead some of them, at least, to protest against Rome's principles.

"The Book for You" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

Are you thinking of getting a new book, or of asking your father or mother to get one for you?

Wait a moment until I whisper something in your ear: The best book in this world for you is the one that Timothy had when he was a boy.

"And what was that?" you say.

In 2 Tim. iii. 15 we are told that the name of it was "The Holy Scriptures."

"What! do you mean the Bible?"

Yes.

"Oh," I imagine I hear you say, "that is too dull and uninteresting."

Ah, you would never say that if you knew what was in it.

You have doubtless thought some friend dull and uninteresting until you got acquainted with him, and now perhaps you find him the best and most interesting friend that you have.

That is the way it is with the Bible. You are unacquainted with it, and it therefore seems dull and uninteresting. But have patience, and spend time to get thoroughly acquainted with it, and you will find it not only the most interesting book in the whole world, but also the most helpful.

In the first place, it is written to you. And it always pays to read a letter very carefully that is written to you. If it came from the Queen to you, you would read every word of it again and again, no matter how uninteresting it might seem at first.

It is from the King of kings, therefore it should receive special and immediate attention, and the utmost reverence. It must be something very important to you, or He would never have taken the trouble to send it to you.

He says that it is able to make you "wise unto salvation;" to thoroughly furnish you "unto all good works;" to make you "understand righteousness, and judgment, and equity; yea, every good path"; "to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified."

A book that can tell you just how to be saved, and can make you understand every good path, and furnish you with every good work, and give you a home on the new earth,-is not that a book worth having, and worth studying? Where is there another book that can do that much for you?

No wonder that Timothy listened to it so reverently and studied it so carefully. And no wonder that he became a great and good man filled with "unfeigned faith," and was "faithful in the Lord," and worked "the work of the Lord" all his life.

If you would learn how to walk with God and be saved, get the Book that Timothy had, and study it and obey it as He did.

"Walking with God" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

No matter how cold or stormy the day, or how rough or slippery the road, it is all forgotten if father says, "Come and take a walk with me."

What joy it is to trip along by his side and feel his great hand over yours and look up into his kind face and listen to his loving voice! If danger threatens, you feel sure that he will protect you; and if you grow weary you know that his strong arms will carry you.

But there is a greater treat than this in store for you, if you will accept it. Your Heavenly Father sends you an invitation to walk with Him!

He has done more for you than your earthly father ever could do, for He is King of kings and Lord of lords, and Creator of heaven and earth. He is much stronger and wiser than your father, and loves you with a deeper, truer love. If you will stop to count up some of the things that He has done for you, you will see that this is true. Therefore you need not be afraid to walk with Him although He is so powerful.

"Well," you say, "when does God want me to walk with Him?"

To-day.

"Where does He want me to walk with Him?"

Wherever He goes; just as your father does when you walk with him. You cannot walk with your father, you know, unless you are agreed with him and go in the same path and in the same direction that he goes. You need not fear that God will ever lead you into evil paths, for the Bible tells us that all "the ways of the Lord are right."

"But," you say, "I cannot see Him as I can my father."

No, that is true, for He says that we must "walk by faith, not by sight."

But have you ever walked with your father when you could not see him? And yet you walked with him as truly as when you could see him plainly.

Thus you may walk with God, although you cannot now see Him with your eyes. You walk with Him when you willingly give up your way and walk in His way, and do as He does. And He promises that He will lead you with His right hand, and guide you with His eye, and get you with His arm, and carry you in His bosom, and talk with you in His word.

That you might not make any mistakes, but might know just how and just where God walks, He sent His only Son to this earth to show you the whole way from childhood up to manhood. So no matter how young you are or how old you may become, you may always walk with God if you follow the steps of Jesus and "walk, even as He walked."

He was sent to guide our feet back into the way of peace, which is God's way, and to walk with us and help us along. Without Him we could never walk with God, for we have all been out of the way ever since Adam chose to walk with Satan.

When man was first created, it was perfectly natural and easy for him to walk with God in His way of holiness, for he was then pure and holy like God. But now we have all yielded to Satan's evil mind so long that we have no power at all to do right and walk in God's way. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are His ways higher than our ways, and His thoughts than our thoughts.

Without Jesus to strengthen us and guide us we cannot do good works any more than your knife can do good work without someone to guide it; for Satan is stronger than we.

But Jesus is stronger than Satan, and God says that if we believe on Him and yield our minds, and eyes, and ears, and tongues, and hands, and feet, and our whole bodies to Jesus, as completely as we have been yielding them to Satan, then we may be able to walk with God by faith and do as He does. Where? Even here while surrounded by temptation and sin of every kind! And more than that He says that if we now thus walk with Him by faith, we shall one day see Him with our eyes, and walk with Him in white.

Is not that good news? Is not God's loving kindness very great to give His only Son that we might be able to walk with Him in His way of life? Would you not think that every one would gladly believe on Jesus and follow Him?

But you remember how Cain disbelieved, and therefore lost all the blessing of walking with God both here and hereafter. Well, ever since that time people have been following the example of Cain.

As people increased upon the earth, many of them went away from Adam and the few who believed, and they built themselves great cities and placed their affections on the perishing things of this sin-cursed earth. They

318

did not believe the promise of a Saviour and of Eden restored, and therefore they were not willing to count themselves strangers and pilgrims here.

Satan tried to get all to disbelieve God's promise, and try to make them believe that no matter how earnestly they believed on Christ and followed Him, they would never receive the promised reward and see God face to face. So to encourage His faithful ones and show to all that He had not forgotten His promises, God did a wonderful thing one day-

He translated Enoch, the seventh from Adam, that is, He changed him and took him to heaven that he should not see death!

We are told in Hebrews that Enoch was chosen because he had faith. Before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God. And we read in Genesis that he had this faith not for one day, or two, or even for one year, but for over three hundred years! He had shown that he could be trusted.

Now that is the kind of companionship that God wants to find in you. He wants you to be like Enoch, and trust Him and walk with Him day after day and day after day all your life, for He says-

"What doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?"

If you are ever tempted to think that God will forget to give you the promised reward, remember Enoch, and remember that God is no respecter of persons; He will reward you as surely as He did Enoch.

1. What was the name of the first child that ever lived on this earth? Gen. iv. 1.

2. What was the name of his brother? Gen. iv. 2.

3. Tell all that you know about Cain.

4. Tell all that you know about Abel.

5. After Abel was slain, whom did God give to Adam and Eve in his stead? Gen. iv. 25.

6. Did Adam ever have any other children, or grandchildren? Gen. v.

7. How long did Methuselah live? Gen. v. 27.

8. What did Enoch, the seventh from Adam, do, that pleased God very much? Heb. xi. 5, last part, and verse 6, first part.

9. What did this faith in Jesus enable him to do, even while surrounded by wicked people and all kinds of temptations? Gen. v. 24.

10. How long did he walk with God? Gen. v. 21, 22.

11. What is meant by "walking with God"? Ps. cxix. 1-3.

12. In what kind of paths does God always walk? Hosea xiv. 9; Ps. cxlv. 17.

13. Then if Enoch walked with God, in what paths must he have walked? Amos iii. 3; Lev. xxvi. 3, 12, 21, 24; Mal. ii. 6.

14. Was it natural for him to do right and walk in God's way of holiness?-No, no more natural for him than for us.

15. Why not? Rom. iii. 12.

16. How far have we all gone out of God's way? Isa. lv. 8, 9.

17. But what has God done that shows wonderful love for us?-He has given His Son to guide us back into His way of peace and life. John iii. 16; xiv. 6; Luke i. 79.

18. If we yield ourselves up to Jesus every day, and "walk even as He walked" when He was on earth, what shall we be sure to do?-To walk with God. 1 Peter ii. 21, 22; John ii. 6.

19. How completely must we yield ourselves to Him?-As completely as we have been yielding to Satan. Rom. vi. 19.

20. But if we do not yield to Jesus and let Him use us, how much good work can we do?-No more than your knife does by itself. John xv. 5, last part.

21. Can Jesus show us how to walk with God when we are only little children?-Yes, for He has walked with God from childhood up to manhood, and knows all the way that we must take.

22. Then no matter how young you may be, what does God want you to do? Micah vi. 8.

23. And how can you do this?-By letting Jesus lead you along the same path that He walked when He was a boy.

24. Need you fear that God will forget to reward you?-No; the God that rewarded Enoch will never forget you, for He is no respecter of persons.

25. When will He reward us all? 1 Thess. iv. 15-18; Rev. xxii. 12.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

-Alarming landslips are reported from Canada In the neighbourhood of St. Anne de la Parade.

-Severe earthquake shocks continue to be felt in Greece, in the districts of Thebes, Livadia and Atalanti.

-Two more members of the Newfoundland Legislature have been unseated for bribery and corruption.

-The strike of bricklayers and masons in Vienna is collapsing, but the coal strikes in Moravia and Silesia are extending.

-ln a conflict which took place between the miners and the gendarmes in the Polish Ostrau district, twenty of the men were killed and many wounded.

-The operations against Kabarega, the chief of Unyoro, in East Africa, have been completely successful, and the British flag has been raised at Wadelai.

-A tornado swept through Iowa City, U.S.A., on the afternoon of May 6, doing immense damage there and in the surrounding country. Many people were injured.

-At the request of the various Labour organisations the Canadian Government has decided to introduce a Bill making the first Monday in September a statutory holiday, to be known as Labour Day.

-The extraditing of anarchists and other criminals has assumed such proportions of late that the French authorities are beginning to complain of the cost.

-A bomb was exploded May 8, at the entrance of a palace belonging to Prince Odescalchi, in the Pratt di Castello quarter of Rome. Several persons were slightly injured.

-Fighting is going on in Salvador between the Government forces and the insurgents, and several battles have been reported, the Government being in the main victorious.

-At the burning of Gatow, a village near Berlin, Emperor William distinguished himself by personally carrying water buckets, wielding an axe, and rescuing live stock from the conflagration.

-The seven entombed cave explorers at Gratz were at last released from their perilous position, and it was found that their stock of lights and provisions was not quite exhausted. Six of the men were able to walk without assistance.

-The United States Charge d'Affaires at Caracas reports that an earthquake occurred on April 28 in the northwest of Venezuela, which destroyed the towns of Fijian and Merida, besides several villages. The loss of life is said to have been heavy.

-The "United Exhibitions" at Milan, comprising ten special exhibitions of fine arts, oils and wines, sport, etc., were opened May 6, with great ceremony, in the presence of King Humbert, Queen Margherita, Signor Crispi, and other persons of royalty.

-Many cities in Illinois, Pennsylvania, and Missouri are experiencing great distress owing to the coal famine which has been caused by the coal strike. If no relief is afforded them within a few days, all the factories, gas, water, and electric light plants will be closed.

-The coalowners in Lanarkshire, Ayrshire, and the Lothians have made a demand of twenty per cent. reduction in their men's wages. The miners in these counties have refused to entertain the demand, and have been locked out. A conference of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain has been called to consider the matter.

-A telegram from Lyck, in East Prussia, reports that a serious anti-Jewish riot has taken place at Grajewo, a small Russian frontier town, whore the workmen engaged in building some new barracks attacked the houses of Polish. Jewish dealers and shop-keepers. Four persons were killed and about 100 injured, some of them very seriously.

-The Russian authorities are reported to be clearing out hundreds of the passportless Turks inhabiting the district around Bateum. Those Turks are now being shipped by the steamers of the Russian Steam Navigation Company to Rizeh, Trebizond and other places along the Antatolian coast. Great distress prevails among them as no provision has been made for them.

-The Royal Dutch Commission, which has long been studying the scheme for the draining and reclamation of the Zuyder Zee, has concluded its labours. Twenty-one members out of the twenty-six composing the commission recommend that the projected work be carried out. It is proposed to reclaim from the sea about 450,000 acres, the value of which is estimated at 326,000,000 guelders.

-Trees are now to be foiled by electricity. The modus operandi is as follows: A platinum wire, having been stretched out between two poles, is heated till it becomes incandescent. It then drawn tight against the tree, through which it immediately proceeds to burn its way. It is said the that a tree can by this process be felled in about one-eighth of the time it would take to saw it down.

-A terrible disaster has over alum the town of Stephani, in the Russian Government of Volhynia, a place of about 5,000 inhabitants. Through a chimney catching fire, a house was burned down, and then the flames, driven by a high wind, quickly spread first to the adjacent dwellings and then extended from house to house, with a rapidity which defied all efforts to check their progress, until nearly the whole town had been destroyed. All that the inhabitants were able to do was to remove as much of their property as they could hurriedly get together to the surrounding fields. While the people were all thus encamped in an exposed place, a cyclone broke over them, and their property was swept away in every direction by the wind.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

It is not surprising that "higher criticism" should flourish in these days. The apostle predicted that it would be a "heady," "high-minded" age.

A traveller in the East begins a letter to his home religious paper thus: "Our first day in Jerusalem was the first day of the week, but it was no type of the Sabbath which the redeemed hope to spend in the New Jerusalem, when earthly Sabbaths have given place to the everlasting rest." Of course it was not, and could not be. The Sabbath is the seventh day of the week, and the first day of the week is a working day; therefore the first day of the week could no more be a type of any Sabbath, either earthly or heavenly, than could Monday or Tuesday.

If there is any Bill that richly deserves to be passed by the present Parliament, it is the one for the abolition of religious prosecutions, which proposes the repeal of certain ancient laws, as, for instance, the law (Act 1 Edward VI. c. 1) "against such as shall unreverently speak against the sacrament of the altar;" the section of 1 Elizabeth, c. 2, which is directed against anything in derogation of the Book of Common Prayer; the section of 21 George III., c. 49, directed against Sunday lectures and debates; and so much of the Act of 6 George IV., c. 47, as relates to "blasphemy" in Scotland. One would think that the naming of these laws would be all the argument necessary to secure their prompt repeal; yet the English Churchman says of the proposal: "Thus the extreme Radicals-we hope unconsciously-further the interests of Romanism and infidelity." Such laws as these are the outgrowth of Romanism, and the breeders of infidelity.

"Reversed" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

Reversed.-In the early days of Christianity and the Roman Empire, Christians were persecuted for refusing to serve as soldiers. Now a missionary in Japan complains of the action of the chief of the Japanese army in issuing an edict ordering soldiers professing Christianity to leave the service.

"God's Care" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

God's Care.-Those who have a hazy idea that they are buying the Lord's favour, or putting Him under special obligations to them by their performance of religious exercises hurl the greatest possible insult in the face of the Almighty. Yet that very idea enters into the thoughts of many who would be horrified at a plain statement of the real significance of their attitude. An incident supposed to be amusing, is vouched for by one writer as follows:-

W., a child of seven or eight, went to visit his grandmother, who asked him, on the morning after his arrival, if he had said his prayers the night previous. W.: "No, I forgot it." She: "You mustn't neglect to say your prayers, W., God will take care of you if you do." W.: "Well, He did."

What an accursed thing to teach a child, who might be taught to look upon God as a compassionate Father, before whom to come with thankfulness and love, rather than as a being whose good will must be secured by such methods as might be employed to appease an earthly despot.

"Who Shall Rule?" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

The same question that caused the rupture between Henry II. and Thomas ? Becket, namely, whether ecclesiastics are amenable to civil laws, has caused a little flurry in the Catholic body in the United States. D. S. Phelan, a Catholic priest, and editor of The Western Watchman, had declared that bishops were subject to the laws of the State, and could be held to account for any illegal act, the same as anyone else. Sattoli, The papal legate, denied this, saying:-

It is well enough known that by Canon law all ecclesiastics and, by a greater right, bishops are personally exempt from secular courts, whether in ecclesiastical causes, or in causes either civil or criminal, unless the Holy See by a concordat takes away their privilege.

Mr. Phelan declared that in the United States, where there is no concordat, this did not apply. The Archbishop ordered that in every church in the diocese there should be read a rebuke for his utterance, and his paper be declared dangerous and unworthy of support. Phelan declare that his pen was his own, and that he would never apologise, under compulsion, for what he had written, the truth of which he still affirmed.

But this did not end the matter. Sattoli wrote a letter to the archbishop, stating that he "wished and exacted that The Western Watchman should be compelled to advocate the laws respecting the exemption of the clergy from the jurisdiction of secular courts," and also wrote to Phelan to the same affect. This was sufficient, and Phelan at once wrote the archbishop that he was ready to sign any apology that might be required. The next issue of the Watchman contained a humble retraction and apology.

This little incident is very significant. It shows the power of the Catholic Church over its members, and it also shows that Rome's claim to supremacy over the nations is no less now than in the Middle Ages, and is as strong in the United States as elsewhere. There is nothing that Rome cannot do when her clergy are exempt from allegiance to the laws of the land. Of course this claim is not yet recognised by the civil authority; but as the Catholics are accustomed to getting everything they ask for in the United States, it will doubtless be acceded to before long.

"Working It Out" The Present Truth 10, 20.

E. J. Waggoner

Working It Out.-It is not in harmony with human nature to acknowledge itself utterly helpless; therefore the religion of human nature is justification by works. This is the heart of the Catholic system, and it is the religion of every unconverted man. He may profess justification by faith as a part of his creed, but unless he knows it as a life he really knows nothing of it. Of all the sacred books of the Eastern religions, Sir Monier Williams has said:-

I have devoted as much time as any man living to the study of the sacred books, and I have found the one keynote, the diapason, so to speak, of them all is salvation by works, a salvation which may be purchased, the sole purchase-money, being our works and our deservings.

Many quote the words, "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling," but they stop there. The apostle goes on, however, "For it is God that worketh in you both to will and to do." Unless our works are "wrought in God," by the Lord Himself, the works will be just as wicked as we are by nature. Thank God that He promises to live in us, to work His will and righteousness in our sinful flesh.

May 24, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

Jesus was on His way to the house of Jairus, "as He went the people thronged Him. And a woman having an issue of blood twelve years, which had spent all her living upon physicians, either could be healed of any, came behind Him, and touched the border of His garment; and immediately her issue of blood stanched." Luke viii. 42-44.

"The life of the flesh is in the blood." Lev. xvii. 11. Therefore the poor woman's life was steadily passing away. From Jesus she obtained that of which she stood in need, namely, life. Jesus said that power had gone from Him. Life from Him went into the woman, and gave her new life.

The miracles of Jesus were recorded that we might believe that He is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing we might have life through His name. John xx. 31. He came for the purpose of giving life to as many as would believe on Him (John iii. 16); and the healing of the woman is an illustration of the reality of the life that He gives. It is not a matter of theory, but a fact.

"Out of the heart are the issues of life." Prov. iv. 23. The law of God was in the heart of Jesus. Ps. xl. 8. Therefore the life of Christ is the righteousness of the law of God. It is the perfection of the law in a living form. And therefore the life which believers in Christ obtain, is the righteousness of God's law, of obedience to the ten commandments. Without that life of Christ received, it is as impossible for a man to keep the law, as for a dead man to walk.

In order to receive this life from Jesus, we must come close to Him, as the poor woman did. Her case shows us what it is to be near to the Lord. There were certainly others who were nearer to Jesus in body than she was; because the throng round Jesus was so great that she could only reach through and touch the hem of His garment. Yet she got near enough to receive life from Him, while the others did not. It was her faith that made her near to Him, and that saved her. Even so we are exhorted to "draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith." Heb. x. 22.

"The Spirit's Sword" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

The Spirit's Sword.-Sometimes people who find in the word of God truths which they do not wish to obey declare that the Spirit tells them they are right. But the Spirit and the word agree, and what the Spirit speaks is by the word. The "sword of the Spirit," says inspiration, "is the word of God." One may be sincere in arraying the Spirit against the word; but such an one is fearfully deceived. The clamour of the flesh, which shrinks from obedience, is interpreted as the voice of the Spirit.

"Is Christ Divided?" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

Is Christ Divided?-Jesus Christ is the Truth. All truth is in Him, and He is the Word, and He declared, "Thy Word is truth." Then when a person says he will believe something, but does not want to believe other truths that are stated in the Scriptures, he virtually attempts to divide Christ-to take a little and reject a little. Some like to believe anything that does not disturb their ease, or inconvenience them, but fight against believing plain words of God pointing out sins to be given up, and duties to be performed. Such a course is not only inconsistent but wicked. Christ is not divided. He is crucified; and when men shrink from the cross they find in any truth they are really refusing to be crucified with Him, and reject Him.

"The Two Deposits" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

The Apostle Paul said, "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day." 2 Tim. i. 12. The literal rendering (see margin of R.V.) is, "He is able to keep my deposit."

He had deposited his life with the Lord against that day "when Christ who is our life shall appear." People usually put their valuable possessions in the safe deposit or the bank for safe keeping, because they are afraid of losing them. It is dangerous to carry about large sums of money. The apostle knew that he was powerless to keep himself; that the only safe place for his life was with the Lord. So he deposited himself in the bank of heaven, knowing that there was perfect safety there.

If all who are worrying over the conduct of life, fearful of losing their souls, would just make a full deposit with the Lord, they would learn Paul's peaceful confidence. If a child of God who finds the way hard, and is fearful lest the strength promised should fail, will deposit all the cares with God, the burden will be loosed and the abiding rest will be found.

The rich man who deposits his gold in the bank is not required to stand by to guard the deposit. The bank takes the responsibility of holding it. In these days of bank failures the depositor may be anxious for the safety of his funds, it is true. But when we

322

put ourselves, our life, into the hands of God, we know whom we believe, and know that He is able to keep the deposit. There is no anxious thought for the future where there is a full and complete deposit and perfect confidence.

The apostle speaks of another deposit. "The good deposit," he charges Timothy,-"that good thing which was committed unto thee"-"guard through the Holy Ghost." Verse 14, R.V. The Lord takes our life as a deposit with Him, and deposits with us His life, His grace, and "the faith of Jesus." He commits to the believer this life that He may reveal it to sinners who have not the life. It is to be guarded by the power of the Holy Spirit, which is given to all who believe. Only by this power can the sacred trust be held. When Paul was about to die, he said, "I have kept the faith." The one who puts His life in the keeping of the Lord will be able to keep the faith committed to him, and to those who make the deposit and keep the deposit will be given the crown of life and righteousness "in that day."

Have you committed your whole life to God? Are you keeping the faith of Jesus?

"Miracles and the Gospel" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

Miracles and the Gospel.-When John sent from his prison to know if Jesus was indeed the expected Messiah, Jesus had the messenger stand by while He was healing the people, raising the dead, and doing mighty works. Then He said to them, "Go your way, and tell John what things ye have seen and heard; how that the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and to the poor the Gospel is preached." Luke vii. 22. But Jesus is not the only one who works miracles. The spirits of devils do them also. Rev. xvi. 14. False Christs and false prophets work miracles to deceive. See Matt. xxiv. 24; Rev. xiii. 12-14; xix. 20. Miracles by themselves, therefore, are not necessarily a proof of one's Divine authority; and Christ did not depend on them alone to test His Divine mission. "Unto the poor the Gospel is preached." It was by His words, more than by His miracles, that men were convinced. The rough soldiers who were sent to seize Him, saying, "Never man spake like this Man." John vi. 46. And so we are thrown back upon the word as the only test. If the ones who perform great signs and wonders are in any point opposed to the plain word of God,-if they seek in any degree to weaken its force, or to show that it does not mean what it says,-know at once that they are not of God. "To the law, and to the testimony; if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." Isa. viii. 20.

"A Personal Message to You" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

The Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy, his son in the Gospel, "Without ceasing I have remembrance of thee in my prayers night and day; greatly desiring to see thee, being mindful of thy tears." 2 Tim. i. 3, 4. Many readers of the Bible pass over passages like this, getting no comfort or encouragement from them, as they seem to them to be restricted in their application to those immediately addressed.

But who put this feeling into the heart of the apostle? It was Christ, of course. "Christ liveth in me," said Paul. The apostle is dead, and cannot address to us the sympathetic message that he sent to Timothy; and yet those words show the feeling of Christ our Lord, toward every toiling child of the Gospel to-day.

Without ceasing He remembers us, and prays for us, too. When Peter was once about to go into sore trial, the Lord said to him, "I have prayed for thee." Do you wish that you might hear the same words in your trial of faith? You have them. "Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on Me through their word." That means you, if you believe on Jesus through the word. Even now He remembers His own, and makes intercession for them, marks their trials and tears, and longs to see them in His kingdom.

"Justifying God and Being Justified" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

Justifying God and Being Justified.-"And all the people when they heard, and the publicans, justified God, being baptized with the baptism of John." Luke vii. 29, R.V. John preached the baptism of repentance, and those who were baptized by him confessed their sins. Thus they justified God; for it is God who declares that "all have sinned;" and whosoever confesses that he has sinned, thereby declares God's justice. He confesses that God is just in His sayings and in His judgments, as David said in his confession, "Against Thee, Thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in Thy sight; that Thou mightest be justified when Thou speakest, and be clear when Thou judgest." Ps. li. 4. But "if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." 1 John i. 9. If we justify God, we shall partake of His justness. God has no good thing that is not for His children; and we get His goodness by acknowledging it. If we recognise and acknowledge His power, we receive of that power. If we truly acknowledge the perfect righteousness of His word in every particular, we shall be filled with that righteousness. "And this is life eternal, that they might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent." John xvii. 3.

"Looking at the Difficulties" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

When the Apostle Paul was convicted of sin and shown his duty, he says, "Immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood." The Lord had spoken, he knew it; and he neither went about to ask men if he should yield to the Lord, nor took counsel with his own natural feelings and tendencies. It meant an entire change in his life, separation from his former co-religionists, and the renunciation of all the world; but what was all that when dealing with the Lord of all?

The man who settles once for all that the Lord is God, will save himself anxiety and worry and sinful procrastination which makes the service of the Lord appear so hard to the man who, when conviction comes from the word of God, goes about to take counsel with men or with his fears. If the Lord says a thing, that is established, and the person who lays hold upon it will find that the Lord will take all the responsibility of fulfilling His word.

When we begin to conjure up the difficulties in the way of following the Lord, it shows that we do not believe Him to be the God revealed in the Bible. The word that reveals a duty to us does not show it to make it hard for us, but offers in the very word the power which will bless us by enabling us to do the duty, and by making known the joy of following the Lord. When we look at the selfish side of the problem we turn away from the power and the blessing, and of course the demand seems hard and impossible.

Some "hear the word, and the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the loss of other things entering in, choke the word, and it becometh unfruitful." Mark iv. 19.

323

The word has power to make the fruit abound in blessed obedience and peace. But when anxiety for self and temporal things chokes the word, and does not allow it a place in the heart, there is no fruit. The secret of Christian service is in believing that the Lord means just what He says, and that He is just what He says He is. Then instead of hesitating and distrusting, the believer will take counsel with God, who is "wonderful in counsel," and the life will be a happy walk with God.

"Do You Want to Know the Truth?" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

"Seek, and ye shall find," said Jesus. The person who wants to know the truth, and seeks to know it, will find it. The way to look for it is to search for it as the man in the parable searched for the treasure that was hid in the field. He really wanted to find it, and was willing to give up all that he possessed for it.

The attitude of the one who is inquiring about truth makes all the difference between getting it and losing it. "If any man will do His will, he shall know the doctrine." John vii. 17. If a man does not want to do the will of God, he can easily deceive himself by shutting his eyes to the light. He who sets his heart to learn the will of God in any matter, at whatever cost to self, will get the light.

The complaint is sometimes made that there are so many conflicting theories that one does not know what to believe. We have no business to believe anything but the word of God. Anyone who wants to know God's will will find it in the word. Multitudes of souls are being deceived, for the time has come when the devil has come down, "having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time." Rev. xii. 12. His deceptions are so subtle, that if possible he would deceive the very elect.

The only safe attitude is to be truly seeking to know the Lord's will. When the Lord speaks, the genuine seeker knows that what He says is truth, because His name is Faithful and True. The seeking will be to learn what He says, not to find out if He means what He says. Just here is the danger. One who is seeking to be convinced that the Lord does not mean just what He says, is very sure to be successful, at the peril of his soul.

When men are convinced of a truth, and are looking for some way to avoid yielding obedience to it, they have a powerful ally at hand to help them. We are told that as the enemy nears the time when his work will be cut short by the coming of the Lord, he will work "with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved." 2 Thess. ii. 10.

It is the love of the truth, for truth's sake, that we must have. Then it will make no difference whether it is popular and pleasant to the natural heart or not. We shall search for it and find it and obey it; for Jesus Christ is the Truth and the Life. Receiving the love of the truth is receiving the love of Christ. Rejecting a truth, or seeking for some way to evade it, is rejecting the Lord, its Author, because of the cross. Those who love the Lord, glory in the cross. "They shall ask the way to Zion with their faces thitherward." Jer. l. 5. They shall know the way of the Lord, and delight in it.

"The Educational Battle" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

ROME SCORES A POINT

Under this heading the Catholic Times of May 4 begins an editorial thus:-

Catholics throughout every part of the country will rejoice that their leaders have at last taken a decisive step in the educational struggle. The bishops at their Low Week meeting drew up a series of resolutions on the subject, which have just been published, and under the presidency of the Cardinal-Archbishop a committee has been appointed to draft a Bill which will in due course be presented to Parliament.

The main points and the resolutions above referred to are these: That Catholic parents cannot accept for their children a system of education in which secular instruction is wholly divorced from education in their religion.

That the only system of religious education which Catholic parents can accept for their children is that given under the authority and direction of the Catholic Church.

That to take the management of schools intended for Catholic children out of the hands of Catholics, and to place it in the hands of public rate-payers, is "a violation of parental rights, to be resisted as an unwarrantable attack upon religious liberty."

"That Catholic public elementary schools, satisfying the demands of the Education Department, have a right to as full a share of public money, whether from the rates or from the taxes, as any other public elementary schools in the country; and that it is unjust to deprive them of it because of the religious instruction required by the parents, which is given to the children attending such schools."

"That, in the present religious condition of England, the State ought to observe a consistent and strict impartiality in respect to religious education, whether given in voluntary or in Board Schools; and to distribute for 'maintenance,' to all public elementary schools fulfilling the requirements of the Education Department, an equal proportionate share of the public money collected for public elementary education."

"That compulsory State education is an intolerable tyranny, unless due regard be paid by the State to the education of the children in their own religion."

"That Catholics, deeply impressed with all that is involved in the issue of popular education, are now compelled to assert their just claim to a full share of the public money raised for the purposes of elementary education."

This is, in brief, and largely in their own words, the Catholic position. As before stated, the Cardinal and his bishops are at work upon a Bill to be presented to Parliament at a fit time, which, if passed, will give to the Catholics all that they desire.

The Catholics have chosen their time well. The circular which has been issued, and which has cost so much controversy in the School Board, is to the effect that teachers are to give instruction in "the Christian religion." Now the Catholic Church claims to be Christian, and the majority of Protestants allow the claim. Therefore by the decision of the majority of the School Board, the Catholics are justified in their claim for a proportionate share in the public money.

From the point of view that it is the duty of the State to provide religious instruction for the people, the Catholic claim is unanswerable; for it is very evident to all that the State has the right to insist on giving children religious instruction to which their parents object; and if religious instruction is to be given, it must be given by those who profess the religion to be taught. Consistency and common fairness, therefore, demand that all who believe that public schools ought to teach religion, shall acquiesce

324

in the demand made by the Catholics.

Unfortunately all but a very small and insignificant minority are committed to the idea of State instruction in religion. Those who have protested against the School Board circular have had no case, because they continually asserted their belief that religion should be taught in the public schools. Thus their protest against the proposal to make such instruction definite was deprived of all force.

The dignitaries of the Church of England have just placed another weapon in the hands of the Roman Catholics. Until recently King's College, London, has been receiving ?1700 a year from the Government. This has now been discontinued on the ground that the college is a religious institution. A meeting was recently held under the presidency of the Archbishop of Canterbury, in which was voted "that the action of the Government in laying down rules for the appointment of the Parliamentary grant to university colleges, by which any college founded on the religious basis of King's College is excluded, is illiberal and oppressive." Lord Salisbury characterised the action as "spontaneous, gratuitous, and arbitrary persecution." King's College is now in exactly the same condition as the Catholic schools; and every statement made concerning it will apply equally to them.

We do not by any means expect that as a general thing either churchmen or Nonconformists will agree that the Catholics ought to be given a share of the public money, to be used in instructing their children in the Catholic religion. They thought only of themselves when contending for religious instruction, to be supported with public money; but now they may see that they were all the time working for the Roman Catholics, who are determined to reap the full benefit. They cannot oppose the Catholic claim without giving up their own claim, and even if they should do that it would not deprive the Catholics of the advantage that they have gained.

Thus Rome steadily moves ahead, assisted by professed Protestants. This is a case that is worth watching. It may be that it will result in bringing many professed Protestants to stand on real Protestant ground, namely, that the State and Christianity have no manner of connection, and that the true church asks for and accepts no aid from any power except God.

"The Geography of the Kingdom" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

The citizenship of the believer is in the spiritual kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ. That kingdom is "righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost," a blessed kingdom in which to live.

Surely, did men only believe that there is such a kingdom they would go far to find it, to escape from the turmoil and strife and trouble in the kingdoms of this world.

The exiled apostle, John, found the kingdom on the "isle that is called Patmos," to which he was banished "for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ." In his letter to the church he speaks of himself as their "companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ."

The brethren scattered abroad shared with the apostle the kingdom of joy and peace, and no tribulation could take it from them. Wherever the believers went they were to preach the Gospel and say, "The kingdom of God is come nigh unto you." Christ said this to the wicked Pharisees; and to the scribe who answered discreetly He said, "Thou art not far from the kingdom."

It lies so near to all men that it is but one step into it. The most wicked man who turns to Jesus, who but looks unto Him, shall live; and that life is the life of the kingdom-the righteousness, the peace, and the joy of the Holy Ghost.

Only a step to Jesus!
Believe, and thou shalt live:
Lovingly now He's waiting,
And ready to forgive.

Only a step to Jesus!
A step from sin to grace:
What has thy heart decided?
The moments fly apace.

Men do not realise how near God is, with His kingdom of grace. A foot-weary and heart-sore wanderer from home and from truth once laid down in the wilderness to sleep, with a stone for his pillow. When he awoke he said, "Surely the Lord is in this place; and I knew it not. . . . How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven." Gen. xxviii. 16, 17.

The gate of heaven is at the feet of every sinner, and yet men hesitate, and go on in the mad rush of business and pleasure knowing nothing of the rest and joy of Christ, thinking of it-if they give it a thought-as being something afar off, a kingdom fanciful and unreal, because it is a spiritual kingdom.

But the believer knows the geography of the kingdom. He breathes its invigorating atmosphere every day, and knows that neither tribulation, nor distress, nor persecution, nor height, nor depth, nor any creature can separate him from it. The citizen of this kingdom of righteousness must submit himself to the righteousness of its rule, but loyalty to the law of the kingdom is liberty and life, and joy and peace.

"Tolerance" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

When you are inclined to feel intolerant toward others, stop and ask yourself how long the Lord has tolerated you; and consider whether you had not better devote your energies first to setting yourself right in His sight, before attempting to make other people set themselves right in your sight. And then ask yourself if you cannot love your fellow instead of regarding him with a feeling of tolerance, seeing that God, through all your own perverseness and sinfulness, has loved you.

"The Labour Problem" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

The greatest problem that confronts the statesmen of the world to-day is the labour problem. For years they have been trying to solve this problem, but their efforts have not been successful. On the contrary, its aspect has been growing more serious year by year, and thoughtful minds are beginning to see with alarm that it carries political and social earthquakes in its train. We have reached the time of "distress of nations, with perplexity," foretold in the prophecy of our Saviour, and men's hearts are "failing them for fear, and for looking after those things that are coming on the earth." We may shut our eyes to these things and refuse to look beyond the narrow compass of our own individual affairs, but the facts of the situation remain, and sooner or later will find us out, whether we find them out or not. In view of this, there is only one wise course to pursue, and that is to open our eyes to the truth, however unwelcome, and prepare ourselves to meet the issue before us.

And this is not, to anyone, a hopeless task. We have the truth, and it only remains for us to open our eyes and hearts to receive it. God's word is truth (John xvii. 17), and that word is not silent in matters which concern both our temporal and spiritual welfare. It is a lamp unto our feet, and

325

a light unto our path (Ps. cxix. 105) in times of peril, as well as in the days of safety. And by its counsel we may know exactly how to meet the issue that is coming. It is time now to gather our wisdom from that word, rather than from political speeches and the utterances of the press. Luke xxi., Mark xiii., and Matthew xxiv., will afford us a clearer view into the future than all the oracular sayings of statesmen and politicians.

There is but one solution of the labour question, and that is contained in the words of Christ: "Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." What the labouring men of the world need is rest in the Lord; not idleness, but rest. They do not know that they need this; they have never known it. But Christ knew it, and knows it to-day. Those who come to Him will find rest and satisfaction, and life will become to them a plain path to the realisation of the heart's longings and aspirations. But those who will not come to Him will never find what they need elsewhere, no matter how many plans they may devise for lifting themselves up to the elysium of their dreams. No man can, by taking hold of himself, raise himself into the air. The base metals of fallen human nature cannot, by any alchemy of the human mind, be transmuted into the gold of love, joy, and peace. These are the fruits of the Spirit,-the result of the touch of the magic figure of God. "The wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt. There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked." Isa. lvii. 20, 21.

The only message that has in it light and wisdom and hope for the human race, or any power to elevate them above their present plane of existence, is the message of the Gospel. The political messages of the day, of which so many are being heard, are the preaching of the power of man unto salvation. The Gospel message is the preaching of the power of God unto salvation. Rom. i. 16. Can we hesitate in deciding which one of these to choose and obey?

"Ten Lepers" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

At one time Jesus healed ten lepers, only one of whom had enough appreciation of the favour to return and give thanks. Those nine lepers were not the only ungrateful ones whom Jesus healed. Yet we do not read that He took back what He had done, or that He expressed regret that He had bestowed charity upon people so unworthy. He was the manifestation of the Father in heaven, who "maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good; and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust." Yet many professed followers of God carefully weigh the fitness of everyone before they render assistance, and feel terribly chagrined if they have been led to bestow alms upon one who proves to be below their standard.

"Christ and the 'Living Wage'" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

No person ever took so great an interest in the welfare of human beings as did the Lord Jesus Christ. No person can take so great an interest in them as He does to-day. But the method which He took to relieve the woes of humanity, and raise mankind to a higher plane of life, was not that of the men who have so much to say nowadays about the "living wage;" although some of these, both in Church circles and out, would have us think that Christ would stand exactly in their place and speak their words if He were here.

Recently we saw it announced that the Rev. Mr.-- would on the following Sunday discuss the question, "Why did Christ demand a living wage for a one-hour day?" referring, presumably, to the parable of the labourers in the vineyard. The Saviour was not forgetful of the physical wants of men when He ministered among them, but He never occupied the position of a socialist, or Labour agitator, or a politician, or a statesmen, Christ was none of these; and he ever put first before men that which was spiritual, and through this reached and relieved their physical wants, and bettered the circumstances and prospects of their lives. He knew-what men now need to know-that the only uplifting power in the world among men is the Gospel of God.

The socialist and Labour questions existed in the days of Christ just as they exist in our day; no doubt with some difference of feature and detail, but the same in general aspect. We read that great multitudes followed Christ in His journeys throughout Judea, and it is plain that their interest in Him was not all due to the spirituality of His teachings. No doubt they consisted largely of the unemployed, or those who had no pressing and constant occupation. And on one occasion, when they numbered above five thousand, He gave them all a free dinner. Let us notice this instance.

After commanding the multitude to sit down, He took the five loaves and the two fishes which His disciples had, and blessed them, and then commanded His disciples to distribute them among the multitude; and "they did all eat and were filled." And in the account given by John (chap. vi. 1-15) we read that "when Jesus therefore perceived that they would come and take Him by force, to make Him a king, He departed again into a mountain Himself alone." The man who could create for them loaves and fishes, was just the kind of a king that they wanted. Here was a solution of the Labour question-the wants of men supplied without any cost to themselves, or any burden upon the Government, or any doubtful dependence upon politicians and statesmen. Who would ask anything better than this at the present time? Yet there is something better even than this, and it is what all men can have if they will take it. It is the Gospel. That is God's way of bettering the condition of mankind, labouring classes and all.

When Jesus again saw the multitude (for we read that they came again seeking Him), He said to them, "Ye seek Me, but not because ye saw the miracles, but because ye did eat of the loaves, and were filled." This reveals the thought which actuated them in their attempt to make Him a king. But the Saviour immediately added, "Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you." This is God's counsel on the Labour question, and it is the best counsel on the subject that was ever given. Then does not God have regard for the physical needs of men? Most certainly; the Saviour, speaking of these needs in His sermon on the mount, said, "Your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you." Matt. vi. 32, 33. The only trouble is, that men will not take God at His word and put in practice the instruction He has given.

In the miracle of the Saviour which the multitude had witnessed, was a most valuable lesson which they might have learned on this point; namely, that man does not need very much, if he only has with it the blessing of God. A little, with His blessing, becomes

326

a large amount. And as God blessed the loaves and fishes then for the good of the multitude, so He will bless them now for the good of any of His creatures; for He is not partial, and never changes. Loaves and fishes are the labouring man's food. And the labouring man to-day may for the asking have God's blessing upon his food and all that he has, and find in that the solution of his difficulties; for "The blessing of the Lord, it maketh rich, and He addeth no sorrow with it." Prov. x. 22. Riches without care or sorrow! Surely no one would ask for more than this.

"The Same Thing" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

The Same Thing.-It is not the name but the soul of the thing that determines its character. Roman Catholic authorities recognise the fact that their doctrines are being spread among the people by the dominant party of the Church of England, the High Church branch. Professor St. George Mivart wrote a few months ago in the Nineteenth Century as follows:-

The English people are sadly inaccessible to the Catholic clergy on accountable of old habits and traditional prejudices, and modern Catholic worship is often strange and repellent to them. But the Ritualistic ministers of the Establishment can easily obtain a hearing, and succeed in scattering the good seed of Roman doctrines far and wide. We now frequently meet with devout practices which, forty years ago, were unheard of, save to be denounced and scouted outside the small Catholic body. But Ritualists are rapidly making the word Protestant to stink in the nostrils of their congregations, and causing them to regard it as a detestable form of belief. Thus, not only are our ancient churches being renovated and decorated in the Roman spirit, and so prepared for us, but congregations to fill them are being gathered together. The devout and noble-minded men who form the advance party, are preparing the way for a great increase of the Catholic Church in England.

"Nourishing Diet" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

Nourishing Diet.-The science of cookery has no doubt made progress, but at the same time it is unquestionably the case that too much attention has been given to the mere pleasing of the palate. The departure from the old-time simplicity of diet has not been a reform in the right direction. The report has just been made by Mr. Wilson Fox, of the Labour Commission, for districts in the West of Ireland. He says: "Evidence is overwhelming that the food now partaken of by the people, though of more refined quality, and more in accordance with modern ideas, is not nearly so strengthening, and in consequence, the actual physical superiority of the people is deteriorating." White bread and tea now take the place of the strengthening oatmeal stirabout and milk. A Westmeath labourer said to the commissioner: "The children are spoilt in their youth from not having any milk. The people are killing themselves with tea, and do not do so much work in consequence. Stirabout and milk used to be a great thing for them."

"The Lord's Day" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

The Apostle John, in beginning the account of the wonderful revelations given him on the isle Patmos, states in the following words the time when he had his visions: "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet." Rev. i. 10.

What day was that? What is the Lord's day? Most people would doubtless answer without a moment's thought or hesitation that it is Sunday, the first day of the week. But the most prompt reply needs the backing of proof; and so we ask again: Is there anything by which we may certainly know which day of the week is the Lord's day?

One thing is sure, and that is that our information, in order to be trustworthy, must come from the Bible. It is not what men think, but what the Bible says, that must be our guide. The expression, "the Lord's day," is found only this once in the Bible, but we are told so plainly in the Scriptures which day is the Lord's day, that there is no need for any doubt. Let us read some of the statements.

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy works; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." Ex. xx. 8-10.

Then we read the words of the Lord in Isaiah lviii. 13, 14: "If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on My holy day; and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; . . . then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord."

Now let us read once more the words of Christ the Lord. He was walking through the fields on the Sabbath day, when some of the Jews found fault with His disciples for plucking and eating the ears of corn. They accused them of breaking the Sabbath, but Jesus maintained that they were not breaking it, and declared, "The Son of man is Lord also of the Sabbath." Mark ii. 28.

Can there be any question as to what day of the week is referred to in these texts? None whatever. They all refer to the seventh day of the week, commonly called Saturday, the day which the Jews professed to regard, and which many of them do still. The day immediately preceding the first day of the week, is the day that in the New Testament is declared to be "the Sabbath according to the commandment." See Luke xxiii. 54-56; xxiv. 1.

We know also that it was on the seventh day of the week that the disciples plucked and ate the corn; for the Jews accused them of Sabbath-breaking; and the seventh day of the week-the day before Sunday-is the day that the Jews have always regarded as the Sabbath. Notice also that Jesus, in harmony with His own commandment, spoke of the same day as the Sabbath, and called Himself its Lord.

What then do we learn from these texts?

1. The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord. It is therefore His day.

2. The Lord calls the Sabbath "My holy day." The Sabbath therefore is the Lord's day.

3. Christ Himself declares that He is the Lord of the Sabbath day. And the Sabbath is the seventh day of the week-the day before Sunday.

Therefore the seventh day of the week (Saturday)-the Sabbath-is the Lord's day.

John was in the Spirit on the Lord's day; the seventh day of the week, known in these days as Saturday, is the Lord's day; therefore it was on the seventh day of the week, or Saturday, that John was in the Spirit, and had his wonderful visions. No other day is ever called the Lord's day in the Bible, and no other day has the slightest right to that title.

"Critics not Students" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

Critics not Students.-It is well known that an art critic is not usually an artist. He does not take the brush into his own hands, neither does he instruct others how to paint; he simply points out defects, or what he is pleased to call defects; he does not tell how those defects may be remedied or avoided, because he does not know. The literary critic, in like manner, is not a writer of books; he simply finds fault with, or approves, as his judgment or disposition may dictate, the work of others.

Even so it is with the Bible critic. He is not often a real Bible student. To be sure he studies, and he necessarily has a degree of familiarity with the Bible; but one who adopts the profession

327

of critic cannot at the same time devote time to straightforward, thorough study. The man who is reverently searching the deep things of God, has neither the time nor the disposition to be a critic. The critic will attract more attention in the world than the student, even as a balloon will attract more attention than a modest cottage. Still it is better to be a humble student than a boastful critic. The charity that builds up is better than the knowledge that puffs up.

"Notions About the Church" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

The church of Christ is the body of Christ, the temple of the Holy Ghost, made up of men and women who have been born anew, begotten by the word of God. Membership is not gained by assent to this or that form of words, or by any formal profession. It is a life with and in Christ, an abiding in the Vine continually.

Strange ideas are abroad nowadays about the nature of the church. It is popular to patronise Christianity, and to talk in religious phraseology. Almost every scheme must be ticketed "Christian" in order to be considered respectable. Now statesmen talk about making a church as they make the navy, and we hear about "labour" churches, "civic" churches, and the like.

The other day an energetic and somewhat famous reformer on these lines advised certain theatrical performers to organise themselves into a Christian church to secure their rights. Commenting on this the Women's Signal says that really every trade union is a branch of the Christian church, and adds that "the most effectual way to preach the Gospel among many classes is to urge them to form associations."

How far short, according to this, did Jesus and the apostles come in their preaching. "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness," was the word in those days; and this, too, was the Gospel which was preached to the poor.

The reversal of the Gospel in these days, putting material things first, is making it another Gospel entirely. It is making the interests of self first, instead of teaching men to renounce self and put themselves into the hands of a Saviour who saves from sin, and in that salvation gives something that makes men rich though in poverty, and joyful in tribulation.

It is so easy to allow oneself to be carried along by the newest fashions in religion, that many sincere people think this labelling of everything as Christian means that the world is becoming Christianised. Loose thinking about the Gospel is a sin; for man's eternal destiny depends upon obedience to it. Injustice to the poor and oppression of the weak is rampant in a selfish world, but the greatest injustice that could be done under the sun is to give sinners the idea that Christianity is summed up in the possession of material advantages.

"Religion the Change of a Cloak" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

Before the marriage of the Princess Alix, of Hesse, to the heir to the Russian throne, she must go through the form of changing her religion. It having been first decided that she will embrace the Greek religion, she is soon to go under the instruction of a famous ecclesiastic, to learn what that faith is. Unfortunately such views of the nature of religion are not confined to officialdom. Many people seem to regard it as something that can be put on or off, or changed with the fashion, as they would change a cloak.

"Death Abolished" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

The greatest act of abolition ever accomplished was that performed by the Lord Jesus Christ when He abolished death. We read of this in Paul's second letter to Timothy, where the apostle exhorts his fellow-worker to be partakers of the afflictions of the Gospel, "According to the power of God; who have saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began; but is now made manifest by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who hath abolished death, and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel." The purpose and grace of God toward us were given us in Christ before the world began, He being the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world;" and therefore men have shared in all ages all the provisions of the Gospel, and by the Gospel death has in all ages been virtually abolished, although the fact was not brought plainly and vividly "to light" until the day of Christ's resurrection.

That death was abolished was the import of Christ's language to the Sadducees, where He cited the words of God, "I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob," and added, "God is not the God of the dead, but of the living." Matt. xxii. 32. Though Abraham and Isaac and Jacob were dead, God counted them as alive, because they were to come up at the resurrection of the just. With God, the eternal One, to whom a thousand years are as a day and as a watch in the night, time is counted as nothing; for it is nothing in relation to eternity. Those things therefore which exist in the purpose of God, though they now be not, He counts as though they were. Rom. iv. 17.

The abolition of death means the abolition of the law by which it works; and so we find the Christian's testimony to be that "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from of law of sin and death." Rom. viii. 2. This baleful law has been repealed by a stronger Power than the power for which it came, and all men are at liberty to avail themselves of this freedom. And so to all who do so, death, though "the last enemy that shall be destroyed," is even now virtually abolished.

"Liberty and Law" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

Liberty and Law.-The idea that civil laws are the preservers or destroyers of religious liberty, or of the freedom of each to practice what religion he pleases, which is commonly miscalled religious liberty, should be dissipated by the fact that in the most enlightened countries, and when the greatest personal liberty prevails, there are still on the statute book some of the most intolerant laws. Last week we referred to the Bill for the abolition of some of these relics of ancient bigotry in England. They could be enforced now as well as at any previous time, if there was the disposition to do so. And although they may be abolished, it would be but a slight matter to re-enact them, if a persecuting spirit should once more prevail among the people. No persecution has ever ceased because the laws which justified it were repealed; but in every case the laws have been repealed because a spirit of justice had caused a persecution to cease, so that the laws were no longer needed to give it the colour of respectability. Law does not make, but follows, popular feeling. Therefore the only true way to advance religious liberty is to instil the principles of the Gospel into the people. When these exercise a controlling influence over even unbelieving men, there will be no persecution, no matter how many intolerant laws stand on the books;

328

such laws will be dead letters. But when the principles of the Gospel are spurned, the most liberal laws will afford but the name of religious liberty, and the people will either repeal them, or find an excuse to persecute in spite of them.

"Hearing Abraham's Gospel" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

Hearing Abraham's Gospel.-The Gospel was preached in the days of Abraham. Not only so, but we who live in this nineteenth century are admonished to take heed to that Gospel and that preaching. It is the same Gospel that has been preached in all ages,-the Gospel which is "the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth." Rom. i. 16. Of this preaching we are told that "the Scripture foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the Gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed." Gal. iii. 8. It was preached also to Abraham's descendants, those "whose carcasses fell in the wilderness," who "because of unbelief" could not enter into the promised rest. Heb. iii. 17-19. The promise of rest and inheritance is the Gospel, since it comes through the righteousness of faith. Rom. iv. 13. And now the exhortation comes, "Let us therefore fear, lest a promise being left us of entering into His rest, any of you should seem to come short of it. For unto us was the Gospel preached as well as unto them." Heb. iv. 1, 2. In preaching the Gospel to Abraham and to them, God also preached it to us, who are the children of Abraham by faith. Very profitable is it, therefore, to consider Abraham and the promises made to him. Unless we do, we shall be ignorant of what the Gospel means, and of what it has for us.

"Adorning the Doctrine" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

Adorning the Doctrine.-The Apostle Paul wrote: "Exhort servants to be obedient unto their own masters, and to please them well in all things; not answering again; not purloining; but showing all good fidelity; that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things." Titus ii. 9, 10. The only recommendation that the truth of God has, is the lives of those who profess it. The theory is nothing if it is not practical. If the Gospel does not make men better in their everyday life, then there is nothing desirable about it. But the upright lives of the followers of Jesus, are the beauty, the ornament, of the doctrine of Christ. The kingdom of God is "righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost." But the bare statement of the fact is nothing; they will attract no one unless he who utters them exhibits in his own life that righteousness and peace and joy.

"Trial of Stundists" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

Russia has a summary method of bringing about unity of faith in her dominions. The Daily Chronicle Moscow correspondent has just received from a trustworthy source the following account of the trial of three leading Stundists at Valki, in the province of Kharoff:-

"The Stundist peasants, Slies, Kholod, and Filonenko, were indicted for preaching Stundism during the years 1892 and 1893. At a first glance the prisoners in the dock looked like ordinary peasants, but a nearer look showed that they were scrupulously clean and remarkably intelligent looking. One was an old man over sixty, and the other two about forty. They were well-to-do men, apparently owning a little land and garden. They had families-one of them grown up. After a few general questions, the president of the Court ordered the public to be excluded. The doors were accordingly shut in our faces, but a few friends of the prisoners were allowed to remain at their special request. The court had been crowded, and we waited about outside the doors several hours, waiting for the decision to be made known. We don't know what went on inside, but at last the doors were thrown open, and we were told that Slies and Kholod had been sentenced to be deprived of all rights and privileges, and to be sentenced to banishment to Transcaucasia, and that Filonenko had been sentenced to the temporary loss of certain specified rights, and to imprisonment for one year. The prisoners were immediately handed over to their gaolers."

"In the Days of Noah" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

"In the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and knew not until the flood came, and took them all away." Matt. xxiv. 38, 39.

In the days of Noah the wickedness of men upon the earth had become so great that every thought of their hearts was only evil continually.

"The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence." "And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth." "And it grieved Him at His heart."

No wonder that it grieved God's loving heart. Think of all that He had done for men. Think of the beautiful home that He had given them, and of the countless blessings that He had strewn about them. Think of His wonderful lovingkindness and tender mercy when they forsook Him. Think of the Way of life that He had provided for them at such great cost. Think how He had striven with them and drawn them toward Him by His Holy Spirit. And yet they would not trust Him nor accept His way of life!

No wonder that His heart ached. It would do no good for His Spirit to strive with them any longer. He had done all that Divine love could do to save them, but they put His salvation away from them, and would have none of it. They had chosen the way of death when He had done all that He could do to get them to choose the way of life.

Enoch, the man of God, had been sent to prophesy unto them of the coming of the Lord, and of the wages of sin, and to entreat them to forsake their ways and their thoughts and return unto the Lord, and He would have mercy upon them and abundantly pardon. But no, most of them preferred their own ways and the fleeting, unsatisfying pleasures of sin. They would not come unto Christ that they might have life. Therefore nothing remained for them but death, and the sooner it came the better; for were they not but heaping up misery and unhappiness to themselves and to those around them?

God's heart yearned over them and loved them, although they were so wicked, and He could not bear to see them go deeper and deeper into wickedness and sorrow when there was no hope of saving them.

The Lord therefore said, "I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping things, and the fowls of the air; . . . for the earth is filled with violence through them." "Behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and everything that is in the earth shall die."

"But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord," for "Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God."

And God told Noah to make him an ark of the strongest wood. It was to be a sort of house three storeys high, with one window in the top and one door in the side, and a bottom like a boat. And the Lord told him to put pitch upon it within and without so that it would not leak, for he and his family and two of every sort of living thing upon the earth were to stay in it during the flood, so that they might be kept alive.

But think of the wonderful longsuffering of God. That was not all that God told Noah to do. He told him to go while the ark was preparing and preach, and once more entreat those who had chosen death to turn to Him that they might have life. And God said that He would wait yet one hundred and twenty years before He brought the flood upon them!

Can you not see how God loved them, and how he hated to have them die? "As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live."

But alas, they would not turn, although Noah faithfully did according to all that the Lord commanded him. They went right on the same as ever, drinking and feasting and marrying and giving in marriage until the very day that Noah entered into the ark. At the end of the one hundred and twenty years when the ark was finished and all things were ready, among those who were alive upon the earth not one was on the Lord's side save Noah and his family!

"And the Lord said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before Me in this generation."

"And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons wives with him, into the ark; they and every beast after his kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind, and every fowl after his kind, every bird of every sort. And they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh, wherein is the breath of life. . . . And the Lord shut him in."

Notice: Noah and his family were shut in with the Lord, but the rest of the people were shut out with Satan. Why? Because Noah and each one of his family had had faith in Jesus and had chosen to be with Him, while all of the other people had rejected Jesus and had chosen to be with Satan. Each one had just what he had chosen. Which made the better choice?

At the end of seven days the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened, and the rain descended upon the earth for forty days and forty nights, just as God had said it should. And the waters increased and bare up the ark, and it was lifted up above the earth, and went safely upon the face of the waters. And the waters prevailed

334

exceedingly upon the earth until all the high hills and mountains that were under the whole heavens were covered!

"And Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark."

Too late the people on the outside believed that the flood was coming. Too late they reached out towards the ark of safety; the door was shut and they could not enter. They had no more faith in Jesus than they had before, but they were afraid to die. But they had chosen death, and death they received.

Noah's righteousness could not save them; he could deliver neither son nor daughter by his righteousness, but only his own soul. Remember this when you are tempted to think that your father's or mother's faith is going to save you. You must yield to Jesus and walk with God yourself if you are ever saved.

1. What did Cain do after he had killed Abel?-He left his father's home and went to another place. Gen. iv. 16.

2. What was the result of this?-Cain and his followers were thus separated from Adam and his followers.

3. Whose sons did those become who, with Adam, received Christ? Gen. vi. 2; John i. 12.

4. Whose sons did those remain who, with Cain, rejected Christ?-The sons of men.

5. When men greatly increased upon the earth, and the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were fair, what did they do? Gen. vi. 2.

6. What did this mingling with the sons and daughters of men, taking them right into their own families, result in?-It caused many of the sons of God to become bad too, and wickedness rapidly increased on every side.

7. How great did the wickedness finally become? Gen. vi. 5.

8. How did this cause the Lord to feel? Gen. vi. 6.

9. Why did it cause his heart to ache?

10. Name some of the things that He had done for them?

11. Could He do any more for them than He had done?

12. And yet what did they refuse to do?

13. Since they would not accept the way of life, what only remained for them?-Death.

14. Since they had fully decided to have that and nothing else, would longer life be any blessing to them?-No, only a curse.

15. Would the continued strivings of the Spirit do them any good?-No.

16. Therefore what did God in mercy say that He would do? Gen. vi. 7, 17.

17. Who only were to be saved? Gen. vi. 8, 18.

18. Why? Gen. vi. 9; vii. 1.

19. How were they to be kept alive? Gen. vi. 14-21.

20. How long would it be until the flood? Gen. vi. 3.

21. Why do you suppose the Lord waited so long?-Because of His great love and longsuffering; He wanted to give them one more opportunity to turn from the ways of death to the way of life. 1 Peter iii. 20.

22. Who was to preach to them? 2 Peter ii. 5.

23. If they would repent and have faith in Jesus, what would God do even then? Isa. lv. 7.

24. Did God take pleasure in their destruction? Eze. xxxiii. 11.

25. Did they believe it and get ready? Matt. xxiv. 38, 39.

26. How many were found ready, keeping the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus?

27. Therefore how many were taken into the ark of safety? Gen. vii. 1.

28. Who shut them in? Gen. vii. 16.

29. Which proved to be the safer place-the outside or the inside of the ark? Gen. vii. 23.

30. Why was it more safe on the inside? Because Jesus was with them.

31. How did they come to have Christ with them?-By faith. Eph. iii. 17.

32. Therefore what saved them? Their faith in Christ. Heb. xi. 7.

33. What must save us if we are ever saved?-Faith in Christ. Acts iv. 12.

34. Could not some of them have been saved by Noah's faith and righteousness?-No. Eze. xiv. 20.

35. What may we learn from that?

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

-It is said that over 200,000 books have been written about the Bible.

-Austria has twenty-six divorces to 1,000 marriages; Hungary but six.

-An earthquake in Venezuela destroyed four cities and several villages.

-Six new cardinals were created by the Pope at a secret "consistory," May 18.

-The racing cutter Valkyrie has foundered off the coast of Africa with the loss of all hands.

-Three hundred persons are reported to have been killed in a railway accident in Salvador.

-Twenty thousand sheep are reported to have perished in a terrible snowstorm in California.

-Onions are imported into this country annually to the extent of about 4,000,000 bushels.

-One hundred fresh arrests of students on political grounds have been made at St. Petersburg.

-No fewer than 30,000 persons were apprehended last year for drunkenness in the streets of London.

-The United States authorities are making active use of Federal troops in suppressing disorders caused by Coxey's "Industrial army."

-By the upsetting of a boat on the River Deben, near Ipswich, six persons, chiefly consisting of a family named Stollery, were drowned.

-The Suez Canal, the greatest work of marine engineering, is 88 miles long, and reduces the distance from Europe to India from 11,379 miles to 7,628 miles.

-The strike movement In Austria is breaking down all along the line, most of the strikes being practically at an end with adverse results to the men.

-An attempt, which uses prove successful, is being made to force the Upper House of the Hungarian Diet to reconsider the civil marriage bill and pass it.

-The Italian Government has given to an English company in Rome a monopoly of the trade in alcoholic drinks, for a consideration of 47,000,000 francs annually,

-Upwards of 50,000 tons of English and Nova Scotia coal have been purchased for consumption in New York, in consequence of the closing of the United States collieries.

-According to intelligence from Cairo, Egypt, an important trial is about to take place in which M. Ferdinand de Lesseps and other early directors of the Suez Canal Company are implicated.

-The latest statistics show that only 7 per cent, of the English people are unable to sign their names. When the Queen ascended the throne 41 per cent, of the population were unable to write.

-The police in St. Petersburg, having discovered an organisation called "The Friends of Political Liberty," are arresting its members wholesale, including officials, professors, students, and priests.

-According to intelligence received at Buenes Ayres from Rio Grande do Sul, General Saraiva with a body of 4,000 insurgents is approaching the Government forces, and an important battle is impeding.

-The Pope has resolved to take active steps to put an end to the differences between his American delegate, Sattoli, and the "reactionary" American bishops. The Pontiff is soon to deliver an important encyclical.

-Marshal Peixoto, President of Brazil, has broken off diplomatic relations with Portugal. The Portuguese Minister has had his passports handed to him, and orders have been given for the recall of the Brazilian Legation from Lisbon.

-A crisis prevails in Servia, owing to the fact that the Court of Cassation, sitting with a full bench, has declared to be null and void the Royal ukase reinstating the father and mother of the King in their rights as members of the Royal Family.

-News has reached Tripoli of serious fighting between Tuareg and Tibboos, in the neighbourhood of Kawar, the latter sustaining a loss of seventy killed. After the battle, the Tuareg, to the number of 6,000, entered Kawar, capturing 600 camels and pillaging the merchants' stores.

-Fire and flood in America have within a few days past destroyed property valued at several millions of dollars. One hundred and thirty buildings were burned in Boston, and Dr. Talmage's Tabernacle in Brooklyn. The destruction from floods was greatest in Minnesota.

-The committee of the National Liberal Federation has convened a conference of the Liberal party at Leeds, June 20, "to elicit the fullest and freest expression of opinion from those present" as to the House of Lords, and to give a "definite and concrete" expression to that feeling.

-A wealthy charitable lady left her property for the relief of the sick and poor in the past of Poland where she resided. An action was brought to exclude the Jewish population from participation in the bequest; it being seriously argued that the Jews were not human beings. The Court, however, has declared that according to law the Jews in Poland are recognised as human beings.

-The Chronicle's St. Petersburg correspondent says a whole train, specially designed for use on Continental railroads, has just been completed for the Czar at the waggon works of the Nickolai is railway. The train, which is fitted up with every conceivable luxury and comfort, consists of eleven carriages, including a magnificent dining saloon and a van for the luggage and electrical apparatus. The length of each carriage is some sixty feet. In order to diminish the danger of collision the train is supplied with breaks of three different types, viz., the Hardner, the Westinghouse, and the ordinary hand brake. Train and fittings are built entirely of Russian materials and by Russian workmen.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

It is announced that the canals of Canada are henceforth to be closed to traffic on Sundays. An order in council has been issued, closing them from twelve o'clock on Saturday night until the same hour on Sunday night.

The Chronicle says:-

Owing to the absolute objection of the Czar to the bestowal of a cross, the symbol of Christianity, upon the Jews, whom he regards as enemies of the Christian religion, a proposal is being discussed in high official quarters to add to the Order of the White Eagle about which does not have a cross in its insignia, some supplementary classes of a lower grade, which could be conferred upon non-Christians.

The Czar's ideas of Christianity are altogether too prevalent, both within his empire and outside of it. That "Christianity" which can be put into the form of a symbol, and become damaged by bestowal upon a sinner, is not the Christianity which God sent into the world for the salvation of men.

The last number of The Morning Star, a paper devoted to the subject of the restoration of the Jews to Palestine, asks all its readers to remember Israel in prayer every Saturday, adding:-

That day, the seventh day of the week, is, of course, the true Sabbath, according to the law. It will be God's Sabbath for the earth when He shall make Jerusalem a praise in the earth.

It is refreshing to find some first day observers who know, and are willing to acknowledge, that the law of God requires the observance of the seventh day of the week, and that that day is not Sunday, but is Saturday. When to that is added the knowledge that it will be the Sabbath in the time when Jerusalem is restored, and that, too, by God's appointment, we cannot see what reason they give for not keeping God's Sabbath now.

The late British Commissioner for the Sikkim-Tibet Convention thus describes a method employed in Tibet for preparing tea for drinking:-

Take a handful of bricked tea; rub it between the hands until it is well loosened, then put it in open vessel with a little water and alum or wood ashes; keep on boiling the decoction (adding a little water from time to time to counterbalance the loss by evaporation) until the infusion is black as ink; then pour into a "choonga" or long churn, filling up with boiling water, and two or three chittacks of butter and salt to taste, and churn with a wooden whisk until the mixture becomes like a rich-brown greasy soup. It looks nasty, but one can get used to it.

The statement that "one can get used to it," shows that this stuff tastes as nasty as it looks. It is astonishing what martyrdom people will undergo in order to "get used" to something which, besides being unpalatable, is unfit to be put into the human stomach.

Here is one of the reasons given by a clerical correspondent of the Church Family Newspaper, why the Establishment should be maintained:-

Any schoolboy who believes in the Bible must know that the apostles who went forth with staff and scrip lacked the spiritual power of our own bishops, for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified, and it was not till the day of Pentecost that they received power from on high.

Yet we read that the first time Jesus sent them out He "gave them power and authority over all devils, and to cure diseases. And He sent them to preach the kingdom of God, and to heal the sick." Luke ix. 1, 2. We have not yet heard of anything of this kind in connection with the bishops of the Church of England. If they had this power, it would not be spending their time begging for State support.

One of the so-called "labour leaders" of the United States is Morrison I. Swift, a man of culture, and of university education. In a speech on May Day he said:-

In Massachusetts the workingmen were brow-beaten and not heard. If things go on in this way and the rich and the law-makers turn their backs on the poor, refusing to listen to the workingmen, there will follow at an epidemic of assassination. Bombs will be exploded, and all the devices known in taking off oppressors will be the fate of our delinquent legislators and capitalists.

Even officers of the State are talking anarchy. The Secretary of State of Kansas, referring to the arrest of Corey, the leader of the "Labour Army," said:-

I want to make a prediction. It is that there will be no overt act until the next election. Then simultaneously with the returns, the flames will shoot up into the air from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and every palatial residence will be destroyed in this uprising of the people. Woe unto them who have sought to stay this tide of the past six months. The farmers are preparing for this. They are selling a horse or a bow and buying Winchesters, and many mechanics are doing the same.

It will be a wonder if some of this incendiary talk does not produce some direful results.

"It is Called Heresy" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

It is Called Heresy.-A man who really acts on the principles laid down by the Lord in His teaching is considered very peculiar by the world, and a worldly church. The German recruit who some time ago refused to be put in training to kill his fellow-men was referred to the medical authorities to determine as to his sanity. The missionary who would refuse to ask help of his consul or the authorities to punish those who misuse him or destroy his property is sometimes seriously blamed, even by mission authorities, because he is so peculiar as to pray for those who despitefully use him, instead of punishing them. Depend upon it, the man who reads his Bible and believes just what the Lord says will find himself considered very peculiar. It has always been heresy in the eyes of the great religious world to believe the Bible. The Apostle Paul really believed the Scriptures which the Jewish Church professed to believe, and he had to confess that "after the way which they call heresy," he worshipped God, "believing all things which are written in the law and in the prophets."

"An Old-Time Bazaar" The Present Truth 10, 21.

E. J. Waggoner

An Old-Time Bazaar.-Mrs. John Richard Green, writing of English town life in the fifteenth century, describes the methods of raising church funds sometimes resorted to in olden times. For example, when St. Andrews, Plymouth, was enlarged, a "church ale" was held each year, on which day the taverns were closed by the town council, and every ward made a booth in the cemetery of the church for the sale of bread and ale. All were commanded to come, bringing as many friends as possible, "for the increasing of the said ale." This was the church bazaar at its worst, perhaps. At its best, it is a humiliating way for a Christian church to raise funds. When the Gospel takes hold of people's hearts, they first give themselves to the Lord, as the Macedonian churches did, and then their love for the Lord is shown in "the riches of their liberality." The preaching of the same Gospel has the same effect to-day upon those receive it.

May 31, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

The Holy Ghost says, "To-day if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness; when your fathers tempted Me, proved Me, and saw My works forty years." Heb. iii. 7-9.

One who is on probation is being approved, for probation means proving. It is a fact, therefore, that God was on probation during those forty years in the wilderness. Nay, more, God is on probation as long as man is, because He invites men to prove Him, to see if He is not to be trusted. When He speaks of the duty of tithing, and a blessing to follow, He says, "Prove Me now herewith." Mal. iii. 10.

In the provocation in the wilderness, the Israelites were proving God by His works. He "wrought His signs in Egypt, and His wonders in the field of Zoan." Ps. lxxviii. 43. Yet "they forgat God their Saviour, which had done great things in Egypt; wondrous works in the land of Ham, and terrible things by the Red Sea." Ps. cxi. 21, 22.

And so the Lord says, "Wherefore I was grieved with that generation, and said, They do alway err in their hearts; and they have not known My ways." Heb. iii. 10. What a strange thing! They saw His works forty years, and yet did not know His ways? "As for God, His way is perfect; the word of the Lord is tried; He is a buckler to all those that trust in Him." Ps. xviii. 30.

There is no other method of learning a person's ways, than by his works. Those years in the wilderness were filled up with the wonderful works of God, all of them showing His love and His power. Yet in all that time the children of Israel, with few exceptions, did not get well enough acquainted with Him to dare trust Him. And so because of their unbelief they could not enter into His rest.

Nothing more marvellous was ever done than to cause water to gush out of a flinty rock. No doubt the Israelites wondered at the sight, and probably they acknowledged God for a little while as the Giver of it, and felt thankful to Him for supplying their needs. But it soon became an old story. As they drank of that same stream day after day, and month after month, they forgot that it had not always been flowing. As they went farther down the stream, they forgot even that it flowed from a dry rock. And so they quenched their thirst without thinking that they were beholding the wonderful work of God. For the water's first gushed from the rock was no greater miracle than its continued flow.

"Because that when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened." Rom. i. 21. This describes the Jews as well as the heathen. And does it not describe many who are called Christians? Who is there that is not every day beholding as wonderful works of God as the Israelites ever saw? If we do not daily recognise God as the direct supplier of our food and drink, because our needs are supplied by "natural" means, how much different are we from the Israelites, who got so accustomed to water that came from a dry rock, that they took it as a matter of course?

We have no reason to condemn the Israelites for their unbelief. They were not exceptional people. They are no more disbelieving than other generations have been. Instead of wondering how they could have been so foolish, let is consider if we have not been beholding the works of God for many years, without learning anything of His ways. "Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you and evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God;" "lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief."

"Tell the Lord About It" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

You find it very natural, when a very intimate friend calls, to talk over the little occurrences of the day. It is a relief sometimes to tell the perplexities that have troubled, and receive the sympathy of a friend.

If every day you would treat the Lord in this way, with the confidence and assurance of sympathy and help that you have in the case of an earthly friend, you would find Him more precious to you than tongue can tell. If you have tried it, you can bear witness to the truth of it.

When the disciples returned from the villages and towns to which they had been sent, they found the Lord, and "told Him all that they had done." Luke ix. 10. The Lord of all was not above listening to their story, either. No more will He turn from your story of the work and trials and triumphs of the day. He is the same Jesus, yesterday, to-day, and for ever.

Those who are well enough acquainted with the Lord to talk with Him all through the day about their

338

work, find that He is not only patient to hear the story, but glad to bestow the help and blessing that lightens the burden and gives rest in perplexing toil. The place of work may be in public, or within the four walls of the room at home. It may all be done as unto Him, and He will gladly give His presence in the daily tasks.

If you have not tried it, try talking over your work with the Lord. It will be a help that you have never known before, if you will treat Him as you would an intimate friend. He is not too great to notice the little things of life. It is because He is so great and good that He does do so.

"A Lesson from Real Life" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

"Therefore being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." Rom. v. 1.

"Therefore by the offence of one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one, the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous." Verses 18, 19.

"The kingdom of God is not in word, but in power." 1 Cor. iv. 20. The promises of the gift of the Gospel are not matters of mere theory, but a fact. And in order to show us the reality of the power, Jesus Christ came to earth and demonstrated it in such a way that all can comprehend it. In the life of Christ we shall find every Gospel truth illustrated. Let us see something of how the above text worked in real life.

A woman whose life had been slowly and steadily wasting away for many years, and who had spent all her living in a vain attempt to recover her health, and was only made to suffer the more from the experiments of many physicians, heard of the great Physician, and went to Him. She was tempted, and the multitude of people pressed about Jesus so closely that she could scarcely approach Him; but "she said within herself, If I may but touch His garment, I shall be whole." Her faith was rewarded, for as she touched the border of His garment, immediately she was fully healed.

Although Jesus was crowded and jostled by the people, He instantly detected that gentle touch. That touch was different from every other, because it was the touch of faith, and drew power from the person of Jesus. When the disciples wondered that in the midst of such a crowd He should ask, "Who touched Me?" He said, "Some one did touch Me; for I perceived that power had gone forth from Me." That power was the power of His life: for it supplied the woman's need, and what she wanted was life.

Here we have something that our mind can lay hold of, and our senses can appreciate. A real thing was done. Something real went from Jesus into the woman. It was not imagination; it was not a figure of speech; but it was an actual fact that the woman was healed. She had the life that she before lacked, and that life came from Jesus. We can never know what life is,-only its Author can understand it,-but we do know the need of it, even of the righteous life of Christ; and here we to see how it is obtained.

For the words of Jesus to that poor woman show that she was healed in the same way and by the same means by which we are justified and have peace with God. He said unto her, "Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace." Luke viii. 48. If we should apply the words of the Apostle Paul to her particular experience, we might read, "Therefore being made whole in body by faith, she had peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." Perhaps this may enable someone to grasp more fully the reality of the righteousness which comes by faith of Jesus Christ.

Nothing is said about forgiveness of sins in this instance, but we may be sure from other instances that such faith as the poor woman had brought healing of soul as well as the body. But no one need have a doubt as to whether this is really parallel to Rom. v. 1, and an illustration of the truth there stated, for we find the same words used with express reference to sins. In the preceding chapter (Luke vii.) we are told of the sinful woman who anointed the feet of Jesus, after her tears of repentance had washed them. Jesus did not repel her, but said to her, "Thy sins are forgiven." And then followed words almost identical with those with which He dismissed the poor woman of whom we have been reading. To the woman who was well in body, but morally diseased with sin, Jesus said, "Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace." Luke vii. 50. Compare Luke viii. 48.

This proves beyond all possibility of doubt that the same thing is done in the forgiveness of sins that was done in healing the woman with the issue of blood. The method is the same, and the results are the same. Therefore as we know that something real was done for the diseased woman, so we may be sure that something real is done for the repentant sinner. Just as something real, although invisible, went from Jesus into the person of the diseased woman, making her perfectly well and strong, even so we are to know that something real comes from Christ into the person of the repentant sinner, making him whole, and free from sin.

That something is nothing less than the actual life of Christ. "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." 1 John i. 9. "If we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin." Verse 7. The blood is the life; and so it is the life of Jesus Christ that cleanses us from sin. This is what we read in Rom. v. 10, in continuance of the statement that being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. "For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life."

Many think that the forgiveness of sins by the imputed righteousness of Christ, is something that exists only in the mind of God. Of course they acknowledge its reality, yet at the same time they do not realise it. There is always something unreal about it in their minds. The trouble is that they fail to grasp and to make real the living connection between Christ and them. There is between the true disciple and Christ a connection as real as that between the vine branch and the parent stock. The forgiveness of sins is too often thought to be illustrated by the payment of a poor man's debt by a rich friend. If a rich man pays the debt of a poor man, then the shopkeeper credits the poor man with the sum, and the record on the books shows that the debt is cancelled. Of course the poor man is benefited, but he does

339

not actually receive anything that will keep him in future. But it is different when God for Christ's sake forgives his sins.

Christ "gave Himself for our sins." Gal. i. 4. His life is given to be manifest in our mortal flesh. 2 Cor. iv. 11. Just as the sap flows through the vine to the farthest branches, and just as the life of Christ went into the poor, diseased woman, to make her perfectly well, so the sinless, endless, inexhaustible life of Christ flows into those who have faith in Him, to cleanse them from sin, and to make them walk in newness of life.

His life on earth was one of obedience to the commandments of God. John xv. 10. The law of God was in His heart (Ps. xl. 8) so that His very life was the fulness of the law. He fulfilled the righteousness of the law. Matt. v. 17. That is, the fulness, the perfection of the law, appeared in His life. And it is by this life that we are saved. It is not that we are accounted righteous because Jesus of Nazareth was righteous eighteen hundred years ago, but because "He ever liveth," "the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever," to save by the power of His endless life, all that come to Him.

Jesus fulfilled the righteousness of the law, in order "that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." Rom. viii. 4. The Revised Version reads, "That the ordinance of the law might be fulfilled in us," and gives "requirement" in the margin, as an alternative. The idea is, therefore, that Christ kept the law, in order that its utmost requirement might be fulfilled in us. Not by us, but in us: for whereas we have no power to do even what we know to be right, Christ dwelling in us does the right by His own power through all our members when we yield them to Him. This He does for all who trust Him. And thus it is that "by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous."

We may thus note two things. First, how we are made partakers of Christ's life, and second what the nature of that life is, and what it will be in us. The miraculous healing of the poor woman shows us the first. The second we learn by reading the ten commandments, and by studying the life of Christ. All that was in His life when He was on earth, is in it now, and that is what He gives to us. And that which was not in His life cannot possibly be given to us in it. Everything that is not in His life is sin, and Christ is not the minister of sin.

"Stumbling-blocksóFoundation Stones" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

"If you would only give up that idea of keeping Saturday, you might do so much more good. You preach Christ, and hold Him up in an attractive manner before the people, and if you would be content with that, you might reach thousands where you now reach tens; but your preaching that the seventh day should be kept instead of Sunday, is a stumbling-block,-a barrier to keep them away from Christ."

Thus spoke a friend to the writer a few days ago. The speaker was sincere, and was not the first one to entertain such a thought. Others have said, and many more have thought, that the preaching of the Sabbath of the fourth commandment is a barrier to prevent people from coming to Christ. "If it were not for that," say they, "you might have multitudes join your ranks." Let us examine the matter briefly.

The fourth commandment, which enjoins the observance of the seventh day of the week,-the Sabbath of the Lord,-is one of the ten. The first and second forbid the worship of any false god, and the making and worshipping of images. Would our friends say that they are stumbling-blocks in the way of people's accepting the Gospel? Perhaps not, yet to many people they are such as truly as the Sabbath ever can be.

A missionary goes to Africa. He finds the natives wholly given to idolatry. They have charms and fetiches by the thousand. He begins to preach the Gospel, presenting Christ to the poor people, who are much attracted, when, lo, he begins to talk about the worship of images, the use of charms, etc. This cools their ardour. One of the most intelligent comes to him and says: "Why do you not preach the way the Roman Catholic missionaries do? They simply present the Gospel, and do not bother the people with the law. Our people are fairly settled in the worship of these idols. To give them up would cause much inconvenience and ridicule. The Catholic missionaries allow us to use them as aides to devotion, and if you would do the same you might make thousands of converts; but as it is, you are simply presenting a barrier to keep people away from Christ. Your preaching of the law nullifies the good that your preaching of the Gospel might do."

Would any man be at a loss to know how to answer such a question? Could not every reader of the Bible point out the fact that the worship of the one true God, and Him alone, is the very object of the Gospel, and that to gain image-worshipping professors of Christianity would be a calamity?

Take the eighth commandment. It says, "Thou shalt not steal." Now there are quarters in nearly every large city, where the people live almost entirely by preying upon others. Indeed, it appears to them that they are compelled to steal, in order to live. People will not employ them because of their bad characters. Some of them would gladly reform, but they have a police record, and it is a sad fact that even many professed Christians have a strong aversion to a man who has been detected in gross sin. Consequently the path of honesty seems to be closed up to these unfortunate people.

Now a true missionary goes into the slums, and preaches Christ. But someone says to him: "You are cutting off your own usefulness in these parts, by telling the people that it is a sin to steal. Don't you see that their ancestors for generations back have been thieves, and they are trained from infancy to steal, and if they should leave off stealing they could not live? Say nothing about the stealing and you could raise up a vast congregation here, and do much good; but by making so much of the eighth commandment, you are keeping people away from Christ."

The fallacy of such talk need not be pointed out. But why are the first, second, and eighth commandments any better than the fourth? How is it that they are an essential part of the preaching of the Gospel, if the fourth commandment be against it?

In a very popular religious journal we have seen a correspondence carried on under the heading, "The Bible a Barrier." One of the writers says:-

My trade has brought me into contact with a great many fellows of my own age in London and elsewhere, and nearly all must be ranked as agnostics, simply because of the narrowness of their teachers, who have tried to force them to look upon all the Bible as perfectly true, and as all equally inspired.

So here we have another stumbling-block. How many thousands of people there are who are kept out of the church

340

solely by the Bible. There is not the slightest doubt but that the whole world would be "converted" almost in a body, if practical belief in the Bible were not made an essential part of conversion. But then what would be the use of preaching which ignored the Bible?

But this is not all. The Apostle Paul found that Christ Himself was a stumbling-block. He wrote, "We preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling-block, and unto the Greeks foolishness." 1 Cor. i. 23. "Wherefore also it is contained in the Scripture. Behold I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect, precious; and he that believeth on Him shall not be confounded. Unto you therefore which believe He is precious; but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner, and a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them that stumble at the word, the disobedient." 1 Peter ii. 6-8.

It is even so to-day. "The offence of the cross" has not yet ceased. Christ is still a stumbling-block to many. Many will be kept out of heaven, because they cannot get there without faith in Christ. If Christ were but left out, how many people would believe. Believe what?-Why, that they are about right as they are, and that they are safe in doing as they please.

Notice that although Christ is a stumbling-block, He is also "a sure foundation." What some imagine to be a hindrance to them, others find to be a support and a joy. Even so it is with the Bible and with all the commandments. For Christ is in the Word, and the law is in Christ. The law of God was in His heart, and He kept all the commandments. Ps. xl. 8; John xv. 10. To the extent that people find any one of the ten commandments a stumbling-block, to that same extent did they find Christ a stumbling-block, for His life is nothing but the perfection of the law in action.

It is the hardness of the human heart that causes people to "stumble at the law," so that the stumbling-block is in reality the stubborn heart. It was this that caused the ancient Jews to fall. See Rom. ix. 31-33; Heb. iii. 12-19; iv. 11. The one who finds a stumbling-block in the fourth commandment, would find one in anything else that seemed contrary to his inclination and convenience. Whoever will exercise "repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ" (Acts xx. 21), thus keeping "the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus" (Rev. xi. v 12), will find the stumbling-blocks removed, and will be one of those who will "raise up the foundations of many generations." Isa. lviii. 12.

"The Church and Politics" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

As an example of the untenable ground which those are obliged to taken who hold that the Church should concern herself with politics and with the affairs of the State, notice the following from an article in an Anglican journal opposing Church disestablishment in Wales:-

As a rule it is a just principle to be observed, that the Church should not take sides in politics. That is to say, that the vantage ground occupied by the Church of her Ecclesiastical organisation and resources should not be used to promote the general ends and interests of any one political party more than those of another.

The reasons why the Church should not do so are obvious. She is equally the home of all political parties, and her members who are of diverse political creeds have, within the bounds of lawful liberty, an equal right to the privileges of her Communion.

In ordinary cases, then, for the Church to take sides in politics would be unfairly to use her influential position in the Dioceses and parishes throughout the land in promoting the political ideas of one section of her members, while assuming an antagonistic attitude to those advocated by another section of her community.

Politics are of the world. But of His church Christ says, "Ye are not of the world," and "I have chosen you out of the world." John xv. 19. Christ's church is therefore not the home of all or any one of the political parties. The church has nothing to do with parties of any kind, but only with individuals. The church is the light of the world (Matt. v. 14), and as such her proper place is in the world, just as the proper place for a ship is in the water; but it is entirely improper to have any of the world in the church, just as it is to have the water of the ocean in the ship.

Being the light of the world, the church should give to the world nothing but truth; for only truth is light. Her power should be used only to promote truth. How improper, then, to assume that the church can properly further the interests of opposing political parties, thus antagonising truth, provided she does not by partiality antagonise one or the other party! Thus a political party is placed above the truth.

In the article aforesaid we are told that in view of the "attempts to dethrone the Church from her present lawful position, and to despoil her of her property," the Church "must intervene in politics, and in this matter take sides against whatever political party it may be that attempts to do her this wrong, and side with whatever political party it may be that is prepared to defend her position and property."

Now the church, that is, the Christian church, is the body of Christ. 1 Cor. xii. 27. Is the body of Christ dependent upon a political party for its defence? And can any political party deprive the body of Christ of the position in which God has placed it? Can it separate the body from the head, which is Christ Himself? If the church will only keep her "lawful position," which is that of the body of Christ, He being the Head, she has nothing whatever to fear from political parties. Her strength is in the arm of the Lord, and her property is the riches of Christ. It is only when she depends upon the "establishment" of the State instead of the power of God, that it becomes a matter of concern to her whether or not she is to have the favour of the leading political party.

When the church allies herself with a political party, or with any worldly power, she disconnects herself from God, and ceases to be the Christian church. A church cannot be at one and the same time, dependent upon God and upon the world. "Ye cannot serve God and mammon." Christ, the Head, will attend to all the wants of His body; and He has said, "All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth." Matt. xxviii. 18. Therefore it is not only absurd, but a manifestation of unbelief in the words of Christ-a slight upon her Divine Head-for the church to seek in any way the aid of any of the powers of the world.

"What the Gospel Includes" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

What the Gospel Includes.-The Gospel of God is not a narrow, circumscribed thing which can be bound off by creeds, as many people seem to think. The Gospel includes everything that pertains to the life of man. By its provisions a man is born again,-created new in Christ. Consequently his life as a Christian knows nothing that is not in touch with that creative power. For this reason the Apostle Paul wrote to his brethren in the church, "Whether therefore ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." 1 Cor. x. 31. And to the Colossian brethren he wrote, "And

341

whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him." "And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men." Col. iii. 17, 23.

The Gospel, therefore, touches our eating and drinking, and every occupation and act of life, be it business or pleasure. It makes every act a spiritual act, done with a view to the glory of God. The Christian life is a spiritual life. It is the life of Christ in human flesh,-in the individual who has put on Christ. And this does not make life a restricted thing, separated from the greater part of the life of the world around us; for all things were created by God, and intended to be used for the benefit and pleasure of man. It separates only from sin. It shows man how to use aright all things that creation affords. It reveals the spiritual aspect of all things, so that in everything God has made or ordained the individual can find Him, and that life and strength and peace which He has to bestow. It obliterates the distinction that men have set up between religion and business, making the service of God the proper business of man, by showing man how to serve God in all his business, and how to find in it all a higher pleasure than any the world has to bestow.

"Divine Drudgery" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

When the Lord said, "Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God," He plainly told us that He is glorified by any kind of work which it is legitimate for a Christian to do. This ennobles the commonest kind of toil and service.

In another place we are told, "Whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus." Col. iii. 17. Every deed is to be done in the name, or by the authority of God Himself. Can there be such a thing, then, as irksome and monotonous drudgery? No; for God is glorified in the task, whatever it may be. The end of life is to glorify God. That is the service of the angels.

These are good scriptures for the housewife who has the same daily round of duties to perform, from one year's end to another. Remember that God is glorified in all the endless details of the daily tasks. And a preacher in the pulpit who preaches the word of God can do no more than glorify Him.

This applies as well to the man or woman who is working for a master or mistress as to those who work for themselves. "Whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men; knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance." Col. iii. 23, 24. George Herbert sang truly,-

A servant with this clause
Makes drudgery Divine;
Who sweeps a room as for Thy laws,
Makes that and the action fine.

If every professor of religion really thought that every word and deed was to be in the name of God, and by His authority, there would not be two rules of conduct, one for worship and one for business. It will be found a helpful practice to ask yourself in every work or conversation in which you may be engaged, Am I doing this by the authority of God?

The Lord does not give His authority to every practice in which professed Christians often engage. It is a fearful sin to forge His name to that which He has never sanctioned. When the Lord authorises the believer to use His name in the performance of every deed and word in all the details of life, He grants a trust which cannot be lightly held. But it is a cheering thought that one may lay brick or stone, drive a nail, mend a shoe, cook a dinner, sweep a room, or add a column of figures-all to the glory of God.

"Statues in Westminster" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

It is stated that, in accordance with the express wish of the Pope, statues to St. Peter have been erected in many of the Catholic churches of Westminster, in commemoration of the reconsecration of England. Cardinal Vaughan recently "blessed" one that had been erected in St. Dominic's Priory Church, Haverstock Hill, at a cost of ?140. All this means that Catholics are in earnest in their purpose to win England back to Romish idolatry.

"Are You One of the Crowd?" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

When Jesus was on His way to the house of Jairus to raise the ruler's daughter to life, the crowd accompanying Him was so great as to throng and press Him. They were interested in His work, talking about what He had done, doubtless, and curious to see and hear more.

But their contact with Him brought no special blessing to them; and they were really in the way of the timid woman who was struggling through the crush to touch but the border of His garment. The touch brought to her actual life, and she knew it. It was the touch of faith. The same story has been re-enacted ever since. To-day it is popular, and really almost necessary, in order to be counted respectable, to talk about the Christian religion and to patronise it. The crowd is thronging about the Lord. But how many who are about Him are touching Him with the touch of faith, for the healing of the soul, and for the life that heals?

The multitude needed the life no less than the woman. But they did not feel the need. The work of the Lord was regarded only as a matter of deep interest, for intellectual discussion, and as a good thing generally. But to-day, as then, it means life to the dying, and so few realise there is daily spiritual life in touching Christ by faith. Many who long for deliverance from the power of sin are hindered from coming to the Lord for life by the formalism and lifelessness which well nigh hides the Christ from view. Yet, thank God, as the living Christ is lifted up, timid souls are pressing in amongst the crowd and finding life.

"Faith and Evidence" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

Faith is the Christian's evidence. "Faith is the substance of things not seen." Heb. xi. 1. The evidence of faith is the word of God. He who has faith will find his evidence for what he believes, in the words God has spoken. He will consider this sufficient evidence in all cases. He will not trust in anything else, for he knows that this is the only evidence that cannot lead him astray.

But he who has not faith will reject that which is evidence, and be convinced by something which is not evidence at all, and in this way he will often be deceived. The case of doubting Thomas affords an illustration upon this point. The Saviour had often declared to His disciples that He should be crucified, and rise again the third day; but, as we are told, "they understood not that saying." They did not believe what Christ said. But when the Saviour, after His resurrection, appeared to them, they called to mind what He had said, and believed that He was indeed risen.

But there was one exception-doubting Thomas. He was not with the others at the first appearance of the risen Saviour, and a spirit of unbelief ruled his heart, and found expression in the words, "Except I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and

342

thrust my hand into His side, I will not believe." John xx. 25. A few days later Thomas, while with the other disciples, had the opportunity for which he asked, and expressed his belief by saying, "My Lord and my God!" But the Saviour said to him, "Thomas, because thou hast seen Me, thou hast believed; blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed."

The evidence which Thomas in his unbelief asked for, was really no evidence at all. The evidence was in Christ's words, I will rise again the third day, and not in the fact that Thomas or any of the disciples could see nail prints and the wound of a spear in the hands and side of a being that appeared before them. This spurious evidence is the evidence which those have who believe in Spiritualism. Because the spirits assume the forms of their dead friends, and present all the characteristics manifested by the latter while living, people who see or communicate with them are led to believe that they are in reality the spirits of the dead; and thereby they entangle themselves in a fatal deception. The evidence of the truth lies not in these appearances, but in the word of God, which declares that the dead know not anything, that they have neither love, hatred, nor envy, and that their thoughts have perished. Eccl. ix. 5, 6; Ps. cxlvi. 3, 4. This evidence is that which faith accepts, for faith is belief of God's word. The other is the evidence accepted by unbelief, which casts aside the testimony of the word. And it constitutes no evidence at all.

The devil can transform himself so that he appears as an angel of light. 2 Cor. xi. 14. He could have appeared before Thomas, had he chosen, with all the outward characteristics of the crucified and risen Redeemer; but it would not have proved anything, for it would have been a lie. He was not interested in leading people to believe in the resurrection of Christ; so he had no incentive to do so. But he is interested in many schemes of deception which he carries out by means of his ability to transform himself into an angel of light. And only those who know the word of God, and depend upon it rather than upon appearances, will escape his deceptions. In other words, those and only those who have faith will have the evidence which is true. All the rest will accept as proof that which really is not evidence at all.

"Supplying Need" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

Supplying Need.-"But I am poor and needy; yet the Lord thinketh upon me." Ps. xl. 17. And He thinks upon the needy, for the purpose of supplying their need; for we are assured, "My God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus." Phil. iv. 19. But whom will He help?-Why, those who need help, of course. This was shown by Jesus when the people followed Him. "He received them, and spake unto them of the kingdom of God, and healed them that had need of healing." Luke ix. 11. It is our need that recommends us to the loving care of the Lord, and our willingness to receive that measures the amount bestowed upon us.

"Something Better" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

Something Better.-To all who are looking for something better in life, it may be truthfully said, There is something better for you to have. You may not think it to be better, and they refuse to accept it as such; but this will affect only yourself, and not the facts. There is something better than a life the brightest spots in which are the occasional "holidays," when people drop the burdens of existence for a moment only to engage in worldly dissipation and pleasure. There is something better than worldly pleasure, and that is the "love, joy, peace" which are the abiding characteristics of the life that is guided by the Holy Spirit. If we will take that Spirit, which God is more willing to give to them that ask Him than parents are to give good things to their children, we shall inevitably have its fruits; and thus our lives will be changed wonderfully for the better. You may have this; for the promise is to all, without distinction of race, sex, or condition. "Every one that asketh, receiveth; and he that seeketh, findeth; and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened."

"Justifying Meanness" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

Justifying Meanness.-A few days ago a Russian mob attacked the Jewish quarters in a Russian town, with a battle cry, "Thrash the Jews for the torturing of Christ; they have sucked our blood all the year, and won't let the orthodox do any business; now we will have our revenge." It is a very common way for men to justify their meanness by professing that they are acting for the glory of God. An eloquent member and leader of the coloured race in America, Frederick Douglass, has well said that whenever a course of conduct is too wicked to be called human, it is called Divine. The Divine purpose is said to have decreed that the white race should rule the black, etc., etc. The Divine destiny of every civilised nation has been pleaded at times in extenuation of acts of oppression and robbery, perpetrated on some weaker people. So, too, men have engaged with zest and religious persecution, satisfying the vanity of their own minds and hatred of those who differ from them, all in the name of the Lord. So little do they know of the Lord, that as He said, they think that they do God service in persecuting His children when they are really serving the devil.

"Simplicity" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

The life that God intended men to live is a simple one. When God made man He gave him a garden, and his work was to dress it and keep it. Adam was a gardener, and as such he was contented and happy. He had greater facilities for enjoyment than the greatest and most honoured men of the world have ever had. It was when man fell that he lost his simplicity and began to seek out inventions, and as we read in the Book of the Ecclesiastes (chap. vii. 29) his inventions have been many. From being natural and simple, life has in most cases come to be something highly artificial,-something which results from the running of ponderous and intricate machinery. And whenever by the wickedness or shortsightedness of men this intricate system gets out of running order, privation and want are the inevitable result.

Consider, for instance, the financial depression which prevails over the world to-day. There has been no famine, no failure of crops, no lack of any of those things which supply the necessaries and comforts of life; and yet in all the great cities are scores of thousands on the verge of starvation. There is land enough, and enough of all that which the land produces; but some hitch has occurred in the money system, and the machinery of exchange is almost disabled. The system has been carried to a point of artificiality where its efficiency is for the time almost lost; and the more its intricacy is extended, the greater will be its liability to break down and become useless, with a panic and hard times as the result.

What is needed is a return to simplicity of living, with a discarding of the artificial systems which the cupidity and folly of men have introduced.

343

How this can be done for nations and for the world, if it be possible at all, is a problem for statesmen; but the way is open for every individual in the world to return to the simplicity of life which God ordained,-the life of the Christian. The wants of the Christian, so far as they relate to things worldly and temporal, are few and simple. Faith is a simple thing, the Gospel is plain and simple, and the union of the soul with Christ is as simple as that of the branch with the vine. In the Christian life, God attends to the intricacies, and the part of man is only to believe and live, receiving life from God with a thankful heart, and doing His will in love.

"Terrible Revolt" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

A correspondent of the Daily Telegraph tells the following story:-

Thirty-eight years ago a peasant lad, named Rykoff, attended a wedding in a Russian village. He had taken too much vodka, and for some inscrutable reason he put into his pocket some wax candles from before one of the icons. This, of course, was shocking sacrilege, and the lad was sent to Siberia. He escaped, and, after enduring great hardships, obtained work from a farmer, ultimately settling in Tomsk, where he has lived an exemplary life, escaping detection by adopting the name of a deceased workman, whose passport he secured. Not long ago, the man's sons and daughters and their children gathered round him to celebrate the anniversary of the wedding. In the fulness of his heart the old man told them the story of his life. The police heard of it, and he has been arrested, and in spite of all appeals, was order to be flogged for his escape, and sent back to the mines for a longer term than the original sentence.

There will some day be a terrible revolt against this tyranny in religious guise, beside which the French Revolution will seem insignifcant.

"Incense" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

Incense.-It is well known that the use of incense in the services of the Greek and Roman and Ritualistic English churches was not borrowed from the services of the Levitical priesthood, but was taken over from the pagan ritual when the main body of the early church became corrupted and compromised with the idolatry and wickedness of the world that surrounded it. In the April Nineteenth Century, Mr. Edward Dillon has an article on "A Neglected Sense," the sense of smell, in which he describes the luxuriousness of the pagan "fast" life, and the use of incense and their revellings and services. The early Christians inveighed against these practices, and "yet for all this," he says, "the use of perfumes crept into the church, and we find the early fathers adopting an apologetic and uncertain tone on the subject." Just in this gradual and insidious way the early piety slipped away from the majority of the church, and the corruptions of heathenism crept in. Speaking of the modern use of incense in church services, Mr. Dillon says:-

Very striking is the ritual of the English Church in the extravagant use of incense. In Greece and in the Lavant so much is this the case that it produces oppression and headache to those not habituated to such an atmosphere. No doubt there is a purpose in this-the heavily perfumed air serves as a stimulus to a devotional frame of mind; so in the orgies of the later Romans, the spiced wines and the aromatics helped to promote other and baser passions. This at least is the opinion of the pious Didache. I think, too, that the heavily "drugged" look so often noticeable in the papsis of Greek convents and churches may be due in part to the constant exposure to these fumes.

"In the Days of the Son of Man" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

"As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man." Luke xvii. 26.

Did you ever stop to think why the Lord has told us so much about the days of Noah and the flood? If you will read 2 Peter iii. 5-7, 10, and 2 Thess. i. 7-9, and Matt. xxiv. 27-39, you will see why.

"By the word of God. . . the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished: but the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire."

As surely as the earth was once destroyed by water, so surely will it again be destroyed by fire; this will be done when Jesus, the Son of man, comes.

But as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the coming of the Son of man. Many will disbelieve the word of the Lord and will know not until the storm comes and takes them all away.

Therefore God has sent this particular word about the days of Noah and about the days of the coming of the Son of man, that we may study them both carefully and know how to be saved from the flood of fire.

For God is the same God to-day that He was then; He has no pleasure in the destruction of the wicked. He is just as anxious now to save each one, as He was then. And He promises, even as He did then, that He will save every one that has faith in Christ and yields himself completely to Him.

All who come to Christ shall have eternal life, for He is still the only Way of life and salvation. But if any refuse to come to Christ that they may have life, they, like the people in the days of the flood, shall have their own choice-even though it be eternal death and destruction.

It has been a long time since God first sent us word about His coming and about this flood of fire, and many are beginning to think that He has either forgotten His promise or that He never intended to keep it. As in the days of Noah, men are scoffing and making sport. They say, "Where is the promise of His coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation."

But God says, "Beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day;" the time does not seem long to the Lord, for a thousand years does not seem longer to Him than one day does to us. He says that "the Lord is not slack concerning His promise;" He has not forgotten; He is not careless about His word.

What, then, is the reason that He waits so long?

Listen, oh, listen to the wonderful reason: He says that it is because He is longsuffering to usward and not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance!

Just as His longsuffering waited and waited for long years in the days of Noah, so it is waiting now to give us all time and opportunity to choose Christ and get ready. God does not want one of us to be destroyed. He has sent us His written word and scattered its pages far and near, like the leaves of the forest. He has sent us His warning in papers and books, and by Sabbath-school teachers, and preachers of righteousness. He has drawn us toward Him and striven with us by His Holy Spirit. But the word comes now, as it did then, that His Spirit will not always strive with men. Only a little longer will He wait, and then "the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up."

My dear child, are you ready? Have you yielded yourself completely to Christ? Have you confessed all your sins? And are you daily following in the footsteps of Jesus and by faith allowing Him to help you to walk with God? Seeing that all these things shall be dissolved and burned up, what manner of persons ought we to be in all holy conversation and godliness! How careful we should be to walk even as Jesus walked in every commandment of God?

Why?

Because the promise is, "Blessed are they that do His commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city."

Jesus is preparing a beautiful city-a place of safety-for His children in that trying time. And He has promised to receive us unto Himself and take us there, when He comes, if we are found keeping the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. As He said to Noah "Come thou and all thy house into the ark," so He will say to the kingdom prepared for you."

But the fearful and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone,-on the outside the city.

As it was in the days of Noah, there will be but two classes of people,-those on the inside and those on the outside, those who are saved because they are with Jesus and those who are lost because they are without Jesus.

Oh, which side shall we be on? Who among us shall dwell safely among the devouring fire? The Lord says it is "he that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness." In other words, it is he who has faith in Jesus and walks even as He walked.

1. What kind of people lived upon this earth when it was first created? Eccl. vii. 29; Gen. i. 27.

2. What kind of people lived on it in the days of Noah? Gen. vi. 5.

3. How did God feel when He saw their wickedness? Gen. vi. 6.

4. Why did it grieve His heart?

5. What more could He do for them than He had done?

6. Therefore since there was no hope of saving them, what did He see would be the best thing for them and for those around them? Gen. vi. 7.

7. Did He take pleasure in their destruction? Eze. xxxiii. 11.

8. What did He do that showed that He loved them greatly and did not want one of them to be lost? 1 Peter iii. 19, 20.

350

9. How long did His longsuffering wait for them to turn from the ways of death and choose the way of life? Gen. vi. 3, last part.

10. What preacher of righteousness did He send to them? 2 Peter ii. 5.

11. How many chose Jesus, the Way of life?

12. Therefore only how many could be on the inside of the ark of safety? Gen. vii. 1.

13. Where were all who would not have Jesus but who would have Satan?-On the outside.

14. Which is always the safe side?-The Lord's side.

15. Therefore who only were saved?

16. Why has the Lord told us about the days of Noah and the flood? Luke xvii. 26.

17. Who is the Son of man?

18. When is His coming?-It is near even at the doors. Matt. xxiv. 29-34.

19. What kind of flood will He bring with Him? 2 Thess. i. 7, 8; 2 Peter iii. 6, 7.

20. Who only will be able to dwell safely among the devouring fire? Isa. xxxiii. 14, 15.

21. Why?-Because they will be with Jesus.

22. Where?-On the inside of the city of safety that Jesus has prepared. Rev. xxii. 14; John xiv. 2, 3.

23. Where will those be who choose Satan?-On the outside. Rev. xxii. 15; xxi. 8.

24. Therefore what will become of them? Rev. xx. 9.

25. What do some begin to do?-Scoff and say, "Where is the promise of His coming?" 2 Peter iii. 3, 4.

26. Why do they say that?

27. Has He forgotten? Is He slack concerning His promise? 2 Peter iii. 9.

28. Then why does He wait so long? 2 Peter iii. 9.

29. But will His Spirit always strive with us?

30. What will surely come? 2 Peter iii. 10.

31. Then what should we be doing? 2 Peter iii. 14, 11.

32. If we would be on the Lord's side then, on whose side must we be now?

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

-In Servia a censorship has been established over the Press.

-A smokeless locomotive has boon successfully tried in Austria.

-A destructive fire at Philadelphia has caused a loss of ?100,000.

-27,000 women are now engaged in the Post Office department of the civil service.

-A rupture of diplomatic relations between Italy and Persia is said to be imminent.

-Great damage has been caused by floods in the interior of Pennsylvania and New York.

-An insurrection is reported from San Salvador, Central America, in which large loss of life has occurred.

-Electrically operated typewriters are now in use. An instrument may be thus automatically worked at any distance.

-The crown of Bohanzin, the conquered King of Dahomey, in to repose henceforth in one of the French national museums.

-Serious disturbances have occurred in Siam, culminating in attacks upon foreign residents. Several Europeans were murdered.

-The gold coins issued from the Mint during the year amounted to ?9,266,251. The silver represented ?1,008,971, and the bronze ?47,000.

-Thirteen suicides were reported last week from Vienna within three days, most of the victims being well-to-do people.

-The arrival of Jewish families in Odessa, South Russia, for the purpose of emigrating to the Argentine Republic, continues without a break.

-It is rumoured in Shanghai that French missionaries in Hsian-fu, Shensi, have been seized, bambooed, and imprisoned by the Chinese officials.

-The Brazilian Chamber has adopted a formal resolution expressing its approval of the attitude taken up by President Peixoto in the dispute with Portugal.

-The latest intelligence from Samoa states that hostilities were imminent, and that the British and German war vessels there were awaiting orders.

-Labour riots continue in America among the miners. Labour troubles also disturb business in Europe. The discontent and restlessness is world-wide.

-Seven schooners have been wrecked in a severe storm on the coast of New Jersey, U.S.A. A terrible gale on Lake Michigan has also resulted in many wrecks.

-There is some talk of deposing the mad King Otto of Bavaria in favour of a Regent. He now imagines himself a horse and tries to bite anyone who goes near him.

-Prost in May is not a usual thing, but last week in the North and Scotland they had frost and snow. Kentish fruit growers report that the strawberry rep has been severely injured by the frost.

-Volunteers' iron-clad train, intended to prevent an enemy from landing, has been tried at Newhaven. A 10-pounder cannon was fired from an armour-plated truck without disturbing the train or rails.

-Telegrams from Corea to the Tokio Press report an uprising in Zenrado, and state that the rebels threaten to advance upon Seoul, the Corean capital. Eight hundred Chinese troops are said to have been dispatched to the scene.

-A Russian has been studying criminals, each group of which, he says, has its own particular colour of the eye. Murderers, it seems, possess 'chestnut brown' eyes; thieves slate-coloured; and vagabonds eyes of an azure-blue tint.

-Herr Dowe has been submitting his bullet-proof cloth to tests in London, before a large number of military men. No bullets could penetrate the material, although a log of oak was penetrated by shots from the same guns to a depth of three feet.

-The outlook in Servia is ominous. The King suspended the Constitution, and established rigid press censorship, which has led to plottings and discontent. Rumours of armed uprisings are circulated. The Powers are watching the situation anxiously, as the Eastern Question is always a live one.

-A new system of advertising, by means of an electric searchlight projector, was tried at Trafalgar Square. The titles of newspapers were thrown upon churches and public buildings 200 yards distant. Portraits can also be projected in the same way. This new advertising terror can also project objects on to the clouds.

-One Anarchist in Paris and six in Barcelona were executed on the same day last week. In Barcelona, it is said, a general feeling of terror prevails, lest the comrades of the executed men should attempt reprisals. The bloody scenes attending the executions are very sure to madden those who are warring against society.

-The coal porters employed at the wharves at Port Said have gone out on strike, demanding a general increase of wages. The strikers, who number some 2,000 men, are preventing those who have not joined the movement from working, and conflicts have taken place, several men being injured. Twenty of the ringleaders have been arrested.

-The student life of Russia is impregnated with germs of revolt. No matter in what direction one looks, one finds that the harsh official decrees that are so constantly being promulgated and so relentlessly enforced are spreading the seeds of discord and mutiny broadcast. Sooner or later they must bear fruit of a disastrous and far-reaching and oven sanguinary character.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

Although Italy is bankrupt, the Chamber last week voted twelve million lire for military expenditure.

He who thinks himself too good to fill the lowest position, thereby proclaims the fact that he is not good enough for anything higher.

The "Orthodox" Church of Russia is fabulously wealthy. It is said that it could pay the thousand million dollars of the Russian debt, and not impoverish itself.

There is a good deal of truth suggested by the announcement of a minister across the border: "Weel, friends, the kirk is urgently in need o'siller, and as we have failed to get money honestly, we will have to see what a bazaar can do for us."

A few years ago the study of the Bible was introduced into the theological course at Yale college. The Rev. Joseph Chandler, writing to the Congregationalist of the innovation, says: "Not only has it not proved prejudicial to piety, but in the meetings of the students there are frequent testimony as to the effect that the Bible study at Yale has been instrumental in saving men from a lapse into religious doubt and indifference." What a comment upon the theological teaching of one of the leading seminaries, that the study of the Bible is introduced as a doubtful experiment, and a minister of the Gospel testifies, without any thought of sarcasm, that it has actually been beneficial, and has "not proved prejudicial to piety"!

Some comment has appeared in the Daily Chronicle, under the heading, "Human Vivisection," upon the recklessness with which many surgeons undertake operations which cannot benefit the patient, but are only tests of the surgeon's skill. A surgeon writes: "It would be to the advantage of the medical schools to teach practical medicine more than theoretical medicine, and to rely on common sense more than the knife and physic. At present every three months some 500 qualified men are let loose on the public, who have no idea of practical medicine."

What a lesson Jesus set for us when in response to the request that the thousands who had followed Him should be sent away to buy food for themselves, He said to His disciples, "Give ye them to eat." How astonished they must have been. They had scarcely enough for their own wants, and here was a multitude to be fed. Nevertheless they did feed them. They had no power themselves, but when they received the bread from the hands of the Master, it was sufficient for all.

The Lord says to us, "Feed My sheep." There are multitudes of them, lost and hungry, and we ourselves are poor and weak; yet if we receive the bread of life direct from the great Shepherd, we may be able to feed all. This is the condition of the servants of Christ: "As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things." 2 Cor. vi. 10.

Although God had given the Israelites light in their dwellings, while the Egyptians were groping in darkness; He had saved their cattle alive, while the cattle of their oppressors were destroyed by the plague and by the hail; He had preserved their growing crops, while just over the line the crops of the Egyptians were destroyed by hail and by the locusts; "He clave the rocks in the wilderness, and gave them drink as out of the great depths. He brought streams also out of the rock, and caused waters to run down like rivers" (Ps. lxxviii. 15, 16);-yet still they sinned against Him, saying in their blind unbelief, "Can God furnish a table in the wilderness?"

"Ecclesiastical Millinery" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

Ecclesiastical Millinery.-The Bishop of Lebombo (Church of England), assisted the other day at a "solemn function," as the Church Times says, "vested in rochet, stole, pectoral cross, cloth of gold, cope, and orphreyed mitre." "Before the sermon the Bishop divested himself of cope and mitre, and assumed a purple biretta, his chaplains attending him to the pulpit." And the church was filled with people who have access to the New Testament.

"Abolishing the Law" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

Abolishing the Law.-Lodging-house keepers in the Isle of Man have long violated the law prohibiting them from selling beer, and now, in view of that fact, the authorities have abolished the law. The Echo says:-

The Manx legislators have a curious way of getting out of a difficulty. You have only to flagrantly and persistently break their laws, and they introduce a measure to remove the law you break.

A government that carried this principle out in every law would of course cease to exist, and be no government at all. But do not some people charge just such folly upon the Divine government, when they tell us that Christ abolished the law of God at the cross? Many urge this in order to excuse themselves from obedience to the law. But the apostle says, "Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law." Rom. iii. 31.

"With Lavish Hand" The Present Truth 10, 22.

E. J. Waggoner

With Lavish Hand.-Who that has a heart can spend a day in the country at this season of the year, when the showers and sun have given vegetation a vigorous stirring into life, without feeling the spirit of the sixty-fifth psalm springing up within him? "Thou makest it soft with showers; Thou blessest the springing thereof." How lavish God is in multiplying the variety of plant life! A foreign journal says:-

It is remarkable how the progress of geographical exploration is adding to our knowledge of the vegetable world. A few years ago it was authoritatively stated that the number of plants known to and described by botanists was 100,000; but the southern part of our continent and Eastern Asia are turning out novelties in great numbers. Works devoted to these topics are continually describing them. It is not improbable that one-half have not yet been known.

And the lavishness with which the Lord causes the earth to bring forth its fruit is only an illustration of the way in which the fruits of righteousness would spring forth in the hearts of men if they were as submissive to the Divine power as the earth is.

June 7, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

When Jesus had fed five thousand men, besides women and children, with five loaves and two small fishes, and they had all eaten till they were satisfied, He said to His disciples, "Gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost."

Here was more than an ordinary lesson in economy. It is doubtful if anyone would of thought of saving the remnants of that dinner, if Jesus had not spoken of it. If any thought were given to it, it would naturally have been on this wise: There is no use in bothering with these little fragments, when we have one with us who can miraculously supply us with abundance. But Jesus in this has shown us that while He supplies our need, He does not pledge Himself to supply our extravagance. We must show our appreciation of His bountiful gifts, by not squandering them.

The men who saw how easily Jesus had provided food for the multitude, at once resolved to take Him and make Him their king. Here was such a king as they desired,-one who could assure them a living. They felt sure that they would never be troubled with a scarcity of provisions, with Him for their king, no matter whether the season was good or bad. A good living, without any work, has been the desire of certain classes, even till this day. People will readily profess faith in Christ, when they are led to believe that Christianity consists in being supported without any effort on their part.

But Jesus frustrated their designs, by taking Himself out of their way. They had entirely mistaken His mission. When they found Him the next day on the other side of the sea, He reproved them for seeking Him because of the loaves and fishes. He wished to be followed for His own sake, for the rich spiritual blessings that He could bestow, and not for merely temporal supplies.

There are many to-day who are making the same mistake about Jesus that the Jews of old made. Even Christian ministers are falling in with the idea, and are causing the people to believe that Christianity means short hours and long wages. They are trying to catch the masses with the promise of abundance of loaves and fishes. By such inducements they are only preparing the people for a bitter disappointment, and for rejecting Christ as fiercely as the Jews did when they found out that He would not serve their selfish ends.

It is true that Jesus has promised that all needful things shall be given to us, but the first thing is to seek the kingdom of God, and His righteousness. He does not promise wealth nor even comfort in this life. It is enough that the disciple be as his Lord, and He had not on earth a place of His own whereon to lay His head. With power to feed others, He was dependent on the kindness of friends for His own daily food. The reproach of the Jews, as He hung on the cross, was true, "He saved others; Himself He cannot save." He came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many.

"Heaken, my beloved brethren, Hath not God chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which He hath promised to them that love Him?" James ii. 5. The portion of Christ's followers is in this life poverty of worldly goods, and the riches of His grace; but in the world to come they will have possessions far beyond the utmost stretch of human and imagination. "He that overcometh shall inherit all things."

"Do You Know Him?" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

Those who have read Job's declaration of faith in the second coming of the Lord, in Job xix., without noticing one of the marginal readings, have missed a beautiful thought.

The patriarch says: "I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the latter day upon the earth; and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God; whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another [margin, a stranger]; though my reins be consumed within me." The marginal rendering is the literal one.

"Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not a stranger." Can you say that? Is Jesus Christ a stranger or a familiar friend to you? He reveals Himself as a friend, tender and homely and true, and yet many who serve Him with the lips do not dare claim close acquaintance with Him. The heart rather shrinks from the thought of meeting Him.

But He is the friend of all, and those who seek Him know His voice, His comfort, and His love. He is no stranger, but a friend, with whom they walk and talk every day. When the disciples and those early followers of the Lord are raised from the dead at the coming of Christ, they will meet "this same Jesus" from whom they

354

parted at Bethany, as the cloud received Him from their sight. Acts i. 11.

He comes in all the glory of the Father, a glory so bright that it is a consuming fire to the wicked (2 Thess. ii. 8), and crowned with many crowns, attended by all the holy angels. But He is the "same Jesus." And we now can become acquainted with Him the same as the first disciples did; for the promise is, "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." He is the helper and friend in every work and every trial.

Many make the mistake of thinking that a formal profession and the performance of a few ecclesiastical rites insure their salvation, and they therefore put off getting acquainted with the Lord until they expect to enter heaven. But the Lord can receive only those who know Him; the brightness of His presence cannot be endured by any who are strangers to His love and grace, and to some He must say "I never knew you." Now is the time to get acquainted with the Lord.

"Full Surrender?" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

Full Surrender.-Many are found who are willing to follow the Lord a little way; perhaps as far as the multitude goes; many are willing to give up some of their old ways if they may but hold to some; but the first and only thing to be settled in the service of Christ is whether you are willing to take His way and follow His word or not. To meet the desire of human nature for some half-way round of service, the standard of Christian living is too often lowered. The Christian well said in a recent number:-

Our Lord and Master never yielded to any accommodation, or to any minimising of His claims. We must adjust ourselves to Him, not Him to us. To obtain adherents by lowering the Divine standard would be to fill the Church with doubtful professors, who would soon destroy every particle of life she possesses. At the very threshold the question must be settled as to who is to rule-the Master or the disciples, the servant or the Lord. "Leave all and follow Me," is His unvarying demand made on every soul man. A missionary to the Hindus noticed that in every case where a convert returned home "to bid farewell" to father and mother before confessing Christ, he either failed to confess Him, or, having confessed Him, sometime afterwards proved unfaithful. We are making the service of Christ hard by not insisting upon complete surrender to Him, for it is hard only to such as do not give Him all.

Are you willing to follow Christ and His life of obedience to His Father, although it means giving up all? Many sing and talk about giving up all to the Lord; but when He takes them at their word, and reveals to them their duty in His word, they often find it a hard struggle to believe that the Lord really means what He says. Decide for the Lord, once for all, and cleave to Him, whether the world or a worldly church smiles or frowns.

"The Divine Reckoning" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

This is the reckoning by which gain or loss, success or failure, is computed in the Christian life. It is mentioned by Paul in his letter to the church at Philippi where he says: "What things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord." Phil. iii. 7, 8. This is the reverse of human reckoning. It must be so, because the life that is so successful by human reckoning, is a failure from the standpoint of Christianity; and vice versa. But it is the only wise and correct reckoning, being the only one based on actual facts and not on appearances. It is obvious that a change from one method to the other must produce a marked effect upon an individual's life, and at first glance it may seem to be a change for the worse. To count as loss all that has been considered gain is seemingly not a desirable plan to adopt; yet viewed from the standpoint of faith, its advantages over the human method of reckoning gain and loss are clearly apparent.

If those things which the world considers gain are counted as a loss for Christ, there will be far less incentive in the mind to devote valuable time and energy and effort to obtain them. Instead of striving for that which is uncertain, the individual will seek for that which cannot fail to reward their earnest, persevering and well-directed effort. Instead of seeking for temporal things which can never satisfy the longings of the soul, he will seek for honour, and glory, and immortality at the right hand of the throne of God. And in this he will have the assurance of the infallible One that "he that seeketh findeth;" for he seeks only for that which God is most anxious and abundantly able to bestow upon him.

And while He counts as loss what before was gain, he can also count as gain that which before was a great loss. On this side of his account he can reckon all such things as trials, disappointments, temptations, and afflictions. This is gain indeed, for it enables him to turn all his sorrow into joy. And sorrow, far more than joy, is the natural heritage of man. In the world he has tribulation, but in Christ he finds comfort and peace. In Him we find the ills of our lives swallowed up and lost in the sea of bitterness which He endured for us upon the cross. "He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows," and in Him we lose all sorrows and disappointments, and gain all happiness. The credit side of the account is swelled by all circumstances, even those which seem the most forbidding; for "all things work together for good to them that love God." Rom. viii. 28.

The difference between the human and the Divine reckoning is the difference between the feverish struggle for that which is elusive and uncertain, and the simple reception of that which is certain and satisfying, by trust in God. It is the difference between chasing shadows and acquiring the substance. It is the difference between knowing and not knowing the one from the other,-between reckoning that to be gain which is truly gain, and mistaking the gain for that which is only loss. The rule is, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these [temporal] things shall be added unto you." Having the righteousness of God, we have Jesus Christ, and having Him, we have the substance of all things valuable, satisfying, and enduring.

"Appealing to the Vatican" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

Every year sees the wish of the English High Churchman for closer outward union with Rome nearer fulfilment. He repudiates the name of Protestant, and with considerable force of logic argues that his church never repudiated the Catholic idea of the supreme authority of the councils and the visible church.

One thing that has troubled many who wish to be in union with the see of Rome has been the fact that Rome haughtily holds off the Anglican "priest," and denies the validity of his "orders." Overtures on this point are being made, and it is possible the Vatican may see a way by which it can receive back those Anglicans who are yearning for union, without requiring them to sacrifice the little point of honour which now stands in the way. The Chronicle says:-

Our Rome correspondent telegraphs that a communication signed by numerous Anglican clergymen has been sent to the Vatican asking for enlightenment upon certain points. The first of these is a request that a congregation of cardinals approved by the Pope should take up the Anglican question, and authoritatively deny the

355

"Branch" theory, which detains so many clergymen who would be ready to be reconciled to the Holy See. The query of the validity of Anglican orders is again put. It is maintained that, although the Roman Catholic Church considers a mere historical circumstance like that of Parker's consecration outside its province, the propagation of the fact that ordinations of Anglican clergymen sub tacita conditione is forbidden would clear up the matter. In conclusion, the document supplicates by all and every means the founding of a Uniat Anglican Church, into which crowds of doubting High Churchmen would enter.

The lines are being drawn closer and closer, and Christians must ere long decide just where they will stand-for Rome, and human traditions, and the authority of what is called the church, or for God, and His word, as the Spirit of God opens it to the understanding.

"God's Word to the Poor Rich and the Rich Poor" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

The vast increase of labour disputes in all countries shows that the wage-earners of the world are learning their strength, and are resenting the control of the wealth of the world by the few. From what we already see, and from the testimony of history, and by the word of God, we know that the fear of the Lord will not keep the selfish rich from covetousness nor the selfish poor from methods of violence.

Now is the time, as never before, for those who do fear the Lord to keep clear from the prevailing evil; for in these days we are told that times are especially perilous, because men are "lovers of their own selves, covetous," and the warning is given to Christians in order that they may not partake of the spirit of the times.

The coming of the Lord is surely drawing near. The woe that will then come upon those who have spent their God-given powers to amass wealth is thus spoken by the prophet:-

"Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten. Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days." James v. 1-3.

The word goes on to state that the rightful hire of the labourers has been kept back by fraud. Not unnaturally, such a course as this leads to dissatisfaction and strife, and the conflict is already begun. The passions of the natural heart lead on both sides of the strife, and the natural heart never works according to the Golden Rule. The attitude of the really Christian man who suffers under the oppression of the mighty and powerful is shown by the apostle when he says to the oppressors, "Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you."

The principle of non-resistance, which Christ taught by precept and example is popularly supposed to be obsolete; but in the text just quoted the Lord lays it down as the rule for us in these last days. At the time when men are banding together to fight for their rights after the manner and methods of the world, His counsel to us is:-

"Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain. Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts; for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. Grudge not one against another, brethren, lest ye be condemned: behold, the judge standeth before the door." Verses 7-9.

Christians are not to be found fighting with the worldly for this world's possessions when the Judge of all is even at the door. There is wisdom in the fifth chapter of James for every one of us in these unsettled times.

"What Does It Mean?" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

What Does It Mean?-As Jesus was coming down from the mount of transfiguration, with Peter, James, and John, "He charged them that they should tell no man what things they had seen, till the Son of man were risen from the dead. And they kept that saying with themselves, questioning one with another what the rising from the dead should mean." Mark ix. 9, 10. What did it mean?-It meant just that, and nothing else. But they were sure in their own minds that it could not mean that Christ should really die and rise again, and so they kept wondering and speculating as to what it could mean. And that is the way that thousands of the followers of Christ are doing to-day. They read something in the Scriptures and straightway they ask, "What does this mean?" They feel quite sure that it must have some mysterious meaning different from what the words themselves indicate, because they have it settled in their minds how it must be, and are sure that the thing actually declared cannot ever take place. Thus they miss the instruction and comfort of the Scriptures, and are unprepared for the things that come. If the disciples had learned to take the Lord at His word, they would not have been thrown into such confusion when He was crucified. They learned better afterwards; let us learn now from their example to believe that the word means what it says.

"Not Justified by Works" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

"But you know we are not justified by the law, but by faith; no works of our own are of any effect whatever." These are the words with which many seek to parry the force of the commandment which says, "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy works; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work." Ex. xx. 8-10.

It is strange that nobody ever thinks of urging this as a reason for not keeping Sunday, even when Sunday is supposed to be enjoined by the fourth commandment; but as soon as it appears that the only day indicated in the commandment as the day to be observed, is the seventh day of the week, immediately we are told that we cannot be saved by the works of the law; and that is supposed to absolve us from all necessity of keeping "the Sabbath according to the commandment." Let us give this matter a little careful examination.

There is nothing made more clear in the Bible than that no man is justified by works, but that justification is wholly by faith. "For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast." Eph. ii. 8, 9. "For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another. But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; which He shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour; that being justified by His grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life." Titus iii. 3-7.

"All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." Rom. iii. 23. "The carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God,

356

neither indeed can be." Rom. viii. 7. "We are all as an unclean thing; and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags." Isa. lxiv. 6. "Being justified freely by His grace, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God hath set forth, to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God." "Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith, without the deeds of the law." Rom. iii. 24, 25, 28.

These texts show plainly that no works of man have any effect in securing his justification. But do they discredit the law?-Not by any means. "Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid; yea, we establish the law." Rom. iii. 31. The law is the only standard of justice; because, "not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified." Rom. ii. 13. Christ's righteousness is perfect obedience to the law, which is within His heart. John xv. 10; Ps. xl. 8. Christ dwells in the heart by faith (Eph. iii. 17), and it is His presence in the heart that justifies us, as we by faith take His life instead of our own. So we are justified by faith, because faith brings Christ and His obedience into the heart and life.

Now let us read something in continuation of texts already quoted. The apostle tells us that we are not justified by works, "for we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained (prepared) that we should walk in them." Eph. ii. 10. The good works come as soon as we become new creatures in Christ.

Again: "This is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works. These things are good and profitable." Titus iii. 8. How are we to maintain good works?-By faith, just as we received them; for we are exhorted, "As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him." Col. iii. 6.

The case, then, is simply this: The law is the standard of righteousness; but the law is spiritual, and we are carnal (Rom. vii. 14); it is the perfect righteousness of the Holy Spirit, and therefore infinitely above us. Our best efforts are only violations of it. But Christ is the righteousness of God, because He is God. The law of God is therefore His very nature. He was made flesh, and dwelt among us (John i. 14), being in all things "made like unto His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest, in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people." Heb. ii. 17. He is "the wisdom of God, and the power of God," as well as the righteousness of God; and therefore "what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh." What for?-"That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us." Rom. viii. 3, 4.

Thus we see that although we are not justified by the works of the law, we are by no means justified in ignoring and transgressing the law. Christ has called us unto liberty, but not that we should make that liberty an occasion to the flesh. Gal. v. 13. We find our liberty only in seeking His precepts. Ps. cxix. 45. "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty" (2 Cor. iii. 17), and "the law is spiritual;" therefore only in obedience to the law, which is found in Christ, is there true liberty.

In closing, let us see how the argument which is brought against the Sabbath, as noticed at the first, will work when applied to some of the other commandments besides the fourth. The idea is that since we are not justified by the works of the law, therefore we are not required or expected to keep the commandment which says, "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy;" and which tells us that the seventh day is the day upon which we should rest. Now the third commandment says, "Thou shall not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain." Suppose I am a swearer, and someone who hears me take the name of God in vain reminds me of that commandment. But I reply, "Ah, do you not know that we are not justified by the works of the law, but by faith? Christ has set me free from the law, and therefore I swear; I dare not keep that law, lest I be brought into bondage." Would not my reprover be shocked at my blindness, which would justly seem to be almost, if not quite, blasphemy? and would he not tell me that Christ died for the express purpose of saving me from the sin of swearing? And if I should plead the same excuse for lying and stealing, he would tell me that faith in Christ does not warrant me in breaking the eighth and ninth commandments, but that it is for the purpose of saving me from those, and from all other sins.

We are not justified because we do not take the name of God in vain; yet no one would on that account risk his salvation by swearing. We shall not be saved simply because we do not steal; but few, if any, would expect to be saved if they were thieves. We cannot be justified by the ninth commandment; yet we have a positive statement that all liars shall perish. No one can claim admission to heaven on the ground that he has never killed anybody; but it is as certain that no one would think of basing a claim to heavenly glory on the fact that he was a murderer. So while we are not justified by the fourth commandment, we are not therefore justified in breaking it. Christ saves men to obedience.

Reader, are you one of those who have been "partial in the law"? If so, stop and ask yourself why you have any more right to disregard the fourth commandment than you have to disregard the third. "The law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good." This true of the whole law, and not merely of a portion of it. May you therefore be one of those of whom it will be said, "Here is the patience of the saints; here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus." Rev. xiv. 12.

"Tobacco and Blindness" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

Tobacco and Blindness.-An evening paper says:-

Captain Abney, the photographic specialist, has been telling an audience at the Royal Institution that smoking, when indulged in by persons who are not physically very robust, may produce temporary colour blindness. It seems that those who are "tobacco blind" can correctly pick out and name the blue pellets in a number of different ones, but all other colours they inaccurately describe as white.

It requires a good constitution to use tobacco without very apparent evil effects. And unbiased physicians of extensive practice bear witness to the fact that many robust constitutions have been weakened by tobacco. The evil effects of tobacco using, as the effects of intemperance, are not always directly apparent, but no man can inhale an active and virulent poison, such as nicotine is, without injury.

"The Descent of Man" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

The Descent of Man.-"The Ascent of Man," as a new book is called, is a subject which many are congratulating themselves upon, because of the superior intelligence of men of the present day which enables them to correct the Bible record of man's creation and

357

history. A wise man of old, to whom was given wisdom greater than to any other man, spent his life in studying man from another point of view than that occupied by modern scientists, who confessedly base their attempts at argument upon the assumption. As to the result of the wise man's study, we are told, "Lo, this only have I found, that God hath made man upright: but they have sought out many inventions." Eccl. vii. 29. The descent of man always comes when he becomes vain in his imagination. Professing himself to be wise, his foolish heart is darkened. The first chapter of Romans tells how men with true knowledge can degenerate into barbarism in process of time, and it also tells of the power that can redeem man from barbarism and sin. The only "ascent of man" that there is will be found to be due to obedience to the Gospel.

"Worse than Serfs" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

Worse than Serfs.-Slavery is just as galling when it is called freedom as when given the proper name. The slaves were freed by proclamation in the Southern States of America, but many of them are not allowed to exercise freedom. The serfs in Russia were freed many years ago, but the same disregard of the rights of others which characterises the treatment of Dissenters in Russia, allows the tyranny over the peasants which makes them worse than serfs. A paper says:-

Not a few of the Russian nobles are returning to their lands, but they find themselves strangers amidst a sullen and distressful population. The divorce between the monjik and the boyar has been complete since the latter has abandoned his estate to live at St. Petersburg. The forty-five millions of rubles squandered in European watering-places between 1860 and 1870 gave Russian nobles a reputation for generosity, but their tenants tell a different tale. In the days of serfdom they were better off. Their master at least took an interest in them as property. But of late they have been utterly abandoned to famine and disease. The social question will be battled fiercely some day in Russia.

"Not of Man" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

Not of Man.-The writer was once talking with an infidel, who, in the course of the conversation, referred to the course which one of his neighbours had taken in a business transaction. That action referred to was evidently dishonest, and the infidel said with some warmth, "Now I don't think there was any Christianity in that." "Of course there was not," was the reply, "but the fact you think so, shows that you know that Christianity does not sanction such things. It shows that you know in your heart that Christianity is good; why then do you not accept and practise what you know to be the truth?" This was a new way of looking at the matter, and he acknowledged that he had no excuse.

The Gospel does not derive its character from the character of the men who profess it. It comes from God. Men may live ungodly lives, but that does not disprove the Bible. On the contrary, it makes the truth the more vivid by the contrast. Men may deny the faith; they may apostatise and say that it is all a sham; but that does not shake the Gospel any more than it would make the fortress of Gibraltar fall down if some of the men who are now stationed there should desert, and say that it is built on cardboard. It is solid rock, no matter what may be said of it.

So whenever we hear that some professed follower of Christ has dishonoured the name, or is teaching some wild doctrine, we can say as Paul said when some fell into the error of supposing that the resurrection was already past, "Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure." God is true, and His word is sure, though every man be false.

"Judaism and Christianity" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

Many people speak about "Judaism," who have very faint ideas of what it is. When they hear of some who keep the Sabbath according to the fourth commandment, they speak of them as "Judaising," because they think that Judaism means the religion enjoined in the Old Testament. But that is a great mistake.

Judaism means the religion of the Jews; but neither in the days of Christ and the apostles, nor since that time, have the Jews understood and believed the teaching of the Old Testament. If they had, they would have been Christians; for the religion of the Old Testament is Christianity.

Jesus said to the unbelieving Jews: "Had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed Me; for he wrote of Me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe My words?" John v. 46, 47. From these words we learn that the Jews did not believe the writings of Moses. Therefore it is evident that the religion of the Jews-Judaism-was not and is not the religion taught by Moses. The religion taught by Moses was that which he received directly from the Lord, and it set forth Christ and Him only.

The Apostle Paul says that in his earlier days he made great progress in "the Jews' religion," "being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions" of the fathers. Gal. i. 13, 14. The Jews' religion, therefore, or Judaism, consisted in following tradition. But this was directly opposed to Old Testament teaching, for Jesus told them that by their traditions they made void the commandments of God (Matt. xv. 3), and said of them, "In vain do they worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." Verse 9. Here again we see that Judaism is the rejection of the Old Testament, instead of the acceptance of it. No man, therefore, who faithfully follows the religion of the Old Testament, can be called a Judaiser. On the contrary He is a Christian.

Again, the Apostle Paul tells us that a veil was upon the hearts of the Jews, even in the days of Moses, so that they could not understand what Moses delivered to them. See 2 Cor. iii. 13-16. He says, "Even unto this day, when Moses is read, the veil is upon their heart." But he adds that when the heart turns to the Lord the veil is taken away. This shows still further that the religion of the Old Testament is Christianity, and that the Jews, who reject Christ, do so solely because they do not really believe the writings of Moses.

What then is Judaism?-It is the rejection of the Gospel, as set forth in the Old Testament, and a following of tradition. When therefore we find people who know that the fourth commandment requires the observance of the seventh day of the week, commonly called Saturday, and who keep Sunday instead of that day, although they know that the Scriptures nowhere sanctions it, either in the Old Testament nor the New, but that Sunday observance stands wholly on tradition and custom, we may know that they are following the essential principles of Judaism, which consists in substituting tradition for the commandments of God. They may differ from the Jews in regard to the tradition which they follow, but they are one with them in principle.

Further: we have read the words of Jesus to the Jews, telling them that they could not believe Him, because they did not believe Moses. The reason is that Moses wrote of Christ. It is evident, therefore, that they who do not see Christ in the Old Testament, even in the writings of Moses, do not understand and believe the Old Testament. But they who

358

do believe the Old Testament, including the writings of Moses, do not really believe in Christ. Therefore they who reject the Old Testament writings, do really also reject the New Testament. They are in precisely the same condition as the Jews, for both fail to see Christ in the Old Testament.

Every word of God is pure and true, and has life. A person, therefore, who knows only a very small portion of the Bible, may know and believe in Christ. But it is impossible for any to be real believers in Christ, when they reject any portion of the word which He has spoken, and which testifies of Him. And it was His Spirit that testified in all the writers of the Old Testament. 1 Peter i. 10, 11.

Let no one fear that by keeping the commandments of God, as set forth in the Old Testament, he will be a Judaiser. He cannot keep those commandments except by faith in Christ. They are in Christ, and Christ is in them. The keeping of the commandments of God, by the faith that appropriates the life of Christ, is true Christianity. He kept the commandments (John xv. 10), and He is the same to-day that He was when on earth in the flesh. Heb. xiii. 8. All that He did on earth was in order "that the requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us." Rom. v. 19. "He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself also so to walk, even as He walked." 1 John ii. 6.

"The Sure Word" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

The transfiguration on the mount was a miniature representation of the coming of the Lord in glory, to raise the righteous dead (represented by Moses who was raised from the dead Jude iv.), and to translate the living (represented by Elijah, who was translated without seeing death). Ever after that memorable day, the coming of the Lord must have been a more vivid reality to Peter, James, and John, than it had been before. Jesus said to them, "When the Son of man shall come in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the throne of His glory," and now these three disciples could realise what that glory would be. They had been eye-witnesses of His majesty, and had beheld the glory of His coming.

Perhaps some may be inclined to say, "If I could have such evidence as that, I should have no doubt about the matter. If I could only see for myself, I should know that these things are so." Well, now read what Peter says immediately after his reference to the transfiguration:-

"We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts; knowing this first, that no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man; but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." 2 Peter i. 19-21.

Our eyes may deceive us, but the word of God "liveth and abideth for ever." It is something that is more sure than anything that man has seen; it is something that comes direct from "the Spirit of truth." Men's eyes may deceive them; but the word of prophecy does not depend upon any human faculty; it "came not in the old time by the will of man; but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." Men were simply the unresisting mouth-pieces of the Spirit of God; it spoke the words, and they had no voice in the matter.

An instance of how the prophecy came not by the will of man, is afforded by the case of Balaam. It is true that Balaam was not a "holy man of God;" but the fact that he intended to pronounce a curse makes it more apparent that the prophecy came not by the will of man. Balaam was tempted by the promise of a great reward to go and curse Israel, but God, in His great love for His people, "turned the curse into a blessing." When Balak reproached Balaam for not cursing Israel, the latter replied, "If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the commandment of the Lord, to do either good or bad of mine own mind; but what the Lord saith, that will I speak." Num. xxiv. 13.

While Balaam was thus passive in the hands of the Lord, he uttered this prophecy: "I shall see Him, but not now; I shall behold Him, but not nigh; there shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Sceptre shall rise out of Israel, and shall smite the corners of Moab, and destroy all the children of Sheth. And Edom shall be a possession, Seir also shall be a possession for his enemies; and Israel shall do valiantly. Out of Jacob shall come He that shall have dominion, and shall destroy him that remaineth of the city." Num. xxiv. 17-19.

Here we have one instance of the "sure word of prophecy" concerning the conduct of the Lord. Considering the circumstances under which it was uttered, it is a notable instance. It shows most fully that prophecy has in it nothing of the human, but is wholly Divine. No human frailty enters into it, but it comes direct from the Holy Spirit. Thus it is "more sure" than human eyesight. For this reason it is that it was said: "If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead."

"A Flower Club" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

A Flower Club.-The beauty of the flower is the beauty of the Lord, just a little glint of His glory. This is the reason why flowers and all that is beautiful in nature have a ministry that gives the beholder a hint of righteousness and purity, and influences him for good. Therefore it is a good work to put a bright flower in a cheerless room. The most unsentimental soul, that is not wholly darkened and sodden with sin, somehow feels that there is such a thing as purity and

360

holiness present. The other day in Shoreditch 475 children were presented with as many pots of geraniums. An evening paper says:-

In one of the larger schoolrooms were marshaled the children, and the Rev. Osborne Jay, the vicar of the parish (Holy Trinity, Shoreditch), first gave the children some simple and exceedingly practical advice on the management of their plants, and then distributed them. Each plant is to be brought back during the second week in July, when an East-end flower show, certainly the first of its kind, will be held, and prizes will be awarded to those children who have brought their plants to the greatest perfection. It would be interesting to follow the plants home, for a more interesting assortment of owners could not well be found. Nearly everywhere was an attempt at cleanliness, but rags were the prevailing garb, among the boys particularly. Belonging as they do to a parish which is said to consist almost entirely of the criminal classes, there was a prevailing air of restlessness and nervous energy totally wanting in, say, the same class of Bethnal-green children. Their eyes and their tongues are those of the typical London ragamuffins.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

-A Russian legislation to the Vatican has been definitely established, with M. Isvoleky as minister.

-It is becoming the custom in America to plant memorial trees to prominent men and others, instead of erecting statues.

-Disastrous floods are reported on the Fraser River, British Columbia, many lives having been lost and much destruction of property caused.

-An interesting movement is on foot in Russia, to erect a great national church and monastery at the source of the Volga, in the province of Tvor.

-The Hungarian Cabinet have resigned in consequence of the refusal of the Emperor to coerce the House of Magnates into passing the Civil Marriage Bill.

-The inhabitants of Pigianello, Italy, are camping in the fields for fear of earthquake shocks, which have already shaken down several buildings in the town.

-The miners on strike in Pennsylvania and Colorado, U.S.A., have engaged in serious rioting, especially in the latter State, where they destroyed considerable property, and killed eleven men who had ventured to take their places in the mine, by dropping 100 pounds of giant powder down the shaft.

-The Brazilian Government has accepted the mediation of Great Britain in the diplomatic dispute with Portugal, duo to the action of the Portuguese warships in regard to the Brazilian insurgents.

-The river Jotinga, in Northern Cachar (Assam), has overflowed its banks, canning the severest flood that has visited the district for many years. Many natives have been drowned, and much property has been destroyed.

-Great agitation has been caused in French political circles owing to the announcement that M. Turpin, the inventor of mÈlinite, has sold a greater discovery to a foreign Power, in consequence of the refusal of the French Minister of War to receive him.

-The debate in the Italian Chamber of Deputies on the financial projects of the Government, is expected to conclude at the end of the week with a victory for Signor Crispi, the more especially as the Government has abandoned the very unpopular land tax.

-It is officially confirmed that Asiatic cholera has broken out in the Russian town of Mlawa on the railway from Marionburg to Warsaw, and distant about three miles from the Prussian frontier. So far there have been twenty cases, ten of which terminated fatally.

-A disastrous flood has occurred in Kulu, in the north-east of the Punjab. A landslip, which had fallen into the bed of a river and dammed it completely, burst suddenly, and the immense volume of water, being once released, poured all over the country. Villages have been swept away, and the loss of life is at present estimated at 200.

-The persecution of Stundists and Baptists has broken out in the Crimea. News from Simferopol states that the Baptists are making rapid progress among the villages there, and that the authorities have replied by hauling up six persons for trial, charged with preaching. Three others remain in gaol untried for using disrespectful language about the images.

-The Russian people, after having had several years of dearth and famine, now seem as if they were going to be blessed with a year of plenty, or what is called a double harvest. Nevertheless, it is said that the farmers and peasantry are more depressed than usual; for if the harvest be a plentiful one they will not know what to do with their surplus produce in view of the present low prices obtaining everywhere.

-The United States Senate have unanimously adopted a resolution declaring that it belongs wholly to the people of Hawaii by right to establish their own form of government and to decide upon their domestic policy; that the United States ought not in any way to interfere, and that interference in the political affairs of the islands by any other Government will be regarded as an act unfriendly to the United States.

-In the oath used at the Papal Consistory for the nomination of new cardinals, the cardinal swears to reclaim all the temporal possessions of the Pope. At the last Consistory, says the Rome correspondent of the Chronicle, the form of oath which has existed for several centuries was modified, a great number of temporal claims having been abandoned. An exception, however, is made in the ease of Rome. The modification was made by the issue of a special Bull, which has caused some surprise.

-The Tourist's Church Guide Book is authority for the following: "The number of Anglican churches in England and Wales has almost doubled since 1882, and is now 5,957. Of these about half are free. At 250 incense is used; at 406 there is a daily celebration of the Holy Eucharist; the much-discussed 'Eastward position' is adopted at no fewer than 5,037: 'Eucharistic vestments' are worn at 1.376, and altar lights are employed during the sacrament of the Eucharist at 2,707."

-A bull-fighter was gored to death in Madrid in the presence of 16,000 spectators. He had just stabbed the poor animal, the matador and bull dying together. Notwithstanding the excitement, the barbarous performance went on, two other fighters being injured, and fifteen horses and several bulls being killed before the audience had had their fill of horrors. The fighter who was killed was a renowned matador. He had amassed a large fortune, and was about to retire from the bull-ring and get married.

"Pessimists" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

Pessimists.-The Lord says of the latter days, "But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived." 2 Tim. iii. 13. People who now believe what the Lord says in this text are called pessimist.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

The demand creates the supply, and just now inventors of death-dealing machines command the greatest rewards. The latest thing is "a light mitrailleuse, worked by electricity, and with such rapidity that it can be charged and scatter balls as thick as hail in the twinkling of an eye." Germany is said to have purchased it.

It is stated that the Free Church Assembly has openly commended Mr. Drummond's new book, "The Ascent of Man." No wonder that a newspaper correspondent asked how the Scotch Presbyterians propose to get rid of Adam. The first chapters of Genesis and Evolution are in irreconcilable opposition. Whoever believes one must necessarily reject the other.

At the annual May meeting of the Salvation Army, General Booth in his review of his work for the year said that in Holland "the Queen and other members of the Royal Family were subscribers to their funds, as all queens and all governments ought to be."

It is strange that people will persistently shut their eyes to the lessons of history, no matter how recent. The Salvation Army has attained wonderful success without Government patronage. Self-denial and enthusiasm on the part of its members brought it to the point where it is, and now these must be replaced by Government supports; for nothing is more sure than the fact that the decline of real religion is always marked by its recognition by the State. Christianity wrought its great success in the face of the bitterest opposition; its decline dated from the first step toward State patronage. Is it not strange that men should assume that a course which has won success is not sufficient to maintain it?

"On Friday last a solemn Mass for the repose of the soul of Bishop Smythies was sung at St. German's, Roath, at 11 A.M." "In the evening Solemn Vespers for the Dead, according to the use published by the Guild of All Souls, were sung at St. Margaret's, Roath." These statements from The Church Times of June 1, which are by no means unusual, show, not that the Church of England is leaning towards Rome, but that it never left Rome. It simply had in the sixteenth century, what Canon Knox-Little calls "a family quarrel."

One of the peculiar symptoms of the disease which afflicts civilised countries is found in the increase of suicide. The high-pressure style of living, the intemperance and lack of self-control, and impatience and wilfulness of the carnal heart, and the despair of unbelief must be at the root of the evil. The Times said the other day:-

Statisticians agree that suicide is on the increase in all civilised nations. The rate varies according to race and climate and density of population, and the differences between countries in this respect are curious and, so far, unexplained. But everywhere trustworthy returns tell of the same phenomenon.

The rate is highest among soldiers, and this too in countries where service is voluntary. Preparation and training to take the lives of others must surely lead men to place little value upon life. The fact that this evil is most prevalent in civilised countries is evidence that in the advancement of arts and sciences and all that goes to make what is called civilisation there is nothing that makes for righteousness and faith in God.

A new effort in connection with London Anti-Sunday Travelling Union is the "Shareholders' Union for the Defence of the Sabbath." It is, as its name implies, an association of railway shareholders, for the purpose of inducing, or forcing, the railway corporations in which they have money invested, to discontinue Sunday traffic. It is stated that there are one hundred and fourteen thousand Sunday goods trains in England every year, and the new association proposes that this traffic shall be "legally suppressed."

The appeal for ?100,000 to be used in the decoration of St. Paul's Cathedral, has called out letters of approval from the Prince of Wales and Mr. Gladstone. Nearly one hundred thousand pounds has already been spent in decorating the Cathedral, and the sum now called for will only partially complete the work that it is proposed to do.

"Depraved Taste" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

Depraved Taste.-The world wants pleasure, and as ordinary frivolity seems to pall on the appetite, the stimulant of wickedness must be added to it. A dramatic critic the other day attributed the partial failure of one popular writer's play to the fact that there was no specially outbreaking wickedness in it. He said the critical British audience did not want the seventh commandment wrapped in wool. The life of respectable society, and the noble, refined, and Christian home would not furnish a subject that would attract the crowds of pleasure-seekers. They must have art and morals inculcated by the acting of sin and passion, and without this the play generally fails. This same taste is being ministered to by the modern society novel, and even women are trying to teach moral lessons by writing books with pens dipped in our social sewers. It is an attempt to teach social purity by preaching social nastiness, and the public taste for this class of literature demands that the vicious flavour be increased just as the drunkard increases the strength of his draught.

"The Handwriting on the Wall" The Present Truth 10, 23.

E. J. Waggoner

The Handwriting on the Wall.-Did it ever occur to you that the hand that traced the mystic letters on the wall of Belshazzar's banqueting hall is still engaged in the work that God is doing in the earth? The Lord knows what is going on in your home or room, just as well as He knew the progress of the Babylonian festivities that night. If only we constantly bore in mind the fact that the presence of God is with us in our homes or places of business, and that the hand that wrote Belshazzar's doom might as easily outline our deeds and thoughts upon the wall, it would cause us oftentimes to repress the springing up of self and sin. We are being weighed in the balances every day, whether we realise it or not.

June 14, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

"Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return unto the Lord." Isa. lv. 7.

What is the necessity for this?-"For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord, for as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts."

"Didn't Think" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

Didn't Think.-When reminded of the performance of some misdeed which comes very naturally to us, we are prone to excuse ourselves with the statement, "I didn't think." That is a mistake. True, we did not think of the right thing; but our performance of the deed was due to the fact that our thoughts were unconsciously running in that channel. "Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh." Matt. xii. 34. "As he thinketh in his heart, so is he." Prov. xxiii. 7. If a man did not think evil, he would not do evil. No man ever yet committed a sin that he had never thought about.

Right Thoughts.-But we cannot cease thinking. God does not wish us to, for He has given us brains with which to think. The secret of right doing is right thinking. If we could always think of the right, we should never do the wrong. But how shall we think of that which is right?-Here is the answer that the Lord gives: "I will put my laws into their minds, and write them in their hearts." Heb. viii. 10. The holy, just, and good law of God in the mind will insure our thinking upon "whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report." And with these thoughts in the mind, the actions will correspond.

Controlling the Thoughts.-"It is easy enough to say that if we had right thoughts we should act rightly; but that is only putting the difficulty one step farther back; how can we think of what we ought?" The promise in the new covenant tells us, "I will put My laws in their mind," says the Lord. He alone can do it. Give Him the ordering of your ways, and He will give you right thoughts. "Commit thy works unto the Lord, and thy thoughts shall be established." Prov. xvi. 3. The Spirit of God can do that which is impossible for man. "For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." 2 Cor. x. 4, 5.

"Elements of Faith" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

Elements of Faith.-To have faith is to believe God's word; not merely a part of it, but all of it, so far as the individual has heard it. It is to believe not only that God is, and that He rewards them that seek Him, but also that we ourselves are "wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked." Rev. iii. 17. Unless we believe this, our faith will lack one essential element, namely, a deep, earnest longing for God's help. God gives to people in proportion to the earnestness of their desire; and the reason why people who seem to approach God and petition Him intelligently do not receive more from Him, is simply that they do not want it badly enough. It was the poor helpless woman who suffered for years and spent all her living upon physicians in vain efforts to find relief,-she it was who obtained immediate help when she touched the hem of Christ's garment, while the multitude who thronged Him, feeling no need of His help, received nothing. It is earnest, importunate faith that prevails.

"The Promise of His Coming" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

Our Lord had been on earth among men for several years. He had gathered about Him a little band of disciples who loved Him. Their eyes had seen Him, and their hands had handled Him, and they had walked and talked with Him as with a friend. His kindness and love had bound them to Him. And now He tells them that He is going away. He had previously told the unbelieving Jews that He was going away, and that they should die in their sins, and could not follow Him. That caused His disciples no trouble because they believed on Him, and He surely would take them with Him wherever He went. But no; unto them also He said, "Little children, yet a little while I am with you. Ye shall seek Me; and as I said unto the Jews; whither I go ye cannot come; so now I say to you." John xiii. 33. What wonder that the disciples were sorely troubled at this announcement. But it is not in the heart of the loving Saviour to cause His children pain. "Though He cause grief, yet will He have compassion according to the multitude of His mercies." Lam. iii. 32. So He said to them:-

370

"Let not your heart be troubled; ye believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father's house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will

371

come again, and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." John xiv. 1-3.

This promise is as sure as the word of God; and the word of God is a sure as His throne. We know that Christ was once here upon earth; therefore we may know that just so surely will He come again.

"I will come again." That means "another time," "once more." When He was here before, that was His first coming. So when He comes once more, that will be His second coming. That is what we are plainly told by the apostle, in words almost identical with those of the Saviour: "Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for Him shall He appear the second time without sin unto salvation." Heb. ix. 28.

A thousand texts could not make the matter any plainer, that Christ will certainly come again. Therefore as it is certain that no one is a believer on Christ unless he believes all the words of Christ, there cannot be the slightest doubt but that every believer in Christ must believe in His second coming. And every lover of the Lord must look for and love His appearing. To such, a crown of glory is promised at His coming. 2 Tim. iv. 8; 1 Peter v. 4.

The doctrine of the Lord's coming, therefore, and the thought that it is very near, is not a thing with which to frighten people. Of course those who do not love the presence of Christ's representative, will be troubled at the thought of His appearing. But the fact is, that the Holy Spirit is only "another Comforter," and that Christ is the Comforter. The thought of His coming is therefore a comfort to His followers. "The glorious appearing of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ" is the "blessed hope" that cheers His disciples in this present evil world.

"A Personal, Visible Coming" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

We have the promise of the Saviour that He will come again, the second time. The question now is, How will He come? So long a time has passed since He was here before, that many have entertained the idea that the coming of Christ is the same as the death of His saints. They think that He comes whenever a saint dies. A moment's thought should be sufficient to show us that this cannot be true, because in that case there would be many comings of the Lord, whereas the Scriptures speak only of His second coming. Other proofs may be given, to show that the second coming of Christ has no connection whatever with the death of good people; but at present we will be content with reading the exact manner of His coming.

We turn to the record of the ascension of Christ, and we find that He led His disciples out as far as Bethany, "and He lifted up His hands and blessed them. And it came to pass, while He blessed them, He was parted from them, and carried up into heaven." Luke xxiv. 50, 51. "While they beheld, He was taken up; and a cloud received Him out of their sight. And while they look steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven." Acts i. 9-11.

They saw Him go up bodily into heaven; He will come in like manner as they saw Him go up; therefore He will come in person, so that He can be seen. This is what we read in Rev. i. 7: "Behold He cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him." There will be no doubt or uncertainty about the matter when He comes.

Read again the words of the Apostle Paul, who wrote just what he had received from the Lord Himself: "For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent [precede, or go before] them which are asleep. For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel, and with the trump of God." 1 Thess. iv. 15, 16. There will be no mistaking that event.

Compare with this last text the words of the fiftieth Psalm, verse 3: "Our God shall come, and shall not keep silent; a fire shall devour before Him, and it shall be very tempestuous round about Him." It is the same testimony.

Again our Lord tells us how clearly His coming will be seen by all living on the earth. If someone shall say that Christ has already come, and gone away again, or that He is in some secret place, we are not to believe him. "For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be." Matt. xxiv. 27. No one on the earth can be ignorant of that grand event when it takes place. Therefore we are assured that Christ's coming has not yet occurred, but that it is still future, an object of hope to all who love Him.

"Receiving His People" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

We know from Christ's own promise that He will come again, and we also know from the infallible word that His second coming will be as real and as personal as was His first advent, although with infinitely more glory. But why is He coming? what is the necessity for it? There must certainly be a necessity for it, because the Lord does not trifle; and so we ask, What is the object of the second coming of the Lord? We have only to listen attentively to the words of Christ, to know exactly why it is necessary for Him to come to this earth again.

Turning to His promise, we read, "I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." John xiv. 2, 3.

Why is He coming?-To receive His children unto Himself. What for?-In order that where He is, there they may be also. What then is the inevitable conclusion?-That Christ's people cannot be with Him until He comes the second time. They cannot be with Him in any other way than by His coming to take them to Himself.

If the promise of Christ were heeded as much as it should be, there would be no uncertainty as to the state of the dead, and the way and the time of the saints' going to be with their Saviour. They are asleep, and cannot be with the Lord until, with the righteous living, they are caught up to meet Him when He comes the second time. Read what the Apostle Paul says by the word of the Lord:-

"But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him. For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words." 1 Thess. iv. 13-18.

What has become of all those who have died in faith in Christ?-They are asleep. "And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise; God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect." Heb. xi. 39, 40. They are not with the Lord, and cannot be until He comes to awaken them. To say that departed saints are with Christ now, is virtually to deny the promise of Christ, that He will come again for the purpose of receiving His people to Himself. For if they were with Him now, there would be no necessity for Him to come to receive them. But Christ does not utter nonsense. He said that He would come, and for the sole purpose of receiving His people to Himself. Therefore it is just as certain as the words of Christ, that Christ's people cannot be with Him until His second coming, which is still future.

Once more we read the plain statement of the Scriptures: "Behold, I show you a mystery; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump; for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory." 1 Cor. xv. 51-54.

With these statements in mind, we can understand why the coming of the Lord is called a "blessed hope." It is the time when "His reward is with Him, and His work before Him." It is the time when His people shall be like Him, for they shall see Him as He is. 1 John iii. 2. It is the means by which they may be with Him whom having not seen they love. It is the only way by which they can see Him and be with Him. Therefore it is the object of their intense longing. In this world they are oppressed, but the Divine encouragement is, "Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain. Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts; for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh." James v. 7, 8.

"Comfort ye, comfort ye My people, saith your God." Isa. xl. 1. The message of comfort is that the Lord is coming. It is the one thing with which mourners are to be comforted. "For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words." Let no one presume to offer anything else as comfort than that given by "the God of all comfort."

"'The Times of Restitution'" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

Although the promise of the coming of Christ is written on almost every page of the Bible, the Apostle Peter, tells us that "there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of His coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." 2 Peter iii. 3, 4. Those who do not love the coming of the Lord, do not look for it, and those who do not look for it, soon cease to understand even the plainest signs of its approach.

But it is not a fact

372

that all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation. When God had finished creation, He "saw everything that He had made, and, behold, it was very good." Gen. i. 31. He put all things in subjection under the feet of man. But sin entered, and the earth was cursed for man's sake (Gen. iii. 17), and "now we see not yet all things put under him." Heb. ii. 8. "The earth mourneth and fadeth away, the world languisheth and fadeth away, and the haughty people of the earth do languish. The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the law, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore hath a curse devoured the earth." Isa. xxiv. 4-7.

In the first chapter of Hebrews we read the words of the Father to the Son: "Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth; and the heavens are the works of Thy hands; they shall perish; but Thou remainest; and they all shall wax old as doth a garment; and as a vesture shalt Thou fold them up, and they shall be changed; but Thou art the same, and Thy years shall not fail." Verses 10-12.

So we are told that those who say that all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation, overlook the fact of the flood, which once destroyed the earth, and that the same word which created the earth in the beginning, which pronounced the curse upon it, and brought the flood which destroyed it, has declared that it shall again be destroyed by fire. "The heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat. Nevertheless, we according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness." 2 Peter iii. 12, 13.

When will this be?-It will be at the coming of the day of the Lord. It will be at the second advent, for the coming of the Lord and the end of the world are placed together. Matt. xxiv. 3. It is at the coming of the Lord that He sends His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, "and they shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." Verse 31. And the Saviour further says that in the end of this world "the Son of man shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity, and shall cast them into a furnace of fire; there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth. Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father." Matt. xiii. 40-43. Then will all things be as they were in the creation, and so will they continue throughout all eternity.

But notice this thing, namely, that all this takes place at the second advent of Christ. We learn from the Scriptures that when the Lord comes it is for the purpose of taking His people to Himself. It is the second advent. And they also tell us that He will not come from heaven until the time for the restoration of all things. "And He shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you; whom the heavens must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets, since the world began." Acts iii. 20, 21. This allows no place for a secret coming of the Lord, to take from this earth a few of His people, leaving the earth and the remainder of the inhabitants just as they were before. The first advent was not a secret affair. "This thing was not done in a corner." Even so, and much more so will the second coming be. It will be as much more loudly heralded than the first, as its glory will exceed that of the first.

"Our God shall come, and shall not keep silent; a fire shall devour before Him, and it shall be very tempestuous round about Him. He shall call to the heavens from above, and to the earth, that He may judge His people. Gather My saints together unto Me; those that have made a covenant with Me by sacrifice. And the heavens shall declare His righteousness; for God is judge Himself." Ps. l. 3-6.

"The Close of Probation" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

"And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment; so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for Him shall He appear the second time without sin unto salvation." Heb. ix. 27, 28.

A thousand theories about the future probation might be written, but they could never shake the simple statement made in these two verses. The statement is so clear that no one need misunderstand it. As it is appointed unto men once to die, so there will be only one more coming of the Lord. That will be His second coming. The judgment is in connection with the second coming of Christ, for we read, that He "shall judge the quick and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom." 2 Tim. iv. 1. And again, "Let the heavens rejoice, and let the earth be glad; let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof. Let the field be joyful, and all that is therein; then shall all the trees of the wood rejoice before the Lord; for He cometh, for He cometh to judge the earth; He shall judge the world with righteousness, and the people with His truth." Ps. xcvi. 11-13.

The judgment at the coming of the Lord will include all nations. See Matt. xxv. 32. "And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged out of those things which are written in the books, according to their works." "And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them; and they were judged every man according to their works." Rev. xx. 12, 13. Thus we see that there will not be a man who has ever lived on this earth, who will not be judged at the second coming of the Lord.

And that coming and that judgment will mark the close of the probation of every man. Of course the probation of many will have closed long before, at death; but there will never be any more probation for any man after the coming of the Lord. Read again what the text says: "Unto them that look for Him shall He appear the second time without sin unto salvation."

"Without sin." What does that mean?-It means just what it says. Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many. "Who His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree." 1 Pet. ii. 24. The sins of the whole world were upon Him; for He tasted death for every man. Heb. ii. 9. He still bears the sins of men, for we may see Him set forth crucified before us. Gal. iii. 1. "Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us." 1 Cor. v. 7. "Jesus Christ and Him crucified" is to be the theme of every Gospel preacher. So long as He bears sins, a guilty man may come and lay all their sins upon Him, and be relieved of the heavy load. So long there is hope for men.

But when He comes the second time it will be "without sin." There will be no more sacrifice for sins. His work will have been completed, and His coming will be preceded by the words, "He that is unjust, let him be unjust sill; and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still; and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still; and he that is holy, let him be holy still. And, behold, I come quickly; and My reward is with Me, to give every man according as his work shall be." Rev. xxii. 11, 12. There will then be two great classes: those who have accepted the Lord, and have been cleansed from all sin; and those who have rejected Christ, and chose to bear their own sins, accounting that their own ways are right.

Christ was once offered. He "offered one sacrifice for sins for ever." Heb. x. 12. He will never offer Himself again. "Neither is there salvation in any other; for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." Acts iv. 12. Now the case is very simple. Christ was once offered to bear sins. It is only as men lay their sins on Him, that there is any hope for them. There is no other one by whom men may be saved. But when He comes the second time, He will not bear anybody's sins. Therefore it follows that when the Lord comes the second time there will be no more probation for any creature under heaven.

That coming will be for one particular purpose, namely, to gather to Himself

373

His faithful followers. He will say, "Gather My saints together unto Me, those who have made a covenant with Me by sacrifice." All who have accepted His sacrifice will then be changed and caught up to meet Him in the air; "and so shall we ever be with the Lord."

"The Lord Helps in Little Things" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

Have you ever thought that the Lord helps people only when they are in some dreadful calamity or affliction? Very many think that the common everyday sort of trials that come must be borne without any special help from God; for can we not worry through them ourselves in one way or another?

It is expected that in a trial so deep that it is not in human flesh to endure it, the Lord will put His strength upon the sufferer. But there are many Christians who struggle on under little discouragements and burdens and perplexities that they know they can endure, without rolling the little things upon the Lord and finding joy in them.

The Lord is so great that He can regard little things. You remember that when the sons of the prophets in the days of Elisha (2 Kings vi.) went out to cut down trees for their house, one of them lost his axe. It fell into the river. An axe is not such a valuable possession, though doubtless more costly in those days than now; but to a poor man with only a little, that little is his all. In this case, too, the axe was not his own, and he cried, "Alas, master! for it was borrowed." The Lord relieved the poor man's anxiety by causing the iron to float upon the water, and the man put out his hand and took it up.

Is there not encouragement in this story to go to the Lord with the little things, and let Him help to bear them? To a rich man a matter of a few shillings may not be worth a thought. But to one who is struggling to earn his daily bread by honest toil, these little things become great. Believe that the Lord is so interested in His children's welfare that He longs to help in the small perplexities, and you have the secret of a happy life.

The Lord is a great deal nearer to men than many think. In Him they "live and move," as Paul says. Every motion that we make in going about our work is actually by the strength which the Lord gives. He sustains us physically for our duties, and He is so near that He knows the slightest burden that rests upon the tired worker. He not only knows, but He asks us to cast that burden upon Him. Try it in the common work and little troubles of life, and you will find the rest that He promises.

"The Scribes and the Scriptures" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

At the first advent of Christ, the scribes were saying that He could not come until a certain event had taken place. This is shown by the question of the disciples as they came down from the mount of transfiguration: "Why say the scribes that Elias must first come?" Matt. xvii. 10; Mark ix. 11. In our own day, while we are waiting for Christ's second advent, in power and glory, we find this history repeated. The scribes-or those who occupy the seats of authority and learning in the church-are saying that certain events must occur before Christ can come again; and their sayings are largely believed. The millennium, say they, must come first, or, the Jews must first return to their ancient land and inhabit it as of old. By this means the attention of vast numbers is largely diverted from the thought of Christ's second advent.

The scribes based their assertions upon the Scriptures; for the prophecy had foretold the coming of Elias before the day of the Lord, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and of the children to the fathers. Mal. iv. 4. Predictions made to-day are likewise professedly based upon Scriptures; and as the people are generally but little acquainted with the inspired word, they are quite ready to believe that the popular theories regarding the millennium and the return of the Jews are somewhere and somehow supported by Scripture; especially as it makes no particular difference to them how either event is ushered in. The current theories concerning them are but palliatives to soothe and lull to sleep those who ought to be aroused and stirred to earnest action over the prospect of their Lord's return.

The reckoning of the scribes was wrong; for the Saviour said, "Elias is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed." "Then," we read, "the disciples understood that He spake unto them of John the Baptist." Matt. xvii. 12, 13. Nor are the scribes of our day any nearer the truth in their theories of what must occur before the coming of Christ. But as long as people are content to know so little of the word of God, they cannot avoid falling into all manner of spiritual deceptions. The only safety for any individual in this respect lies in studying and knowing that word for himself. The student of Scripture must search deeply and thoroughly into his subject if he would be made wise unto salvation.

The Lord says it is for lack of knowledge that His people perish. Hosea iv. 6. And the knowledge which they lack is the knowledge of His word. Without that word they are without a lamp unto their feet and a light unto their path (Ps. cxix. 105), and that they should miss the way is inevitable. That word is the revelation of Jesus Christ, who is "the true light, that lighteth every man that cometh into the world." 1 John i. 9. But there are many false lights, and he who has not the true light will inevitably be attracted to one of them, and thus be led astray.

The important question for each of us is not, Why say the scribes this or that? but "What saith the Scriptures?" The Scripture is for us as well as for them. The Holy Spirit, the Guide into all truth, is free to all who ask for it in faith. But the tendency of the age is against prayerful and reverent study of the word of God. A great deal is written to criticise the word, but little or nothing to urge upon people the necessity of knowing what it says. The Christian must not allow himself to drift with the current, but must set his face steadfastly against all worldly and atheistic sentiments,

374

whether coming from the publicans or the scribes. "What saith the Scriptures?" If you would enter into life, you must be able to answer this question.

"Under the Curse" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

To those who are looking for the second coming of our Lord, according to the promise, the world is full of signs which indicate that His return is near, "even at the doors."

The unsettled state of the whole world, and the Spirit of unrest and strife is causing men of the world anxiety. The business and financial depression that have troubled every civilised country are a symptom in the case. The militarism of the Old World shows that there is utter lack of confidence in one another among the nations.

Jesus said that just before the end there would be "upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things that are coming on the earth." Luke xxi. 25, 26. The distress and perplexity are apparent, and the situation grows more complex.

The curse of militarism has strained the resources of all Europe to the verge of bankruptcy; but the danger of war has led every nation to go on and on, though peace and disarmament are talked about. Now a new reason is urged for keeping up the military system. Public Opinion says:-

The leading Austrian journal, Pester Lloyd, has published a series of articles in defence of the military policy of the European Governments. It begins by inquiring what would be the condition of the Europe of to-day without its great armies, and what would be the position of justice, freedom, and progress. There is, it says, a hatred of things as they are in millions of souls over the world, and if it were not for militarism that hatred would seize the weapons of destruction and lay the existing order of society in ruins, together with all the gains of thousands of years of progress. Nihilism, Social Revolution, Anarchism, and Fenianism are but the changing phenomena of one disease of our time-namely, the blind resistance of huge masses to civilisation. Without its enormous armies, Europe would fall a helpless prey to this revolutionary impulse. Dynamite would be the dictator of the world. The bombs are silent only so long as they fear the repeating-rifle.

As it was in the days of Noah, so now, as the Lord said it would be, the land is filled with violence. The flood then destroyed the earth. By the same word, we are told, the heavens and the earth which are now "are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men." 2 Peter iii. 7.

"The earth mourneth and fadeth away, the world languisheth and fadeth away, the haughty people of the earth do languish. The earth is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore hath a curse devoured the earth, and they that dwell therein are desolate; therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men left." Isa. xxiv. 4-6.

The curse is sin. The curse came because man disregarded God's authority, and thought He did not mean exactly what He said. Man deviated just a trifle from God's command-but that deviation was a lawless denial of God's authority. The curse has continued to devour the earth from that day to this, and the spirit of lawlessness has ruled the world. It is not surprising that as the end of all things approaches, this spirit should lead to such a state of society as we are forced to consider to-day.

The work for every believer is to stand loyally by God's word, His law, His ordinances, and His everlasting covenant, the Gospel. The ruin is coming, and the day of final reckoning is approaching; but that is the day of final salvation to those that believe. So the darker the picture presented by the world, the more earnestly every child of God should be working to save the lost and perishing.

"The Meanest Side of Human Nature" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

Did you ever have the experience of giving to one in need, and continuing to do so until no longer possible to keep it up, and then finding that what you had done only made the individual feel that you were under special obligations to him, and had grievously wronged him when your benefactions ceased?

It is an experience which reveals the darkest side of human nature. Yet so weak is human nature that nearly every one who has had anything to do with business management, and with all sorts and conditions of men, knows something about it. Instead of thankfulness for favours received, which perhaps required real self-denial on the part of the giver, the recipient shows only hatred when the favours cease. It is only the bestial and brutal in depraved natures that wounds the hand that blesses, and knows no such sentiment as thankfulness.

When one feels depressed over such an experience, it is a good time to think about the favours which the Lord has granted to all men. He has given us "life, and breath, and all things," and yet sometimes we have taken these things as our due, by justice, and have not thanked the Lord from the very soul for these common blessings which come so bountifully.

Really, the Lord has already blessed us with all spiritual blessings in Christ Jesus (Eph. i. 3); "the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men" (Titus ii. 11); but all men will not take what is brought to them, and men are often so faithless that they do not believe that all blessings have been given; and so they take from the Lord continually, without thankfulness, and at every trial or misfortune are ready to charge God with injustice.

Unthankfulness is a great sin. It was because man glorified not God, "neither were thankful," when they knew Him, that the world went into heathenism. Romans i. 21-25. The same unthankfulness changes professed Christians into actual unbelievers. In these cultured days men do not always give up the profession, the form; but the person who receives life and all things from God, and takes them without thanksgiving as a matter of course, is just as much a heathen as the man who does the same thing without the profession. It is unspeakably mean for a man to treat another man in this unthankful manner. Is it not unspeakably mean for man to treat the Lord in the same manner when He has given His "unspeakable gift"?

"A Mistaken Zeal" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

A Mistaken Zeal.-When certain Samaritans refused to give Jesus and His disciples lodging, James and John said to Him, "Lord, wilt Thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did? But He turned and rebuked them, and said, Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of. For the Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them. And they went to another village." Luke ix. 54-56.

The two disciples thought that they were prompted by zeal for the Lord. But He gave them to understand that He did not countenance such actions. He came to save men's lives, not to destroy them. Hence it follows that the putting of men to death, for either their opinions or their practices, even though done professedly in the name of Christ, has been only of the devil.

It is quite likely that there was

375

as much personal resentment in the proposal of the disciples, as there was zeal for the Master. It is very easy for men to dignify their selfishness and intolerance with the name of Christian zeal. There has never been a time of persecution in this world, when the greater portion of it was not the gratification of personal malice. If the men had been acquainted with Christ, in whose name they professed to act, they would not have sought to punish others for not agreeing with them.

"The Christian Home" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

The Scriptures open to us very little of the child-life of Moses, but we know that the faith of godly parents dedicated him to the service of God in infancy, and that the wise-hearted training and instruction at his mother's knee prepared him, under God, to withstand the temptations of the royal court of Egypt, and become the deliverer of his people. The first impressions and influences of childhood-how powerful for good or for evil! The simple annals of many a humble home, if laid before our eyes, would show in the care of a quiet, Christian mother, and the counsel and example of a praying father, the spring of the good that has flowed out to bless hundreds and thousands through the efforts of devoted sons and daughters. Well may it be said that the hand of Susanna Wesley, the mother of the Wesleys, rings the bells of the Methodist chapels around the world. And if we should ask the source of the marvellous missionary activity of the early Moravians-and to-day one in every sixty-five of their adult members is labouring as a missionary-we should find it in those little Hernhut home-circles, where the children daily breathed in the holy inspiration of the missionary cause.

A beautiful and inspiring picture of a Christian home, where missionaries were trained for the work of Christ, is given in the autobiography of that devoted man, John G. Paton, missionary to the New Hebrides. His father, it is said, "had a strong desire to be a minister of the Gospel; but when he finally saw that God's will had marked out for him another lot, he reconciled himself by entering with his whole soul into this solemn vow,-that if God gave him sons, he would consecrate them unreservedly to the ministry of Christ, if the Lord saw fit to accept the offering, and open up their way." His offering was accepted, and he lived to see three of his sons engaged in the ministry. It will do us good to follow the writer into that Scottish cottage in the village of Torthorwald.

"Our home consisted of a 'but' and a 'ben' and a 'mid-room' or chamber, called the 'closet.' The one end was my mother's domain, and served all the purposes of dining-room and kitchen and parlour. . . . The other end was my father's workshop, filled with five or six 'stocking frames,' whirring with a constant action of five or six pairs of busy hands and feet, and producing right genuine hosiery for the merchants of Hawick and Dumfries. The 'closet' was a very small apartment betwixt the other two, having room only for a bed, a little table, and a chair, with a diminutive window shedding diminutive light on the scene. This was the sanctuary of that cottage home. Thither daily, and oftentimes a day, generally after each meal, we saw our father retired, and 'shut the door;' and we children got to understand by a sort of spiritual instinct (for the thing was too sacred to be talked about) that prayers were being poured out there for us, as of old by the high priest within the veil of the most holy place. We occasionally heard the pathetic echoes of a trembling voice pleading as if for life, and we learned to slip out and in past that door on tiptoe, not to disturb the holy colloquy. The outside world might not know, but we knew, whence came that happy light as a new-born smile that always was dawning on my father's face; it was a reflection from the Divine Presence, in the consciousness of which he lived. Never, in temple or cathedral, on mountain or in glen, can I hope to feel that the Lord is more near, more visibly walking and talking with men, than under that humble cottage roof of thatch and oaken wattles. Though everything else in religion or by some unsinkable catastrophe to be swept out of memory or blotted from my understanding, my soul would wander back to those early scenes, and shut itself up once again in that sanctuary closet, and, hearing the echoes of those cries to God, would hurl back all doubt with the victorious appeal, 'He walked with God, why may not I?'"

Then there was also "that blessed custom of family prayer, morning and evening, which my father practiced probably without one single omission till he lay on his death-bed, seventy-seven years of age; when, even at the last day of his life, a portion of Scripture was read, and his voice was heard softly joining in the psalm, and his lips breathed the morning and evening prayer, falling in sweet benediction on the heads of all his children, far away, many of them, all over the earth, but all meeting him there at the throne of grace. None of us can remember that any day ever passed unhallowed thus: no hurrying for market, no rush to business, no arrival of friends or guests, no trouble or sorrow, no joy or excitement, ever prevented at least our kneeling around the family altar, while the high priest led our prayers to God, and offered himself and his children there. And blessed to others, as well as to ourselves, was the light of such example. I have heard that, in long after years, the worst woman in the village of Thorthorwald, then leading an immoral life, but since changed by the grace of God, was known to declare that the only thing that kept her from despair and hell of suicide, was when in the dark winter nights she crept close up underneath my father's window, and heard him pleading in family worship that God would convert 'the sinner from the error of wicked ways, and polish him as a jewel for the Redeemer's crown.' 'I felt,' she said, 'that I was a burden on that good man's heart, and I knew that God would not disappoint him.'"

Before the age of twelve, young John Paton had resolved to be a missionary, or a minister of the Gospel; and as he

378

wrought at the frames of his father's work-shop from six in the morning till ten at night, he used the spare moments at meal hours for study. "How much my father's prayers at this time impressed me," he said, "I cannot explain, nor could any stranger understand. When, on his knees, and all of us round him in family worship, he poured out his soul with tears for the conversion of the heathen world to the service of Jesus, and for every personal and domestic need, we all felt as if in the presence of the living Saviour, and learned to know and love Him as our Divine Friend. As we rose from our knees, I used to look at the light on my father's face, and wish I were like him in spirit, hoping that, in answer to his prayers, I might be privileged to carry the blessed Gospel to some portion of the heathen world." Not less powerful in that cottage home was the work of "that noble mother of ours, whose high spirit, side by side with her humble and gracious piety, made us, under God, what we are to-day."

"The very discipline through which our father passed us was a kind of religion itself. If anything really serious required to be punished, he retired first to his closet for prayer, and we boys got to understand that he was laying the whole matter before God; and that was the severest part of the punishment for me to bear. I could have defied any amount of mere penalty, but this spoke to my conscience as a message from God. We loved him all the more, when we saw how much it cost him to punish us; and, in truth, he had never very much of that kind of work to do upon any one of all the eleven-we were ruled by love far more than by fear."

We cannot follow the story of his father's life further in the sketch. "His happy partner, 'Wee Jen,' died in 1865, and he himself in 1868, having reached his seventy-seventh year, an altogether beautiful and noble episode of its existence having been enacted, amid the humblest surroundings of a Scottish peasant's home, through the influence of their united love by the grace of God; and in this world, or in the world, all their children will rise up at mention of their names and call them blessed."

As we read this loving tribute of a great missionary to his parents' life and training, we do not wonder that he should say that his father's life is much more worthy, in many ways, of being written than his own. The beauty and the power of the Christian home is the same, whether in the little village nestling among the Scottish hills, or in our own bustling cities. Wherever such homes exist, there we shall find a very gate of heaven, and a recruiting station for the church and the mission field. And when the happy parent can meet his Lord with the words, "Behold I and the children which God hath given me," he will also enter into the labours and the joys of those who, around the hearth-stone, were trained to be loyal soldiers of the cross.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

-London has 15,000 policemen and 15,000 public-houses, but only 6,000 teachers.

-A scientist declares that a cubic inch of air in the London streets contained 1,640,000 particles.

-The town of Yahualica, in Mexico, was destroyed by a terrible storm on Juno 3, ten persons being killed and others injured.

-A play is to be performed in New York and heard in a London theatre through the telephone, and seen through the kinetoscope.

-The floods on the Fraser River, British Columbia, are reported to have assumed alarming proportions and to have caused an enormous destruction of property.

-There has been a great falling off in the emigration from the United Kingdom this year, the number being 77,188, against 145,151 in the same five months of last year.

-Women in Victoria are agitating for their "rights." They have formed an organization "to obtain the Parliamentary franchise for women on the same terms as are applied to men."

-A hundred years ago Benjamin Franklin bequeathed ?1,000 to an American city, which was to accumulate for a century. The sum now amounts to ?66,000, and will be expended in building a technical school.

-The two British troopers charged with suppressing a message of submission from Lobengula, and appropriating a present of ?1,000 forwarded by the king, were found guilty at Buluwayo, and sentenced to fourteen years' penal servitude.

-A logan-stone, larger than the one at Land's End, has been discovered on the island of St. Mary's, Scilly. It is 21ft. high, 55ft. in circumference, and weighs 313 tons. The stone is so nicely poised that one person can easily put it in motion.

-Three large houses at St. Johns, New Brunswick, were, destroyed by fire, June 3. The loss is estimated at $250,000, of which $130,000 is covered by insurance. A fire at Ottumwa, Iowa, on the same day destroyed property valued at $225,000.

-Reports received at Berlin from Myslowitz, on the Russian frontier, announce that the number of cholera patients has increased to such an extent that the lazaretto at that place is overcrowded, and huts have been erected for the reception of invalids.

-It is estimated by some experts who have considered the question, that the cost of constructing a railway from Mombasa to the shores of Lake Victoria Nyanza would probably exceed four millions sterling. The ground is extremely difficult, and the highest point on the route is about 8,000 feet above the sea.

-According to advises from Salvador, received in Panama, the Government troops, under General Antonio Ezeta, the President's brother, have been defeated in a battle against the rebels in Santa Ana, and 600 were killed, including the General himself. It is added that President Ezeta has resigned in favour of General Bonilla.

-Details have been received at New York regarding the terrible railway accident which recently occurred in Salvador, and in which President Ezeta had a very narrow escape. It appears that President Ezeta, with 1,500 troops, started on the 3rd ult. to proceed by rail to the assistance of the Government troops operating against the rebels at Santa Ana. The insurgents, it is said, learning of the approach of these reinforcements, removed some of the rails on a steep gradient. The train, on reaching the spot, was completely wrecked, eight cars being telescoped. Two hundred of the troops were killed and 122 were injured.

-Mr. H. H. Johnston, British Commissioner for Africa who has just arrived in England, fully confirms the news of the absolute defeat and submission of Makanjira, the slave-trading chief of Nyassaland. Mr. Johnston firmly believes that his surrender puts an cod to all the slave-trading in Nyassaland.

-The United States Government has paid $1,000,000 to the Cherokee Indians for the surrender of territory, which was immediately visited by immense crowds of speculators, many of whom hoped to prey upon the Indians, each one of whom meekest; ?33 as his or her share. The territory had formed the hunting-grounds of the Cherokees for generations.

-A strike of 50,000 colliers is threatened in Scotland. The masters have forced on them a reduction of wages. The men are about to take a ballot as to whether they will accept it. Last year they joined the Miners' Federation. If they decide to accept the reduction, they will thereby cut themselves off from the Federation, which will support them if they stand out.

-Advices received at Shanghai front Corea report that the rebellion in that country is becoming serious. Two thousand Chinese troops, who have been drilled by foreign officers, have been sent from Tientsin to suppress the rising. The British Fleet, according to Reuter's Shanghai correspondent, is waiting at Port Hamilton, prepared to protect the foreign residents in Corea if necessary.

-The insurrection in the province of Kirin, in Manchuria, China, has attained considerable dimensions. It arose from agrarian disputes between the Chinese colonists and the natives of the Mongol provinces. Mounted banditti, armed with repeating rifles, who have joined in the movement, have defeated the Imperial troops in every engagement, and have occupied several important positions, including Sarsing Arsenal, at Kirin, containing 100,000 stand of arms.

-An alarming report has appeared in the Italian Secolo from the pen of Signor Colajanni, a Member of the Chamber of Deputies. He declares that he has received news, from Sicily that 30,000 miners are without bread, and threaten to set fire, to the crops, on the plea that if they are condemned to die of hunger they wish others to share their fate. Brigandage has assumed such proportions in the island that owners of land are abandoning the cultivation of the soil. In consequence of this news Signor Colajanni has left already for Sicily.

-By mail from Shanghai it is learned that a disastrous freshet took place on the night of April 20 on the River Han, which flows into the Yangtse, near Hankow. At this time of the year the mouth of the Han is usually crowded with junks and boats. The water rose upwards of six feet in one hour, and the enormous rush wrecked or carried away hundreds of boats. It is impossible to estimate how many lives were lost, but already (between April 22nd and 23rd) over 400 bodies have been washed ashore at Yangle, a little farther down the Yangtse.

-The arctic regions seem likely to become ere long a rendezvous for summer tourists. At the end of the present month, says the Chronicle, a vacation party will leave New York by special steamer, will stop at Nova Scotia and Cape Breton, will cruise round the Newfoundland and Labrador coasts, and then cross the Davis Straits for the west coast of Greenland, visiting the fjords, the Norse ruins, the fossil beds, etc., and then proceed north, entering Melville Bay about July 25. The bear and seal will then he duly hunted, and the present site of the Peary headquarters will be visited. The excursion will return to New York about the middle of September.

-The popular vote in Switzerland on the subject of the "right to work" shows that while that country is intensely democratic, Socialistic ideas have not yet made very great progress there. The Socialists made a great effort in favour of their pet project, and by dint of great assiduity they obtained 52,387 signatures to a petition for a referendum or plebiscite on the question. This being so, the Government under the Constitution, were bound to give facilities for the referendum. The people had to vote "yes" or "no" to the question whether in their opinion every citizen willing to work, but unable to get employment, had a right to have work found for him by the State. The answer was an emphatic "No," 203,000 have voted against the tremendous obligation thus sought to be thrust upon the Executive, while, only 75,000 were in favour of it.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

The Y.M.C.A. Jubilee Convention, just closed, was the largest delegated religious convention ever held in Great Britain, numbering 747 voting delegates, and 1,160 visiting delegates.

One of the leading London publishers is reported to have said the other day, "All fiction! nothing nowadays pays but fiction." This is just what might be expected in a time when, as the apostle says, "they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and be turned unto fables."

The editor of Griffin's Journal, said to be the most careful student of American Catholic history which the church can boast, has been looking over the text-books in history issued by Catholic publishing houses, and says:-

There are no school mysteries known to me with so many errors as those for Catholic schools. But correcting them has brought disfavour on me. Errors people like are preferred to truth.

The same could doubtless be said of the Catholic histories of any other country. Remember that the above is the statement of a Catholic.

The Church of England has just held a Missionary Conference at which representatives of the Church were present from every mission field. Sixty Bishops were in attendance. If the statement made by the Rev. R. P. Ashe is true, and it was not contradicted, it would seem to be time for something to be done. He said:-

After a century of effort, the expenditure of many noble lives, as well as some millions of money, the Church of England (extraordinary to say) has signally failed to establish one solitary or single native Church in any part of the world-that is to say, a Church self-governed, self-supporting, and expanding, or exhibiting any true signs of vitality as a Church.

The Archbishop of Canterbury says that disestablishment "would place all discipline and jurisdiction in jeopardy, and absolutely prohibit our united deliberations in Synod. Those are of the securities which we now have for the teaching of spiritual truths, and the Bill would strike them away. Yet more, it would deprive the poor of all their rights to the public and private ministrations of religion, which have been theirs for ages. And we cannot but believe that such sweeping interference with religion would have a wide and evil effect on morals."

The ordinary Christian finds it difficult to comprehend how the withdrawal of State support and control from the church would hinder spiritual instruction. The history of the church in the Acts of the Apostles, and what we know of it since, shows us that almost all the real spiritual work ever done by the Christian church, has been done in poverty, and in spite of the opposition of those in authority.

"By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye have loved one to another." John xiii. 35. Only the love of God, which is shed abroad in the hearts of those who believe in Christ, can cause people perfectly to love one another; so that wherever this perfect love is manifested, even the world knows that a supernatural power is working. But this is not all. The love of God is the life of God; and the life of God is light; and a shining light cannot be hid. Therefore when pure love is burning in a soul, the influence will be felt, and souls will be won to God. Christianity is summed up in the one word, love.

"Church Magnificence" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

Church Magnificence.-The proposal to spend an additional ?100,000 for decorations in St. Paul's Cathedral, while depression and distress are everywhere prevalent in the kingdom, is not one that can tend to the glory of God, but rather toward the state of things observable in Roman Catholic countries, where magnificent cathedrals are filled with shabby, indigent, and ignorant worshippers. If Church people would believe and remember that the Almighty dwelleth not in temples made with hands, but that the human heart is His temple and dwelling-place, there would be less money spent in useless ornamentation of church buildings, and more in the work of making human hearts a fit dwelling-place for the Holy Spirit. It is the inward adorning that God looks upon with approval.

"A Great Invention" The Present Truth 10, 24.

E. J. Waggoner

A Great Invention.-The man who, like M. Turpin, can devise a machine which will vastly multiply the death-dealing powers of modern military implements, becomes at once a conspicuous and envied figure before the world. But the inventor of that which confers blessings upon mankind is often scarcely heard of. He finds no government ready to buy his invention, for governments are interested more in increasing their military power than in promoting the welfare of individuals. It is to the Gospel, and not to any nation or form of government, that man must look for help. So long as earthly governments exist, the question of what will kill the most men in the shortest space of time will overshadow all questions of individual welfare. The hope of the individual lies in the fact that the time is coming when the kingdoms of this world will "become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ." Rev. xi. 15. And that time is now nigh at hand.

June 21, 1894

"Fellowservants" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

Fellowservants.-When John was about to fall down and worship the angel who had been sent to him with important messages, the angel said, "See thou do it not; for I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them which keep the sayings of this book; worship God." Rev. xxii. 9.

The angel did not say, "I am thy fellowservant, and one of thy brethren the prophets," but that he was the fellowservant of John and also of his brethren the prophets, as well as the fellowservant of all who should keep the sayings of the book. He was not a prophet, but was a servant of God, a fellow-worker with all other servants of God.

It is a wonderful thought that the angels in heaven, "who excel in strength," who were created before man was, and who were present and "shouted for joy" at the foundation of the earth, are willing to associate themselves with men as fellowservants of one common Lord and Master. Such humility does not lower them, but does infinitely exalt man.

The disposition that some servants of the Lord have to worship those whom they think their superiors, and who may be far above them in capacity and in power, but who are nevertheless only fellowservants, is not by any means extinct. But unfortunately the disposition of the angel who refused worship is not so common. Human nature loves admiration, and it is most easy for one who is sent on God's message, to receive homage that is due to God alone. It requires much of the grace of God and the mind of Christ to enable a man to whom God has entrusted a great work to remember that he is only a fellowservant with the humblest soul who loves and fears the Lord.

"Misunderstanding" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

Misunderstanding.-Very often when a verse of the Bible is read someone will say, "I understand that so and so," giving an idea which is not found in the words of the text. It is quite common for people to think that they are warranted in treating the Bible in that way,-reading it, and then putting their own construction upon it, regardless of what it says. In such a case it is a mistake to say, "I understand." They should say "I misunderstand." Much of that which is called an understanding of the Bible is only a misunderstanding of it; and very often when a man proceeds to tell his "ideas" upon a certain Bible subject, he simply gives expression to his lack of ideas upon the matter.

"Love Waxing Cold" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

Love Waxing Cold.-The Bishop of London stated in a pastoral concerning "Hospital Sunday" that 200 years ago the hospitals in London could take in one of every 133 residents, but that "the proportion is now one out of every 600." Archdeacon Farrar contrasts these figures with the thousands of pounds spent in "brainless excitement" on a Derby Day, and the "superfluous thousands spent in mere luxuries of ostentation." He adds that of the 122 hospitals, and fifty-five dispensaries in London, which last year sheltered 104,000 in-patients, tended 3,900,000 out-patients, and dealt with 244,000 cases of accident, nearly all are "struggling with debt, or wildly endeavouring to raise funds by the spurious and spasmodic means of dinners, dances, and bazaars." People who are wont to dilate upon how much better and more charitable the world is getting, do not seem to bring these items into the account. The Bishop of London is constrained to say that "men's hearts are colder, and we are put to shame by our own forefathers." Is not this illustrative of the words of the Saviour, concerning the last days? "Because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold."

"'Depart from Me'" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

These words were addressed by Simon Peter to the Lord on one occasion when the Saviour had manifested His Divinity by causing a miraculous draught of fishes. See Luke v. 1-8. Peter said, when he saw the miracle, "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord." It was the expression of the natural feeling of the human heart, when made by the presence of God to realise its sinfulness. It is the feeling in the hearts of many to-day who are touched by the Spirit of God, and convicted of sin, and know not what to say.

But the Saviour did not depart from Peter, and in this there is encouragement for all sinners who feel their unworthiness in the sight of God. The fact that Peter realised that he was a sinful man, so far from being a reason for Christ's leaving him, was the very reason why Christ could not leave him. He had come all the way from heaven to earth, at the sacrifice of all that He had, to be with sinners and to take them by the hand and lift them out of their fallen state. And therefore He could not then, and He cannot now, leave a man because he realises that he is a sinner. When we feel and acknowledge our unworthiness in His

386

sight, so far from doing anything to drive Him from us, we are presenting to Him His own all-powerful reason for not leaving us to ourselves.

The Saviour does not stay where He is not wanted; but there is a vast difference between this petition of Peter's and that of the inhabitants of the country of the Gergesenes, who came and besought Him to depart out of their coasts. There was no enmity in Peter's heart towards the Lord, no aversion to the Divine principles which shone out in Jesus' life. His aversion was all for himself. He asked the Lord to depart because he felt himself to be sinful and the Lord good-a state of mind exactly opposite to that of those who wish the Lord to depart because they feel themselves to be good and the Lord evil. It is this latter class of sinners from whom the Saviour departs, because they feel not their need of Him, and His grace cannot reach their hearts.

So when we feel our sinfulness and our need of Divine aid, we may come boldly to the throne of grace, presenting before God the reason He Himself has furnished us, namely, our need of Him. Instead of feeling that the Lord will turn us away because of our wickedness, and destroy us with His judgments, we may feel the assurance of His own words, that "the Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them." Luke ix. 51-56. And we may gather assurance from the fact, which the inspired word reveals, that it is for the glory of God that He should receive sinners; and that therefore in asking God to receive and pardon us, we are really asking Him to work for His own great glory.

We may read this thought in Paul's letter to the Ephesians. The apostle says, "But God, who is rich in mercy for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ (by grace ye are saved); and hath raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus; that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace, in His kindness toward us, through Christ Jesus." Eph. ii. 4-7. And so now, in receiving the vilest sinners, the great Father is but preparing the way to manifest to the universe the exceeding riches of His grace through the ages of eternity,-that grace which reaches the lowest depths of sin, and lifts up from thence the helpless sinner to a place at His own right hand.

The great God has no word of discouragement for the sinner who feels his sinfulness. To all such He says, as He did to Peter, "Fear not." "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

"Christ's Courteous Forbearance" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

Christ's Courteous Forbearance.-What an insight into the character of Jesus we get from His conduct when the people of this Samaritan village refused to receive Him. After telling how He rebuked the intolerant zeal of His disciples, the record closes with the simple statement, "And they went to another village." He came to save men's lives, and He had a burning desire to save them, yet He would not force His presence upon them.

What a comment on Rev. iii. 20: "Behold, I stand at the door, and knock; if any man hear My voice; and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me." He is anxious to come in, for His presence can give life. He begs to come in, yet He will not intrude His presence where it is not desired. Every man is left perfectly free. What infinite tact and courtesy! It would do no good to try to compel men to receive Him, for that would be an impossibility. He is the personification of freedom, and comes to give freedom;

387

and to attempt to force men to be free would be a contradiction. It would be to deny Himself, and to defeat the very object for which He came.

So when men reject His advances, and refuse to receive Him, He sadly turns away to another place. Still is He knocking at every door, and still the Spirit pleads, "To-day, if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts."

"The Definite Seventh Day" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

When God said, "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work," He designated a definite day to be observed alike by all men. To suppose, as some claim, that the Sabbath of the Lord has not a particular, specified place in the succession of days which make up the months and years of time, but is any one day out of seven which men may chance to select for rest and worship, is to charge God foolishly. "God is not the author of confusion;" nor has He left it to the caprice or self-interest of man to determine the day upon which His Sabbath shall be kept. Of this He has given us abundant evidence in His word.

The Sabbath is God's rest-day. It was instituted at creation; for, "in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it." From the creation, therefore, each recurring seventh day has been the day upon which God rested, and therefore the Sabbath day; for any day upon which God did not rest could not be His Sabbath. While any day can be one day out of seven, only one day can be the one on which He rested; and that day, as He tells us, is the seventh day.

Notice also the language of the Sabbath commandment: "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates." God rested on the seventh day, and thus pointed out and fixed the seventh day in the calendar of our first parents, Adam and Eve. The children of Adam and Eve did not inaugurate a new reckoning, but learned from them which day was the seventh day, and thus it has been with all the people of God from that day to this, for each parent would, in obeying the Sabbath commandment, be obliged to instruct both son and daughter, manservant and maidservant, in their duty to refrain from work on the Sabbath day. So long as the commandment was observed by parents, there could be no question about which day was the Sabbath in the minds of the children; and had the commandment not been violated, no question of that nature could ever have arisen. But God has always had at least a few faithful followers in all ages of the world, and through these the definite Sabbath day has come down to us, which God pointed out at creation.

During the forty years' wandering of the children of Israel in the wilderness, God designated by miracles the day which was His Sabbath; for on the sixth day He sent a double portion of manna from heaven, and withheld all manna on the seventh day, and preserved what was kept over from the sixth day to the seventh, so that it was not corrupt, as it would have been on other days. If there had been any disposition on the part of the Israelites to select their own Sabbath day,-to choose any one day in seven, as some people claim the right to do now, it must have been effectually corrected by this emphatic testimony from the Lord. And that testimony has lost none of its force at the present time. If the Sabbath was a particular, definite day then, not left to be determined by the choice of man, it must be so now. God does not change, His law does not change, and the obligation of man to His law does not change with the lapse of years.

The seventh day has never lost its identity from creation down to the present time. The day, marked by the unchanging revolution of the earth, and the week, marked by the six days of creation and the seventh day Sabbath, are divisions of time marked off by God Himself; and they have continued unchanged through all the ages. The seventh day of the week in the days of Adam, is the seventh day of the week at the present time, as it ever has been. "The Sabbath day according to the commandment," which followed the "preparation" day and immediately preceded the first day of the week at the time of the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ (Luke xxiii. 54-56; xxiv. 1), is the Sabbath day according to the commandment now. And happy is he who is willing to accept and observe the day God has designated, rather than a day that has been chosen by man.

His commandments are not grievous.

"Our Shield" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

The best shield in the world is not Herr Dowe's new bullet-proof cuirass. One might suppose, from the great interest this invention has excited throughout the military world, that something had been discovered in this line far superior to anything that was known before. But this is not so. Thousands of men have been far better shielded in battle, though openly exposed to the enemy's fire, than they would have been if clad in Herr Dowe's cuirass. Nor is there any secret about this. Every Christian will understand it. It is the shield which David had when he went forth to meet Goliath, and said to him, "I come to thee in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel." 1 Sam. xvii. 45. That is a shield which can protect against cannon-balls as well as bullets, and against every weapon that man has ever invented; and the protection that it affords is just as real as that which any person ever enjoyed.

God said to Abram, "Fear not, Abram; I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward." Gen. xv. 1. And the Psalmist testifies, "The Lord God is a sun and shield." Ps. lxxxix. 11. See also Ps. iii. 3; cxix. 114. And of His children God has said, "In righteousness shalt thou be established, thou shalt be far from oppression, for thou shalt not fear; and from terror, for it shall not come nigh thee. Behold, they shall surely gather together, but not by Me; whosoever shall gather together against thee shall fall for thy sake. Behold, I have created the smith that bloweth the coals in the fire, and that bringeth forth an instrument for his work; and I have created the waster to destroy. No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper." Isa. xlix. 14-17. It is God who "breaketh the bow and cutteth the spear in sunder, and burneth the chariot in the fire." With His protection about us, we are safe indeed.

All may have the shield who will take it; and it is very much easier to get than one of the bullet-proof coats of Herr Dowe. The poorest can afford it just as well as the rich; for it costs nothing, except that which every man has in abundance, and can well afford to give. It costs only the giving up of self,-the surrender of our will for the will of God. Then so long as He sees it to be best for us to have life and health and strength, we shall have them, in spite of all the military weapons of all the armies of the world.

388

And when He sees it to be best that we should die, a protection against death would be a very unfortunate thing for us to have.

"Our Reward" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

Our Reward.-If we are the children of Abraham, our reward will be his reward. What his reward was we learn from Gen. vi. 1: "Fear not, Abram; I am thy Shield, and thy exceeding great reward." These were the words of God; and in harmony with them are the words of Christ to His followers: "Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for My sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad; for great is your reward in heaven; for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you." Matt. v. 11, 12. The universe can afford no higher reward than that promised to Abraham, which was God Himself. And we, if we are his children, are heirs with him of the promise. "He that overcometh shall inherit all things."

"'Fierce'" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

"Fierce".-The Apostle Paul in his letter to Timothy (2 Tim. iii. 1-4), mentions that men in the last days will display very many evil traits of character, one of which is expressed by the word "fierce." Coupling this declaration with the fact of the mob rule spirit which is becoming such a prominent feature of national life in some, if not all, civilised countries, we see before us to-day a striking fulfilment of the apostle's words. We have been hearing much recently about lynch law in America, and the statements made are abundantly borne out by facts. In 1882, fifty-two negroes suffered death at the hands of mobs in that country; in 1892, the number had increased to one hundred and sixty, and some of these had been put to death with a display of cruelty that was fiendish.

And all over the world, the spirit of unrest characteristic of our times,-of seeking some short road to wealth or power,-is making men less humane and less considerate of the welfare of their fellows. Now, as never before, men are "lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud. . . without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God."

These traits of character come naturally to the surface and the individual who throws himself into the fierce human current that is struggling toward worldly wealth and fame. But the Gospel will do for men to-day all that it has ever done in the past, if they will but turn their eyes away from these things, and "seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness."

"Studies in Romans. The Salutation.óRom. 1. 1-7" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

Under this heading it is proposed to conduct, as nearly as can be done in writing, a class study of the epistle to the Romans. It is designed to be literally a study, and it is hoped that the "study" will not be all on the part of the writer, but that the readers of PRESENT TRUTH will be encouraged to acquire for themselves an acquaintance with an epistle that is doubtless the greatest treatise ever written.

In each number the text for the week will be quoted, in order to facilitate the study. The reader, however, should use his Bible freely. Read the verses to be studied very frequently, and form the habit of questioning each verse, after the manner indicated below, only more closely. In this way the force of the words used by the apostle will stand out clearly, and the thought will be fixed in the mind, in the exact words of Scripture. This is far better than trying to "commit to memory." In the latter case you get the words without always getting the thought; in the former, you hold the words in mind only because close attention has enabled you to grasp the thought.

Inspiration assures us that in all of the epistles of Paul there are "some things hard to be understood." 2 Peter iii. 16. Perhaps this is the case with the Epistle to the Romans in a greater degree than with any other epistle. But they are not impossible to be understood, it is only the "unlearned and unstable" who wrest them unto their own destruction. The Bible student should note for his own encouragement that it is only those who wrest "the other scriptures" to their own destruction, who thus miss the point of Paul's writings. They who have a desire to understand, and who read the simple promises of the Bible with profit, will not be among that number.

In beginning this study it will be an encouragement to the reader if he will remember that it is simply a letter written to the church in Rome. We cannot suppose that the congregation in Rome differed from the great body of Christians in general, and of them we read that "not many wise men after the flesh, not many might, not many noble are called." 1 Cor. i. 26. The truest followers of Jesus have always been among "the common people." So in the church in Rome there were doubtless shopkeepers, artisans, day labourers, carpenters, gardeners, ect., and many servants in the families of wealthy citizens, together with a few who might hold some position of rank. When we consider that it was confidently expected that people of this sort would understand the letter, we may be encouraged to believe that the same class of people can understand it now.

Paul's exhortation and assurance in Timothy form the best guide to the study of all his epistles, and the whole Bible as well: "Consider what I say; for the Lord shall give thee understanding in all things." God is His own interpreter. The words of the Bible explain the Bible. This is why you should closely question the text so as to get at exactly what is said, in connection with what precedes and follows. Nothing can take the place of prayerful meditation upon the exact words of the Bible. By this means the most unlearned in this world's wisdom may become mighty in the Scriptures. The Lord has said just what He means; and the only way to find out just what He means is to become thoroughly familiar with just what He says, just as He says it.

The notes that accompany the text in this study are designed to fix the student's attention more closely upon the word, and for the benefit of the casual reader. That the study of this epistle may be greatly blessed to those who pursue it, and that the word may become more highly esteemed by all, because of the increased light that the Holy Spirit may cause to flash from it, is the earnest prayer of the writer.

THE SALUTATION.óROM. 1. 1-7

Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the Gospel of God (which he had promised afore, by His prophets in

389

the Holy Scriptures), concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh; and declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead; by whom we have received grace and apostleship, for obedience to the faith among all nations, for His name; among whom are ye also the called of Jesus Christ: To all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you, and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What did Paul declare himself to be?

"A servant of Jesus Christ."

To what was he called?

"Called to be an apostle."

To what was he separated?

"Separated unto the Gospel of God."

Was this Gospel first announced in Paul's day?

"Which He had promised afore by His prophets in the Holy Scripture."

Whose Gospel is it?

"The Gospel of God."

What is this Gospel, or good news, about?

"Concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord."

Who is this Jesus?

He "was made of the seed of David according to the flesh, and declared to be the Son of God with power."

What is His power as the Son of God?

"According to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead."

For what purpose did Paul receive grace and apostleship from Christ?

"For the obedience of faith among all nations for His name."

In what blessed condition were the people in Rome?

"Beloved of God.

What were they called?

"Called saints."

What was the request of the Spirit for them?

"Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ."

A Bondservant.-"Paul, a servant of Jesus." It is thus that the apostle introduces himself to the Romans. In several other epistles the same expression is used. Some people would be ashamed to acknowledge themselves servants; the apostles were not. It makes a vast difference whom one serves. The servant derives his importance from the dignity of the one served. Paul served the Lord Jesus Christ. Everybody may serve the same Master. "Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey?" Rom. vi. 16. Even the ordinary house servant who yields to the Lord is the servant of the Lord, and not of man. "Servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh; not with eyeservice, as men-pleasers; but in singleness of heart, fearing God; and whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men; knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance; for ye serve the Lord Jesus Christ." Col. iii. 22-24. Such a consideration as this can not fail to glorify the most menial drudgery.

Our version does not give us the full force of the term which the apostle uses when he calls himself a servant. It is really "bond servant." He used the ordinary Greek word for slave. If we are really the Lord's servants, we are servants bound to him for life. It is a bondage that is itself freedom, "for he that is called in the Lord, being a servant, is the Lord's freeman; likewise also he that is called, being free, is Christ's servant." 1 Cor. vii. 22.

Separated.-The apostle Paul was "separated unto the Gospel." So is every one who is really the servant of the Lord. "No man can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye can not serve God and mammon." Matt. vi. 24. No man can serve the Lord and have other service besides that. "Do you mean to say that a merchant or other business man can not be a Christian?" By no means. What I said was that a man cannot serve the Lord and at the same time have other service. "And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him." Col. iii. 17. If the man is not serving the Lord in his business, then he is not serving the Lord at all. The true servant of Christ is truly separated.

But this does not mean that he separates himself from personal contact with the world. The Bible gives no countenance to monkery. The most hopeless sinner is he who thinks himself too good to associate with sinners. How then are we to be separated unto the Gospel? By the presence of God in the heart. Moses said to the Lord: "If thy presence go not with me, carry us not up thence. For wherein shall it be known here that I and thy people have found grace in thy sight? Is it not in that thou goest with us? so shall we be separated, I and thy people, from all the people that are upon the face of the earth." Ex. xxxiii. 15, 16.

But the one who is separated to the public ministry of the Gospel as the apostle Paul was, is separated in a special sense in that he may not engage in any other business for personal gain. "No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier." 2 Tim. ii. 4. He can not take any position, however high under earthly governments. To do so is to dishonor his Master, and to belittle his service. The minister of the gospel is the ambassador of Christ, and there is no other position that can approach it in honor.

The Gospel of God.-The apostle declared that he was "separated unto the Gospel of God." It is the Gospel of God "concerning his Son Jesus Christ." Christ is God and therefore the Gospel of God, of which the apostle speaks in the first verse of the chapter, is identical with "the Gospel of Christ" of which he speaks in the sixteenth verse. Too many people separate the Father and the Son in the work of the gospel. Many do so unconsciously. God, the Father, as well as the Son, is our Saviour. "God so loved the world, that He gave his only-begotten son." John iii. 6. "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself." 2 Cor. v. 19. "The council of peace" is "between them both." Zech. vi. 13. Christ came to the earth only as the representative of the Father. Whoever saw Christ, saw the Father also. John xiv. 9. The works which Christ did, were the works of the Father, who dwelt in him. Verse 10. Even the words which he spoke, were the words of the Father. Verse 24. When we hear Christ saying, "Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest," we are listening to the gracious invitation of God the Father. When we see Christ taking the little children up in His arms, and blessing them, we are witnessing the tenderness of the Father. When we see Christ receiving sinners, mingling with them, and eating with them, forgiving their sins, and cleansing the hideous lepers with a touch, we are looking upon the condescension and compassion of the Father. Even when we see our Lord upon the cross, with the blood streaming from His side, that blood by which we are reconciled to God, we must not forget that "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself," so that the apostle Paul said, "the church of God, which He hath purchased with His own blood." Acts xx. 28.

The Gospel in the Old Testament.-The Gospel of God to which the apostle Paul declared himself to be separated, was the Gospel "which He had promised afore by His prophets in the Holy Scriptures" (Rom. i. 2); literally, the Gospel which He had before announced or preached. This shows us that the Old Testament contains the Gospel, and also that the Gospel in the Old Testament is the same Gospel that is in the New. It is the only Gospel that the apostle preached. That being the case, it should not be thought strange for people to believe the Old Testament, and to refer to it as of equal authority with the New Testament. We read that God "preached before the Gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed." Gal. iii. 8. The Gospel preached to the people when Paul lived was the same Gospel that was preached unto the ancient Israelites. See Hebrews iv. 2. Moses wrote of Christ, and so much of the Gospel is to be found in his writings that a man who does not believe what Moses wrote, can not believe in Christ. John v. 46, 47. "To Him give all the prophets witness, that through His name whosoever believeth in Him shall receive remission of sins." Acts x. 43.

Paul had only the Old Testament when he went to Thessalonica, "and three Sabbath days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures, opening and alleging, that Christ must needs have suffered, and risen again from the dead." Acts xvii. 2, 3. Timothy had nothing in his childhood and youth but the Old Testament writings, and the apostle wrote to him: "Continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them; and that from a child thou hast known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus." 2 Tim. iii. 14, 15. Then go to the Old Testament with the expectation of finding Christ and His righteousness there, and you will be made wiser unto salvation. Do not discriminate between Moses and Paul, between David and Peter, between Jeremiah and James, between Isaiah and John.

The Seed of David.-The Gospel of God is "concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh." Rom. i. 3. Read the history of David, and of the kings who descended from him, and who became the ancestors of Jesus, and you will see that on the human side the Lord was handicapped by His ancestry as badly as anybody can ever be. Many of them were licentious and cruel idolaters. Although Jesus was thus compassed with infirmity, He "did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth." 1 Pet. ii. 22. This is to give courage to men in the lowest condition of life. It is to show that the power of the Gospel of the grace of God can triumph over heredity.

The fact that Jesus was made of the seed of David means that He is heir to the throne of David. Of David's throne the Lord said, "Thine house and thy kingdom shall be established forever before thee; thy throne shall be established forever." 2 Sam. vii. 16. David's kingdom is therefore coextensive with the inheritance promised to Abraham, which is the whole world. See Romans iv. 13. The angel said of Jesus, "The Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of His Father David; and He shall reign over the house of Jacob forever; and of His kingdom there shall be no end." Luke i. 32, 33. But all this involved His bearing the curse of the inheritance, and suffering death. "For the joy that was set before Him" He "endured the cross, despising the shame." Heb. xii. 2. "Wherefore God also hath highly exalted Him, and given Him a name which is above every name." Phil. ii. 9. As with Christ, so with us; it is through much tribulation that we enter the kingdom. He who fears reproach, or who makes His lowly birth, or His inherited traits, an excuse for his shortcomings, will fail of the kingdom of heaven. Jesus Christ went to the lowest depths of humiliation in order that all who are in those depths might, if they would, ascend with Him to the utmost heights of exaltation.

Power by the Resurrection.-Although Jesus Christ was of lowly birth, He was "declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead." Rom. i. 4. Was He not the Son of God before the resurrection? and was He not so declared to be? Certainly; and the power of the resurrection was manifested in all His life. To speak of nothing else, the power of the resurrection was shown in His raising the dead, which He did by the power dwelling in Him. But it was the resurrection from the dead that settled the matter beyond all doubt for men. After His resurrection He met the disciples, and said unto them, "All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth." Matt. xxviii. 18. The death of Christ shattered all the hopes that they had centered in Him; but when He "showed Himself alive after His passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days" (Acts i. 3), they had ample proof of His power. Their sole work thenceforth was to be witnesses of His resurrection and of its power. The power of the resurrection is according to the Spirit of holiness, for it was by the Spirit that He was raised. The power given to make men holy is the power that raised Jesus from the dead. "His divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain to life and godliness."

The Obedience of Faith.-Paul said that through Christ he had received grace and apostleship for the obedience of faith among all nations. True faith is obedience. "This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent." John vi. 29. Christ said, "Why call ye Me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?" Luke vi. 46. That is, a profession of faith in Christ which is not accompanied by obedience, is worthless. "Faith, if it hath not works, is dead." James ii. 17. "For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also." Verse 26. A man does not breathe in order to show that he lives, but because he is alive. He lives by breathing. His breath is his life. So a man cannot do good works in order to demonstrate that he has faith, but he does good works because the works are the necessary result of faith. Even Abraham was justified by works, because "faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect. And the Scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness."

"Beloved of God."-"That was a most comforting assurance that was given "to all that are in Rome." How many people have wished that they could hear an angel direct from glory say to them what Gabriel said to Daniel, "Thou art greatly beloved"! The apostle Paul wrote by direct inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and so the message of love came as directly from heaven to the Romans as it did to Daniel. The Lord did not single out a few favorites by name, but declared that all in Rome were beloved of God. Well, there is no respect of persons with God, and that message of love to the Romans is ours as well. They were "beloved of God" simply because "God so loved the world, that He gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." John iii. 16. "The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love; therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn thee." Jer. xxxi. 3. And this everlasting love to men is not shaken, although they forget it; for to those who have turned away, and fallen by their iniquity, He says, "I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely." Hosea xiv. 43. "If we believe not, yet He abideth faithful; He can not deny Himself."

"Called Saints."-The reader will notice that the words "to be" in Rom. i. 7 are indicated as supplied, so that instead of "called to be saints," we may read literally, "called saints." God calls all men to be saints, but all those who accept Him He calls saints. That is their title. When God calls people saints, they are saints. These words were addressed to the church in Rome, and not to the Church of Rome. The Church of Rome has always been apostate and pagan. It has abused the word "saint" until in its calendar it is almost a term of reproach. No greater sin has ever been committed by Rome than the distinction it has made between "saints" and ordinary Christians, making practically two standards of goodness. It has led people to think that laboring men and housewives were not and could not be saints, and has thus discounted true, everyday piety, and has put a premium on pious laziness and self-righteous deeds. But God has not two standards of piety, and all the faithful people in Rome, poor and unknown as many of them were, He called saints. It is the same to-day with God, although men may reckon differently.

"The Necessaries of Life" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

From the standpoint of tradition and custom, the "necessaries of life" include some very strange articles. A member of Parliament from Cambridge, in a speech touching the relation of the Budget bill to the liquor traffic, is reported as saying that "the increased taxation of the rich will relieve the taxation on such necessaries of life as sugar and tobacco."

A very large proportion of the Anglo-Saxon race seem to regard tobacco as one of the necessaries of life, although it was not known to the civilised world until the time of Sir Walter Raleigh. Another very large class regard intoxicating liquor,-beer, stout, wine, and whisky,-as among these "necessaries;" at least they will hold on to one or more of these drinks until the very last penny is gone, and sacrifice many of the real necessaries to obtain them. Still others think that tea and coffee are among the necessaries. They feel a craving for these articles which leads them to think they could not do without them. Another class believes they are unable to get along without opium and morphine. In a locality in the Southern United States there is a class of people who regard clay as an essential article of diet. And if we were to consider all the different races and nations and classes throughout the world, we could increase this list almost indefinitely.

Such facts only point to the conclusion that men are wont to take their ideas of what constitutes the necessaries of life more from the customs of depraved human nature than from the declarations of either science or revelation. Though the latter two speak with a positive voice against these customs, they are not regarded by the devotees to popular vices and fashions. Science-which in this case may be taken as almost synonymous with common sense-declares plainly and emphatically that such articles as those mentioned above contribute little or nothing to the building up and strengthening of the human body, and on the other hand do it an immense amount of harm.

None of these things came into use by man until after he had fallen from his uprightness and "sought out many inventions." Our first parents, Adam and Eve, were strangers to all such "indispensable" customs. The Saviour indulged in no such practices during His life on earth. Imagine Him, the Redeemer of men, whose life is to be our example,-smoking a cigar, like an individual who indulges in this modern "necessary" of life! Could such a case be supposed, the most dissipated beholder would know instinctively that He had fallen below even the human ideal of perfect uprightness and purity. And if men would not stifle the voice of conscience which the Creator has put within them, and would exercise their minds to discern and know the pathway of holiness, with the aid of the light God has given, they would know better than to class an article whose use constitutes a harmful and vicious indulgence, as among the necessaries of life.

No necessary of life creates in the human system an unnatural craving for its use. Hunger itself is not a craving for one particular thing, but for anything which will supply nourishment to the failing tissues of the body. And when the body is nourished and built up, the result is not a craving for something, but a feeling of comfort and ease, which is the natural feeling of health. The very fact, therefore, that the use of an article creates a strong craving for it, is the best of evidence from a physiological standpoint that it is not conducive to health, and therefore very far from belonging to the necessaries of life.

"Wonderfully Fashioned" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

It was no fable of Evolution that caused the Psalmist to exclaim by inspiration: "I am fearfully and wonderfully made." "Thine eyes did see my imperfect substance, and in Thy book were all my members written." When he contemplated the infinite power and wisdom by which the Lord entered into the minutest detail of the life of His creatures, he said, "Such knowledge is too wonderful for me." The following words from a foreign journal suggest some interesting thoughts:-

We are accustomed to regard the statement that "the hairs of our heads are numbered," as a highly figurative way of making us believe that nothing is too small for the attention of the Divine Artificer, and the more one studies, and the further one looks into the marvellous structure of the body, the more does he perceive that this minute uniformity is a literal reality.

Exactly such or such anatomical elements go to the production of a single hair, and one arrangement of these elements makes the hairs that pass out through the cutical of the scalp, keep up an uninterrupted growth, so that a man in full vigour must visit his barber at stated intervals, or be very uncomfortable; while the hairs that pass through the apertures of the skin of the arm remain of about the same length constantly.

No human ingenuity can change this order of nature; but one of the most interesting order of applications of this persistent uniformity is found in the recording of thumb-and-finger prints, for the identification of recruits, prisoners and other large classes of men. The ends of the nerves of touch, technically called the papill?, are arranged in orderly rows on the bulbs of the thumbs and fingers, and each papilla is placed at a certain determinate distance from its adjacent fellow, and can easily be "made out," with a good glass on many hands.

The result of the arrangement is, that a "pattern" is produced, for these nerve tips are not placed in any two of the millions of us exactly similarly, so that if a man blackens his finger with a suitable pigment, and presses it upon a properly prepared paper, he leaves an impression that is "his mark," and not another's. it is said that the Chinese practised this method of detecting criminals a thousand years ago. Perhaps they did; and very likely they'll claim Edison next; but it has remained for a scientific

393

Englishman to collect hundreds of these impressions-compel them to disclose their individuality by enlarged photographs, so that he has them classified and described and named and indexed-and prove the superiority of this means of identification to measurements of other methods now in vogue.

Sir Francis Galton has produced a novel, interesting, and entertaining book; of course, the subject is treated in a scientific spirit, and has added another interesting testimony to the truth, that not only the hairs of the head, but the tiny mounds made by the tips of the nerves are under the governance of the Divine law, unchanging, and the fiat of Him with whom "there is no variableness neither shadow of turning."

"Tobacco and the Blood" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

When taken in any form, tobacco very readily finds its way into the blood, and, according to Sir B. W. Richardson, it produces in the vital fluid serious changes. He describes these changes in the following words:-

"On the blood the prolonged inhalation of tobacco produces changes which are very marked in character. The fluid is thinner than is natural, and in extreme cases paler. In some instances the deficient colour of the blood is communicated to the body altogether, rendering the external surface yellowish white and puffy. The blood, being thin, also exudes too freely, and a cut surface bleeds for a long time, and may continue to bleed inconveniently even in opposition to remedies. But the most important influence is exerted over those little bodies which float in myriads in the blood and are known as the red corpuscles. These bodies have naturally a double concave surface, and at their edges a perfectly smooth outline. The absorption of fumes of tobacco necessarily leads to rapid changes in them; they lose their round shape, becoming oval and irregular, and instead of having a mutual attraction for each other and running together, a good sign of physical health, they lie loosely scattered before the eye, and indicate to the learned observer as clearly as though they spoke to him and said the words, that the man from whom they were taken is physically depressed, and deplorably deficient both in muscular and mental power.

"Interesting Items" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

-The death of the Sultan of Morocco is announced, and it is supposed that be was poisoned.

-The judicial statistics of Great Britain pros the existence of over 70,000 known professional thieves.

-Lord Coleridge, Lord Chief Justice of England died at his London residence, 1, Sussex-square Hyde-park, June 14.

-A German has constructed a tricycle to run on either land or water, with which he propose crowing the Channel to Folkestone.

-Joan of Arc is to have an annual fÈte day in France, and a national memorial is to be created on the spot where she suffered martyrdom.

-The volcano on the island of Stromboli is showing great activity. The eruption is increasing in violence, and there are frequent earthquakes.

-Italy is struggling with a ministerial crisis owing to the refusal of Signor Crispi to moderate his demands for military expenditure in the coming year.

-Intelligence has reached Shanghai that Japer has sent large forces to protect her interests in Cores. The King of Corea is reported to have fled to Japan.

-The expulsion of Danish actors from Schleswig, under a law prohibiting Danish performances in that country, is causing much comment in Copenhagen.

-There is a prospect of a general federation of the Australian colonies, a scheme for that purpose having been proposed by the premier of New South Wales.

-A Scotchman is launching a new form of vegetarianism in Paris. Its members eat and drink nothing but uncooked vegetable foods and natural liquids.

-A "plague" has been raging at Hong Kong, China, which has caused 1,700 deaths, but is now said to be abating. Many thousands have fled from the place.

-New Zealand is bent on preserving her remarkable wild birds and animals, and has set apart two islands on which all hunting and trapping is forbidden.

-Over 25,000 natives of India have been inoculated for cholera by a Pasteur agent, and the protection afforded against the disease thus far has been considerable.

-By order of the Czar an expedition has been dispatched in search of the Russian ironclad monitor Roussalka, which foundered, with all on board, some months ago.

-The Great Northern Railway Company have decided to abolish third ideas fares, add all passengers will be able to travel at a parliamentary rate of one penny a mile.

-According to figured published by the railways of Eastern Russia, the number of emigrants to Siberia during the past five years was a little under 220,000, an average of 44,000 per annum.

-An important discovery of arms and ammunition less been made by the Russian Government in the Caucasus, where it is believed a rising is meditated, and great discontent prevails.

-A "beer war" between Social Democrats and breweries is raging in Germany, and has assumed such proportions that a report is to be prepared and presented to Emperor William by his special request.

-A conference held at Columbus, Ohio, between representatives of the colliery owners and miners in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois has resulted in an agreement on the question of wages.

-A telegram from Panama reported a great conflagration in progress in that city June 14. Over 800 houses had been destroyed, and the flames, fanned by a high wind, were still spreading. The inhabitants were panic stricken.

-The Russian Government is seriously contemplating the construction of a railway tunnel through that principal Caucasian mountain chain. Until this is done, Russia's hold of the Caucasus cannot be considered an assured one.

-According to a telegram from Lagos, on the west coast of Attics, the chiefs and elders of the people of Dorodu, an important trading place in the neighbourhood of Lagos, are soliciting the annexation of their country to Great Britain.

-The clerical party in Hungary has been completely defeated, and the Upper House will now accept the Civil Marriage Bill. Great disappointment is expressed in Court circles, while in Hungary the rejoicings over the victory of the Liberal party are unbounded.

-New regulations have recently been issued at St. Petersburg for the settlement of disputes between Russian officers. They provide for the appointment of a court of honour, consisting of officers, which will determine the question whether a duel is unavoidable or not.

-An experiment in providing family meals ready for the tables of the poor is being made at Martineau Building, Christian-street, East London. A substantial hot beef-pie is sold for one shilling, a single direr, sufficient for a working-man, costing threepence.

-Phra Yot, the Siamese mandarin about whom there has been a dispute between France and Siam, was sentenced at Bangkok to twenty years' hard labour on a charge of causing the death of a French officer. The event has caused great bitterness of feeling throughout Siam.

-While the increase of the population of the world is calculated at the rate of 200,000,000 in every twenty years, the growth of wheat throughout the world has fallen from 804,000,000 quarters in 1891 to 280,000,000 in 1898, and the price per quarter has fallen from 41s. in 1891 to 25s. in 1898.

-The rejuvenescence of the German Army is rapidly proceeding under the vigorous supervision of the Emperor William, and soon none of his grandfather's old officers will be left. Between thirty and forty generals and a still larger number of staff officers are to be retired in the course of the month.

-The young Sultan of Morocco, Miley Abdul Aziz, has left Rabat for Fez, accompanied by his troops Disturbances continue to take place in the interior, but the representatives of European Powers at Tangier advise their Governments not to send war-vessels to Moorish ports for fear of exciting the Mussulmans.

-German enterprise is going ahead in Asia Minor. A railroad extending some 309 miles from Ismid east by north to Angora has just been completed by German contractors. One remarkable feature in its construction is the almost total absence of wood. Not only are the mile and bridges of iron, but the sleepers and telegraph poles are of the same material.

-A boat containing eighty harvesters from Achill Island capsized near Westport Quay, June 14. Over thirty persons, nearly all of whom were young, were drowned. Thirty corpses were recovered. The harvesters were sailing to Westport to take passages to England and Scotland by steamers leaving there the next day.

-Excavations have been recently made in Sainte Marguerite cemetery, to try and discover the body of the Dauphin of France, who died a century ago and was duly buried. Several coffins were opened, but none contained remains which could have been those of a boy of ten. The object of the search is to demolish the legends of his escape put forth by pretenders from time to time.

-The proposed new Constitution for Hawaii provides for the establishment of a Republic, and forbids any advocacy of the monarchical form of government. It gives the franchise to all sup-porters of the Provisional Government, and to natives and neutralised aliens who swear to support the new Constitution. It further declares the Crown lands to be the property of the Government.

-At the City Dust depot in Lambeth, 42,572 loads of street sweepings were received in the last twelve months. Marketable articles were eliminated, 26,000 loads of rubbish being burned in the destructors. The old paper fetched ?590; rags, ?47; bottles, ?107; string, ?177; works and wax, ?58; and old iron, ?82. Cheques and notes were frequently discovered in the refuse, and returned to the owners when possible.

-M. Nicolas de Savin, a Frenchman now living in Saratoff, is supposed to be the oldest person now living, having been born in 1768. He remembers all the events of the French Revolution. He was a soldier in the Egyptian campaign, fought at Austerlitz and Jena, and was decorated at Saragossa. He was taken prisoner at Berezina, and afterwards sent to Berate, where he has remained ever since. His daughter, who lives with him, is over eighty.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

It is calculated that horse racing in England involves a direct expenditure of not less than ?3,000,000 a year. This does not include the amount lost in betting, which of course cannot be estimated, nor the sums squandered in various other vices that flourish in connection with the race course.

The suffering amongst the few thousands of destitute Jews who have found their way to Jerusalem is acute. The large sum of money distributed by charitable societies, which has doubtless attracted many to the city, is not sufficient to afford more than slight relief. The agent of one society says of a visit recently made:-

To call it a house-to-house visitation would be a misnomer. It was literally a hole-to-hole violation in fifteen groups of dwellings, where about 500 poor Jews are to be found in cellars and holes wholly out of sight, rarely any above ground. I have found, in courts behind houses, steps leading down to lower courts, and from there have gone down to others still lower, dark places piercing the debris, fragments of passages and chambers; solid masonry of past ages, where, among the ancient foundations, Jerusalem, of the past gives shelter to the homeless poor of the present."

"And they were astonished at His doctrine; for His word was with power." Luke iv. 32. "And it came to pass, when Jesus had ended these sayings, the people were astonished at His doctrine; for He taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes." Matt. vii. 28, 29. In like manner the officers who were sent to apprehend Him, were so captivated by His words that they forgot their errand, and returned without Him, and when asked, "Why have ye not brought Him?" replied, "Never man spake like this Man." John vii. 45, 46. And so we learn that the wonder of Christ's teaching was not so much in the strange things that He said, as in the power with which He spoke. Therefore my prayer shall be, "Lord, help me, not that I may be able to astonish people with the vastness of my learning, but that I may tell the old, old story with words that are powerful because prompted by Thy Holy Spirit."

As a sample of the conclusions men will come to when they follow the lead of the idea that Christ's Church ought to be "established" by some one of the powers of earth, we quote the following from the Christian World:-

Chancellor Philip V. Smith was chief speaker at a Bootle Church Defence meeting. He said Parliament was, at the instigation of the Liberation Society, proposing to inflict an injustice upon the Church which, he ventured to say, no Roman Emperor in the most cruel times would have attempted to do. If the Church were disestablished in Wales, the people would be practically left from Sunday night until Saturday night in a state of heathenism, and destitute of all spiritual aid.

What ideas can such men have as to the source of the Church's spiritual aid? or of the promise of Jesus Christ to His followers, "Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." Men who look to a worldly power to supply their spiritual aid, very soon forget their Lord.

In reply to the inquiry of a correspondent, the Church Times (June 15) points out the misuse of the term Sabbath, as applied to Sunday by many people:-

The Sabbath, "Dies Sabbati" (as still in Acts of Parliament), never meant anything but Saturday. Till the sixteenth century no Christian ever called "Sunday" the Sabbath. The great Lightfoot, a Puritan says, "I have diligently searched the Fathers to find 'Sabbath' used in the sense of Sunday; would that I could find it!" The Presbyterians and the Puritans were the first to give this (as well as other theological words) an entirely new meaning.

Of course the Bible everywhere calls the seventh day the Sabbath, and as the Bible only is the word of God, that makes the seventh day for ever the Sabbath. Even though the Fathers had called Sunday the Sabbath it would not have made it so. Shall we take the word of man or the word of God? And as the Bible tells us when the Sabbath is, and what it is, in order that we may receive the blessing that is in it, shall we not follow the ways of God rather than the way of the world?

In these days, when architecture and music are becoming the principal religious attractions, some words recently spoken by the Rev. J. Ossian Davies, of Bournemouth, ought to have wide circulation. When asked, "What is the best way to reach the masses with the Gospel?" he replied:-

Somehow or other they do not like our grand buildings. I do not exactly know why, but it is a fact, and this fact must be faced if we are ever to reach the people successfully. I have the impression that we depend too much upon our places of worship, and not enough upon the word "Go," which is the first word in the condition that Christ gave to His apostles. It may turn out that our building churches and chapels and begging the people to come into them, is, after all, a wrong method. However, if places were built in harmony with the character of the people we wish to reach, it is probable that these houses would answer a good purpose. Still, nothing will take the place of that active seeking the people which is clearly implied in the command, "Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature." My own experience leads me to believe that the people are not indifferent to the Gospel. I believe that when this simple message delivered by good, earnest men, will always find a hearty response from the masses.

"Prophetic Lights," noticed in our advertising page, is an excellent study of prophecies concerning the first and second advent of Christ, proceeding on the true basis that Scripture must interpret Scripture.

"Delighting in Wickedness" The Present Truth 10, 25.

E. J. Waggoner

Delighting in Wickedness.-In the book notices of one of the best London dailies, in the review of a new novel, which is declared to be intolerably dull on account of the uniform goodness of the hero, we find the following statement:-

The possession of all the domestic virtues makes a man desirable enough from the point of view of the possible bride; from that of the novel reader it is apt to render him uninteresting, to say nothing more.

This is stated in all seriousness. It shows what novel-readers desire, and the object for which they read. They think that a writer who describes a virtuous man, has dealt unfairly with them. Why should he lead them through three volumes, and give them no spice of wickedness? The fact stated in the few lines above presents a fearful picture of the condition of society. This class also is described in Scripture, as those "who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, . . . have pleasure in them that do them."

June 28, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

"And the seventy returned again with joy, saying, Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through thy name. And he said unto them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven. Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy; and nothing shall by any means hurt you. Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven." Luke x. 17-20.

The name of Jesus is all-powerful. He has by inheritance a better name than the angels. Heb. i. 4. God has given Him "a name that is above every name." Phil. ii. 9. "Neither is there salvation in any other; for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." Acts iv. 12. But it is not to be used as a mere charm. The seven sons of Sceva tried to cast out evil spirits by the name of Jesus, saying, "We adjure you by Jesus whom Paul preacheth." Acts xix. 13. The only result was that the evil spirit cast them out. Why was this?-Because they did not know the name that they used. It is something more than a sound; it is a life.

Jesus said, "I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven." "And there was war in heaven: Michael and His angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, and prevailed not; neither was there place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world." Rev. xii. 7-9. Satan has been conquered again and again by the power of heaven. He was defeated and cast out of heaven in the beginning, and when Christ came to this earth, He "spoiled principalities and powers," triumphing over them in Himself." Col. ii. 15. Therefore whoever meets the devils with the power of heaven, is sure to triumph over them.

Satan fell as lightning from heaven. He is still an angel, though fallen. Sin has robbed him of his original glory, yet the brightness which he still retains far surpasses all human conception of glory. "Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light." 2 Cor. xi. 14. What wonder, then, that he deceives men who trust in appearances? By reason of the brightness which he still retains, he will be able to cause many to believe that he is the Christ. The life of Christ cherished in the heart will alone enable us to detect his devices, and to quench his fiery darts.

Great power is given by Christ to His disciples. It is a wonderful thing to have power over that old Serpent, and all of his kind. "Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven." It is very natural for man to rejoice in that which they can see. Wonderful phenomena dazzle the senses. Christian workers are apt to place their rejoicing in what the Lord has wrought through them. This is their danger. When they begin to glory in the works accomplished, the power by which they were wrought departs. Our connection with Christ, who is our life, is to be our only rejoicing. We are not to look at the things which are seen, but that the things which are unseen; "for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen our eternal."

"What Is that to Thee?" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

This is the question put by the Lord to sinful man when the latter manifests a disposition to supervise the religious conduct of his fellows. Jesus and His disciples were alone at the Sea of Galilee after His resurrection, and when they had eaten and Jesus had talked with them, He said to Peter, "Follow Me." "Then Peter, turning about, seeth the disciple whom Jesus loved following; . . . Peter seeing him saith to Jesus, Lord, and what shall this man do? Jesus saith unto them, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou Me." John xxi. 20-22.

This brief dialogue reveals very plainly the mind of the Lord in regard to the exercise of ecclesiastical authority among men. There was Peter, who held as high a position as any in the church, and to whom many people believe to have held the highest place, meeting with a pointed rebuke from the Lord for presuming to demand even a knowledge of the obligations which the Saviour had laid or would lay upon John. Yet how many since that time who have neither held the station nor possessed the virtues of an apostle, have assumed the authority to dictate to their fellow-men what they must do to discharge their obligations to God, and even to punish them if they refused to obey!

This is the spirit that is embodied in all those laws which men have presumed to enact for the punishment of "offences against God and religion."

402

Men have become so ostensibly zealous for the Lord that they have taken it upon themselves not only to know just what everybody else must do in order to meet the mind of God, but to execute upon them the penalty for transgression, as if the Lord were not able or competent to uphold the honour of His own law! It is the zeal which Saul of Tarsus had, which was "not according to knowledge." The zeal of Paul the apostle, and of every converted person, is to feed the flock with the living word, which is the bread and water of life.

Would you enquire, Lord, and what shall this man do, who keepeth not Thy commandments? or, Lord, here is one that worshippeth not Thee according to the way that I conceive to be right; what shall be done with him? The answer is, "What is that to thee? follow thou Me." Give your attention to your own course, and leave all others free to do the same.

"Feed My sheep;" and "Follow thou Me." Thus did the Lord mark out the duty of Peter; and thus He has marked out the whole duty of all His followers, whether high or low. He who will obey his Lord's words will find ample scope for the exercise of all his energies, without giving any attention to enforcing religious duties upon his neighbours.

"The Greatness of Service" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

The Greatness of Service.-Service is not a mark of degradation, but of greatness. We are accustomed to think of the position of a servant as a menial one, because it has been made so in the majority of cases by the customs and traditions of men; but considered from the standpoint of Gospel truth, it is not so. To His disciples the Saviour said, "The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and they that exercise authority upon them are called benefactors. But ye shall not be so; but he that is greatest among you, let him be as the younger; and he that is chief, as he that doth service. For whether is greater, he that sitteth at meat? but I am among you as he that serveth." Luke xxii. 25-27.

From the world's standpoint, he that sitteth at meat is greater than He that serves; yet Christ, the only begotten Son of the eternal God, came and took on earth a place of a servant; and in this He did not degrade Himself, but invested with His own glory and greatness all service for the benefit of our fellow-men.

And is not God Himself the greatest servant in the universe? Who does so much to minister to the comfort and happiness of all creatures as He? Not only does He minister in things that are great and exalted, but in all the little things that pertain to daily existence, whether of high or low, rich or poor. The veriest vagabond of the street is not passed by. To him, equally with the prince, it is granted to live and move and have his being in the Lord. Acts xvii. 28. He gives to him "life, and breath, and all things," as freely as to anyone else. "He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust." Matt. v. 45. The path that leads to greatness is the path of service; and in proportion to the service we have rendered to our fellows here, and to the capacity we have developed for being a blessing to others, will be the height of the station assigned us in the world hereafter.

"'This Is Elias'" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

It is a natural tendency of the human mind to give more heed to personalities than to principles-to look more to men engaged in some great work, than to the point and principle of the work itself. This caused the scribes and Pharisees to make a great mistake in the days of John the Baptist, and has caused great mistakes in all ages since that time.

The prophet Malachi had prophesied of the coming of Elias before the day of the Lord, to prepare the world for His appearance. But this prophecy was fulfilled, so far as it related to the first advent of Christ, in the coming of John the Baptist; for the Saviour said of him, "If ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come." Matt. xi. 14. John himself had testified that he was not Elias, and he gave a true answer to the question asked him, for he was not the person who had prophesied before Ahab, and called down fire from heaven on Mount Carmel. The nature of his identity with Elias is explained in the first chapter of Luke, in the words of the angel who talked with Zacharias: "He [John] shall go before Him in the spirit and power of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; and to make ready a people prepared for the Lord." Luke i. 17.

It is not the man as a person, but the spirit and power which actuates him in his work, that is important for us to consider. We should not be fascinated by a striking personality, so as to lose sight of the principle that is embodied within him. John would do nothing to call attention to himself as an individual, but merely declared himself to be "the voice of one crying in the wilderness." The important question to be considered in connection with any work is not, Who is the mouthpiece? but, Whose is the voice that is speaking? The important thing about Elias was not his physical self, but the voice that spoke through him; and when that voice, with the same spirit and power, spoke through John, John became Elias. And whosoever now is sent forth in the spirit and power of Elias to prepare the way of the Lord and make ready a people for His coming, fulfils the prophecy as did John. But we must bear in mind the truth, of which this instance affords a striking evidence, that any man, in himself, is nothing; and that whatever prominence and importance attached to his name is due only to what he receives from God.

"Studies in Romans. Debtor to All. Rom. i. 8-15" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

The first seven verses of the first chapter of Romans are the salutation. No uninspired letter ever embraced so much in its greeting as this one. The apostle was so overflowing with the love of God that he could not write a letter without covering almost the whole Gospel in the salutation.

The next eight verses may well be summarised in the words "Debtor to All," for they show the completeness of the apostle's devotedness to others. Let us read them carefully, and not be content with one reading:

First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world. For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the Gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers; making request, if by any means now at length I might have a prosperous journey by the will of God to come unto you. For I long to see you, that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift, to the end ye may be established; that is, that I may be comforted together with you by the mutual faith both of you and me. Now I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that oftentimes

403

I purposed to come unto you, (but was let hitherto,) that I might have some fruit among you also, even as among other Gentiles. I am debtor both to the Greeks, and to the barbarians; both to the wise, and to the unwise. So, as much as in me is, I am ready to preach the Gospel to you that are at Rome also.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

For whom did the apostle give thanks to God?

"I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all."

What does he say is the chief characteristics of the Romans?

"Your faith."

How prominent was their faith?

"Your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world."

What did the apostle always do for them?

"Make mention of you always in my prayers."

How often did he pray for them?

"Without ceasing."

How emphatically does he make this statement?

"God is my witness."

How did he say that he himself served God?

"Whom I serve with my spirit in the Gospel of His Son."

For what did the apostle pray concerning the Romans?

"Making request, if by any means now at length I might have a prosperous journey by the will of God to come unto you."

Why was he so anxious to see them?

"I long to see you, that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift?

Why did he wish to impart a spiritual gift to them?

"To the end ye may be established."

What had he often purposed?

"Oftentimes I purposed to come unto you."

Why had he not gone?

"But was let [hindered] hitherto."

Why had he purposed to go to them?

"That I might have some fruit among you also, even as among other Gentiles."

How did Paul hold himself as related to men?

"I am debtor both to the Greeks, and to the barbarians; both to the wise and to the unwise."

What was he therefore willing to do?

"So, as much as in me be, I am ready to preach the Gospel to you that are at Rome also."

A Great Contrast.-In the days of the apostle Paul the faith of the church in Rome was spoken of throughout all the world. Faith means obedience; for faith is counted for righteousness, and God never counts a thing so unless it is so. Faith "worketh by love." Gal. v. 6. And this work is a "work of faith." 1 Thess. i. 3. Faith also means humility, as is shown by the words of the prophet, "Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him; but the just shall live by his faith." Hab. ii. 4. The upright man is the just man; the man whose soul is lifted up is not upright or just; but the just man is such because of his faith; therefore only the man whose soul is not lifted up has faith. The Roman brethren, therefore, in the days of Paul, were humble.

But it is far different now. An instance is given by the Catholic Times of June 15, 1894. The pope had said, "We gave authority to the bishops of the Syrian rite to meet in synod at Mossul," and had commended the "very faithful submission" of those bishops and had ratified the election of the patriarch by "Our Apostolic authority." An Anglican paper had expressed surprise, saying, "Is this a free union of equal churches, or is it submission to one supreme and monarchical head?" To which the Catholic Times replies: "It is not a free union of equal churches, but it is submission to one supreme and monarchical head. . . . To our Anglican pleader we say, You are not really surprised. You know well what Rome claims and always will claim, obedience. That claim is now, if it ever was, before the world." But that claim was not before the world in the days of Paul. In those days it was the church in Rome; now it is the Church of Rome. The church in Rome was famous for its humility, and its obedience to God. The Church of Rome is famous for its haughty assumption of the power of God, and for its demand for obedience to itself.

Praying without Ceasing.-The apostle exhorted the Thessalonians to "pray without ceasing." 1 Thess. v. 17. He did not exhort others to do that which he did not do himself, for he told the Romans that without ceasing he made mention of them always in his prayers. It is not to be supposed that the apostle had the brethren at Rome on his mind every waking hour of the day, for in that case he could not have thought of anything else. No man can be consciously in prayer every moment, but all can continue "instant in prayer," or, as Young translates it, "in the prayer persevering." Rom. xii. 12. This is in harmony with what the Saviour said, that "men ought always to pray, and not to faint," or grow weary. Luke xviii. 1. In the parable that follows, the unjust judge complains of the "continual coming" of the poor widow. That is an illustration of praying without ceasing. It is not that we are to be every moment in conscious prayer, for then important duties would be neglected, but it is that we should not grow weary of praying.

A Man of Prayer.-This is what Paul was. He made mention of the Romans in all his prayers. To the Corinthians he wrote, "I thank my God always on your behalf." 1 Cor. i. 4. To the Colossians, "We give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you." Col. i. 3. Still more emphatically he wrote to the Philippians, "I thank my God upon every remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all making request with joy." Phil. i. 3, 4. Again to the Thessalonians, "We give thanks to God always for you all, making mention of you in our prayers; remembering without ceasing your work of faith," etc., 1 Thess. i. 2, 3. And further, "Night and day praying exceedingly that we might see your face, and might perfect that which is lacking in your faith." 1 Thess. iii. 10. To his beloved son in the faith he wrote, "I thank God, whom I serve from my forefathers with pure conscience, that without ceasing I have remembrance of thee in my prayers night and day." 2 Tim. i. 3.

"Rejoice Evermore."-The secret of this is to "pray without ceasing." See 1 Thessalonians v. 16, 17. The apostle Paul prayed for others so much that he had no time to worry about himself. He had never seen the Romans, yet he prayed for them as earnestly as for the churches that he had raised up. Recounting his labors and sufferings, he adds that they are "beside those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches." 2 Cor. xi. 28. "As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing." He fulfilled the law of Christ by bearing the burdens of others. Thus it was that he was able to glory in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. Christ suffered on the cross for others, but it was "for the joy that was set before him." They who are wholly devoted to others, share the joy of their Lord, and can rejoice in Him.

"A Prosperous Journey."-Paul prayed earnestly that he might have a prosperous journey by the will of God to visit Rome. Read the twenty-seventh chapter of Acts, and you will learn just what kind of journey he had. Most people would say that it was not a prosperous journey. Yet we do not hear any complaint from Paul; and who can say that he did not have a prosperous trip? "All things work

404

together for good to them that love God." Therefore it must have been prosperous. It is well for us to consider these things. We are apt to look at matters from a wrong side. When we learn to look at them as God looks at them, we shall find that things that we regard as disastrous are prosperous. How much mourning we might save if we always remembered that God knows much better than we do how our prayers should be answered!

Spiritual Gifts.-When Christ "ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men." Eph. iv. 8. These gifts were the gifts of the Spirit, for he said, "It is expedient for you that I go away; for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you." John xvi. 7. And Peter said on the day of Pentecost: "This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses. Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear." Acts ii. 32. These gifts are thus described: "Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal. For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit; to another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of healing by the same Spirit; to another the working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues; to another the interpretation of tongues; but all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will." 1 Cor. xii. 4-11.

Established by Spiritual Gifts.-"But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal." What is the profit? "For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ; till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." Eph. iv. 12, 13. The gifts of the Spirit must accompany the Spirit. As soon as the early disciples received the Spirit in accordance with the promise, they received the gifts. One of the gifts, speaking with new tongues, was manifested that very day. It follows, therefore, that the absence of the gifts of the Spirit in any marked degree in the church, is evidence of the absence of the Spirit, not entirely, of course, but to the extent that God has promised it. The Spirit was to abide with the disciples forever, and therefore the gifts of the Spirit must be manifest in the true church until the second coming of the Lord. As before stated, the absence of any very marked manifestation of the gifts of the Spirit is evidence of the absence of the fulness of the Spirit; and that is the secret of the weakness of the church, and the great divisions that exist. Spiritual gifts establish the church; therefore the church that does not have those gifts cannot be established. Who may have the Spirit? Whoever asks for it with earnest desire. See Luke xi. 13. The Spirit has already been poured out, and God has never withdrawn the gift; it only needs that Christians should ask and accept.

"I Am Debtor."-That was the keynote of Paul's life, and it was the secret of his success. Nowadays we hear of men saying, "The world owes me a living." But Paul considered that he owed himself to the world. And yet he received nothing from the world but stripes and abuse. Even that which he had received before Christ found him was a total loss. But Christ had found him, and given Himself to him, so that he could say, "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Gal. ii. 20. As Christ's life was his life, and Christ gave himself for the world, Paul necessarily became a debtor to the whole world. This has been the case of every man who has been a servant of the Lord. "David, after he had served his own generation by the will of God, fell on sleep." Acts xiii. 36. "Whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; and whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant; even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many."

Personal Labour.-There is a foolish notion prevalent that ordinary labor is degrading, especially to a minister of the Gospel. It is not all the fault of the ministers themselves, but largely the fault of the foolish people about them. They think that a minister must always be faultlessly attired, and that he must never soil his hands with ordinary manual labor. Such ideas were never gained from the Bible. Christ himself was a carpenter, yet many professed followers of him would be shocked if they should see their minister sawing and planing boards, or digging in the ground, or carrying parcels. There is a false dignity altogether too prevalent, which is utterly opposed to the spirit of the Gospel. Paul was not ashamed nor afraid to labour. And this he did not merely occasionally, but day after day while he was engaged in preaching. See Acts xviii. 3, 4. He said, "These hands have ministered unto my necessities, and to them that were with me." Acts xx. 34. He was speaking to the leaders of the church when he said, "I have showed you all things, how that so labouring ye ought to support the weak, and to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, It is more blessed to give than to receive." Verse 35.

Slandering Paul-At the second international convention of the Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions, the main address for one evening was on the subject of "Paul, the Great Missionary." The speaker said that "Paul had a faculty for dividing up the work so that he undertook very little of it himself." It was a foolish and wicked idea to present before young volunteers for missionary service, because it was an utter falsehood, and it was anything but a compliment to the apostle. In addition to what has been cited above, read the following: "Neither did we eat any man's bread for naught; but wrought with labour and travail night and day, that we might not be chargeable to any of you." 2 Thess. iii. 8. "I will very gladly spend and be spent for you." 2 Cor. xv. 15. "Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent." 2 Cor. xi. 23. "But by the grace of God I am what I am; and His grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain; but I laboured more abundantly than they all; yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me." 1 Cor. xv. 10. The grace of God is manifest in service for others. The grace of Christ led him to give himself for us, and to take upon himself the form and condition of a servant. Therefore he who has the most of the grace of Christ will labour the most. He will not shun work, even though it be the most menial service. Christ went to the lowest depths for the sake of man; therefore he who thinks that any service is beneath him, is altogether too high for association with Christ.

Gospel Liberty.-Gospel liberty is the liberty that God gives men through the Gospel. It expresses His idea of freedom. It is the freedom seen in nature and in all the works of His hands. It is the freedom of the winds, blowing where they list; it is the freedom of the flowers, scattered everywhere through wood and meadow; it is the freedom of the birds, soaring unrestrained through the heavens; the freedom of the sunbeam, shooting from its parent orb and playing on cloud and mountain top; the freedom of the celestial orbs, sweeping ceaselessly on through infinite space. This is the freedom which flows out from the great Creator through all His works. It is sin that has produced what is narrow and contracted and circumscribed,-that has erected boundary lines, and made men stingy and niggardly. But sin is to be removed, and then perfect liberty will be realised once more in every part of creation. Even now this freedom may be tasted, by having sin removed from the heart. To enjoy this freedom through eternity is the glorious privilege now offered in the Gospel to all men. Who that claims to love liberty can let this opportunity pass unimproved?

"In Siberian Exile" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

The railway being constructed across Siberia will open up the great mining and agricultural resources of the country, besides diverting some of the trade of Japan and China into Russian channels. The Russian Government is sparing no effort to change the Siberian wilderness into an enterprising and prosperous country. Farming communities are being encouraged to emigrate to the country, and the criminal exiles are no longer to be located in the Siberian colonies. Siberia is to be reserved for political exiles, and heretics. Speaking of these latter offenders, the Russian correspondent of a foreign journal says:-

The "politicals," however, do not seem to call out our sympathies as the heretics do. These latter are men of the noblest principle as a rule, suffering the most cruel hardships with supreme fortitude. A good many of them lately have been sent to Siberia, but somehow they generally manage to fall on their feet, to get hold of a little farm somewhere, or a windmill, or a house near a stream abounding in fish, or a rich farmer in want of a reliable steward. And then they write home to their friends in Russia long letters of consolation and encouragement, and the letters circulate about from hand to hand and do almost as much for the cause as the spoken word of the preacher. A Stundist told a friend of mine the other day that in his village there is a shoemaker who receives a letter from Siberia about once in two months. The writer is a man who was sentenced to banishment for life for uttering expressions in ridicule of the usages of the orthodox church. My friend assured me that the banished Stundist's letters were read by a circle of quite two hundred people, and have a far more potent effect in bracing up the brethren than the most eloquent sermons preached by the local preachers.

Does it ever strike the authorities in Russia that this settling of banished Stundists, Baptists, and others all over the country where the population is sparsest is the best plan they could devise for the future Protestantising of the country? It was the little settlements of German Protestants in the southern provinces that brought about the great Stundist movement. The Germans are now settling in the eastern provinces of Orenburg, Samara, Sarateoff, and Ufa. May we not reasonably expect a similar movement in the east?

"Custom Against Precept" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it." Ex. xx. 8-11.

Thus reads the fourth commandment. In thousands of churches it is read every Sunday, and all the congregation unite in saying at its close, "O Lord, incline our hearts to keep this law." And yet it is not kept, because the day which the commandment says must be observed is the seventh day, while people in general keep the first day of the week, a day not mentioned in the commandment, except as included in the "six days" in which work may be done.

It is a fact that the seventh day of the week is the day commonly called Saturday.

It is a fact that the people who heard the words of the law spoken directly to them from Mount Sinai, did observe the seventh day of the week in obedience to the commandment, and to this day still hold that it is the Sabbath, whether they keep it or not.

It is a fact that the Jews in the wilderness, and for centuries thereafter, were under the direct leadership of the Lord Himself, the Lord manifesting Himself to them, and talking with them and their leaders as He has never done with any other people.

It is also a fact that when they were the most closely connected with the Lord, and His presence among them was the most marked, they were the most faithful in their observance of the seventh day.

The fact that the Jews kept the seventh day of the week while the Lord who spoke the fourth commandment was personally conducting them, shows that God meant just what He said, and that the fourth commandment does require the observance of the seventh day of the week, which alone is the true Sabbath of the Lord.

Further, it is a fact that the commandment cannot mean two different things. The words, "the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work," cannot mean both the seventh day and the first. Neither can they refer to either one of them indifferently. Neither can they mean anything different now from what they did when first spoken and written. If they apply to the first day of the week now, then they must always have meant the same day, and in that case the ancient Jews must have been wrong in their practice, and the Lord must have encouraged them in that wrong.

But such a supposition is impossible. The fact that God specified by daily miracles for forty years, just which day they should observe, shows, as before stated, that the seventh day of the week-Saturday-and that only, is the day which the commandment enjoins.

This being the case, those who hear the commandment read every Sunday should either cease responding, "O Lord, incline our ears to keep this law," or else should begin to keep it; for it is certain that the fourth commandment can no more be obeyed by resting on Sunday, than the first commandment can be kept by worshipping Jupiter.

But some one will ask, "Has not the commandment been changed?" We do not find in the Bible any record of a change. If the commandment has been changed, so as to warrant Sunday observance, why is it that the revised edition is not read in any of

406

the churches? If people really thought that the commandment had been changed, it would be very strange for them to keep on for years reading the old commandment, which enjoins another day from that which they keep. No; the commandment has not been changed, and nobody really thinks that it has been.

"But surely the day has been changed." Nothing can show the weakness of this position any better than the statements of those who hold to it. Read what the Vicar of Burgh, Lincolnshire, in a tract intended to show the necessity of Sunday observance, says about the matter:-

When Christ's life on earth was ended, and He had ascended to heaven, a change was made as to the day which was to be kept holy. . . . Before Christ's coming, the seventh day was kept holy in remembrance of the finished work of creation. After His ascension, the first day was sanctified in remembrance of the completed work of redemption. This change was made by the apostles in obedience to the will of Christ. We are not told of any words of His in which He gave this direction.

Just think of it. It is said that the apostles made the change in obedience to the will of Christ, and yet we nowhere find the words in which He gave the direction, nor even any words of the apostles, in which they intimate that such a direction ever was given! How then do men know that it was given? They do not, and never can know that it was. For no one can know that a thing is so when it is not so; and the fact that there is no record of any such change, is evidence that no such change was ever made. Christ ascended to heaven without saying anything about a change in the day. The apostles all died without ever saying anything about it, or even intimating that Christ ever said a word about it. But some men say that the change was made by the disciples in obedience to the will of the Lord. Let them produce the inspired record before they try to make people believe it.

No; the day remains the same, and will remain unchanged throughout eternity. But the people have changed. The great apostasy began, and the people insensibly drifted away from the standard of Christ and His apostles, under the influence of surrounding Paganism. Then the apostasy culminated in the Papacy, which thought to change the times and the laws, so that the customs of the people were taken as the standard of right, instead of the Bible. And this is how people now keep Sunday instead of the Sabbath.

But custom cannot make a thing any different from what God has established it. "The customs of the people are vain." Jer. x. 3. The traditions of men are the transgression of the commandments of God. This matter of custom against the word of the Lord is strikingly set forth in the following from John Bunyan's famous "dream." Christian was on his journey, when

He espied two men come tumbling over the wall on the left hand of the narrow way; and they made up apace to him. The name of one was Formalist, and the name of the other was Hypocrisy. So, as I said, they drew up to him, who thus entered with them into discourse.

Chris. Gentlemen, whence came you, and whither go you?

Form. and Hyp. We were born in the land of Vain-glory, and we are going for praise to Mount Zion.

Chris. Why came you not in at the gate which standeth at the beginning of the way? Know ye not that it is written, "He that cometh not in by the door, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber"?

F. and H. They said that to go to the gate for entrance was, by all their countrymen, counted too far about; and that therefore their usual way was to make a short cut of it, and to climb over the wall as they had done.

Chris. But will it not be counted a trespass against the Lord of the city whither we are bound, thus to violate His revealed will?

F. and H. They told him that as for that he need not trouble his head thereabout; for what they did they had custom for, and could produce, if need were, testimony that could witness it for more than a thousand years.

Chris. "But," said Christian, "will it stand a trial of law?"

F. and H. They told him that custom, being of so long standing as above a thousand years, would doubtless now be admitted as a thing legal by an impartial judge. "And besides," said they, "if we get into the way, what matter is it which way we may get in? If we are in, we are in: thou art but in the way, who, as we perceive came in at the gate; and we are also in the way, that came tumbling over the wall; wherein now is thy condition better than ours?"

Chris. I walk by the rule of my Master; you walk by the rude working of your own fancies. You are counted thieves already by the Lord of the way. You came in by yourselves without His direction, and shall go out by yourselves without His mercy.

To those who plead "custom" as a sufficient reason for keeping Sunday instead of the Sabbath, let me ask, "Will it stand a trial at law?"

"The Plane of the Gospel" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

The Plane of the Gospel.-When Christ descended from heaven and took upon Himself the nature of sinful flesh, He did not stop when He touched the topmost rim of humanity, but descended to the level of the poorest and most humble of birth. Born in a manger, and reared in an obscure village, He possessed not a single mark of worldly distinction. He was the son of Joseph the carpenter. His foremost followers were fishermen; His food was loaves and fishes, and He testified that He had not where to lay His head. He was among His disciples as a servant. Yet in it all He was the Son of God. He stood on the level of the sons of God, and angels did His bidding.

The plane of His life is the plane of the Gospel, and to that plane the poorest and humblest have access. The mysteries of salvation and heirship with Christ are not revealed to the wise and prudent, but unto babes. Jesus Christ identified Himself with poverty, with humility, with reproach, and with suffering in their keenest forms, but in all He was without sin. He did not make a low level of His followers, but an exalted one, for it was the level of the sons of the eternal God. It is sin that degrades, and not poverty, humility, and suffering. The plane of sin, though it is covered with men of wealth and power and honour, is infinitely below the plane of the Gospel, with its poor and lowly and outcast saints.

"Christ All and in All" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

"For I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified." 1 Cor. ii. 2.

It might seem that in this Paul became narrow in his views, and repudiated all science, learning, and education. But such was not the case. He simply determined to begin at the beginning, to commence with first principles, and start the building upon a solid foundation.

What is Christ? "Other foundation can no man lay," says Paul, "than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ." 1 Cor. iii. 11. He is the true foundation, the chief corner-stone.

Christ Himself says, "I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending." Rev. i. 8. He is all, from first to last. He is the A, B, C, and the X, Y, Z,-the entire alphabet. All that can be learned from written language depends upon a knowledge of the alphabet. No one can read without knowing his letters, and no one who reads ever gets beyond or above the use and the usefulness of the alphabet. From this are formed all the two hundred thousand words in our language. By the use of these twenty-six letters are printed all the thousands and hundreds of thousands of books in the English language. In the simple alphabet, therefore, are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge that are contained in all the books of any language.

"Good Things from God" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

The Apostle Paul wrote in his letter to the Romans, "We know that all things work together for good to them that love God." Do you know it? Of course it is so; because it is the word of God who can make all things work for good.

Then there need be no complaining and sulking when you cannot have your own way. Our own way is not always as nice as we thought it would be. So the Lord tells us to give up our way, and take His way, and though His way is often strange it is always best. Therefore we can be cheerful and happy even when trouble comes, and when things do not come to pass just as we might wish.

The Lord is so good and so great that He can bring good to us out of the strangest ways. The patriarch Jacob once said, "All these things are against me," when his sons wanted to take their younger brother to Egypt, where they went to buy corn because of the famine in the land. Jacob thought of his long-lost son Joseph, and now he feared that Benjamin would be taken from him. He did not know that the young ruler who sold the corn was his own boy, Joseph, whom he had given up as dead. Things were working for him and not against him. God could see it when Jacob could not.

You remember the story of Joseph. When he was sold as a slave into Egypt by his brothers, he did not spend his time murmuring and grieving and sulking because he had been badly treated. He knew the Lord was caring for him even though everything seemed to go wrong. And even when cast in the prison for doing right, he was so cheerful and kind that the keeper let him help to take care of the prisoners, and so he was able to do good to others. How easy it would have been for him to have said, "If this is the way I am to be used I will not try to do right." But he believed that everything would work together for good, because he knew that he loved God, and that God loved him.

God is good to everybody. He loves every one. And when there was going to be seven years of famine in the land of Egypt, He gave the king a dream so that he might prepare for the famine by storing up food. None of the wise men of Egypt could tell the meaning of the dream, and, as you know, Joseph was at last called out from prison to tell the king the word of the Lord, and was made the ruler of the land. Read the story in Genesis xli. So all Egypt learned about the true God from this young slave and prisoner.

Joseph's brothers only wanted to get rid of him, but the Lord made good come out of their wicked deed. When they went to buy corn of him, and he had told them who he was, he said, "Be not grieved nor angry with yourselves, that ye sold me hither; for God did send me before you to preserve life." "God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance." Gen. xlv. 5, 7. Even when we are used unkindly, and do not deserve the ill we receive, the Lord can look beyond and make it all come out for our good, and the good perhaps of others as well.

God was with Joseph when his feet were in iron chains in prison just the same as when he stood before Pharaoh, the great king, and told him the word of the Lord. Joseph knew it, and so he did not grumble when in prison, but served God with a happy heart.

You remember how Paul and Silas sang songs of praise in prison, and the Lord brought good out of their affliction. Daniel was put in the lions' den, but an angel went in with him and shut the mouth of the lions. The three Hebrew children were cast into a burning furnace, and the Lord walked with them in the flames and they were not harmed. Those who punished them learned about God's power. The Lord always cares for His servants when they are in danger and distress, and teaches men good lessons.

Then when tempted to complain because it rains when you want the sun to shine, or because you have to work when you planned to play, or because your parents cannot give you all the things that you would like or that some of your playmates get, and even when ill

414

or in any trouble, just think about the text, "All things work together for good to them that love God." Think of Joseph in prison and Joseph before Pharaoh and the great men of Egypt. If you learn the text by heart, and believe it every day, it will save you many unhappy hours. It is because many grown-up people have not believed this word of the Lord that they have been unhappy when things have not gone with them as they thought they should. Believe it all the time, even when trouble comes. You know good will in some way come out of it; for God promises to make all things work for good. He is good.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

-The plague at Hong Kong is diminishing in virulence.

-In twelve months 404 persons were killed by vehicles in the streets of London.

-A fire in the vicinity of Moorgate St., June 21, destroyed property valued at ?150,000.

-The total number of deaths from the terrible mining disaster in Silesia is stated to be 232.

-An Austrian is said to have invented a motor bicycle which will travel from twenty-five to fifty miles an hour.

-London has now an estimated population of 5,948,000, which is 100,000 more than at the beginning of the year.

-Five thousand sheep were burned and 760,000 dollars lost by a fire in the central stockyards at Jersey City, U.S.A.

-During the past year applications, were made in this country for 25,000 patents, 19,400 designs, and 8,625 trade marks.

-The Spanish war indemnity has not been paid by the Moorish officials, and an appeal is to be made to the Sultan.

-A sunfish recently caught by boatmen near Melbourne harbour measured eleven feet in circumference, and weighed twenty-eight cwt.

-War is still in progress in Samoa between the "insurgents" and the forces of King Malistoa, who is supported by the English and Germans.

-Steps are being taken in America to put an end to the sale to children of sweetmeats containing alcohol, which hitherto has gone on unchecked.

-It is probable that a conference of represents fives of the Australian provinces will be called ere long to consider a scheme for their federation.

-The Powers have decided to recognise Abdul Aziz as Sultan of Morocco. The Kabyles in the neighbourhood of Tetuan are reported to be in a state of revolt.

-The latest advises from Corea state that no further troubles are apprehended, and that the Japanese troops who were recently landed are now re-embarking.

-A ferryboat with young people, returning from a f?te, capsised while crossing the River Isk, in the Russian province of Samara, forty-five persons being drowned.

-At an International Athletic Congress held in Paris, a committee was appointed to report on the possibility of reconstituting the Olympian games on the modern basis.

-Anarchists continue to give trouble to municipal authorities in various places by the use of explosives, the latest beings terrific explosion in a house in the Rue Royale at Brussels.

-The population of India numbered in 1891, the date of the last census, 287,000,000. In 1881 it was 250,000,000. The population now is considered to be something like 400,000,000.

-A dinner entirely cooked by electricity was recently given in London. The cost per guest was a fraction of a penny per course, the viands, it was explained, being unadulterated by gases.

-Mr. G. M. Lawson, a missionary recently returned from German East Africa, reports a terrible famine in that country, due to the ravages of locusts. The disaster affects a population of about 90,000.

-The Hungarian Civil Marriage Bill was carried in the House of Magnates by a majority of four. The victory of Dr. Wekerle and the Liberal Cabinet has been received with great rejoicing throughout Hungary.

-A "better understanding" has been brought about between Russia and the Vatican, so that the order prohibiting the Russian Bishops from visiting Rome has been revoked, and the Russian papers are also allowed to publish the Encyclical to the Poles and other documents emanating from the Roman Curia.

-It is said that the gold contained in the medals, vessels, chains, and other objects preserved in the Vatican would make mere gold coins than the whole of the persent European circulation.

-A tramcar was successfully driven by compressed gas at Croydon. The cost of gas was a penny a mile for a full load of passengers. The gas was carried in cylinders at the pressure of 130lbs. to the square inch.

-The science of medicine seems to have attained quite a considerable stage of development in Japan. A Japanese physician now claims to have discovered the "bacillus" which is supposed to be the cause of the plague in Hong Kong.

-The Pope has issued another of his encyclicals, in which he addresses the Protestant world and informs them that they have no certain rule of faith, and invites them accordingly to come back into the "true Church."

-A severe shock of earthquake was experienced at Oran, Algeria, on the morning of June 20. It lasted four seconds, and caused such alarm that the, residents of the most populous quarters forsook their houses, and passed the remainder of the night in the open air.

-A cablegram received at the Church Missions House, at New York, states that a severe earthquake has (recurred at Tokio, the capital of Japan. The missionaries report that they themselves are safe, and it is hence concluded that there must have been loss of life.

-Lord Dunmore, it is reported, is planning a journey by "land" from New York to Paris. He has gone to Montreal to arrange with the Hudson's Bay Company for the equipment of an expedition which will go to Alaska, cross to Siberia at a season when the Behring Strait is frozen, and then travel through Siberia to Europe.

-The barque Silicon, which has just arrived at Philadelphia, brings the first news from the Arctic regions since the departure of the Peary expedition. Last winter, it appears, was unusually severe in Greenland. The Esquimaux made frequent trips up the coast, but heard nothing of Lieutenant Peary and his companions. The captain of the vessel believes that any attempt to reach the Polo this year will result in the loss of all those who make the attempt.

-According to a letter from St. Petersburg, the Czar has presented his subjects with an "aerial" flag. Since there is already in Russia one flag for the land and another for the sea. It seems quite natural that with the development of ballooning there should be a third one for the firmament. The new flag will fly over the "park" of balloons of St. Petersburg, a military storehouse for these air-ships. The new flag, which has been designed by the Czar himself, is white, with a red cross on the left, and a winged anchor on the right. It will be dressed with great solemnity in the course of this month.

-Disastrous floods, accompanied by the loss of many Iives, are reported from Hungary, Galicia, and Silesia. The rivers Waag, Vistula, and Oder and the contributory streams having overflowed, thousands of miles of fertile land are inundated. The railway and other traffic is mostly interrupted, the Hungarian and Galician plains being like vast lakes. The damage to property is enormous, numerous bridges and dykes having been destroyed by the torrents. Upwards of a hundred towns and villages are under water, the alarm bell being rung continuously. Among them are the well-known watering places Trenesin, Teplitz, and Pietyan. A great number of houses have collapsed there, and the bodies of men and cattle have been swept away by the torrents.

-At the village of Ashlyka, in the province of Tobolsk, Siberia, there exists a Russian temperance society, which observes the following regulations: Every year, in the month of September, the members of the society meet in the church to sing a Te Deum, and afterwards make one to the other a solemn promise to abstain for a whole year from wine and spirits. They also sign an agreement that any person who breaks this pledge shall pay a fine of 25 roubles to the Church, and that all the members of the association shall spit in the face of the erring brother. Once a year only-viz., on the day that the period of abstinence expires-the members are permitted to take wine and brandy, but this species of armistice lasts only for the few hours which precede the renewal of the pledge.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

It is stated upon documentary testimony, that during the forty-four years from 1850 to 1894 the "higher critics" have set forth not less than seven hundred and forty-seven different theories in regard to the origin of the Bible. "Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure."

A lawsuit in the New York City courts, over the ownership of a dog valued at 75 cents (8s.), has already cost the litigants 2,000 dollars (?400). So long as such foolish strife is common to men, there will be worse in spite of all arbitration treaties. There can be no hope of seeing nations at peace while individuals composing the nation have their hearts full of war and strife. And the Gospel of peace is the only thing that can make peace.

If it were a fact that governments ought to patronise the religion of majorities, as some say, it would be difficult to resist the plea made at a Mohammedan meeting in London. The Queen reigns over more Mohammedans than Protestants and Catholics combined, and so a speaker for Islam declared that the Government should build them a mosque in London. There are 80,000,000 Mohammedans in the British Empire.

Nothing could have contributed more to the popularity of Signor Crispi, the Italian Prime Minister, than the recent attempt upon his life by an anarchist. Strange as it may seem, some newspapers that were before opposed to his policy have now come over to his side. The indignation felt against the attempted assassination has greatly strengthened his position. There is no question but that Italy is suffering greatly from its war burden, yet this outrage will cause many to forget their grievous taxation. So true is it that any cause, whether right or wrong, is always helped by persecution and unjust and unlawful methods of opposition.

"Out of Place" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

Out of Place.-The sad position of a church subject to the management of politicians is illustrated just now. The Bishop of Bath and Wells having died, the newspaper press is watching with interest to see who will succeed the late Bishop. The Premier, who has lately received such a castigation in the religious press for his connection with the turf, now has the exercise of bishop-making powers in connection with the Church. The Record alludes to the political papers which seem to feel "that the highest offices in the Church should be prostituted to the purpose of mere political rewards," and adds, "It is, no doubt, a better way of bringing home to us the unhappy side of the union between Church and State."

"Fines, Imprisonment, and Stocks, for Sunday Labour" The Present Truth 10, 26.

E. J. Waggoner

The Melbourne Age, of May 8, contains the following despatch from Sidney, Australia:-

At the Parramatta police court to-day, Wm. and Henry Firth, Seventh-day Adventists, of Kellyville, were charged with exercising their worldly labours on the Sabbath day. The defendants pleaded justification, owing to their religious convictions. They were fined under Statute 20 of the reign of Charles II., and were ordered to forfeit the sum of 5s., levy and distress; in default, to be set publicly in the stocks for two hours.

It is stated that the trial was very short and arbitrary. "Guilty or not guilty," was the demand of the magistrate. They readily admitted that they had laboured on Sunday, although of course they could not admit that they were guilty in any sense of the word. No explanations, however, were allowed, and the sentence promptly followed. They absolutely refused to pay the fines.

Why could they not plead "guilty"?-Because they had done no wrong. God has said, "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work." No guilt can attach to obedience to the commandment of God. What God permits is right, and He permits all men to labour on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, the first six days of the week. For a man to admit that he is "guilty" because he works on Sunday, would be to contradict the Lord.

"But why should this man be so stubborn as to refuse to pay their fines?" They were not stubborn, but were acting on high principle. God is supreme. He has given to all men the right to work on "the six working days" (Eze. xlvi. 1), which include Sunday. Men, following the lead of the Papacy, which has exalted itself against God in thinking to change times and laws (Dan. vii. 25), have enacted laws and penalties against Sunday labour. When a man pays a fine for working on Sunday, he consents to buy from men the privilege of doing what the Lord has told him to do, thus tacitly admitting that men have authority above God. He may not resist imprisonment, but he must not voluntarily do anything that would be acquiescing in the preposterous claim set up by men, that it is wrong to do what God permits and commands.

We learn also that another Seventh-day Adventist, W. C. Capps, of the State of Tennessee, U.S.A., has been convicted of Sunday labour, and sentenced to fines which will command about two months' imprisonment. Lest anyone should get the idea that these men were prosecuted for disorderly conduct, it should be stated that they are peaceable, hard-working farmers, who were quietly about their ordinary work. And that it may be clearly seen that the object of Sunday laws is really to prohibit Sabbath rest,-rest upon the seventh day of the week,-it is sufficient to state that these men laboured more quietly than did their neighbours who are not Sabbath-keepers, who also worked on Sunday, but against whom no complaint is made. This fact does not always appear, nevertheless it is a fact that Sunday legislation originated with Rome for the purpose of crushing out Sabbath observance.

We have also to record the fact that the Seventh-day Adventist publishing house in Basel, Switzerland, has been levied on for the purpose of collecting fines imposed for Sunday labour. Thus we find three governments, all professedly Protestant, doing the work of Pagan and Papal Rome, in persecuting those who are determined to keep the commandments of God.

July 5, 1894

"The Lord's Treasury" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

Cutting off the Income.-A notice has been posted on the doors of one of the fashionable West-end churches, to the effect that the stewards who go round with the offertory plates have received peremptory instructions not to receive any coppers in the future. It is a great pity, for, according to the words of the Saviour, the church officers are by this means cutting off the largest gifts. When He sat over against the Treasury, and saw the rich man casting in large sums, and a poor widow casting in two mites, which make a farthing, He said, "Of a truth I say unto you that this poor widow hath cast in more than they all; for all these have of their abundance cast in unto the offerings of God; but she of her penury hath cast in all the living that she had." Luke xxi. 3, 4. No church can ever recover from the blow inflicted on it by the rejection of the offerings of the poor.

Patronising the Poor.-But it must not be supposed that the notice above referred to means that the poor are not wanted in that church. By no means. The following statement appears in the notice. "Those who cannot afford a three-penny piece are welcome to worship here free." This statement, which is doubtless meant in kindness, it is the worst feature of the whole affair, for it shows that the idea prevails that gifts to the church are not really freewill offerings, but are payments for the privilege of worshipping there; and so the poor are put on the basis of objects of charity, dependent on the bounty of the men who have the Gospel in charge, and who will dole out a little portion to them free. This is not the basis on which the Lord puts it, for He says, "Blessed be ye poor, for yours is the kingdom of God." Luke vi. 20. No exclusive rich men can shut them out, and no patronising ones can offer them any share in it, for it is theirs already.

Buying the Gospel.-The statement that the poor are welcome to worship free, gives expression to an unspoken idea that is altogether too prevalent. It is that the privileges of the Gospel are regulated on a money basis. One side of it is that money contributed is in payment for benefits received. The other side is that a man must have privileges in the church, and attention from the ministers of the Gospel, in proportion to his contributions. The church is thus considered as a sort of stock company, from which each one is to receive dividends in proportion to his cash investment. This feeling often manifests itself in a threat to cease contributing, because one has not had as much attention as he thinks is due to him in consideration of what he has "done for the church." Such need to learn the first principles of the Gospel.

The Gospel is Free.-"The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." Rom. vi. 23. "They which receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ." Rom. v. 17. "By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God." Eph. ii. 8. "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; being justified freely by His grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." Rom. iii. 23, 24. "Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely," that is, "as a gift." Rev. xxii. 17. "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, and buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price." Isa. lv. 1. "By the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life." Rom. v. 18. "Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot." 1 Peter i. 18, 19. All the wealth of the Rothschilds multiplied by that of the Astors and Vanderbilts, and that multiplied by the wealth of the Czar of Russia, would not be sufficient to pay for the smallest of the favours of God.

The Gospel to the Poor.-When Christ announced His mission in the synagogue at Nazareth, He did it in the words written by the prophet Isaiah: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He hath anointed Me to preach the Gospel to the poor." Luke iv. 18. When John the Baptist sent to know

418

if He was indeed the Messiah, Jesus gave as the crowning proof of His Messiahship the fact that "to the poor the Gospel is preached." Luke vii. 22. And so the Apostle James wrote by inspiration: "Hearken, my beloved brethren, Hath not God chosen the poor of this world rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which He hath promised to them that love Him?" James ii. 5.

Purchasing the Gift of God.-This is a thing that cannot be done. One Simon tried it once, and grievously failed. Seeing the people receive the Holy Ghost as the result of the laying on of hands by the apostles, he offered them money, asking them to give him the like power. "But Peter said unto him, Thy money perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be purchased with money. Thou hast neither part nor lot in this matter; for thy heart is not right in the sight of God. . . . For I perceive that thou art in the gall of bitterness, and in the bond of iniquity." Acts viii. 21, 22, 23. It was not his act, so much as his thought, that was so distasteful to God. What then must be the condition of men who think that they are entitled to peculiar Gospel privileges and to the favour of God, because of their great gifts? "It cannot be gotten for gold, neither shall silver be weighed for the price thereof. It cannot be valued with the gold of Ophir, with the precious onyx, or the sapphire. The gold and the crystal cannot equal it; and the exchange of it shall not be for jewels of fine gold. No mention shall be made of coral, or of pearls; for the price of wisdom is above rubies. The topaz of Ethiopia shall not equal it, neither shall it be valued with pure gold." Job xxviii. 15-19.

The Purchase of God.-God has paid the price of man's redemption, and in so doing has bought man himself. "Ye are not your own; for ye are bought with a price." 1 Cor. vi. 19, 20. "Feed the church of God, which He hath purchased with His own blood." Acts xx. 28. Money cannot repay Him, and if it could, no one could make payment, for "the earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein." Ps. xxiv. 1. "The silver is Mine, and the gold is Mine, saith the Lord of hosts." Haggai ii. 8. We are to make offerings to the Lord, but not with the thought that we are enriching Him. Our gifts, if they are real offerings to the Lord, are merely expressions of thanksgiving, and our confidence that He in whose hand are all things can care for us even though we spend all in His service. "But who am I, and what is my people, that we should be able to offer so willingly after this sort? for all things come of Thee, and of Thine own have we given Thee." 1 Chron. xxix. 14. Since we are the purchase of God, it is evident that all that we have is His also.

Tithes and Offerings.-Although everything belongs to the Lord, He has placed the treasures of earth in men's possession, for him to use as he will, in order to test him. But He has told us that a certain definite portion is His own in a peculiar sense. "And all the tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land, or of the fruit of the tree, is the Lord's; it is holy unto the Lord." Lev. xxvii. 30. It is the Lord's in such a sense that for one to appropriate it to his own use is to rob God. "Will a man rob God?" The natural answer would be that no one would dare do such a thing; but the Lord says, "Yet ye have robbed Me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed Thee?-In tithes and offerings. Ye are cursed with a curse; for ye have robbed Me, even this whole nation." Mal. iii. 8, 9. The fact that God puts the property into man's hands, leaving it wholly to him to decide how he will use it, only increases the guilt; for he who embezzles money left to him in trust, increases the dishonour of the theft.

The Sabbath and the Tithe.-Notice that the same expression is used for both the Sabbath and the tithe. "The tithe is the Lord's;" "it is holy unto the Lord." God has reserved as absolutely His own the seventh day of the week, and the tenth part of man's income; and no one can appropriate either to his own use without being guilty of robbery. Notice that neither the Sabbath nor the tithe are mere Levitical regulations. The Scriptures state emphatically, "The tithe is the Lord's;" "the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." These are statements of everlasting facts. The seventh day and the tithe are both the Lord's, and He has never surrendered His claim to either one.

Tithe not a Gift.-The tithe is the Lord's; therefore it is evident that in returning it to Him we are not conferring any favour upon Him. We are not giving Him anything. It is entirely distinct from offerings. But even offerings belong to the Lord, as is shown by the fact that in withholding them we rob Him.

Not the Payment of a Debt.-Neither can we regard the payment of tithes and offerings as in any sense the payment of a debt. It is not something that we give to God in return for something that He has bestowed on us. It belongs to Him, and we are entitled to no more credit for returning it to Him, than we should before returning to a man a sum of money with which he had trusted us. The only way in which we can pay God for His gifts to us is by receiving them as freely as He gives them. "What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits toward me? I will take the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the Lord." Ps. cxvi. 12, 13.

Use of the Tithe.-The tithe is God's appointed way for the support of the Gospel. He says, "Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in Mine house." Mal. iii. 10. It is a Gospel measure, instituted and sanctioned by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. To the hypocritical Jews he said: "Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith; these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone." Matt. xxiii. 23. He did not reprove them for being particular in paying tithe, but for neglecting other duties. He declared that they ought to have done both. God has ordained that they who preach the Gospel should live of the Gospel (1 Cor. ix. 14), and the tithe is that from which they should live. If all professed Christians were honest in this matter, there would be no empty missionary treasuries, neither would there be such things as bazaars, fairs, etc., by which people dishonour the cause of God, professing to atone for the results of their robbery of God by buying themselves a supper, or some article to minister to their selfish pride.

Neither Gifts nor Wages.-The true church of God is not a pauper. It is supported by the Lord who is its head. The means necessary to the existence

419

of the minister comes from the Lord's own money, when His people are all honest. The true shepherd of the flock is not an hireling. He does not receive wages in money for what he does. The people who think that he does, show that they do not have a true sense of the value of the Gospel. God could support His cause without tithes and offerings from men; but He allows men to be His stewards, in order that they may share with Him the blessedness of the work. So He says, "Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in Mine house, and prove Me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it." And remember that even the great God does not despise the day of small things; but that "if there be first a willing mind, it is accepted according to that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not."

"No Immortal Sinner" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

An immortal sinner is one of the myths of theology. The Bible nowhere states that any sinner has immortality or will live for ever, but declares that God only hath immortality, and that "the soul that sinneth it shall die." 1 Tim. vi. 16; Eze. xviii. 4. Theology teaches that the soul of the sinner lives on for ever in the torment of hell; and, unfortunately, most people believe the teachings of theology and pay but little attention to the declarations of Scripture; or rather, they put theology in the place of the Bible, accepting its profession of being in harmony with and explanatory of the Bible, and trusting in those who "sit in Moses' seat" to make the teachings of both agree.

The Scriptures declare that "the wages of sin is death;" and that eternal life is "the gift of God" through Jesus Christ, to be given only to those who by patient continuance in the well-doing, seek for glory, honour, and immortality. Rom. vi. 28; ii. 7.

But theologians, in order to harmonise the Bible with theology, have invented a definition of death which makes it mean eternal conscious existence in hell; and accordingly they affirm that it is this, and not non-existence, that is meant by the many Scripture references to the death of the sinner. But the Scriptures themselves leave no room for belief in such a theory. If we accept what they declare, we shall see that death has no special and peculiar meaning in the language of inspiration, but that it means cessation of life, and passing away into non-existence.

This is clearly shown in the record of man's fall and the consequences which attended his transgression. In the narrative in Genesis we read that "the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil; and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever; therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken. So He drove out the man; and He placed at the east of the garden of Eden, cherubim, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life." Gen. iii. 22-24.

This testimony is emphatic and unmistakable. God did not intend that a sinner should live for ever. That was what the devil wanted, but it was the very thing that the Lord especially guarded against. The devil wished to perpetuate sin, and thus put an eternal stain upon God's universe. But God, while allowing them free access to the tree of life before his fall, immediately took special precautions to shut him away from it as soon as he transgressed, lest, as a sinner, he should put forth his hand to the tree, and eat, and live for ever.

Thus has God testified that there will be no such thing in His universe as an immortal sinner. Not one of the sinful descendants of Adam has ever passed the fiery guard of cherubim and put forth his hand to the tree of life. And therefore not one of those descendants has ever had any power in himself which would enable him to live for ever. "Eternal life is the gift of God, through Jesus Christ our Lord." It comes in no other way.

"Romanism at Home" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

Romanism at Home.-In such countries as Italy and Spain Romanism is dominant, and its true nature is not veiled as we see it in lands where the open Bible has had to be reckoned with by the authorities of the Papacy. In the report of the Italian Evangelical Church, Pastor Conti says of religion in Rome:-

As on the one hand Popery dazzles with its ceremonies and the pomp of its external magnificence, on the other hand, without any mask, it here shows all the ambitious designs, all its greediness of dominion and of riches, and, together with the evil doings of its clergy and prelates, manifests its reactionary spirit, and the materialism of its worship and its traffic of religious things. All this in the popular mind has produced a disgust of religion, and incredulity and indifference. Another fatal consequence of the system is the general ignorance of everything pertaining to religion. If even the priests do not know anything of the Gospel and of the Bible, which most of them have not even read, it is natural that the people do not know anything of it, and therefore no difference is made in general between Christ and the Pope, His vicar, between the Gospel and the Syllabus, between the word of God and the decrees of councils. Many leading thinkers, of whom some are members of Parliament, believe that the only remedy for the many rampant evils is the pure religion of Jesus Christ.

"Blasphemy" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

The Jews condemned Christ to death on the charge of blasphemy. They said to Pontius Pilate, "We have a law, and by our law He ought to die, because He made Himself the Son of God." John xix. 7. And when at His trial the Saviour had avowed His Sonship in answer to the question of the high priest, the latter said, "He hath spoken blasphemy; what further need have we of witnesses? Behold, now ye have heard His blasphemy." Matt. xxvi. 65.

The same charge that was brought against Christ, has been brought against His followers. To speak the truth in Christ always leads sooner or later to a charge of blasphemy from the synagogue of Satan. What the Saviour spoke was not blasphemy, because He was in reality what He declared Himself to be. And not only was He the Son of God, but His disciples were also sons of God, as John declares; "Beloved, now are we the sons of God;" so that one of His followers could without blasphemy have declared before the Jewish tribunal that he was a son of God. And this relationship they can and do declare to-day; and for it they are charged and will be charged, as He was, with blasphemy.

It was "blasphemy" for the early Christians to affirm that there was but one God, thus speaking against the gods of Rome. It was "blasphemy" for the Reformers to speak against the idolatrous worship of the papist, by preaching justification by faith. And it is "blasphemy" now for Christians to speak in any manner derogatory to the established worship of the nation, whether that worship be Greek Catholic, Roman Catholic, or Church of England. But this no one who is a son of God can avoid doing, for the very announcement of that relation to and dependence upon God which the Saviour as a man sustained here upon the earth, is a testimony

420

against any connection with or dependence upon the power of the State. Connection with God as a son it is utterly incompatible with dependence upon the sustaining power of the civil arm. For the church to ally itself in any way with a power of the world, is nothing less than a denial of Him who has said, "All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth;" and "lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world."

Blasphemy is speaking against the honour and glory of God; and only those who know God can know when this sin is committed. And only those can know God who know His word, for this is the only revelation of Himself that He has given to men. Those who know not His word are the ones who charge the sons of God with blasphemy, while being themselves guilty of the sin they try to fasten upon others. Had the Jews known the word of God, "they would not have crucified the Lord of glory." They would not have brought against Him the charge of blasphemy. And it is for lack of the knowledge of the word to-day that those who stand in the place of the scribes and Pharisees of old will charge the children of God with blasphemy, and with being anarchists and conspirators against good government. While "critics" and infidels both in the pulpit and out of it are working to throw discredit upon the word, it is for the lack of that very word that they themselves, with the masses who look to them, are perishing in their sins.

"A Jesuit's Training" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

About a year ago, as many will remember, considerable interest was excited by the withdrawal of a German Count from the Jesuit order. He published a book giving his reasons, and from a review of the work we gather some samples of the regulations and methods by which the order destroys individuality and independence of character, which the Gospel encourages and strengthens, and guides into right channels.

Most of the recruits are very young-between sixteen and twenty years of age. The mental strait-waistcoat which is to hinder all development of individuality is put on the novice for two years, and never relaxed for a moment. His tasks are frequently and abruptly changed, so that no one of them has time to make any fixed impression on his mind. He never knows what he is to do next. It is five minutes here, ten minutes there. If he is thirsty he must ask leave to drink; does he need a paper, pencil, or a book, he must ask permission to get it. He is told us how to do even the simplest task, and not allowed to think it out himself, or do it in his own way.

Such slavery is the discipline by which the order is prepared for the enslavement of human souls. There is no tyrant like a slave who has the authority given him. The very essence of the Gospel is liberty, and every man is set free to exercise his own way. "Hast thou faith? have it to thyself before God," wrote the apostle. Rom. xiv. 22. The Jesuit system, like every Papal abomination, is just the opposite of the truth. Men are taught to judge one another, and to give more attention to repressing faults in their fellows than to discovering their own.

In the early part of his novitiate he is given a "guardian angel," who daily at a given hour tells him of his faults. Several times a year a so-called "stoning" takes place, when each novice steps out before his associates and superiors, and he is criticised. He may walk too fast, or too slowly; he looks to one side, or straight ahead; speaks too loudly, or too softly, etc. He is told what to eat and drink, how to walk, sleep, dress, and with all this the very expression of the countenance is prescribed.

Thus men are trained to pitilessness, exacting preciseness, and consciousless obedience to the commands of the head centre of the wicked combination.

"One Side" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

One Side.-The sayings of the emperor Marcus Aurelius are much prized by many Christians. He was the great moral philosopher of his day; and although some see such light in his writings that they feel sure he would have been a Christian if he had lived in the days of Christ, the fact remains that there were thousands of Christ's representatives living in his day, and that instead of listening to them he persecuted them to death. Here is a bit of his "moral" philosophy:-

Look within. Within is the fountain of good, and it will ever bubble up, if thou wilt ever dig.

"The Other Side" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

The Other Side.-Christ said, "That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: all these evil things come from within, and defile the man." Mark vii. 20-23.

That is just the difference between the teaching of heathen philosophy at its best, and the teaching of Christ and the Gospel. They are as different as earth and heaven. One could climb to the stars by burrowing in the earth, as well as he could find the truth by studying the writings of heathen philosophers. But the source whence they expected to receive light and goodness was itself darkness and corruption, what but wickedness could result. Human religion says, "Look within;" the Gospel of God says, "Looking unto Jesus."

"A Lesson from Germany" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

For twenty years there has been waged in Germany a parliamentary war between Government and the Catholic party. The Culturkampf, as the Germans call it, has practically ceased, the Catholic party having won all the victories.

German Rationalism, with its rejection of the word of God, has fostered the superstitions of Romanism. And the Protestant Church, relying on its State establishment and patronage, has ceased long since to be truly Protestant; so that it could not resist Rome as the Reformers did, by the simple and powerful preaching of the word. When the battle field is the political arena, and the weapons intrigue for legislative power, and parliamentary tactics, the astute Church of Rome can more than hold her own in any land. The Culturkampf has left the situation as follows, according to a writer in the Sunday at Home:-

There is no doubt that Romanism is at the present time more active and determined than ever, and in this sense puts Protestantism to shame.

The Culturkampf has done good service to Rome. The former position of favour and influence has not only been retained, but also strengthened; and so the hearts of the Romish section of the people are full of hope and expectancy.

Rome is winning all along the line in this country also, and many professed Protestants who think they are fighting Romanism loyally are helping her instead, by the methods they employ, and by the rejection of the old battle cry of the Reformers, "The Bible and the Bible only." Rome always excels in wielding her own weapons.

"Political and Spiritual Power" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

Political and Spiritual Power.-A clergyman of the Church of England, who says that he has a great deal of practical knowledge of dissenters, especially of "political dissenters," stated in an address on the Welsh Disestablishment Bill, that "they were bound to see that the spirituality of Non-conformists was rapidly decreasing as their political interests grew stronger." Although some dissenting journals strongly dissent from this statement, it is none the less a fact. The early

421

church lost all spiritual power when it went into politics. The Reformation was a spiritual power only when its leaders confined themselves to the Bible. When politicians took hold of it, and ministers became politicians, it became only a name. That is the trouble with the Church of England. It depends for its existence upon the votes of politicians, and so, as a church, it is spiritually dead. But there are scores and hundreds of men in it who ignore politics, desiring to know nothing but Jesus Christ and Him crucified, and in them is centred the spirituality of the church.

"The Garden of God's Word" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

It is painful to see men going to the writings of the Fathers and the decisions of councils to learn the truth. Whatever truth these saw, they learned simply by believing what God says, and anyone can find the same in the Scriptures to-day. And as the Fathers and the councils interpreted the Bible rather than believed it, their writings and decrees are so full of pagan philosophy that the humblest reader of the Bible who believes what he reads, knows more of the truth than they did.

In the days of Christ, the Church interpreted the Scriptures, and followed the traditions of the elders, and the customs of their fathers, instead of the precepts of God. They made void the word of God by their traditions. Reproving them, Jesus said, "Every plant which My heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up." Matt. xv. 13. Then why need we spend time searching about in the tangled maze of the words and teachings of fallible men? We may go ourselves direct to the garden of God's word. There we shall find every plant that God has planted.

The word of God is His great garden, in which he planted His promises and precepts for the children of men. Abraham plucked blossoms from it, but they still bloom for those who are the children of Abraham by faith. All the promises of God are in Christ, and by the power of the endless life, always springing up from Christ the root, the fruit of the word is always there, no matter how many have appropriated it.

Then let no one go outside into the tangle and the bramble to find the truth. Walk in the garden itself. Just as in Christ's day, so now there is a great overgrowth of tradition that seeks to obscure the truth. Go to the garden direct, no matter how luxuriant or how aged the growth, unless you can find it for yourself rooted in the garden of God, and can there pluck it and find life in it as you take it, be assured that it is not of God's planting, and has in it the seeds of sin and death.

The word of God is a garden of delights. It is a living word, and we live by it; it is the water of life springing up, and we may drink of it. Who would forsake such a paradise as this for the confused tangle of human tradition?

"Human and Divine Prohibitions" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

There is a difference between human and Divine prohibitions, as marked as that between the natures of man and of God. Man says, Refrain from this or that, for my benefit. God says, Refrain from this, for thy benefit. It is a great mistake to look at God's commandments as we would at those of men.

"Studies in Romans. The Righteousness of God. Rom. i. 16, 17" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

The two lessons we have already had, have covered the introduction to the main body of the epistle. The first seven verses are the salutation; the next eight treat of personal matters concerning the apostle and the brethren in Rome, the fifteenth verse being the link which unites the introduction to the directly doctrinal portion of the epistle. Let the reader note carefully the verses referred to, and he will readily see that this is not an arbitrary division, but that it plainly appears. If in reading any chapter, one will note the different topics touched upon, and the change from one subject to another, he will be surprised to find how much easier it is to grasp the contents of the chapter, and to hold them in mind. The reason why so many people find it difficult to recall what they read in the Bible, is that they try to remember it in bulk, without giving special thought to the details.

In expressing his desire to meet with the Roman brethren, the apostle declared himself to be debtor to both Greeks and barbarians, both to the wise and to the unwise, and therefore ready to preach the Gospel even in Rome, the capital of the world. The fifteenth verse, and the expression, "preach the Gospel," give the keynote to the whole of the epistle, for the apostle glides from this naturally into his theme. Accordingly, we have next

THE GOSPEL DEFINED. ROM. i. 16, 17

"For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ; for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, The just shall live by faith."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What had the apostle declared himself ready to do?

"I am ready to preach the Gospel to you that are in Rome." Verse 15.

Of what was he not ashamed?

"I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ."

Why was he not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ?

"Because it is the power of God."

In what respect is it the power of God applied?

"It is the power of God unto salvation?"

To whom is the Gospel the power of God unto salvation?

"To every one that believeth."

In what order?

"To the Jew first, and also to the Greek."

What is revealed in the Gospel?

"For therein is the righteousness of God revealed."

How is it revealed?

"From faith to faith."

Of what is this an illustration?

"As it is written, The just shall live by faith."

"Not Ashamed."-"I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ." There is no reason why any man should be ashamed of the Gospel; nevertheless, many men have been and are ashamed of it. Many people are so ashamed of it that they could not think of lowering themselves so much as to make a profession of it; and many who do make a profession of it are ashamed to let it be known. What is the cause of all this shame? It is that they do not know what the Gospel is. No man who really knows what the Gospel is. No man who really knows what the Gospel is, will be ashamed of it, or of any part of it.

Desire for Power.-There is nothing that men desire so much as power. It is a desire that God Himself has planted in man. Unfortunately, the devil has deceived the most of mankind, so that they seek for power in the wrong way. They think that it can be found in the possession of wealth or political position, and so they rush to secure those things. But these do not supply the power for which God has

422

created the desire. This is shown by the fact that they do not satisfy. No man was ever yet satisfied with the power that he obtained by wealth or position. However much they have, they desire more. No man finds in them just what he thought he would; and so he grasps after more, thinking that he will find his heart's desire farther on; but all in vain. Christ is "the Desire of all nations" (Haggai 2:7), the only Source of complete satisfaction, because He is the embodiment of all the real power there is in the universe the power of God "Christ the power of God." 1 Cor. i. 24.

Power and Knowledge.-It is commonly said that knowledge is power. That depends. If we take the statement of the poet, that "The proper study of mankind is man," then certainly knowledge is anything but power. Man is nothing but weakness and sin. All men know that they are sinners, that they do things that are not right, but that knowledge gives them no power to change their course. You may tell a man all his faults, and if you tell him nothing more, you have weakened rather that strengthened him. But he who with the Apostle Paul determines to know nothing "save Jesus Christ and Him crucified," has knowledge that is power. "And this is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent." John xvii. 3. To know Christ is to know the power of His endless life. It is for lack of this knowledge that men are destroyed. Hosea iv. 6. But since Christ is the power of God, it is quite correct to say that power is the one thing that men need; and the only real power, the power of God, is revealed in the Gospel.

The Glory of Power.-All men honour power. Wherever power is manifested, there will always be found men to admire. There is no one who does not admire and applaud power in some form. Powerful muscles are admired and boasted of, whether they be those of man or of beast. A mighty engine that moves vast weights with ease always attracts attention, and men honour the one who constructed it. The man of wealth, whose money can command the service of thousands, always has admirers, no matter how his money is obtained. The man of noble birth and position, or the monarch of a great nation, has multitudes of followers who applaud his power. Men desire to be connected with such an one, because they derive a certain dignity from the connection, although the power is not transferable. But all the power of earth is frail and but for a moment, while the power of God is eternal. The Gospel is the power, and if men would but recognise it for what it is, there would not be any who would be ashamed of it. Paul said, "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ." Gal. vi. 14. The reason for this was that the cross is the power of God. 1 Cor. i. 18. The power of God, in whatever form manifested, is glory, and not for shame.

Christ not Ashamed.-Concerning Christ we read, "For both He that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one; for which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren." Heb. ii. 11. "God is not ashamed to be called their God; for He hath prepared for them a city." Heb. xi. 16. Surely if the Lord is not ashamed to be called the brother of poor, weak, sinful mortals, man has no reason to be ashamed of Him. "Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God." 1 John iii. 1. Ashamed of the Gospel of Christ! Could there possibly be a worse case of the exaltation of self above God? For to be ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, which is the power of God, is an evidence that the man who feels thus ashamed really thinks himself superior to God, and that it is a lowering of his dignity to be associated with the Lord.

"Ashamed of Jesus! sooner far
Let evening blush to own a star;
He sheds the beams of light divine
O'er this benighted soul of mine.

"Ashamed of Jesus! just as soon
Let midnight be ashamed of noon;
'Twas midnight with my soul till he,
Bright Morning Star, bade darkness flee."

Saved by Faith.-The Gospel is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believes. "By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God." Eph. ii. 8. "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved." Mark xvi. 16. "As many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His name." John i. 12. "With the heart man believeth unto righteousness." Rom. x. 10. "This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent." John vi. 29. Faith works. Time would fail to tell of those "who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, . . . out of weakness were made strong," etc. Heb. xi. 33, 34. Men may say, "I can not see how it is possible for one to be made righteous simply by believing." It makes no difference what you can see; you are not saved by sight, but by faith. You do not need to see how it is done, because it is the Lord who does the work of saving. Christ dwells in the heart by faith (Eph. iii. 17), and because He is our righteousness, "He also is become my salvation" (Isa. xii. 2). We shall have salvation by faith illustrated more fully as we proceed in our study, because the book of Romans is devoted wholly to this one thing.

"To the Jew First."-When Peter, at the request of Cornelius, the Roman centurion, and the command of the Lord, went to C?sarea to preach the Gospel to the Gentiles, his first words when he heard the story of Cornelius were, "Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons; but in every nation he that feareth Him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with Him." Acts x. 34, 35. This was the first time that Peter had ever perceived that truth, but it was not the first time that that thing was true. It had been a truth as long as God had existed. God never chose anybody to the exclusion of anybody else. The wisdom that comes from above is "without partiality." James iii. 17. It is true that the Jews as a nation were wonderfully favoured by the Lord; but they lost all their privileges simply because they assumed that God loved them better than He did anybody else, and were exclusive. All through their history God was trying to make them see that what He offered them was for the whole world, and that they were to pass on to others the light and privileges which they shared. The cases of Naaman, the Syrian, and of the Ninevites to whom Jonah was sent, are among the many instances by which God sought to show the Jews that He was no respecter of persons. Then why was the Gospel preached "to the Jew first"? Simply because the Jews were nearest. Christ was crucified at Jerusalem. It was from there that He commissioned His disciples to preach the Gospel. At His ascension He said, "Ye shall be witnesses unto Me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth." Acts i. 8. It was most natural that they should begin to preach

423

the Gospel in the place and to the people nearest them. This is the secret of all missionary work. He who does not labour in the Gospel in his home, will not do any Gospel work although he goes to a foreign country.

The Righteousness of God.-The Lord says: "Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look upon the earth beneath; for the heavens shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment; and they that dwell therein shall die in like manner; but My salvation shall be forever and my righteousness shall not be abolished. Hearken unto Me, ye that know righteousness, the people in whose heart is My law." Isa. li. 6, 7. "My tongue shall speak of Thy work; for all Thy commandments are righteousness." Ps. cxix. 172. The righteousness of God, therefore, is His law. Let this not be forgotten. The term "the righteousness of God" occurs frequently in the book of Romans, and much confusion has resulted from giving it arbitrary and varying definitions. If we accept the definition given in the Bible, and do not abandon it in any instance, it will simplify matters very much. The righteousness of God is His perfect law.

Righteousness and Life.-But the ten commandments, whether engraved on tables of stone or written in a book, are only the statement of the righteousness of God. Righteousness means right doing. It is active. The righteousness of God is God's right doing, His way. And since all His ways are right, it follows that the righteousness of God is nothing less than the life of God. The written law is not action, but is only a description of the action, but is only a description of the action. It is a picture of the character of God. The very life and character of God are seen in Jesus Christ, in whose heart was the law of God. There can be no righteousness without action. And as there is none good but God, it follows that there is no righteousness except in the life of God. Righteousness and the life of God are one and the same thing.

Righteousness in the Gospel.-"For therein is the righteousness of God revealed." Wherein? In the Gospel. Bear in mind that the righteousness of God is His perfect law, a statement of which is found in the ten commandments. There is no such thing as a conflict between the law and the Gospel. Indeed, there are not in reality two such things as the law and the Gospel. The true law of God is the Gospel; for the law is the life of God, and we are "saved by His life." The Gospel reveals the righteous law of God, because the Gospel has the law in itself. There can be no Gospel without law. Whoever ignores or rejects the law of God, has no knowledge whatever of the Gospel.

The First View.-Jesus said that the Holy Spirit should convince the world of sin and of righteousness. John xvi. 8. This is the revelation of the righteousness of God in the Gospel. "Where no law is, there is no transgression." Rom. iv. 15. Sin can not be known except by the law. Rom. vii. 7. Therefore it follows that the Spirit convicts of sin by making known the law of God. The first view of the righteousness of God has the effect of making a man feel his sinfulness, just as we feel our littleness when gazing upon a lofty mountain. And as the grandeur of the great mountains grows upon us, so God's righteousness which is "like the great mountains" (Ps. xxxvi. 6) appears greater the more we look at it. Therefore he who looks continually at the righteousness of God, must continually acknowledge his own sinfulness.

The Deeper View.-Jesus Christ is the righteousness of God. And "God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved." John iii. 17. God does not reveal His righteousness in the Gospel in order to cause us to cower before Him because of our unrighteousness, but that we may take it and live by it. We are unrighteous, and God wishes us to realise it, in order that we may be willing to receive His perfect righteousness. It is a revelation of love; for His righteousness is His law, and His law is love. 1 John v. 3. So "if we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." 1 John i. 9. If when the preaching of the Gospel reveals to us the law of God, we reject it and find fault with it because it condemns our course, we are simply saying that we do not desire that God should put His own righteousness upon us.

Living by Faith.-"As it is written, The just shall live by faith." Christ is "our life." Col. iii. 4. We are "saved by His life." Rom. v. 10. It is by faith that we receive Christ Jesus, for He dwells in our hearts by faith. Eph. iii. 17. Dwelling in our hearts, He is life, for out of the heart are the issues of life. Prov. iv. 23. Now the word comes, "As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him; rooted and built up in Him, and stablished in the faith." Col. ii. 6, 7. As we receive Him by faith, and we walk in Him as we have received Him, we shall "walk by faith, and not by sight."

"From Faith to Faith."-This seemingly difficult expression, which has been the subject of so much controversy, is very simple when we allow the Scripture to explain itself. In the Gospel "the righteousness of God" is "revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, The just shall live by faith." Note that "from faith to faith" is said to be parallel with "the just shall live by faith." Just means righteous. The reader has noticed that some versions have "righteous" in 1 John i. 9 where the KJV has "just." Both are the same. God's life is righteousness; He desires that our lives shall be righteousness also, and therefore He offers to us His own life. This life becomes ours by faith. That is, just as we live naturally by breathing, so we are to live spiritually by faith, and our whole life is to be spiritual. Faith is the breath of life to the Christian. So just as we naturally live from breath to breath, we are to live spiritually from faith to faith. We can live but one breath at a time; so we cannot live spiritually except by present faith. If we live a life of conscious dependence upon God, His righteousness will be ours, for we shall breathe it in continually. Faith gives us strength, for those who have exercised it "out of weakness were made strong." Heb. xi. 34. So of those who accept the revelation of God's righteousness "from faith to faith," it is said, "They go from strength to strength; every one of them in Zion appeareth before God." Ps. lxxxiv. 7.

"For Diphteria" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

It is very hazardous to speak of sovereign remedies for disease. If all the "sure cures" that are advertised were as potent as represented, mortality would certainly be greatly reduced. But a writer in the Humanitarian speaks very confidently of pine-apple juice as a remedy for diphtheria; and as the remedy is a pleasant one, which cannot well injure, while it might relieve the symptoms in some cases, even if it did not of itself effect a cure, we quote what is said of it:-

"Medical science has long sought for a sovereign remedy for that scourge of childhood, diphtheria, yet the coloured people of Louisiana, and, perhaps, of other localities, have for years known and used a cure which is remarkable for its simplicity. It is nothing more nor less than the pure juice of the pine-apple. 'The remedy is not mine,' said a gentleman, when interviewed, 'it has been used by negroes in the swamps down South for years. One of my children was down with diphtheria and was in a critical condition. An old coloured man who heard of the case asked if we had tried pine-apple juice. We tried it, and the child got well. I have known it tried in hundreds of cases. I have told my friends about it whenever I heard of a case, and never knew it to fail. You get a ripe pine-apple, squeeze out the juice, and let the patient swallow it. the juice is of so corrosive a nature that it will cut out diphtheritic mucous, and if you will take the fruit before it is ripe and give the juice to a person whose throat is well it makes the mucous membrane of his throat sore.'"

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

-Englishmen have ?100,000,000 invested in American railways.

-A son was born to the Duchess of York on Saturday morning, June 23.

-A Chinese fleet under the command of Admiral Ting, has been sent to Corea.

-A plough is the only agricultural implement shown on the monuments of Nineveh.

-The Imperial Library at Paris has 72,000 treating of the French Revolution.

-A strike of 66,000 miners was begun, June 26, in Scotland, to resist a proposed reduction in wages.

-Within the Antarctic circle the temperature is at or near 32 degrees in the warmest part of the year.

-The American Vice-Consul at Maragan, who has arrived Tangier, reports that all the Kables are in revolt, and that the roads are impassable.

-The largest oil-painting in the world is one by Tintoretto, entitled Paradise. It is thirty-three and a half feet in height, and eighty-four feet in width.

-A youthful anarchist, only twelve years of age, threw a bomb at a crowd in Corunna, but it fell short, or the loss of life would have been very great.

-The torpedo boat "Daring," recently built for the British Government, on her trial trip attained a speed of over twenty-nine knots per hour, and is said to be the swiftest vessel afloat.

-Since June 18 twenty-two deaths have occurred at Tilleur, near Liege, from choleraic disease. At Jemmieppe, in the same district, nine persons have died since June 23.

-Some Americans are said to be erecting a gigantic hotel in the ocean. It will be called "Atlantis." It will be eighteen miles off Sandy Hook, and is being built on cylinders.

-Thirteen persons are reported to have lost their lives through the sinking of a fishing tug in the neighbourhood of New York, and many other members of a party of seventy-five are missing.

-A French surgeon has supplied a female patient with a splendid new lip in place of one which was destroyed. The loss was made good with a piece of flesh out from the patient's arm.

-A carpet which has been woven for the Queen in Agra Prison, and upon which nearly thirty of the deftest convicts were employed, measures 77ft. by 40ft., and contains fifty-nine million stitches.

-A plot is reported to have been made to destroy the life of the Czar on his recent visit to Borkl. An infernal machine is also said to have been found at the Imperial Palace at St. Petersburg.

-The Forth Bridge is being painted. The bridge is painted once in three years, the amount of paint required being, while still unmixed, about fifty tons, and the area to be covered about 120 acres. The bridge, since its opening, has been crossed by some 825,000 trains-about 900 a day-yet the wear and tear is said to be inappreciable.

-At a meeting of the Midlothian Liberal Association, held in Edinburgh, it was announced that Mr. Gladstone would not again return to Parliament for Midlothian or elsewhere. A meeting has been called to adopt a successor.

-It is said that the Queen's status at Madras has been, for some time past, an object of worship by certain of the native population. It was found recently adorned with the marks usually made on forehead, neck, and breast of Hindo deities.

-At Reichenberg, Bohemia, June 28, a building in course of construction suddenly collapsed, burying most of the workmen engaged upon it. within a short time eleven dead men and twenty severely injured had been extricated from the debris.

-The insurrection in Brazil seems not yet to be quite at an end. Intelligence recently received from Rio Grande reports fighting between the Government troops and the insurgents, under General Pina, in which the latter were defeated.

-In the French National Assembly, which met at Versailles, M. Casimir-Perior, ex-Premier and president of the Chamber of Deputies, was elected President of the Republic in succession to the late M. Carnot by 451 votes out of a total of 853.

-Queen Victoria's descendants, which number about a hundred, either now occupy, or in the natural course of events bid fair to sit upon seven thrones, those of the British, German, and Russian Empires, the Kingdom of Greece, and the Duchies of Hesse, Saxe-Coburg, and Sax-Meinigen.

-On the afternoon of Saturday, June 28, a terrible explosion took place at the Albion Colliery. Clifyndd, near Pontypridd, Wales. Out of more than three hundred men who were in the mine when the disaster happened, only about a dozen were rescued alive, and several of those have since died from its effects. The mine was completely wrecked.

-Before issuing his recent Encyclical, the Pope, it is said, received assurances from the dissenters in several Greek communities that they would be willing to return to the Roman Catholic Church under certain conditions. Similar letters were also received from a number of Anglican clergymen, expressing the desires of English "Protestants" for unity.

-The French authorities have decided to proceed against the devil-worshippers, the "Satanists," and "Luciferians" as they call themselves. They not only steal communion plate from lonely churches to carry on their mock services, but actually inveigle young children preparing for their first communion into buildings where their blasphemous ceremonies are performed.

-War is threatened between China and Japan. A telegram from Shanghai says, "It is confidently anticipated in foreign circles here that the presence of a large number of Japanese troops in the Corean capital, and the recent dispatch of a Chinese force to Corea, will result in an armed conflict between native circles which may reasonably be supposed to be well informed, it is declared that war between the two Powers is imminent."

-A strike of railway men who handle Pullman cars has been begun in America, pending the settlement of the wages dispute in the Pullman works, and many Western lines are now involved. Dispatches from various parts of the country indicate that the entire traffic in the West is paralysed, and that perishable freight, which has been placed in sidings, is being ruined. The passenger traffic from the Pacific has ceased, and all traffic westward of Chicago is greatly hampered.

-M. Sadi-Carnot, President of the French Republic, was assassinated at Lyons in his carriage on Sunday evening, June 24, by an Italian anarchist armed with a dagger. The news has profoundly shocked the whole civilised world, and called forth telegrams of sympathy for Madame Carnot and France from the governments of all civilised lands. The immediate consequence of the terrible event was an uprising among the citizens of Lyons against the Italian residents, and in the rioting which followed many houses were wrecked and a number of persons injured, and only with the greatest difficulty were the police and military forces able to quell the disturbance, after making several hundred arrests. It is stated that three thousand Italians have left France on account of the attacks made upon them in several towns by the enraged populace.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

It is stated that the names of three Bishops of the Church of England were signed to the letter sent by the Anglican clergymen to the Pope, begging for closer union with Rome.

The annual report of the Bible Society shows that the Bible, in whole or in part, is now sent out in 320 languages. The total circulation from the Society's depots last year was 3,664,456 volumes.

The Roman Catholic Church in Stavanger, Norway, consists of two persons, yet a costly building is to be errected there this summer, and a priest located there. This is according to historical precedent, for in the formation of the Catholic Church Constantine built places of worship in cities where there were no professed Christians, and then hired people to join. So says Eusebius, his eulogist.

A member of the German Parliament, Dr. Otto Arendt, has issued a pamphlet in which he says that when the new recruiting laws have come into full force, there will be no fewer than twenty-two and a half millions of healthy men ready to fly at one another's throats at the word of command. In case of war, the cost would be ?600,000 a day for France, ?526,906 for Germany, and ?314,974 for Italy.

The Catholic Times, on the Pope's recent "appeal for Christian unity," says that "there can be no doubt that in the East there has been for some years a constant though gradual approach to Roman doctrines and practices," and feels convinced that the Pope "is by no means too sanguine when he declares that we may expect to see at no distant day the return of a large number of the Eastern Christians to the Unity of the true fold."

The Church Times of June 29 contains an extract from a speech by a clergyman, which shows what the design of the "Catholic" portion, at least, of the Church of England, is in regard to the Board Schools. Having described the plan of a "School of Religion" which he had conducted, he asks for the establishment of such a school in every parish where a Board School exists, "until an alteration in the law makes it possible to teach the Church Catechism in Board Schools by the mouths of Church teachers."

People talk about different theories of inspiration; but nobody has any right to have any theories on the subject. It is not a matter for speculation, but for simple belief. "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable." "The prophecy came not in old time by the will of man; but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." That is the whole of it. "But how was it inspired?"-Nobody knows except God; and as man is not expected to make the Bible, it is not necessary that men should know. If a man could understand how the Scriptures were inspired, he could understand how God made the world. Then he would be as great as the Creator. Men who try to explain inspiration, creation, and other miracles, are really assuming that they are on a level with God.

The assassination of President Carnot by an anarchist shows that no European ruler, and, in fact, no ruler in the world, is safe. There was no special political crisis in France, to excite passions, and President Carnot was politically and personally above reproach. No person or party had any grievance against him. He was struck down simply because he represented government and law. Anarchy is opposed not merely to tyrants, but to government of any kind. It is simply wild lawlessness, the prevalence of which is not surprising when we consider how freely the law of God is dispensed with, and treated as a trifling thing by professed Christians who would be shocked at the suggestion that there is anything anarchistic about them. The spirit of the Papacy, which thinks itself able to change times and laws, or to ignore them as convenience may dictate, is the spring of all anarchy. It is the spirit of the kings and judges of the earth, who, by their persecuting laws against those who keep the commandments of God, say of the Lord and His Christ, "Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us."

"Answering Prayers" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

Answering Prayers.-Most people make the mistake of considering the answering of a prayer as identical with the petition. If a man prays for a thing, and does not receive it, they say that his prayer was not answered. The Apostle Paul prayed three times for a certain thing, and did not receive it; but he did not charge God with neglecting his petition. On the contrary, he tells us that he received the answer, "My grace is sufficient for thee." When the child makes a request of its mother, and the mother kindly but firmly says "No" the child has no reason to say that the prayer has not been answered. The trouble is that people are usually so unconsciously bent on having their own way that they do not recognise the right of the Lord to say "No," even though He adds, "My grace is sufficient for thee."

"The Positiveness of Ignorance" The Present Truth 10, 27.

E. J. Waggoner

The Positiveness of Ignorance.-The Bible is the only book concerning which all people feel free to express decided opinions without any knowledge. On other matters people are generally silent until they study them, but everybody feels himself competent to discuss the Almighty and His works, without having any real knowledge of them. Almost any man will give you his views upon the Bible and the Gospel, although he might fumble through the Old Testament for half an hour looking for the book of Revelation, or might turn the leaves of the New Testament in the vain hope of finding the book of Isaiah or Daniel. Why is it that the Bible has to be treated so differently from other books? We do not say that people who do not know the Bible should take the opinions of those who do, but that they should become acquainted with it for themselves, and not talk positively about that which they do not understand.

July 12, 1894

"Christ or Self?" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

The following extract from the first paragraph of the Pope's Encyclical, shows what is to be the basis of the unity which he desires:-

Throughout the whole course of Our Pontificate it has been Our constant purpose, and We have endeavoured, as far as We could by word and deed, to bind all nations and peoples more closely to Ourselves, and to place in evidence the power of the Roman Pontificate, which is salutary in every respect. We therefore feel deeply grateful. . . to rulers, Bishops, the Clergy, and private individuals everywhere, who by numerous proofs of piety and affection have taken care to honour Our person and Our dignity, and to tender to Us opportune consolation.

We have given the capital letters as in the document, in order that the reader may get the full benefit Papal arrogance. Everything is to centre round the Pope's person. To bind people more closely to himself is his "constant purpose." This one statement shows that the Pope is of the class against whom the Apostle Paul warned the Elders of the church at Ephesus: "For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them." Acts xx. 29, 30. The true shepherd leads people to Christ; the wolf, or the false shepherd, seeks to draw them to himself.

The blasphemous presumption that characterised the Papacy in ancient times, is not lacking in this Encyclical, as will appear from the following. After mentioning the vast number of people who are not Catholics, Leo XIII., says:-

By this thought We were and are seriously affected; nor would it be right We should without poignant grief think of such a large portion of the human race who are far separated from Us, and have, as it were, taken a path that leads them astray. Now, as We are on earth the Viceregent of the Omnipotent God, Who wants all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of truth, and as both Our protected age and the bitterness of the cares we have to bear are pressing Us to imitate the example of Our Redeemer and Master Jesus Christ in this, that when He was just about to return to heaven He besought the Father with most earnest prayers that His disciples and followers should become one in mind and heart: "I pray. . . that they all will become, as Thou Father art in Me, and I in Thee that they also may be one in Us."

"A Convict's Letter" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

True to the traditions of every "Catholic" church that ever existed, the Greek Church uses the power of the State to punish dissenters from her formularies. The Stundists who meet together to read the Bible, the Baptist who refuses to have his children sprinkled by the priest, the Seventh-day Adventist who keeps the Sabbath of the Lord in preference to the Sunday of the Catholic Church,-all are under the ban, and liable to be called upon to suffer the loss of all things save the faith of Jesus, which brings the possession of all things.

Thus Russia makes "convicts" of the men who are loyal to real principle and to God. Many a little Russian home is scattered by the persecuting priests and civil officers. A writer in Good Words gives the following letter, written by an exile in Tomsk to his little daughter in a village of Bessarabia, one of the provinces which the priests have been raiding in their search for men who fear God:-

My darling little Varatchka, you must have waited so long for a letter from papa, and now you have it, and I can hear you kissing it. And you'll give it to mother to let her read it, and to Vanya and Vasya as well. Won't they just wonder at getting a letter from a convict in Siberia! But you, darling, you know that although papa is a convict he is no criminal. Thank God, I have a good conscience! You will pray for me will you not? You and mother together?

This gives us a peep into a broken Russian home circle, the like of which may be found all over Southern Russia. There is a healthy life where men are willing to suffer for conscience' sake, and where mothers and children yield up those whom they love with resignation. The Christian fortitude of these and others is a rebuke to the sickly religious life that weighs duty in the scales of convenience and worldly prospects, and stifles the voice of conscience wherever the word of God points out the narrow path.

"Our Victory" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

The wicked glory in their own works, and their triumphs are but the precursors of their overthrow; but the righteous find no cause of glory in themselves. They have no confidence in the flesh, but all their confidence is in God. The Psalmist, in setting forth the beauty of praise and thanksgiving to the Lord, exclaims, "For Thou, Lord, hast made me glad through Thy works; I will triumph in the works of Thy hands." Ps. xcii. 4. The Psalmist recognised that there was no occasion of triumph for him or any man in any other works than the works of God. And therefore, since men glory only in that which they regard as a triumph, his only occasion of glory was in the works of God, and he ascribed to God all the glory, and took none of it to himself. And so is it with all the righteous.

But far different is it with the man who has not faith. He neither sees the hand of God in that which befalls him, nor is he able to discern between victory and defeat. In his ignorance he is compared to the brutes that pass unwittingly to the slaughter. "O Lord, how great are Thy works! and Thy thoughts are very deep. A brutish man knoweth not, neither doth a fool understand this. When the wicked spring as the grass, and when all the workers of iniquity do flourish, it is that they shall be destroyed for ever." What a terrible significance is given to the prosperity of the wicked,

435

and how far are all their imaginations from such a truth. Being destitute of faith, he cannot see beyond the present hour, and his pride goes before his fall.

Yet there is nothing more common among men, or more natural to human nature, than to triumph in the works of the flesh and give praise and glory to self. All the works of the flesh are against the works of the Lord, and therefore no real triumph can ever attend them. And because they are against the Lord, they against His people. "The wicked plotteth against the just, and gnasheth upon him with his teeth." Ps. xxxvii. 12. They will oppress the just and rule over them and persecute them, and because of the prosperity of their wicked devices they imagine that their power has caused them to triumph; but the very triumph of the wicked are defeats, while the seeming defeats of the just are their victories. For we read that "the prosperity of fools shall slay them" (Prov. i. 32); but neither persecution, nor distress, or even death in any of its forms can bring defeat upon the righteous, for "in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us." Rom. xiii. 35, 37.

The victory of the saints is not always made manifest in the things of this world, for their welfare is not with flesh and blood, but with principalities and powers, and spiritual wickedness in high places. Eph. vi. 12. And the weapons of their warfare are "not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." 2 Cor. x. 4, 5. Their weapon is "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God," and their victory is the victory of faith. God works with their faith, and in the works of His hands there is always triumph.

"Ignore Him" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

Ignore Him.-It is the privilege and the duty of every person to ignore Satan and his evil hosts in all the affairs of life. Not that we should ignore the fact of his existence, or that of his going about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour; but we should ignore him. He is constantly seeking to hold communication with us, in order that he may deceive or discourage us in our spiritual undertakings. He is a constant meddler in all our affairs pertaining to our relation to God, and he should be treated as such. His suggestions should not be listened to, or his authority or power recognised. To parley with him is of no possible use, for we can never convince or persuade him, while He only too often persuades us thereby. We can ignore him by "looking unto Jesus," whose glory and loveliness have power to charm the eye and can take hold on the affections of the heart.

"The Papal Plea for Unity" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

The Roman Pontiff has issued an "Encyclical" in behalf of Church unity, which is remarkable in that it is addressed to all Christendom,-Protestant, Greek, and Roman Catholic. The fact affords strong evidence of the feeling of confidence which pervades the Roman hierarchy at this stage of their struggle for the recovery of Rome's former supremacy. It is said that the Pope was previously in possession of reliable assurances both from Greek and Anglican Church parties that such a plea for himself would be welcomed in their midst; though doubtless the ever increasing flow of the Romeward tide in so-called Protestant churches throughout Christendom, furnished the Pontiff with all the evidence needed that his effort would not be in vain.

The papal plea for unity is, of course, nothing more than a plea for union with Rome. No other kind of unity is desired or recognised by the Papal Church. The Pontiff has deliberately invited the Protestant bodies throughout the world to acknowledge the authority of the Church of Rome in spiritual things, and to declare that the Reformation was wrong and that Wycliffe, Luther, Wesley, and their co-labourers were agents of the devil, instead of servants of God. An Italian, surrounded by others of this kind, brought up in an atmosphere that knows never a ray of Gospel and liberty, invites those who have been reared in the atmosphere of freedom to acknowledge him as their spiritual leader! But on the other hand, the insult has itself been invited by the inconsistent, compromising, and spiritually-lifeless character of the Protestantism which a great part of the Protestant world has now for some years exhibited.

The basis of the desired union is as stated, an acknowledgement by all other churches of the authority of Rome, of the error of all doctrines which stand in opposition to hers, and of the wickedness of the work of all by whom such doctrines have been taught; for this is what a compliance with the Pope's proposition involves. It is not Christian unity for which the Pontiff pleads, but for the "unity of Christendom," in that sense of the word which refers more to a profession of Christ than to possession of what He gives. Christian unity is "the unity of the faith" (Eph. iv. 13),-not unity of belief merely, nor unity which men can bring about with respect to the faith, but unity which the faith itself gives to men, as many as will receive it. Faith-Christian faith-is a gift of God, and not an outcome of a will or reason of man (Eph. ii. 8), and Christian unity is the result of the faith which they have, and not of any efforts on their part to agree on points of doctrine while in a state of discord. There being but one faith, there must necessarily be unity among all who possess it. All who are united to Christ are by that very bond united to each other. And therefore no anxiety need ever be felt by anyone for Christian unity itself, for that must always exist wherever there are Christians; and the very fact that a plea is put forth for the unity of Christendom is itself proof that it is not Christian unity that is called for, but only such unity as can be produced by the will and efforts of men.

The Encyclical declares, as stated in the Catholic Times, that "the Church continues with an ardour that knows no abatement the work of propagating the faith which has lived through nineteen centuries,"-in which assertion there is more of truth stated than is realised by the Pope or his defenders; for what he miscalls "faith" has, in its Catholic phase, existed since the days of the Apostle Paul, who saw the beginning of its working nineteen centuries ago (see 2 Thess. ii. 7); but the Christian faith is very much older than that, for "by faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous" (Heb. xi. 4), and the Gospel was preached to Abraham (Gal. iii. 8), and to his descendants who came out of Egypt. Heb. iv. 1, 2. The Christian faith is as old as the days when God first spoke to men, for faith is belief of God's word, and we read in the first epistle of Peter, "the word of the Lord endureth for ever; and this is the word by which the Gospel is preached unto you." The Gospel is everlasting (Rev. xiv. 6), and therefore the Christian faith,-the faith which God gives to

436

man,-is everlasting; it has been prepared for eternity. The doctrines of the Papacy are, in principle, older than nineteen centuries, extending back into the darkness of ancient heathenism until they become lost in the mists of time; but in their Christian guise they have existed for nineteen centuries and no more.

The Pope offers himself to the Protestant world as an infallible religious guide, since they have, as he informs them, no certain rule of faith or authority. In other words, since the word of the Lord, which by the Gospel is preached unto men is not a sure rule of faith or authority to them, the Pope offers them the word of man, preached by the prelates of Rome! Sad indeed it is that the attitude of professed Protestants should invite such a deliverance from the "man of sin." The root of this terrible evil is neglect of the words of God,-the holy Scriptures. Turning away from them and refusing to accept them in childlike faith, they have indeed no certain rule of faith or authority left them, but have only the dire remedy for their schisms of going back to Rome. But "nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having the seal: The Lord knoweth them that are His." 2 Tim. ii. 19.

"A 'Strong Man' on Health" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

In the Cosmopolitan magazine, Sandow, the champion strong man, gives his views and experience in the matter of physical development. The wonderful strength which he possesses has been developed by constant exercise and training, having regard for the principles of healthful living. Of eating, drinking, and sleeping, he says:-

"In passing, let me say that tea and coffee contain alkaloids, which are injurious to the nerves and stomach. I never drink either. Water is nature's offering to the thirsty, and, when distilled, cannot be improved upon. It should always be taken when the stomach is empty.

"Good health depends upon sound asleep as well as upon good nutrition. I encourage as much sleep at one time as possible. People who seek to do with a small amount of sleep are burning their lives at both ends, and wasting nature's reserve of vitality. . . . I sleep nine hours always, and often more."

Again, he says in conclusion:-

"I do not keep to any special diet, but eat whatever I have a taste for, without stinting myself unduly; nor do I restrict myself seriously in what I drink. I abjure everything intoxicating, and never suffer myself to touch tea or coffee. . . I endeavour to have my meals at regular hours, and prefer that they shall be simple and easy of digestion. I take plenty of sleep, and find this essential to my well-being."

"Studies in Romans. God's Revelation to Man. Rom. i. 21-25" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

Let us not forget that it is from the very words of the Bible that one is to learn. All the real help that any teacher can be to any one in the study of the Bible is to show him how to fix his mind more clearly upon the exact words of the sacred text. Therefore, first of all, read the text over many times. Do not do this hastily, but carefully, paying particular attention to every statement. Do not waste one moment in speculating as to the possible meaning of the text. There is nothing worse than guessing the meaning of a text of Scripture, unless it is the acceptance of somebody else's guess. Nobody can know any more of the Bible than the Bible itself tells; and the Bible is just as ready to tell its story to one person as to another.

Question the text closely. Probe it again and again, always in a reverent, prayerful spirit, to make it reveal itself. Do not be discouraged if you do not at once see all that there is in the text. Remember that it is the word of God, and that it is infinite in its depth, and that you can never exhaust it. When you come across a difficult statement, go back and consider it in connection with what precedes. Do not think that you can ever get at the full meaning of any text apart from its connection. By constant application to the words of the text, in order to be sure that you know exactly what it says, you will soon have them constantly in your mind; and it is then that you will begin to reap some of the rich fruits of Bible study; for at unexpected times new light will flash from them, and through them from other scriptures as you read.

Our last lesson covered verses 16, 17, which contain the statement of what the Gospel is, and what it reveals to men. The remaining portion of the chapter may be summarized thus:-

THE JUSTICE OF JUDGMENT. ROM. 1. 18-20

"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness; because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath showed it unto them. For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His external power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse."

HOW MEN LOST KNOWLEDGE

ROM. 1. 21-25

"Because that, when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things."

RESULT OF IGNORING GOD. ROM. 1. 24-33

"Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleaness, through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves; who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections; for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature; and likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one towards another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was meet. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful; who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

From what place is the wrath of God revealed?

"The wrath of God is revealed from heaven."

Against what is the wrath of God revealed?

"Against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men."

What is done to the truth by ungodly men?

"Who hold down the truth in unrighteousness." Revised Version.

What is the justice of the revelation of God's wrath against all ungodliness of men?

"Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them."

How is it that the knowledge of God is manifest in them?

"For God hath showed it unto them."

Since what time have the invisible things of God been seen?

"Since the creation of this world." R.V.

437

What are these invisible things?

"His everlasting power and Divinity." R.V.

By what are the everlasting power and Divinity of God made known?

"Being perceived through the things that are made."

What then is the condition of all who sin?

"They are without excuse."

When they knew God, wherein did they fail?

"When they knew God, they glorified Him not as God."

In what respect did they fail to glorify Him?

"Neither were thankful."

What caused their ingratitude?

They "became vain in their imaginations."

What was the result of their vain imaginings?

"Their foolish heart was darkened."

In what sad condition were they?

"Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools."

What did they then do?

"Changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things."

To what were they left as a consequence?

"Wherefore God also gave them up to the lusts of their own hearts."

How did they pervert the truth?

"They "changed the truth of God into a lie." "Exchanged the truth of God for a lie." R.V.

What false worship did they introduce?

They "worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator."

What was the result of this self-exaltation and creature worship?

"For this cause God gave them up to vile affection."

What was the result of their refusing to have God in their knowledge?

"God gave them over to a reprobate mind," or "a mind void of judgment."

With what were they therefore necessarily filled?

"Being filled with all unrighteousness," etc.

All Unrighteousness Condemned.-The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. "All unrighteousness is sin." 1 John v. 17. "But sin is not imputed when there is no law." Rom. v. 13. Therefore enough of the law of God is known in all the world to deprive all people of any excuse for sin. The statement in this verse is equal to that in the next chapter, that "there is no respect of persons with God." His wrath is manifested against all unrighteousness. No person in the world is so great that he can sin with impunity, and no person is so insignificant that his sin will be overlooked. There is strict impartiality with God. He "without respect of persons judgeth according to every man's work." 1 Peter ii. 17.

Restraining the Truth.-The statement is that men "hold down the truth in unrighteousness." Some people have superficially read verse 18 as though it said that men may possess the truth while they themselves are unrighteous. It does not say so. Sufficient evidence that such a thing is not meant is found in the fact that the apostle is speaking in this chapter especially of those who did not possess the truth, but had exchanged it for a lie. Although they had lost all knowledge of the truth, they were in condemnation for their sin.

The statement is that people restrain the truth by unrighteousness. We might note the fact that when Jesus went into His own country "he did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief." Matt. xiii. 58. But the apostle in the text before us means much more than this. He means, as the context plainly shows, that people by their perverseness restrain the working of the truth of God in their own souls. But for their resistance of the truth, it would sanctify them. And herein is seen the

Righteousness of God's Wrath.-The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, and justly, too, "because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shown it unto them." Note particularly the statement that that which may be know of God "is manifest in them." Although in the common version the margin gives "to them" as an alternative reading, the Greek gives no warrant for any such rendering. No matter how blindly men may sin, the fact remains that they are sinning against great light, "because that which may be known of God is manifest in them." With such knowledge not only before their eyes, but actually within them, it is easy to see the justice of God's wrath against all sin, no matter in whom it is found. Even though it should not be perfectly clear to us how the knowledge of God is really placed in every man, we may accept the apostle's statement of the fact. In the wonderful description of the foolishness of idolatry, given in Isaiah, we are told that the man who makes an idol lies against the truth which he himself possesses. "He feedeth on ashes; a deceived heart hath turned him aside, that he can not deliver his soul, nor say, Is there not a lie in my right hand?" Isa. xliv. 20.

Seeing the Invisible.-It is said of Moses that "he endured, as seeing him who is invisible." Heb. xi. 27. This was not a privilege peculiar to Moses. Every other man may do the same thing. How? Because the "invisible things of Him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made." There has not been a time since the world was created when all men did not have the knowledge of God within their grasp.

"Lord, how Thy wonders are displayed
Where'er I turn my eye!
If I survey the ground I tread,
Or gaze upon the sky.

"There's not a plant or flower below
But makes Thy glories known."

Eternal Power and Divinity.-The invisible things of God that are known by the things that are made are His everlasting power and divinity. "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth His handiwork." Ps. xix. 1. Jesus Christ is "the power of God." 1 Cor. i. 24. "For in Him were all things created, in the heavens and upon the earth, things visible and things invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things have been created through Him, and unto Him; and He is before all things, and in Him all things consist." Col. i. 16, 17. "He spake, and it was." Ps. xxxiii. 9. He is "the firstborn of all creation." Col. i. 15. He is the source, or beginning, of the creation of God. Rev. iii. 14. That is to say, all creation springs from Christ Jesus, who is the power of God. He spoke the worlds into existence from His own being. Therefore the external power and Divinity of God are impressed upon everything that has been made. We can not open our eyes, we can not even feel the breeze upon our face, without having a clear revelation to us of the power of God.

"We are His Offspring."-When Paul upon Mars' Hill rebuked the Athenians for their idolatry he said that God is not far from every one of us, "for in Him we live, and move, and have our being." The men to whom he was speaking were heathen, yet it was just as true of them as it is of us. Then he quoted one of their own poets, who had said, "For we are also His offspring," and placed upon it the stamp of truth, by saying, "Forasmuch then

438

as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device." Acts xvii. 27-29. Every movement of men, and every breath, is the working of the external power of God. Thus the eternal power and divinity of God are manifest to every man. Not that man is in any sense divine, or that he has any power in himself. Quite the contrary. Man is like the grass. "Every man at his best state is altogether vanity." Ps. xxxix. 5. The fact that man is nothing in himself, and even "less than nothing, and vanity," is evidence of the power of God manifested in him.

God's Power in the Grass.-Look at the tiny blade of grass just pushing its way through the hard ground to the sunlight. It is a very frail thing. Pull it up, and you will see that it has not power to stand alone. Even scrape the soil away from it as it stands in the earth, and it will at once lose its upright position. It depends upon the soil to hold it up, and yet it is pushing its way to the surface through that very hard soil. Dissect it as carefully as you please, and you will find nothing to indicate the possession of power. Rub it between your fingers, and you will see that there is scarcely any substance to it. It is about as frail a thing as there is in nature, and yet it will often remove quite large stones that are in the way of its growth. Whence comes this power? It is not inherent in the grass, but is nothing less than the power of the life of God, working according to his word, which in the beginning said, "Let the earth bring forth grass."

The Gospel in Creation.-We have seen that in every created thing the power of God is manifested. And we also learned from the scripture studied last week that the Gospel is "the power of God unto salvation." God's power is ever the same, for the text before us speaks of "His eternal power." The power, therefore, which is manifested in the things which God has made is the same power that works in the hearts of men to save them from sin and death. Therefore we may be assured that God has constituted every portion of his universe a preacher of the Gospel. So then men may not only know the fact of God's existence from the things which he has made, but they may know His eternal power to save them. The twentieth verse of the first chapter of Romans is an expansion of the sixteenth. It tells us how we may know the power of the Gospel.

The Stars as Preachers.-"The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth His handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge. There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard [Or, "without these their voice is heard"]. Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world." Ps. xix. 1-4. Now read Romans x. 13-18: "Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? and how shall they preach, except they be sent? as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the Gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things! But they have not all obeyed the Gospel. For Esaias saith, Lord, who hath believed our report? So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. But I say, Have they not heard? Yes verily, their sound went into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world."

In this text all the objections which men raise against the punishment of the heathen are answered. As stated in the first chapter, they are without excuse. The Gospel has been made known to every creature under heaven. It is admitted that men cannot call on one in whom they have not believed, and that they can not believe in one of whom they have not heard, and that they can not hear without a preacher. And that which they ought to hear, and which they have not obeyed, is the Gospel. Having stated this, the apostle asks, "Have they not heard?" and at once answers his own question by repeating the words of the nineteenth psalm, "Yes verily, their sound went into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world." Thus we learn that the speech which the heavens utter from day unto day is the Gospel; and the knowledge which they show from night unto night is the knowledge of God.

The Heavens Reveal Righteousness.-With the knowledge that that which the heavens declare is the Gospel of Christ, which is the power of God unto salvation, we can easily follow the nineteenth psalm through. It seems to the casual reader that there is a break in the continuity of this psalm. From talking about the heavens, the writer suddenly begins to speak of the perfection of the law of God, and its converting power. "The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple." Verse 7. But there is no break at all. The law of God is the righteousness of God, and the Gospel reveals the righteousness of God, and the heavens declare the Gospel; therefore it follows that the

439

heavens reveal the righteousness of God. "The heavens declare His righteousness, and all the people see His glory." Ps. xcvii. 6.

The glory of God is His goodness, because we are told that it is through sin that men come short of His glory. Rom. iii. 23. Therefore we may know that whoever looks upon the heavens with reverence, seeing in them the power of the Creator, and will yield himself to that power, will be led to the saving righteousness of God. Even the sun, moon, and stars, whose light is but a part of the glory of the Lord, will shine that glory into his soul.

Without Excuse.-How evident it is, therefore, that men are without excuse for their idolatrous practices. When the true God reveals Himself in everything, and with His power makes known His love, what excuse can men have for not knowing and worshipping him? But is it true that God makes known His love to all men? Yes, it is just as true as that He makes Himself known, for "God is love." Whoever knows the Lord must know His love. This being the case with regard to the heathen, how utterly without excuse are people who live in lands where the Gospel is preached with an audible voice from His written word.

The Cause of Idolatry.-How is it that if God has so clearly revealed Himself and His truth, there are so many who are in utter ignorance of Him? The answer is given, "Because that, when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful." There is one thing which God has given as the seal and sign of His Divinity, and that is the Sabbath. Speaking of men, He says, "Moreover also I gave them My Sabbaths, to be a sign between Me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord that sanctify them." Eze. xx. 12. This is in keeping with what we have learned in Romans; for our text tells us that God's power and Divinity are perceived by thoughtful people through the things that He has made; and the Sabbath is the great memorial of creation. "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work; . . . for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it." Ex. xx. 8-11. If people had always kept the Sabbath as it was given, there would never have been any idolatry; for the Sabbath reveals the power of the word of the Lord to create and to work righteousness.

Vain Imaginations.-Men became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Gibbon says of the speculations of the ancient philosophers that "their reason had often been guided by their imagination, and their imagination had been prompted by their vanity." The course of their fall was the same as that of the angel who became Satan. "How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the Most High." Isa. xiv. 12-14. What was the cause of this self-exaltation and fall? "Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness." Eze. xxvii. 17. Dependent entirely upon God for all the wisdom and glory that he had, he did not glorify God, but assumed that all his talents sprang from himself; and so, as he disconnected himself in his pride from the Source of light, he became the prince of darkness. Even thus it was with man.

Changing the Truth into a Lie.-"There is no power but of God." In nature we see the manifestation of mighty power, but it is the working of God. All the different forms of force which philosophers name, and which they declare to be inherent in matter, are but the working of the life of God in the things that He has made. Christ is "before all things, and by Him all things consist," or hold together. Col. i. 17. Cohesion therefore is but the direct power of the life of Christ. Gravitation also is the same power, as we read of the heavenly bodies, "for that He is strong in power; not one faileth." Isa. xl. 26. But men looked upon all the operations of nature, and, instead of seeing the power of the one supreme God in them, they attributed Divinity to the things themselves. So, as they looked upon themselves; and saw what great things they could achieve, instead of honouring God as the giver and upholder of all things, the One in whom they lived and moved and had their being, they assumed that they themselves were by nature divine. Thus they changed the truth of God into a lie. The truth is that the life and power of God are manifested in everything that he has made; the lie is that the force which is manifest in all things is inherent in the things themselves. So men put the creature in the place of the Creator.

Looking Within.-Marcus Aurelius, who is accounted the best of the heathen philosophers, said: "Look within. Within is the fountain of good, and it will ever bubble up, if thou wilt ever dig." That expresses the spirit of all heathenism. Self was the supreme thing. But that spirit is not peculiar to what is know as heathenism, for it is very common in these days; nevertheless, it is nothing but the spirit of heathenism. It is a part of the worship of the creature instead of the Creator. It is but natural that they should put themselves in his place; and when they do that, it is a necessary consequence that they look to themselves, and not to God, for goodness. When men look within, what is the only thing that they can see? "Evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness." Mark vi. 21, 22. Even the apostle Paul said, "I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing." Rom. vii. 18. Now, when a man looks at all this evil which is in him by nature, and thinks that it is good, and that he can get good out of himself, the result can be plainly seen: the vilest wickedness must be the result. He virtually says, "Evil, be thou my good."

The Wisdom of this World.-"The world by wisdom knew not God." Keenness of intellect is not faith, nor is it a substitute for faith. A man may be a brilliant scholar, and still be the basest of men. Several years ago a man charged with half a score or more brutal murders was hanged, and yet he was a scholar and a scientist, and had held a high position in society. Learning is not Christianity, although a Christian may be a learned man. Modern inventions will never save men from perdition. Some modern philosopher has said that "idolatry can not live by the side of steam engine and

440

telegraphs." But it does. It lived in ancient times by the side of the highest art and culture that the world has ever known. And at the same time men were sunk in such wickedness as referred to by the apostle in the last part of the first chapter of Romans. Even the reputed wise men were such as are there described. It was the natural result of their looking at themselves for righteousness.

In the Last Days.-Read the last verses of the first chapter of Romans if you wish to have a picture of the world in the last days. The one who believes in a millennium of peace and righteousness before the coming of the Lord will doubtless be shocked; but he needs to be. Read that list of sins carefully, and then see how exactly it tallies with the following: "This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lover of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof." 2 Tim. iii. 1-5. This all springs from self, the very source of the evil with which Paul charged the heathen. Those things are the works of the flesh. See Gal. v. 19-21. They are the natural result of trusting in self.

In spite of the declaration of the apostle, there are very few who will believe that this state of things will ever be general, and especially among those who profess godliness. But the seed which produces such a crop is already sown broadcast. The Papacy, "that man of sin," "the son of perdition; who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped,"-is the strongest force in professed Christendom, and its power is daily increasing. And how is it increasing?-Not so much by the direct accessions as by the blind acceptance of its principles by professed Protestants. It has placed itself above God in thinking to change His law. Dan. vii. 25. It boldly adopted the heathen sun festival day, Sunday,-in the place of the Sabbath of the Lord, the memorial of creation, and defiantly points to it as its badge of authority. And the majority of Protestants follow in its train, accepting a custom which stands for the exaltation of man above God,-the symbol of justification by works instead of by faith. When professed Christians cling to a human ordinance in spite of the express command of the Lord, and support their custom by appeals to the Fathers, men who were learned in the philosophy of heathenism, the road to any evil which their hearts may choose is but a down grade. "He that hath ears to hear, let him hear."

"The Resurrection Literal" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

OLD AND NEW TESTAMENT HARMONY

"If a man die, shall he live again?" Job xix. 14.

"The dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and they that hear shall live." John v. 25.

"Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer Thine Holy One to see corruption." Ps. xvi. 10.

"This Jesus hath God raised up." Acts ii. 32. "He whom God raised again saw no corruption." Chap. xiii. 37.

"I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the latter day upon the earth." Job xix. 25.

"I am He that liveth and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore." Rev. i. 18. "And I looked, and, lo, a Lamb stood on Mount Zion, and with Him an hundred forty and four thousand, having His Father's name written in their foreheads." "These were redeemed from among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb." Chap. xiv. 1, 4.

441

"My flesh also shall rest and hope." Ps. xvi. 9. "Thy dead men shall live; together with My dead body shall they arise." Isa. xxvi 19.

"If the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you." Rom. viii. 11.

"I will ransom them from the power of the grave." Hosea xiii. 14.

"There is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time." 1 Tim. ii. 5, 6.

"I will redeem them from death." Hosea xiii. 14. "The wages of sin is death." Rom. vi. 23. "Sin is the transgression of the law." 1 John iii. 4.

"Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us; for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree." Gal. iii. 13.

"Behold, O My people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves." Eze. xxxvii. 12.

"God hath both raised up the Lord, and will also raise up us by His own power." 1 Cor. vi. 11.

"God will redeem my soul from the power of the grave; for He shall receive me." Ps. xlix. 15.

"If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto Myself." John xiv. 3.

"O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy destruction." Hosea xiii. 14. "He will swallow up death in victory." Isa. xxv. 8.

"This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave where is thy victory?" 1 Cor. xv. 53-55. "Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." Verse 57.

"We Are All Alike" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

Little folks are very much alike in many ways, no matter where they may live. The same is true of grown-up people. The Apostle Paul said in one of his sermons, that God "hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth."

It makes no difference what language they speak, or what the colour of their skin, the Lord made them all, and loves one just as much as another; for does it not read, "God so loved the world"? Sometimes we in Great Britain may perhaps wonder if the peculiar looking people we see pictured in books of travel really feel and think as we do. Did you ever think that possibly they may have the same doubts about us?

A lady missionary to Africa, in the early days of missions, learned that the natives thought white people were of an altogether different order of beings from themselves. They were surprised and delighted to find that she loved her children, and that white people had the same feelings that they had. We know more now about the world we live in, and the people in it, than our grandfathers did when they were young; because steam engines and newspapers and books are multiplied. But it is not easy for many to acknowledge that all men are really of one blood, and that the Lord cares for all and loves all. But so He says, and all who believe Him must believe it.

If we could see the games that children play in different lands, we should see that all like a good time. Away in the interior of Africa, Stanley found the children playing games, some of which were after all not so very different from those that you like to play. The play that is inside of the children is the same; it works out in different ways, that is all the difference.

When it is too warm to play cricket on these warm summer days, perhaps some boys cool themselves by thinking of icebergs, and wonder what the children in Greenland and the arctic regions play. They play games with a ball, that is sure. The ball is probably made of Walrus hide, or bone, and the bats are bones. Many hours of their long winters are enlivened by the merry shouts of these little Esquiman (Eskemo) players, in skin clothing.

In some places in our southern lands the children have a snow game that they play in winter, fancying themselves Esquimau children. Taking hold of hands they sing something like this,-

Oh, do you know the Esquimau
The Esquimau, the Esquimau?
Oh, yes, I know the Esquimau,
He dwells in lands of ice and snow,
Of ice and snow, of ice and snow.

And then they hop about in the snow in supposed imitation of the children of the Far North. A traveller in arctic lands, a few years ago, found a game very similar to this one, in which the little people in fur garments fancied themselves imitating the games of boys and girls in lands where they think it must be very warm and uncomfortable. They think about us, you see, and fancy that we are a very strange and unnatural kind of people. And so we are to them.

When missionaries first went to Greenland the people felt at first very much as we perhaps once felt. They did not want to be told that their ways were not right, and that their only hope was in turning to the Lord and loving Him. They laughed at the missionaries, and thought them very ignorant because they were unable to speak the Esquimau language properly. But the missionaries trusted in God and refused to leave the people, even though they were brought almost to death by starvation; and finally the cold, icy hearts of the people were melted by the warm love of Jesus, and very many received a knowledge of the true God.

The Lord is so great that His kingdom ruleth over all, and now He is sending to all men the message of His everlasting Gospel,-"to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people." He says, "I will say to the north, Give up; and to the south, Keep not back; bring My sons from far, and My daughters from the ends of the earth; even every one that is called by My name; for I have created him for My glory, I have formed him; yea I have made him." Isa. xliii. 6, 7.

So the Lord made us all, and made us to glorify Him. Then we are to remember, as we are all alike, and all made to serve God, that if we know more of Him than some people in far away lands, or even people living near us, He has told us about His love in order that we may tell them, and not because He loves us more than them. We cannot be selfish with the Lord.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

-The hay crop of the United Kingdom is estimated at 12,900,000 tons.

-The total of deaths from bubonic plague in Hong Kong is slightly over 2,800.

-There is some prospect of an early settlement of the railway strike in the United States.

-Sir Henry Layard, the well-known diplomatist and Eastern explorer, died July 6. He was horn in 1517.

-In an accident on the Canadian Pacific Rail-way, July 5, five persons were killed and eight injured.

-The infant great grandson of the Queen is to be baptized with water brought for the purpose from the Jordan.

-The Royal Navy protects the commerce of the entire empire. The value of this commerce is ?970,000,000.

-An Inter-colonial Conference, sitting at Ottawa, Canada, has been seriously considering the subject of a Pacific cable.

-General Booth states that be has now under his command in this country 10,791 officers, and 200,000 unpaid workers.

-In Dresden a thread is produced from the common nettle so fine that a length of 60 miles weighs only two and a half pounds.

-A despatch from Warsaw states that the authorities have just given orders that all synagogues in the neighbourhood of Russian churches are to are closed.

-A destructive fire occurred at Buda-Pest on Sunday, July 1. Ten houses were burned to the ground, and twenty-five adjacent buildings wore partly destroyed.

-Signor Bandi, an Italian journalist and patriot, was assassinated July 2 at Rome, in a manner similar to the assassination of President Carnot. The assassin escaped.

-Only 450 out of 11,000 workmen remain at work in the great Austrian rifle factory of Steyr, the others having been dismissed, apparently on account of orders being exhausted.

-The famous racing yacht Valkyrie was sunk by a collision while starting in it race off the Clyde, July 5. By good fortune no lives were lost, though several persons were injured.

-The silkworm is in some danger of being superseded. Artificial silk is actually being produced at Bradford from very ordinary fibre, the process having been discovered by a Swiss chemist.

-It has been discovered that before the assassination of the lute President the Anarchists formed a plot to kidnap Madame Carnet, to hold her as hostage against the punishment of the murderer.

-A man in France is said to be 126 years old. He accounts for his longevity by the privations of his youth, followed in after-life by abstinence from intoxicating liquors and from excesses of all kinds.

-It is stated that the Russian Government has intervened between China and Japan, urging them to withdraw their respective troops from Korea, and then endeavour to arrive at an amicable settlement.

-It is said that when the Queen of Madagascar closed the drink-shops in her kingdom, and the ex-publicans asked for compensation, she replied, "Compensate those you have wronged, and I will pay the balance."

-President Casimir-Perier, on the occasion of his election to the presidency of the French Republic and in view of the National F?te on July 14, has signed a decree granting an amnesty to 314 prisoners sentenced for offences connected with strike movements.

-Owing to an outbreak of cholera at Cronstadt the military governor of that place has taken far-reaching measures for the suppression of the epidemic. The Government of Kielce, in South-West Russia, has been declared by order of the Minister of the Interior to be suspected of cholera infection. One death from suspected cholera has been announced from the Fejan quarantine station near Stockholm. There are at present eight cholera patients at Liege.

-President Casimir-Perier in his message to the French Parliament, said he is not a man of any party, but belongs to the Republic and to France. He appeals, to Frenchmen to avoid personal ambitions, and to work for public order and the social peace.

-During the eleven months ending May last the number of immigrants who arrived in the United States was 288,020 as compared with 430,210 in the corresponding period of last year. The greatest decrease was in Poles and ltalians, who numbered a third less than last year.

-The boy-King of Spain him horn provided with a costly toy in the shape if a juvenile regiment. Four hundred children, ranging in age from five to eight, have been gathered and provided with miniature rides and a uniform. The King amuses himself by drilling the baby battalion.

-If hot rolls are indigestible, they, it seems, are not without their redeeming points. A Russian investigator declares that now and uncut bread is free from the disease producing microbes which find the ant loaf an excellent breeding-ground.

-A terrible disaster at Nyiregyhaza, near Budapest, on July 3 was reported. A large ferry boat was crossing the River Theiss, near Mad, when it capsized, and those on board, numbering about 200, were thrown into the water, and the greater part of them drowned.

-The reports of the crops in the various districts of Italy are satisfactory, and a good harvest in anticipated. The season has so far been generally favourable. The hay crop has been most abundant and the wheat harvest is very advanced. Reaping will probably be finished by the middle of the month.

-News has been received from Sitka, Alaska, of the arrival there of seventeen survivors of the craw of the whaler James Allen, which was wrecked off the western coast of Alaska. The men had suffered the most terrible privations, and had been compelled to eat the flesh of their dead companions. Four of the crew were drowned, two died from starvation, and fifteen were missing.

-The latest thing in automatic machines is an automatic gallows. The condemned criminal steps upon a certain place in the scaffold. His weight releases a flow of water, which releases a spring, which in turn permits the drop to fall. Thirty-four executions have taken place by its means in Colorado, but the people of Connecticut object to its introduction on the ground that the State has no right to make a man commit suicide.

-Strained relations exist between Italy and Brazil, owing to the hardships to which the Italian colony at Rio de Janeiro is subjugated. Signor Crispi has sent instructions to the Italian Legation there to act with energy. The Brazilian Government having refused to submit to the arbitration of the United States the questions still pending regarding Dalian subjects in Brazil, Signor Crispi is determined to take energetic steps. The warships Fieramosca and Vesuvio will proceed to Rio de Janeiro to support the demands of the Italian Legislation.

-One result of the assassination of President Carnot has been to make more work for the Scotland Yard officers. All the Royalties at present in England are to be carefully guarded by detectives who know the Anarchist desperadoes. Prominent politicians on both sides of the House of Commons and in the Howe of Lords are also to have increased protection by men from Scotland Yard. The Czarevitch is almost surrounded by a special guard of detectives, as it is feared he may have bean followed to England by some of the desperate Nihilists of Russia, and an eye has to be kept on the numerous Anarchists usually resident in London.

-According to Mr. Wardell, the Government Inspector, the existence of floating dust in mines is becoming every year more and more an acknowledged element of danger, and especially when gas is given off. In spite of the scepticism of some persons, he assures us that by means of duet an explosion can be spread over large areas, and be enormously aggravated. It is curious that a very small percentage of gas will suffice to cause the initial explosion-so small a percentage, in fact, as to be undiscoverable by the ordinary mode of testing with a safety lamp. If drastic measures are to be adopted, Mr. Wardell considers the prohibition of the use of gunpowder in mines would be the safest and most desirable. The use of high explosives might be substituted.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

M. Decle, the French traveller has returned from a 7,000 mile march in Africa. During his three year's journeyings amongst the natives, he was not responsible for the death of a single human being, although passing through districts where other expeditions had battled and burned.

It takes a German scientist to get at the bottom facts of any event recorded in the Bible. Herr Hening has ascertained that "the flood was contemporaneous with the glacial period, and was due to some unknown cause which led to an unusual rainfall." It is not likely that his discovery will displace the Bible narrative.

Last year, at this time, Chicago was glorying in its achievements at the great World's Fair. Changes come rapidly nowadays, and American cables bring the news of rioting, and burning, and bloodshed in that city, attending the struggle between labour and capital. The unrest is world-wide, and the spirit of lawlessness rules in hearts that are not subject to the Divine law. The lawlessness of wealth is pitted against the lawlessness of poverty, and covetousness is at the root of the struggle. The signs of the times are not difficult to read. The Lord says to Christians, "Be patient, therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord."

A recent book on "Society in China," by Robert K. Douglas, keeper of the Oriental books and manuscripts in the British Museum, makes it appear that there is a vast difference between the people of China and the official classes. The people are democratic, peaceful, and friendly; the officials are bigoted, tyrannical, and hostile to foreigners. Mr. Douglas declares that Chinese riots are made to order. When the occasion is thought fit, then the emissaries of the mandarins are let loose on the multitudes. Disorders at once follow, and cease as soon as the provincial ruler finds that he has gained his point, or that further disturbance will be disastrous to himself.

What wonderful provision God has made for the salvation of all men! "That which may be known of God is manifest in them, for God hath showed it unto them." That is, the true Light, has lighted "every man that cometh into the world." Therefore whoever would follow the light that he has, even though it be but a glimmer, would be brought to the perfect day. To be lost requires not simply a failure to accept Christ, but a positive rejection of Him. Christ said, "If I be lifted up, I will draw all unto Me." He has been lifted up, and He does draw. If men are willing, He will save them; if they are not saved, it is because they wilfully break away from Him. It is a blessed truth, that the Lord "is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance."

"Spoiling of Their Goods" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

The following extract from a letter from Brother H. P. Holser, of the Seventh-day Adventist publishing house in Basel, Switzerland, will be of interest to many readers. The thoughtful reader will learn the lessons of practical importance from the story. It may be necessary to state for the benefit of some that the fines spoken of were imposed by the city authorities, for labour done on Sunday:-

I received notice from the authorities last week that they would come Friday to attach goods for the fines. I had an appointment out with some churches, and had to leave Friday evening, and the officer did not come before my departure. He spent a while with my wife, and tried to get her to pay it, or just sign her name that it was all right, bringing it about in a smooth way, but she would not. He evidently did not expect to have to attach our goods, and when she refused any sort of promise that we would pay, he seemed hardly to know what to do, but finally postponed the matter till Monday, when I would be back.

When he came, I took him into my office, and explained to him quite fully our position, and the light in which we considered his act. He tried to induce me to pay it, or promise to do so in the future, and seemed quite reluctant to take our goods; but when he learned what our position was, he saw that there was no hope of getting me to pay. He listened attentively to all I had to say, and was gentlemanly throughout. He next went to list the goods, and wanted me to tell him what to take. I told them that I would have no part in the matter whatever; he must perform the act alone. He took our private furniture and attached about all that was attachable, except our organ. The goods are left with us, and if not redeemed in thirty days, will be taken to town and sold at public auction.

I expected that they would take office property; but they hold me personally responsible, and so take my personal property. If they go no farther than this, they will not have far to go in this direction, for the law allows a man to have what is necessary for a living. I shall buy no more than this in the future, as it would be better for me to put what little surplus I may have into the cause them to give the civil authorities another chance to shear me.

To the present I have had several opportunities to explain the principles of the message to those that I have had to do with in this place of injustice, and shall have several more opportunities. When they come to take the goods, I shall again take the opportunity, and perhaps there will be another chance when they sell our goods.

When the officer left, he stated that he regretted having to take up my time with such an affair: I replied that it was worse for him and the city than for me; I was entirely safe in keeping the ten commandments, but he and the city were not for robbing me for it.

"Using His Talents" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

Using His Talents.-Some people who are in possession of all the natural senses think they have no talent that can be consecrated to service. But a visitor at a school for deaf and dumb children, who was asked to address them, tells of one boy bereft of two of the senses was able to instruct a companion more unfortunate. "Now and then," says the visitor, "I caught sight of some flying fingers and half-hidden signs, which showed that whispering was taking place, and I was much affected by one sight that caught my eye. On one of the upper seats a boy who is deaf, dumb, and blind was sitting, facing another boy who was spelling in his hand the meaning of my sermon. The scene was extremely touching, and I could hardly repress tears of emotion. Here was one who, though himself shut out from one great avenue of knowledge, hearing, was labouring to inform an associate to whom the two great avenues, sight and hearing, were closed. Truly, thought I, the Great Father of all sees no better imitation of His own beneficence than the service which this little death-mute is giving to the deaf, dumb, and blind lad whose receptive hand he holds!"

"Consistency" The Present Truth 10, 28.

E. J. Waggoner

Consistency.-A very faulty idea prevails quite extensively as to what consistency is. Most people think that it is never changing one's views and practices, so if they have held a wrong opinion once, or have followed a bad custom, they will hold to it for ever, in order to be consistent. Such a course is most inconsistent. The consistent man is the one who always follows the light of truth. This necessarily means that he always changes the worst for the better. He acts in harmony with a principle, and does not make his own past life the standard.

July 19, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

Jesus said, "Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth." Luke xii. 15.

This exhortation was enforced by the parable of the rich man who, in consequence of abundant crops, proposed to pull down his barns, and build greater, so that he might say to himself, "Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry." But God said to him, "Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee; then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?"

The fool, in the Bible use of the term, is the one who says in his heart, "There is no God." Ps. xiv. 1. God has revealed Himself in every star in the sky, every leaf of the forest, every fountain of the hills, and in every breeze that blows. The heavens declare His glory, and the whole earth is full of His goodness. This revelation lies at the very foundation of all true knowledge, and is the easiest and most natural thing in the world. Whoever therefore does not recognise it is justly a called a fool.

The rich man in the parable talked and acted as though there were no God. He who really believes that there is a God, must believe that He is just what He has declared Himself to be,-"a rewarder of them that seek after Him;" a tender, loving Father. Therefore whoever believes that there is a God, will know that He alone is able to preserve life, and that He delights to supply the needs of His children. The rich man acted as though his life depended solely upon himself; and thus he said in his heart, "There is no God."

But this parable is not for the rich alone. The poor need it as well. The exhortation, "Beware of covetousness," is needed by the poor as well as by the rich. The poor man who bends all his energies towards the accumulation of wealth, or the one who has no hope or expectation of becoming rich, but who is in constant anxiety over the future, is trusting in earthly goods just a surely as any rich man. Whoever acts though his life depended wholly on itself, is thereby denying the existence of God.

In the sixth chapter of Matthew the Saviour tells us that we cannot serve two masters; if we serve mammon we cannot serve God. Then He proceeds to show us that serving mammon consists in anxious care and worry about the future. Anxious thought as to what we shall eat, drink, and wear, is a characteristic of the heathen. Therefore the professed Christian who allows himself to doubt, or who is covetously anxious about the future, is denying the faith. Covetousness is idolatry.

"Your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you." For "my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory." Phil. iv. 19. "Trust in the Lord, and do good; so shall thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed. Delight thyself also in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart." Ps. xxxiii. 3, 4.

"Studies in Romans. Universal Judgment. Rom. ii. 1-11" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

"Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But His delight is in the law of the Lord; and in his law doth he meditate day and night." Ps. i. 1, 2.

"My son, if thou wilt receive My words, and hide My commandments with thee; so that thou incline thine ear unto wisdom, and apply thine heart to understanding; yea, if thou criest after knowledge, and liftest up thy voice for understanding; if thou seekest her as silver, and searchest for her as for hid treasures; then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord giveth wisdom; out of His mouth cometh knowledge and understanding." Prov. ii. 1-6.

Here we have the secret of the understanding of the Bible: study and meditation, coupled with an earnest desire to know the will of God in order to do it. "If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine." John vii. 17. Repetition-review-is one of the prime essentials to knowledge of the Bible. Not that any amount of study will compensate for lack of the Holy Spirit's guidance, but that the Holy Spirit witnesses through the word.

A LOOK BACKWARD

In this study of Romans we wish to carry along with us as much as possible of what we learn. We will therefore take a view of the first chapter as a whole. We have found that it is naturally divided somewhat as follows:-

Verses 1-7, The salutation, containing an epitome of the whole Gospel.

Verses 8-15, Paul's personal interest in the Romans, and his sense of obligation to them and to all mankind.

Verses 16, 17, What the Gospel is, and what it contains.

Verses 21-23, The corruption of wisdom.

Verses 24-32, The result of unthankfulness and of forgetting God.

A careful reading of the chapter shows that the main thought is that God has made Himself known to every soul in His creation, and that even the most degraded heathen know that they are guilty and are worthy of death for their wickedness. "Who, knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them." Verse 32. So "they are without excuse." This leading thought of the first chapter should be well in mind before beginning the second chapter, for the second is a continuation of the first, and dependent upon it.

A WIDER VIEW. ROM. 2. 1-11

"Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest; for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things. But we are sure that the judgment of God is according to truth against them which commit such things. And thinkest thou this, O man, that judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judgment of God? Or despisest thou the riches of His goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance? But, after thy hardness and impenitent heart, treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God; who will render to every man according to his deeds; to them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honour and immortality, eternal life; but unto them that are contentious, and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil; of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile; but glory, honour, and peace to every man that worketh good; to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile; for there is no respect of persons with God."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What declaration does the apostle make to man?

"Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man."

What man is it that is inexcusable?

"Whosoever thou art that judgest."

Why is the man that judges inexcusable?

"For wherein thou judgest another thou condemnest thyself."

How is it that he condemns Himself?

"For thou that judgest doest the same things."

Of what may we be sure?

"We are sure that the judgment of God is according to truth against them which commit such things."

450

Therefore what is the man who judges evil-doers not to think?

"That thou shalt escape the judgment of God."

What leading question is asked of the self-righteous judge?

"Despisest thou the riches of His goodness and forbearance and longsuffering."

Of what is such an one ignorant?

"Not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance."

What do such treasure up for themselves?

"Treasurest up unto thyself wrath."

In accordance with what is this wrath treasured up?

"After thy hardness and impenitent heart."

Against what time is this wrath treasured up?

"Against the day of wrath."

What will then be revealed?

"Revelation of the righteousness judgment of God."

What will God then render?

"Who will render to every man according to his deeds."

To what class will He render eternal life?

"To them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory and honour and immortality."

Unto how many will this be rendered?

"Upon every soul of man that doeth evil."

In what order?

"Of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile."

Is God as impartial in His rendering of rewards as of punishment?

"But glory, honour, and peace, to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile."

What is not found with God?

"For there is no respect of persons with God." He, "without respect of persons, judgeth according to every man's work." 1 Peter i. 17.

Acknowledging their Guilt.-The truth of the apostle's statement is easy of demonstration concerning the heathen and their deeds, that they know that they are worthy of death. When Adam and Eve had eaten the forbidden fruit, they were afraid to meet God, and hid themselves. Fear is a necessary accompaniment of guilt, and a proof of it. "Fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love." 1 John iv. 18. "The wicked flee when no man pursueth; but the righteous are bold as a lion." Prov. xxviii. 1. "But the fearful . . . shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire." Rev. xxi. 8. If the heathen did not know that they were guilty, they would not expect punishment for murdering or stealing, and would not arm themselves for defence.

An Unanswerable Charge.-There is wonderful shrewdness in the way that the apostle works up the charge made in the first verse. The first chapter is confined to the heathen. All will agree with the apostle's statement that they are guilty of most abominable wickedness. "They ought to know better," is the almost involuntary exclamation. "They do know better," is the apostle's reply, or, at least, they have a chance to know better, and they do know that they are not doing right. "They are without excuse." Whatever men may think about the responsibility of the heathen, all agree that their practices are to be condemned. Then comes the crushing rejoinder: "Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest; for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things." We are caught, and can not escape. If we know enough to condemn the unrighteous deeds of the heathen, we by that very judgment acknowledge ourselves to be without excuse for our own misdeeds.

All Alike.-"Thou that judgest doest the same things." It is clear enough that anybody who knows enough to condemn evil in another is without excuse for his own sins; but all will not at once see that the one who judges another does the same things. Read, therefore the last verses of the first chapter again, and compare the list of sins with that found in Gal. v. 19-21, and it will be seen that the things which the heathen do, and for which we can readily see that they are guilty, are but the works of the flesh. They are the sins that come "from within, out of the heart of men." Mark vii. 21-23. Whoever is included in the term "man" is subject to just such things. "The Lord looketh from heaven; He beholdeth all the sons of men. From the place of His habitation He looketh upon all the inhabitants of the earth. He fashioneth their hearts alike; He considereth all their works." Ps. xxxiii. 13-15.

Self-condemned.-Therefore, since all men are alike sharers in one common human nature, it is evident that whosoever in the world condemns another for any misdeed thereby condemns himself; for the truth is that all have the same evil in them, more or less fully developed; and the fact that they know enough to judge that a thing is wrong, is a declaration that they themselves are worthy of the punishment which they see that the other one deserves.

Sympathy, not Condemnation.-The robber often cries out, "Stop thief!" after some other man, in order to direct pursuit away from himself. So people condemn sin in others, in order that it may not be suspected that they are guilty of the same things. Often, too, people

"Compound for sins they are inclined to
By damning those they have no mind to,"

but of which they are actually guilty by reason of their human nature. Since all flesh of man is the same, we ought to be filled with humiliation, instead of contempt, when we hear of a gross sin that is committed; for it is really a picture of what is in our own hearts. Instead of saying, "God, I thank thee that I am not as other men," we should bear the burden of the erring, considering ourselves lest we also be tempted. Very often the man whose weakness we feel inclined to condemn, has not failed so badly as we should have done if we had been tempted in the same way, and to the same degree.

Outcry Against Sin.-When Talkative left it with Faithful to decide upon the subject of their conversation, Faithful proposed this question: "How doth the saving grace of God discover itself when it is in the heart of man?" And then Bunyan proceeds thus:-

Talk. I perceive then that our talk must be about the power of things. Well, it is a very good question, and I shall be willing to answer you; and take my answer in brief thus: First, where the grace of God is in the heart, it causeth there a great outcry against sin. Secondly-

Faith. Nay, held, let us consider of one at once. I think you should rather say, it shows itself by including the need to abhor sin.

Talk. Why, what difference is there between crying out against and abhorring sin?

Faith. O, a great deal! A man may cry out against a sin, of policy; but he can not abhor it but by virtue of a godly antipathy against it. I have heard many cry out against sin in the pulpit, who can yet abide it well enough in the heart, house, and conversation. Joseph's mistress cried out with a loud voice, as if she had been very chaste; but she would willingly, notwithstanding that, have committed uncleanness with him."

A keen perception of right and wrong, and a vigorous denunciation of sin, will never justify any man. On the contrary, they only deepen his condemnation. It is a sad fact that too many of the so-called reformers of the present day seem to think that Gospel work consists largely in the denunciation

452

of evil practices. A detective is not a minister of the Gospel.

Judgment According to Truth.-"But we are sure that the judgment of God is according to truth against them which commit such things." "Hold," says one, "I am not sure of that." Well, you may very easily assure yourself of it. (1) God exists. We are agreed as to that. (2) He is the source whence every created thing comes. (3) Every creature is absolutely dependent upon him. "In Him we live, and move, and have our being." (4) Since all life depends on Him, it is evident that the continuation of man's life depends upon his agreement and union with God. (5) Therefore God's own character must be the standard of judgment. (6) But God Himself is truth. "There is no unrighteousness in Him." (7) But He has made a revelation of Himself and His righteousness to all men. "His righteousness hath He openly showed in the sight of the heathen." Ps. xcvii. 2. (8) Therefore all men, from the least to the greatest, are without excuse for their sin. (9) Then it is plain enough that when God judges all men, without exception, His judgment is according to truth. And earth will be constrained to join with heaven in saying, "Thou art righteous, O Lord, which art, and wast, and shalt be, because thou hast judged thus." "Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are Thy judgments." Rev. xvi. 5, 7.

No Escape.-No one need think that he can escape the righteous judgment of God. It is usually the most enlightened who flatter themselves that they shall escape. It is so easy for us to think that our great knowledge of right and wrong will be counted for righteousness, to persuade ourselves that our condemnation of the sins of others will make the Lord believe that we could never be guilty of such things. But that only makes our condemnation the more clear. The first chapter of Romans knocks all the props from under every man. If the lowest are justly held guilty, there is no escape for the "higher classes." "God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil." Eccl. xii. 14.

Goodness Leading to Repentance.-"Despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance." God is the perfection of purity and holiness; man is altogether sinful. God knows every sin, yet He does not despise the sinner. "God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved." John iii. 17. Christ said, "If any man hear My words, and believe not, I judge him not." John xii. 47. And in everything that He said and did, He was simply representing the Father. God "is longsuffering to usward;" and "the longsuffering of our God is salvation." 2 Pet. iii. 9, 15. Now it is impossible that one should consider the goodness and longsuffering of God without being humbled and moved to repentance. When we consider how tenderly God bears with us, it is not possible that we should deal harshly with our fellow-men. And if we do not judge, we shall not be judged. Luke vi. 37.

Repentance Is a Gift.-"By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God." Eph. ii. 8. "The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree. Him hath God exalted with His right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins." Acts v. 30, 31. But it was not to Israel alone that God gave repentance through Christ. "To Him give all the prophets witness, that through His name whosoever believeth in Him shall receive remission of sins." Acts x. 43. And so plainly did God make this appear that even the exclusive Jews were forced to exclaim, "Then hath God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life." Acts xi. 18.

Incentives to Repentance.-The goodness of God leads men to repentance. Therefore the whole earth is full of incentives to repentance, for "the earth is full of the goodness of the Lord." Ps. xxxiii. 5. "The earth, O Lord, is full of Thy mercy." Ps. cxix. 64. God may be known through His works, and "God is love." All creation reveals the love and mercy of God.

And we need not try to improve on the Scriptures, and say that the goodness of God tends to lead men to repentance. The Bible says that it does lead them to repentance, and we may be sure that it is so. Every man is being led toward repentance as surely as God is good. But not all repent. Why? Because they despise the riches of the goodness and forbearance and longsuffering of God, and break away from the merciful leading of the Lord. But whoever does not resist the Lord, will surely be brought to repentance and salvation.

Treasuring up Wrath.-In the first chapter we learned that "the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men." Therefore all who sin are treasuring up for themselves wrath. It should be noted that in the judgment God is clear. Men receive only what they have worked for. God is not arbitrary. He has not fixed arbitrary decrees, and declared that whoever violates them shall be visited with vengeance. The punishment that will come upon the wicked is the necessary result of their own choice. God is the only source of life. His life is peace. Now when men reject Him, the only alternative for them is wrath and death. "For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the Lord; they would none of My counsel; they despised all My reproof. Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices. For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them." Prov. i. 29-32. Trouble and death are bound up in sin; they are what men choose when they refuse the Lord.

"According to His Deeds."-Unbelievers often say that it is not just for God to condemn a man simply because he does not believe a certain thing. But he does not do so. Not a word can be found in the Bible about judging a man according to his belief. Everywhere it is said that all will be judged according to their works. "For the Son of man shall come in the glory of His Father with His angels; and then He shall reward every man according to his works." Matt. xvi. 27. "Behold, I come quickly; and My reward is with Me, to give every man according as his work shall be." Rev. xxii. 12. He "judgeth according to every man's work." 1 Pet. i. 17. The man who says that his work is all right, sets himself up as judge in the place of God, who says that every man is all wrong. God is Judge alone, and he judges strictly according to a man's work, but a man's work is decided by his faith. "This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent." John vi. 29. It is not for any man to judge himself, and say that his work is all right. It is for him simply

453

to trust the goodness and mercy of the Lord, that his work may be wrought in God.

Immortality and Eternal Life.-God will render eternal life to them who seek for glory and honour and immortality. Christ "hath brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel." 2 Tim. i. 10. Life and immortality are two different things. Whoever believes on the Son of God has eternal life. "This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent." John xvii. 3. We have eternal life as soon as we know the Lord; but we can not have immortality until the Lord comes, at the last day. "We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump; for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality." 1 Cor. xv. 51-53. We are to seek for immortality; that of itself is proof that no man has it now. Since Christ has brought it to light through the Gospel, it is evident that immortality can be found in no other way than through the Gospel. Therefore those who do not accept the Gospel will never have immortality.

Tribulation and Anguish.-Those who sin are the children of wrath. Eph. ii. 3. Indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, are sure to come upon evil doers. But tribulation and anguish will have an end. The fact that none receive immortality except the ones who are Christ's at His coming, shows that all others will eventually cease to exist. There will be torment in connection with the punishment of the wicked, but the torment, however long it may continue, will come to an end in the utter destruction of the wicked. God's indignation will come to an end. "For yet a very little while, and the indignation shall cease, and Mine anger in their destruction." Isa. x. 25. The call is: "Come, My people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee; hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast. For, behold, the Lord cometh out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity." Isa. xvi. 20, 21. "He will not always chide; neither will He keep His anger forever." Ps. ciii. 9. His anger will cease, not because He will become reconciled to iniquity, but because iniquity will come to an end with its workers.

"To Every Soul."-Tribulation and anguish will come upon "every soul of man that doeth evil," and "glory, honour, and peace to every man that worketh good." None will be left out. There is not a soul so poor and ignorant that he will be passed by, nor one so wealthy and learned that he will be allowed to escape. Wealth and position will have no influence in that court. God has made the revelation of Himself so plain that every man has had an opportunity of knowing Him. "The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold down the truth in unrighteousness." Note well that His wrath is revealed against sin. Only those persons will suffer who cling to sin, and will not allow God to take it from them. In the final blotting out of sin, they are necessarily blotted out with it.

To the Jew First.-This statement is sufficient to show that God is no respecter of persons. Indeed, the apostle states as a necessary conclusion that "there is no respect of persons with God." "First" does not always refer to time. We speak of a man as being the first man in the country, not because there were no men before him, but because he is the chief man. In school a certain one is the first one in his class because he is the best scholar. The Jew is the one who has had the greatest revelation made to him, and therefore it is just that he should be chief in the judgment. The text shows, however, that God has no special favor to the Jew over other men. If glory, honour, and peace come to the Jew first, so also do indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish. The question is not, "What is the man's nationality?" but, "What has he done?" God will render to every man according to his deeds, "for there is no respect of persons with God."

"The Pope of Islam" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

The Pope of Islam.-The immense influence which the Sultan is able to exercise as head of the Mohammedan religion is thus stated by the late Sir Austen Layard:-

Do not forget what the Sultan is. He is the Pope of Islam, the chief of a faith fanatically held by one-third of Asia and the whole of Northern Africa. You may laugh if you please at his power which the Sultan is able to exert in India itself; but I was never so struck in my life as when I took a certain ex-potentate to see the Sultan. My friend had been a sovereign himself, but no sooner did he enter the presence of Abdul Hamid than he fell upon his face and began kissing the Sultan's boots. Abdul Hamid, who is a good-natured man, wished to raise him, but he refused, and after the interview was over, and we had left the palace, I said to my friend, "How can you, who have been a sovereign yourself, kiss the shoes of the Sultan?" "Ah!" he replied, "he is the chief of my religion; I must do it." In that incident you have a key to the attitude of Moslems throughout the world.

"The True Israel" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

"For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel: neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children; but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called." Rom. ix. 6, 7.

These words of the Apostle Paul should be sufficient to clear up all mystery in the minds of Bible believers concerning who are the "Israel" of to-day. It is plain that all theories and all claims based upon literal descent from Abraham are of no value. It is of no consequence to us to know who are the natural seed of Abraham to-day, or what is to become of them in the future. No promise of God made to Israel was fulfilled through the simple process of natural descent.

The line of descent from Abraham which God recognises is not a natural line, but a spiritual one. He has never recognised any line but the spiritual one, even from the days of Abraham himself. Of this fact there are many proofs. When Ishmael was born, and Abraham desired that he might live before God as the heir of the promise (Gen. xvii. 18), the Lord said to him, "Sarah thy wife shall bear thee a son indeed, and thou shalt call his name Isaac; and I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him." And when after the birth of Isaac, Sarah desired the son of Abraham by the bondwoman to be cast out because of his mocking, the Lord said to Abraham, "In all that Sarah hath said unto thee hearken unto her voice; for in Isaac shall thy seed be called."

Ishmael was the father of a great nation; and we read that Abraham had other sons beside Ishmael and Isaac; but to these he gave gifts and sent them away, and Isaac alone was his heir. So there were several sons of Abraham, but only one heir; multitudes of natural descendants, but only a certain line of them whom God recognised as his children.

Isaac was chosen as the heir because

454

he was the child of promise. The scripture commentary upon this is, "They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God; but the children of the promise are counted for the seed." So then the line of descent was reckoned from God Himself. Between God and the carnal nature there could be no possible union, and therefore no child of the flesh could be a son of God. Isaac was the child; that is, he was born through faith in the promise of God made to Abraham, and thus he became a son. No person was ever a son of God who did not become so by faith. It has been possible for all the fallen sons of Adam to become the sons of God by believing, as Abraham did, on "Him that justifieth the ungodly." By so doing they are "born again," into the line of the true descendants of Abraham,-into the family of God. And the same privilege is open to every man to-day.

The distinguishing mark of this line of descent from Abraham, is righteousness; and his descendants compose together a "righteous nation,"-the only righteous nation this earth has ever known. Of them it will be said in the final day of reckoning, "Open ye the gates, that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in." Isa. xxvi. 2. This righteousness is by faith; for we read that "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness;" and also, "to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness." Rom. iv. 3, 5. And thus, as the apostle states in another place, "they which are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham." And the same are also the sons of God; for "as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His name; which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of men, but of God." John i. 12, 13.

Faith, and faith alone, stands out through all the history of Israel as the means by which the heirship of the promises of God was received. Abraham had faith in God, and God gave him the covenant of circumcision, "a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had yet being uncircumcised; that he might be the father of all them that believe." Rom. iv. 11. But when the Israelites signally failed in faith, at Kadesh-Barnea, and were turned back from the land of promise to wander in the wilderness, circumcision ceased among them, and was not renewed until, under the command of Joshua, they again stood on the borders of Canaan. Though they were the literal descendants of Abraham, and of Isaac, the child a promise, the Lord refused to recognise them as the children of Abraham, because of their unbelief.

John the Baptist, also, and the Saviour, plainly told the Pharisees that they were not the children of Abraham. Said John, "Think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our Father; I say unto you, that God is able of the stones to raise the children unto Abraham." Matt. iii. 9. Thus he declared that natural descent from Abraham counted for nothing. And the Saviour said of them, "If ye were Abraham's children ye would do the works of Abraham;" and also, "Ye are of your father the devil." They had not been born of God and therefore were neither the children of God nor the children of Abraham.

As the natural seed of Abraham were not counted as children without faith, so on the other hand those who were not the natural seed could become united to Israel by faith. Any stranger could come and join himself to them and be counted as one of them. The promises of God were specifically made to the stranger who came and united with Israel, as to the natural descendants themselves. God did not separate the Israelites from the other nations for the purpose of going off by Himself with a certain people to favour them, and shutting the others out. He separated them from the wickedness of the nations around them, that they might not be contaminated thereby; but He excluded no one from joining them and sharing with them in all their blessings. He designed to magnify His name in them before all the world, that men might be drawn to them with a desire to obtain a knowledge of Him.

There is an Israel of God to-day, as there ever has been; and now, as then, it is open to all persons of whatever race or ancestry to unite themselves to it. There is nothing exclusive about it; it is as free as the offer of salvation. The condition of union with Israel now is the same that it ever was,-belief in God. "They which are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham." The same promises of God to ancient Israel hold good to-day; the advantages of union with Israel are the same. But there is no promise to the merely natural descendants, and no advantage in being connected with Abraham Isaac or Jacob through the flesh. The Israel of God is to-day the remnant of the "righteous nation," that have been gathered out in all ages from every race and kindred and tongue, by the power of God's grace, through faith. "Israel" stands for those who by faith have power, as Jacob did, with God, and prevailed. All these are children of God; and only these has God recognised in past times as Abraham's children, or does recognise as such to-day. They are those whom Christ has redeemed. "If ye Christ's, then are ye Abraham seed, and heirs according to the promise."

"An Intoxicating Plant" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

There is a fine moral in the following newspaper paragraph:-

In Texas there abounds a dangerous weed which farmers and stock raisers are doing their best to exterminate. It is the Lathyrus cicera, a low creeping vetch, known as the "loco plant" in its native habitat. Horses and cattle are extremely fond of this herb, and seek it out and devour it with the avidity with which men take alcohol or opium. Its effect is to befuddle the animals which eat it, and if they consume it in any quantity they not only become intoxicated, but mad. A doctor, who has made a study of the symptoms of "loco" poisoning, says the prominent ones are due to a loss of muscular co-ordination. The animals become weak and staggering, and a slight blow on the head would be sufficient to cause one affected by the poison to rear and fall over backwards. There is also considerable loss of flesh, the coat loses its natural bright shiny appearance, and the hair becomes rough and of a dirty colour. The brain, as well as the spinal cord in some cases, seems to be affected, and the animals become perfectly crazy. Man, we are sometimes told, is the only animal that gets drunk, but horses and cattle do the same, it seems, when they have the opportunity.

The poor beasts, like many men, have not the power or the inclination to resist an appetite that is so perverted by the narcotic or stimulant that no healthful food can supply the demand. But why do not the stock-raisers make provision to grow this herb and supply it in moderate quantities to the stock? Simply because they know that things of this nature, which produce such results when taken in quantities, are harmful in whatever proportion they are taken. The real food does not enslave the appetite. Stock-raisers prefer to supply the horses and cattle with food; and, as they raise them for profit, they try to exterminate the weed described. Amongst men we find the use of stimulants and opiates producing exactly similar effects, and yet there are encouragements offered to the traffickers in these things that ruin men's bodies, as the Texan weed

455

ruins the bodies of the cattle. And although souls are lost in the indulgence of perverted taste, even some well-intentioned people apologise for the moderate use of intoxicants, thinking they can stop short of injury to health. It is coming to be recognised more and more generally that they cannot begin without injury to health.

"Spiritual or Fanciful?" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

It is impossible for man to give a spiritual meaning to any text of Scripture; and therefore it is impossible for anyone to "spiritualise" away the meaning of any text; but he may take away its meaning for himself and others who listen to him through his own fancy or imagination. Every text of Scripture is spiritual and its meaning is spiritual, and only by the aid of the Spirit can its meaning be impressed upon the heart. This spiritual character of the Scripture is impressed upon the words by the Spirit which dictated them, and no man has power to impress a spiritual nature upon anything. All men could do is to make Scripture appear fanciful, by "interpreting" it according to his own imaginations. And this he has no business to do. For the Spirit is the interpreter and the guide into all truth.

The spiritual meaning of all Scripture is therefore to be revealed by the Spirit itself; and this being so, it follows that the Bible must be its sole interpreter, or in other words, that what the Spirit has said in one place must be understood in the light of what it has said in another place; each text must be understood in the light of all others. He who presumes to interpret the word of God in any other way, only darkens counsel by words without knowledge.

"Unclean Fiction" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

Unclean Fiction.-A writer in a literary journal scathingly arraigns the writers and readers of the classic novels which have become popular of late, which profess to teach good morals by putting wickedness on exhibition. He says:-

Druggist and physicians have told me that a person who takes to opium-eating will lie, steal, or barter body and soul for a morsel of dried poppy-juice. Never in my life have I known that a man or a woman given over to the pleasure of writing or of reading novels based on illicit love who did not habitually lie to avoid personal responsibility.

"Getting Angry" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

Getting Angry.-Nearly everyone knows by experience that it is a bad thing physically to allow feelings of anger to rage inside the heart, whether the feelings are directly expressed or not. Impatience and forgetfulness make many people old before their time. Mdme. Modjeska recently said:-

I cannot afford to get angry. A woman at my time of life must economise her emotions and her nerves if she wants to hold the remnants of her youth and beauty.

Anger means physical ill, but, worse than that it means also spiritual death. The light was an unnatural one on Stephen's face, when the council saw it, "as it were the face of an angel," but his face would not have shown as the face of an angel if he had had one trace of anger and bitterness in his heart toward those who were about to martyr him for his testimony.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

-Lord Charles Russell took the oath of allegiance on his appointment as ford Chief Justice, July 11.

-Emperor William is expected to arrive in England at the beginning of the second week in August.

-The Perth School Board have decided that the teaching of dancing in the schools is to be continued.

-The plague still continues at Hong Kong, but is said to be abating. The number of deaths to date is 2,370.

-About 160 Russian Poles have been banished to Siberia for commemorating the Kilinsky insurrection of 1799.

-The Canadian Government will grant an annual subsidy of $750,000 for a new fast mail across the Atlantic.

-At West Bromwich a father is said to have sold his daughter, aged eleven, in a public-house, to a man for a pint of beer.

-A bust supposed to be that of Herod the Great, and the only one extant, has been placed in the Imperial Hermitage in St. Petersburg.

-According to a telegram from Yokohama, Japan declines to withdraw her troops from Korea, and a war with China is regarded as inevitable.

-The Parliamentary Committee on the London Buildings have passed a clause fixing the maximum height of any building at eighty feet.

-Owing to the failure of a brake, a train was wrecked on a Spanish railway line near Bilbao, twelve persons being killed and thirty-eight injured.

-An attempt has been made to smuggle Chinese girls into America in boxes. While removing a huge box, a sound was heard, and upon opening it, four girls were found, nearly dead from suffocation.

-A new company has been formed in Paris, with a capital of 50,000,000 francs, to continue the construction of the Panama. Canal to completion.

-At last the federal authority in Argentina, he decided that Mr. Jabot, Balfour, the much wanted manager of the Liberator Society, cannot he extradited.

-Contradictory reports are being circulated concerning the health of the Pope, and an impression prevails that a papal conclave and a new election will be is necessary of the near future.

-Cholera has reappeared in St. Petersburg and other places on the Continent, and seems to be rapidly making its way westward. At St. Petersburg it has already attained the stage of an epidemic.

-At a recent secret meeting of the Miners' Federation at Pilsen, it was decided to propose to the federations in all the other parts of the world a universal miners' strike, to take place in August or September next.

-Reliable coal deposits are said to have been found in Matabeleland. This is an important discovery for those interested in developing the resources of the country, as the fuel supply is almost the first necessity in such inland countries.

-A violent shock of earthquake was felt July 10 at Constantinople. At Stamboul about fifty persons were killed, and the people of both places were panic-stricken. In all about 150 lives are supposed to have been lost and an enormous amount of damage has been done to property.

-Mr. Siemens, the electrician, has submitted an offer to the Government of the Dominion of Canada for laying a cable under the Pacific Ocean, from Victoria, British Columbia, to Sydney, New South Wales. He undertakes to complete the construction within three years. His offer is now being considered.

-Count Leo Tolstoi has recently prepared a brochure on "Patriotism and Christianity," the publication of which has created considerable sensation in political as well as literary circles throughout Austria and other portions of Europe, on account of its portrayal of the antagonism between those two forces.

-News has been brought to Memel by steamer that the township of Plunjan, on the Russian frontier, about seven miles from Memel, has been completely destroyed by fire. Three hundred and seventy houses have been burnt to the ground, and over 2,000 people are without shelter. A few children perished in the flames.

-According to mail advices from Fiji, a number of hill tribes in Vauna Levu recently refused to obey summonses for neglecting to pay communal duties, and attacked the native police with clubs owing to their attempting to enforce pay merit. Cannibalism was revived, together with other heathen practices. Sir John Thurston, the Governor, proceeded against the tribes at the head of an armed party, and quelled the rising. Seven of the rebels were killed.

-The latest reports made to the Italian Minister of Justice at Rome show that there are 250 Anarchists in prison in that city. At Milan there are 300 in prison, at Turin 815, at Genoa 180, at Bologna 213, including, it is believed, several members of the gang who are thought to have plotted the attempted murder of Signor Crispi and the death of M. Carnot; and about 900 more are distributed among the prisons at Pisa, Leghorn, Lutta, Ravenna, Forti, and some smaller towns.

-The railway strike in America, which began with a dispute over wages in the car shops of the Pullman Company, near Chicago, rapidly grew in size until it assumed the dimensions of a civil war, and involved nearly all the railway lines west of Chicago, and several large lines east of that city. The World's Fair buildings were burned, thousands of railway cars were destroyed, and arson and pillage were almost unrestrained. The militia were called out to suppress the rioting and a large number of the mob were shot. In California the militia and strikers joined hands, and the State and government authorities seem openly defied: but on the arrival of regular troops they abandoned their hostile attitude. The total damage to property cannot, it is said, be less than $6,000,000. President Cleveland was obliged to issue a proclamation placing Chicago and other centres of disturbance under martial law. The strike seems to have collapsed, although it is stated that a general strike of the trades unions will be inaugurated on the 14th, in support of the demands of the Pullman employees.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

This is what Mr. Chauncey Depew telegraphs to the Times concerning the labour troubles in the United States: "There is universal unrest, and an almost frantic desire for anything in place of the present conditions." That does not afford a very hopeful prospect for the future.

In consequence of competition with Continental steamship lines, the American Line has announced a reduction in their steerage rates from London, Liverpool, or Queenstown to any of their American ports, to 86s. for adults, including outfit. This is the lowest rate ever offered.

The simple, practical faith of the Chinese boy in California, who began to keep the Sabbath after attending a mission school, and studying the Bible, is worth noting. When asked why he did so, he replied: "God talk to me in English Bible and Chinese Bible all the same; He say seventh day Sabbath day, and I believe Him." Surely a better reason could not be asked for nor given.

The desperate determination with which anarchists are adhering to their warfare against society and government, especially in France, is seen from information which has come to light, of plots to destroy the military arsenal at Toulon, and to blow up a number of public buildings in Paris, among them the Chamber of Deputies, the Senate, and the Elysee. As a consequence the inhabitants of the French capital are almost in a state of panic. And meanwhile such a state of affairs as prevails in America and in some of the countries of Europe, is doing much more to breed anarchists than civil governments can do to exterminate them.

The bubonic plague which prevails at Hong Kong is said by medical authorities to be identical with the terrible "black death," which has ravished Asia and Europe at different times in preceding centuries. The fact of an outbreak now in a district closely connected by trade with the civilised world, affords some cause for fear of another visitation, which would be the more dreaded because the nature and proper treatment of the disease seem not yet to be understood by the medical world.

The Catholic, an Irish anti-Roman paper, gives a recently-found confession of St. Patrick, it discovered in an ancient manuscript in Paris. In it St. Patrick says:-

If now Thy vengeance upon me shall be as great as my own sins multiplied upon me, how shall I bear up against Thy judgment? But I have Thee for my High Priest, to whom I confess all my sins, and to Thee alone, my God, do I confess my sins, for to Thee alone have I sinned, and before Thy face have I done evil.

The early Irish and British believers knew too much of the word of God to be a Romanists.

The records of those early days are fragmentary, but enough remains to show that in many things the traditions of the Roman apostasy had not corrupted the faith in the North of Ireland and Scotland as it had in the most of Europe. Thus Mr. Skene, in his "Celtic Scotland" (Edinburgh), says of the Scottish churches as late as the eleventh century:-

They seem to have followed a custom of which we find traces in the early Monastic Church of Ireland, by which they held Saturday to be the Sabbath.

To get the people to conform to Roman custom, and cease their worldly labour on Sunday, Queen Margaret quoted the decrees of Pope Gregory, and used her authority.

In an article in the North American Review, on "How to Protect a City from Crime," Superintendent Byrnes, of the New York Police Department, says:-

When once a man serves a term in prison, I have very little hope for him; for while there he lives in a criminal atmosphere; He comes in contact with other prisoners, who talk to him about their crimes, and who teach him new ways of committing a crime; so that he leaves the place more tainted than he was when he went into it.

He states that he does not intend any slur on prison life, but that this is the necessary result of prison life at best. There is certainly but a forlorn hope that crime will ever be diminished, when the best means at Government command for that end, only add to the amount.

"In Bondage" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

In Bondage.-Remonstrating against the Prime Minister's first appointment to a Bishopric, that of Bath and Wells, one of the most representative organs of the Church of England, the Church Times, says:-

The time is coming when the Church herself will claim a voice in the selection of her rulers and chief pastors.

It is a humiliating confession of wide departure from Gospel lines.

"Called and Sent" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

Called and Sent.-Paul was "called to be an apostle." An apostle is one who is sent. The Lord called Paul in order that He might send him with a message. But in order that he might carry the message, He revealed His Son in him (Gal. i. 16), because He was called to preach Christ. Still God is calling, "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" Isa. vi. 8. The call is not limited. "Whosoever will, may come;" but let everyone remember that it is a call to service. Then with his iniquity taken away, let him reply, "Here am I; send me."

"Authority" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

Authority.-When the Lord speaks, His word requires no endorsement of man; and where His word is silent no power of men can speak with authority. But the Catholic theory is thus stated by a clergyman in the last Church Times:-

It is an axiom in theology, that short of an Ecumenical decree, nothing is so authoritative as universal consent, according to the Vincentian rule.

But the safer way is to take God's word alone as authority. Instead of telling us to follow common consent, or the majority, He tells us to follow Him, and in warning says, "Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil."

"Settling Labour Troubles" The Present Truth 10, 29.

E. J. Waggoner

Settling Labour Troubles.-There are two ways of settling labour troubles,-man's way and God's way. Man's way is by force, as represented in a strike, where each party seeks to compel the other to submit. God's way is by persuasion, and never by force. God's way teaches men patiently to endure wrong, trusting in Him who is all-powerful to enable them to endure every ordeal, and who has said that He would never suffer the righteous to be moved. God's way converts men, and thus cleanses the fountain of people at its source. Man's way simply dams up the tide, and by that very thing increases the evil at its source. And therefore man's way can never permanently succeed, and the only hope for peace and order among men lies in the uplifting power of the Gospel. Wherever the Gospel is received, there will be quietness and peace; and wherever it is rejected, there we may look for confusion and every evil work.

July 26, 1894

"Is Bread Food?" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

Is Bread Food?-"Of course it is," every one replies. How do you know? "We have tried it, and proved it; we have eaten it, and it has given us life and strength." Very good; that is evidence enough.

Reasoning About It.-No sane man thinks of questioning the fact that bread is food, and that it gives strength. The reason is that we learn to eat before we learn to doubt. We prove the value of bread before we know enough to question it. But if we could arrive at the age of manhood before ever seeing bread, many people would starve to death before they would believe that it is of any use. Even while starving, some would doubtless "prove" to their own satisfaction that bread could not sustain life.

Personal Experience.-Suppose that there is a man in such a condition. He has heard that bread will give him strength, and he comes to me and asks me to prove it to him. I say to him, "Very well, here is a piece; eat it and see for yourself." He replies, "No, no; I will not try any experiments. I must first have satisfactory proof that it is good, and then I must understand how it works." But I cannot tell him the mystery of the transformation of the bread into bone and muscle. As to experimenting, however, I tell him that there is nothing doubtful about it, for I and thousands of others have proved it abundantly. I can give him evidence, but not demonstration; he must demonstrate by his own experience.

"Is The Bible Truth?"-This is the subject of a religious meeting, which I saw announced the other day. No minister or other Gospel worker ought ever to raise such a question, or to discuss it for a moment when others raise it. It is just as foolish to argue about it as it would be to argue the question whether bread will support life. The only proof is by eating. Give men the Word, and let them prove its value by eating it. If they do not believe it, give them some more, and leave it with them, until its power convinces him. He who will for a moment admit that the truthfulness of the Bible is a debatable question, does not know it as he ought to know it, and has no business to attempt to teach others.

"Taste and See."-"O taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the man that trusteth in Him." That is the true method of proof. Jeremiah took the proper course, and he found satisfaction. He said, "Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and Thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart." Jer. xv. 16. Go and do thou likewise.

Faith Is Substance.-People seem to think that faith is fancy. As soon as you speak about the power of God's word in them that believe, they think that you have unsettled everything. They have an idea that it is your faith that gives the efficiency to the word, and that anything else would do as well if one would only exercise his imagination. Let them try their imagination on a loaf of sand formed so as to resemble bread made from flour. All the imagination in the world will not give a man an ounce of strength from such a loaf. The more he eats, the worse off he is. But his imagination is not faith. Faith lays hold of substance. Faith grasps realities. Faith does not clothe a worthless thing with an imaginary value, but appropriates the value that actually exist in its object.

"His Name" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

"And they that know Thy name will put their trust in Thee." Ps. ix. 10. This being the case, it follows that there are very many in so-called Christian lands, and even in the church, who do not know

466

the name of the Lord. Let us see something of what is involved in knowing the name of the Lord.

In Scripture, names are not given at random. Every name has meaning. The true name indicates the character of the one to whom it belongs. For instance, the name "Jacob" means "supplanter," and that was the character of the son of Isaac. He was a schemer, benefitting himself at the expense of somebody else. That was before he was converted. When the Lord met him, and, like Saul, he was "turned into another man," he was given the name "Israel," to indicate the character of the new man. He was a conqueror over his besetments.

So the name of God is the expression of His character. One may be familiar with the form and sound of the words which are used in His titles, without knowing the name of the Lord. His name is just what He is, and only those who are personally acquainted with Him know what His name is.

Moses prayed to be permitted to behold the glory of the Lord, God said, "I will make all My goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee." Ex. xxxiii. 10. Accordingly the "Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaim, the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin." Ex. xxxiv. 5-7.

He who does not know the goodness and longsuffering and truth of the Lord, and that He forgives iniquity and transgression and sin, does not know His name. But no one need be ignorant of His name, for He has written it upon everything that He has made. "The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord." Ps. xxxiii. 5. "O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Thy name and all the earth." Ps. viii. 1. "Thy mercy, O Lord, it is in the heavens; and Thy faithfulness reacheth unto the clouds." Ps. xxxvi. 5. The Lord's name is a glorious name (Deut. xxviii. 58), and "the heavens declare the glory of God."

The name of God is in Christ. The only begotten Son of God has by inheritance the same name. Heb. i. 4. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." John i. 1. Whoever knows Christ, therefore, knows God. "The only-begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him." John i. 18. "He that hath seen Me, have seen the Father." John xiv. 9.

"And thou shalt call His name Jesus; for He shall save His people from their sins." Matt. i. 21. Jesus means Saviour. If He did not save, His name would be a misnomer. But His name is expressive of what He is. He saves by virtue of Himself. In Him is salvation. "Behold God is my salvation." Isa. xii. 2.

Trustworthiness and fidelity beget confidence. No one can help trusting one whose honesty is well known. Even the most suspicious come at length to lose their doubts after long dealing with a one whose fidelity is unswerving. The cause of doubt is dishonesty and lack of faithfulness. If no lie had ever entered the world, there would never have been such a thing known as doubt. Goodness wins confidence, and so they who know the Lord must necessarily trust Him.

But the Scripture meaning of trusting is to take refuge. Ps. vii. 10 would more accurately express the original, and would be more striking, if rendered as in the margin of the Revised Version, "O Lord, my God, in Thee do I take refuge; save me from them that pursue me, and deliver me." So when we read, "They that no Thy name will put their trust in Thee," we may know that it means that they will take refuge in God. And this is in keeping with the verse just before. "The Lord also will be a refuge for the oppressed, a refuge in times of trouble." The Revised Version has it, "a high tower."

God Himself is a Tower, a Rock of defence, a tower of Refuge. Ps. xviii. 2. But His name is just what He is; so we read, "The name of the Lord is a strong tower; the righteous runneth into it, and is safe." Prov. xviii. 10. His name is a strong tower, an impregnable fortress; it stands to reason, therefore, that they who know it will fly to it for refuge, and will abide in it.

Christ is God. John i. 1. The Father and the Son are one. John x. 30. Their name is one. He who is in Christ is in God, for Christ "is in the bosom of the Father." Baptism is the sign of taking refuge in Christ; "for as many of you as have been baptized into Christ, have put on Christ." Gal. iii. 27. Those who have put on Christ in baptism, have taken refuge in God. Baptism therefore is a reality, and not a mere form, only when the soul consciously takes refuge from sin in the mighty name of God.

This is in exact accord with the Saviour's commission, as properly rendered in the Revised Version: "Baptizing them into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." Matt. xxviii. 19.

Reader, at do you know the name of the Lord? It is easy to learn. When you know it, you know Him, and then you have eternal life: for "this is life eternal, that they might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent." John xvii. 3.

"Oh, the precious name of Jesus!
How it thrills our souls with joy.
When His loving arms receive us,
And His songs our tongues employ!"

"Christ at the Helm" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

If Christ is at the helm why should we be running about the deck in distress lest the vessel should sink? Duty belongs to us, results to God. Then let us work and wait and trust, cast our burdens on the Lord, leave them there and go right on with our work. The prophet says, "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose minds is stayed on Thee."

"Studies in Romans. The Law and Judgment. Rom. ii. 12-16" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

A few words may suffice at present to bring to mind what we have already studied. The first chapter of Romans may be briefly summed up as setting forth the condition of those who know not God, and the way in which they lost their knowledge, together with the fact that they are wholly without excuse. Then just as we are ready to hold up our hands in horror at their wickedness, and to launch forth severe condemnation upon them, the apostle turns to us, and shuts our mouths with the stinging words, "Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest; for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things." And so the second chapter proceeds to show that all will be subjects of God's righteous judgment, "for there is no respect of persons with God." Thus we are brought to a confirmation of the fact that God is impartial, by a comparison of the

TWO CLASSES IN THE JUDGMENT

ROM. 2:12-16

"For as many as have sinned without law shall also perish without law; and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law for not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified. For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves; which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the meanwhile accusing or else excusing one another); in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my Gospel."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What proves that there is no respect of persons with God?

"For as many as have sinned without law shall also perish without law; and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law."

What is to become those who have sinned without law?

They "shall also perish."

How shall those who perish who have sinned without law?

"Without law."

467

What of those who have sinned in the law?

They "shall be judged by the law."

When shall this be?

"In the day when God shall judge the secrets of men."

What will simply hearing the law not do for men?

"For not the hearers of the law are just before God.

Who alone shall be justified?

"The doers of the law shall be justified."

But what of the men who had never heard a law?

"Those, having not the law, are a law unto themselves."

What shows that even without the law they have some knowledge of what the law requires?

"Their conscience also bearing witness."

How do they regard the different actions done by themselves?

"Their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another."

By whom will the secrets of men be judged?

"God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ."

In accordance with what will the judgment be?

"According to my Gospel."

Without Law, and in the Law.-Although it is quite certain that when the Lord comes the second time there will be no people on the earth who have not heard the preaching of the Word, it is a fact that thousands and millions have died without ever having seen or heard of the Bible. They are the ones to whom the apostle refers as "without law." Yet it is plainly set forth that they are not absolutely without law, but only without the written law. The fact that they have some knowledge of the law is stated in the verses following, and is proved by the fact that they are counted sinners; but "sin is not imputed where there is no law." Rom. v. 13.

All Sin Punished.-Whether we have had the written law or not, all are alike counted sinners. "The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men." Rom. i. 18. The heathen are declared to be without excuse; and if they who have not the written law are without excuse, they who have the law in their hands are of course far more inexcusable. God is just. "We know that the judgment of God is according to truth against them which commit such things." Yet all who sin, whether in the law or without the law, are to be punished. This is sufficient to show that "without law" does not mean without any knowledge of God. The first chapter settles that. The trouble with too many who read this statement that all shall be punished, and who think that it does not seem just, is that they forget, or are ignorant of, what is contained in the first chapter. It is a great mistake to take any single verse of the Bible and separate it from its connection.

They Shall Perish.-That is declared to be the fate of the wicked. The apostle Peter tells us that the world is "reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men." 2 Peter iii. 7. What is meant by "perish?" It means just the opposite of living forever. On one occasion some people told Jesus of the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices, and Jesus replied, "Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish." Luke xiii. 1-3. Again we read, "The wicked shall perish, and the enemies of the Lord shall be as the fat of lambs; they shall consume; into smoke shall they consume away." Ps. xxxvii. 20. Therefore the statement that those who sin shall perish means that they shall die, that they shall be utterly extinct, that "they shall be as though they had not been." Obadiah 16.

Strict Impartiality.-That means strict justice. Sinners will be punished, whether they live in heathen lands or in so-called Christian lands. But no one will be judged by that of which he knew nothing. God does not punish men for violation of a law of which they knew nothing, nor does He hold them accountable for light that they have not had. It is very plain that those who have the law must know many things that are not known to those who do not have it in written form. All men have light enough to know that they are sinners; but the written word gives those who have it a knowledge of many particulars of which those are ignorant who do not have it. Therefore God in His justice does not hold the latter accountable for many things for which the former will be judged. "As many as have sinned without law shall also perish without law; and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law." The man who has rejected light, whether it be little or much, is obviously guilty.

The Root of Sin.-To some it seems unjust that those who have had but comparatively little light should suffer death for their sins, the same as those who have sinned against the greatest light. Their difficulty arises from the fact that they do not consider what sin really is. God alone is good. Luke xviii. 19. He is the source of goodness. Whatever goodness ever appears in man is only the working of God in him. But He is also the source of life. With him is the fountain of life. Ps. xxxvi. 9. God's life is righteousness; therefore there can be no righteousness apart from the life of God. Now it is evident that if a man rejects God, he effectually cuts himself off from life. It matters not that he has had but comparatively little knowledge of God, if he rejects that light he rejects God, and thus rejects life. And by rejecting the little that he has seen of God, he shows that he would reject God in any case. Sin is simply separation from or rejection of God; and that means death.

Justified.-Here is another term the meaning of which should be settled once for all. We have seen that righteousness means conformity to the law of God, and so we shall understand it throughout the book of Romans and the whole Bible. Rom. ii. 13 shows that "just," or "justified" means the same thing. Who are the justified ones?-They who do the law. We need not hear stop to consider the fact that is stated later, that there are no doers of the law; all we are concerned with now is the statement that to be justified means to be in a condition of harmony with the law of God. The matter of how men get into such a condition will be considered later. Let it not be forgotten that "just" means "righteous," and that both mean a state of harmony with the law of God, which is His life.

Hearing and Doing.-"Not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified." That is, it makes no difference how much a man knows; his knowledge will not justify him. People who have had great advantages are very prone to look with contempt upon those who have been less favoured, and to feel pride because of their own superior knowledge, forgetting that their superior knowledge only makes

468

their own shortcomings the more marked. The man who knows much and does wrong is obviously more blameworthy than the one who knows only little. "Take heed how ye hear." Luke viii. 18. "Be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any man be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass; for he beholdeth himself, and goeth his own way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth their end, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, that men shall be blessed in his deed." James i. 22-25.

"A Law unto Themselves."-"These, having not the law, are a law unto themselves." They have not the written law, and so they are their own law. "Which show the work of the law written in their hearts." So the law that they are unto themselves is nothing different from the written law. This statement is the same as that in the first chapter, namely, that "that which may be known of God is manifest in them." God has revealed Himself, and therefore His law, not only to every man, but in every man. Christ is God, and He is "the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world." John i. 9. In the judgment even the heathen will stand self-condemned.

Accusing and Excusing.-"Their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another." The French have a proverb to the effect that "He who excuses himself accuses himself." This is a true proverb. No man thinks of excusing himself if he does not think that he is at fault. If a thing is right it needs no excuse. And so in the statement that the heathen either excuse or else accuse one another for the things that they do, we find evidence that their conscience continually condemns them. Even in the things which they try to make themselves believe are right, they show that they know that they are wrong.

A Parenthesis.-The reader will note that verses 13, 14, 15, are thrown in by way of explanation, to show that although the heathen are said to sin without law, and to perish without law, they are not absolutely without law, but only without the written law. This needs to be noted in order not to become confused in following the apostle's statement about the judgment. The connection is found by reading verses 12 and 16 together, thus: "For as many as have sinned without law shall also perish without law; and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law; in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my Gospel."

Judged by Jesus Christ.-God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ. Christ is the representative of the Godhead in all things,-in creation, in redemption, and in judgment. "The Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son; that all should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father." John v. 22, 23. "He hath appointed a day in the which He will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom He hath ordained; whereof He hath given the assurance unto all men, in that He raised Him from the dead." Acts xvii. 31. The fact that the judgment will be conducted by Christ "who gave Himself for our sins," who died to redeem man, and who is our Advocate with the Father, the propitiation for our sins, "and not for ours only, but also for the whole world," is assurance to all men that the judgment will be conducted with the utmost fairness.

According to the Gospel.-The judgment is according to the Gospel. This is additional evidence that love is always combined with justice. In fact the justice of God is always love itself. For God is love, and He can never be anything else but love, for He cannot deny Himself. And He is always just. His mercy appears even in His judgments. "O give thanks unto the Lord; for He is good; for His mercy endureth for ever. . . . To Him which divided the Red Sea into parts; for His mercy endureth for ever; and made Israel to pass through the midst of it; for His mercy endureth forever; but overthrew Pharaoh and his host in the Red Sea; for His mercy endureth for ever." Ps. xcccvi. 1-15. Since the righteousness of God-the law-is revealed in the Gospel, and men are judged by the law, it is plain that the Gospel is not omitted in the judgment. The Gospel is in reality nothing else but the law of God in Christ.

"My Gospel."-Paul says, "God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my Gospel." What does he mean by "my Gospel"? Is it that he has a Gospel that is peculiarly his own, or from himself?-By no means. Let him explain himself. "But I certify you, brethren, that the Gospel which was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ." Gal. i. 11, 12. The Gospel which Paul preached was the word which he had received from the Lord Jesus Christ Himself; and therefore his statement in the text before us is the same as saying that this judgment will be according to the word of the Lord.

"The Uneasy Conscience" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

How fearful the darkest conscience sometimes is at the knowledge of its guilt is shown by the notes of a journey into unexplored regions of Central Asia, made by a late Russia traveller. The natives had a myth that "any Russian article, if stolen, would at once begin to cry out, 'I am here,' till it was rescued."

These people, Tunguts by name, greet one by putting out their tongues, and bid farewell by knocking their heads silently together. "As they never wash, and seldom remove their clothes, this etiquette has other disadvantages than the percussion." Yet these ignorant and unwashed Tunguts have enough of the law written in their hearts by nature so that their consciences accuse and terrify them when they wish to steal from the Russians.

"'No Hope'" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

"But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow, not even as others which have no hope." So wrote the Apostle Paul to the Church in Thessalonica, concerning those of their number who had fallen asleep in death. He then proceeded immediately to enlighten them with regard to the final outcome of the sleep which had fastened upon those whom they had laid away in the grave. "This," he wrote, "we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord, shall not prevent [go before] them which are asleep. For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the

469

trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord." 1 Thess. iv. 13, 15-17.

These words the apostle wrote to them that they might not be ignorant. If they were ignorant they would have to sorrow for their dead as others which had "no hope." It plainly follows therefore that the thought here expressed in the language of the apostle concerning the resurrection, and that thought alone, is the hope of the Christian, and that all other ideas and theories on the subject constitutes "no hope." And therefore there is no hope to be derived from the theory that the saints at death go at once to be with the Lord. Those who entertain this view are, according to Paul's testimony, comforting one another with words of error, and not with words of the Lord. But only the words of truth, which are the words of God, can give real hope and comfort to the sorrowing soul. For He is the God of all comfort.

"Standing in the Faith" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

In the first epistle to the Corinthians we have this exhortation: "Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong." 1 Cor. xvi. 13. Here is set forth the duty of every soldier of the cross. It does not imply a life of ease and quiet, but one of earnest active warfare. Unlike the soldiers of earthly kings, the Christian warrior has not to wait and long for some outbreak of hostilities that will terminate a period of tiresome inactivity and give opportunity for a display of valour and skill. The great controversy between good and evil is ever in progress, and the devil and his angels will force him either to yield or fight without delay. They will take care that he be not long left without ample opportunity to display his valour for truth.

It has not been left, however, for the soldier to adopt his own tactics, or choose his own weapons. Whenever the professed followers of Christ have done this, they have fought with the weapons of Satan, and done service in his cause. In the epistle to the Ephesians we find careful instructions given upon this point. The apostle writes, "Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might." Eph. vi. 10. This cuts off at once any thought of the soldier being strong in his own might, or by the might of men. He must not seek the backing of the State nor think to make himself strong by leaning upon the power of the civil arm. He must learn what the power is upon which Christianity rests, and how to "be strong" by its means. He must not think to wield the power himself, for the Lord's might is the might of the Lord's own acts, just as man's might is the might of his acts. It is by the working of God, therefore, that the Christian soldier must show himself strong. His might is the might of God working in him. And as God in him has still the strength of God, which is Omnipotence, the Christian becomes "strengthened with all might" (Col. i. 11), and able to conquer every enemy that would oppose him.

The apostle further says, "Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil." Eph. vi. 11. Nothing less than the whole armour of God will afford security against Satan's attacks. A single point left unguarded, will be speedily discovered by the wily foe, and become the target of his darts. But with all the armour on, the Christian becomes invulnerable, and with the weapons furnished from the Divine armoury, he is irresistible to all his foes.

"For," continues the apostle, "we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places." It is a great mistake to suppose that the Christian warfare is ever a warfare against flesh and blood. When the Christian stops to wrestle with flesh and blood, He ceases at once to fight the battles of the Lord, and cuts himself off from "the power of His might." He must not attack people, but principle; not sinners, but sin. Neither man, nor civil governments, nor churches, can properly be made objective points for his weapons. The conflict is with "spiritual wickedness," and must not be lowered to the place of human warfare. The controversy is not man's, but is between the "rulers of the darkness of this world" and Him who is the light of this world, and man's part is but to unite his will, his weakness and his ignorance with the will and power and wisdom of the great Captain of the hosts of the Lord.

"Stand therefore," continues the apostle, "having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness; and your feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace; above all taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. And take the helmet of salvation, and the word of God." V. 14-17. The first requisite mentioned is truth. One is no more prepared to fight in the cause of God without truth, than he is to take a journey with loins ungirded. He may have great zeal; but without truth his efforts will be worse than useless, for he will be led without knowing it to fight under the banner of the prince of evil. Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." And therefore he who has not the truth has not Christ, and does not know Him.

But truth is of no avail unless the individual having it is sanctified thereby, and hence the necessity for "the breastplate of righteousness." The wise man has said, "Keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life." Prov. iv. 23. The only sure safeguard for the heart is the breastplate of God's righteousness. "Behold," says the psalmist, "Thou desirest truth in the inward parts." This truth in the heart, by which it is cleansed and sanctified, and guarded from the entrance of evil.

For the feet there is provided "the preparation of the Gospel of peace." Those whose feet are shod with this are ready and eager to publish peace and good tidings of salvation to all men, both far and near. Thus it was with the Apostle Paul, who testified that he was debtor both to the Greeks and to the Barbarians (Rom. i. 14) to give them the Gospel, and likewise with his colabourers, by whom ere the first century A.D., had elapsed, the Gospel was carried to every part of the world. No one is fit to be a soldier of the cross until he is ready to say, "Here am I; send me" in response to the call of his Master, no matter to what place Lord may send him.

With "the shield of faith," the Christian is protected against "all the fiery darts of the wicked." Faith is trust in the word of the Lord,-confidence in God that He will fulfil His promises to deliver us from the power of all our enemies. No one who had this confidence in the Lord was ever disappointed in it. God cannot deny Himself, and His power is able to save to the uttermost all that come unto Him. The Lord is ready and waiting to save each one of us from all the fiery darts of our adversary.

The helmet is "the hope of salvation," upon which hope the Christian's

470

mind must ever be fixed. The Apostle Peter also exhorts the church, "Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind; be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ." 1 Pet. i. 13. This is the hope of salvation, for it is the grace of God that brings salvation (Titus ii. 11), which Christ brings with Him, when He appears "the second time." Heb. ix. 28.

Lastly, he must take with him "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." This is his weapon of offense and defence. But he must remember that it is the sword of the Spirit, and not his own sword; and that therefore it must be wielded by the Spirit. And therefore the Spirit must accompany him. There could be nothing more foolish than to take this sword along and leave the Spirit behind; for since without the Spirit no one can know the word of God, it is only the Spirit in man that understands how to use this sword; and man himself cannot do it. It is a very sharp sword (Heb. iv. 12), and he who undertakes to wield it by his own power is sure to cut himself much worse than he does his enemy.

Thus completely equipped with "the whole armour of God," the Christian is fully able to "stand fast in the faith," to acquit himself like a man, and "be strong." But let him remember that he holds no carnal weapon and has no controversy with flesh and blood. The battle is the Lord's, and only He knows the foes to be overcome and has the power and the wisdom to overcome them. Man's part is to stand in that place where the Lord can manifest through him His power in fighting the battles of His truth; for "the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole world, to show Himself strong in behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward Him." 2 Chron. xvi. 9. Man and God co-operate in the battle; but the Lord by His Spirit does the fighting, while man, His instrument, beholds with wonder and joy His salvation.

"The Passion Play" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

The Passion Play.-The great attraction which the Passion Play has proved to be in Ober-Ammergan has led another town to organise a similar exhibition, where, every Sunday during July, August and September the last days of Christ on earth will be represented by the aid of the "most approved modern theatrical appliances." Nothing could be further from the true story of those days than these theatrical exhibitions, which play on sentiment. The day is long since passed when simple people ignorantly did these things as a religious exercise. They are mere money-making enterprises.

"A Few Quotations" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

What every believer wants to know is what the Bible says. That settles all controversy; it is the only word that is able to build us up, and is the word by which, according to the knowledge which we have of it, we shall be judged in the last day. No word of man can be of any authority whatever. But here are a few quotations from well-known writers on the Sabbath question, as to the truth of which everyone able to read the Bible can decide for himself.

Dr. Wm. Smith's "Bible Dictionary," known to every experienced Sunday-school worker, after quoting a passage is usually referred to in behalf of Sunday observance, says:-

Taken separately, perhaps even altogether, these passages seem scarcely adequate to prove that the dedication of the first day of the week to purposes above mentioned, was a matter of apostolic institution or even of apostolic practice.

Sir Wm. Domville, who wrote, be it remembered, merely with a regard for accuracy as an ecclesiastical writer, said:-

Not any ecclesiastical writer of the first three centuries attributed the origin of Sunday observance either to Christ or to His apostles.

Neander, the Church historian, said:-

The festival of Sunday, like all other festivals was always only a human ordinance, and it was far from the intention of the apostles. . . and from the early apostolic Church, to transfer the laws of the Sabbath to Sunday. Perhaps at the end of the second century a false application of this kind had begun to take place; for men to appear by that time to have considered labouring on Sunday as a sin.-Rose's Neander, p. 186.

Dr. Peter Heylyn, who was Sub-Dean of Westminster, and an acknowledged student of ecclesiastical history, said:-

Take which you will, either the Fathers or the moderns, and we shall find no Lord's day instituted by any apostolic mandate; no Sabbath set on foot by them upon the first day of the week.-Hist. Sab., part. 2, chap. 1.

Dr. Kitto, in his "Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature," says of Sunday observance in the time of Chrysostom:-

Though in later times we find considerable reference to a sort of consecration of the day, it does not seem at any period of the ancient church to have assumed the form of such an observance as some modern religious communities have contended for. Nor do these writers in any instance pretend to allege any Divine command, or even apostolic practice in support of it. . . . Chrysostom (A.D. 360) concludes one of his homilies by dismissing his audience to their respective ordinary occupations.

The Bible is not only silent as to any change of day, but in the words of Christ and the Holy Spirit repeatedly enforces the obligation of the Lord's Sabbath, His day. The tracing of the growth of Sunday observance in ecclesiastical history is but the tracing of the growth of that apostasy which culminated in the Roman Papacy.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

-According to advices from Honolulu, a Republic has been proclaimed in Hawaii.

-The Courrier de Bruxelles reports five fatal cases of cholera at Jemeppe, near Li?ge.

-Mr. Gladstone's prospects for the recovery of his eyesight are said to be somewhat unfavourable.

-The damage to property in the Turkish capital from the recent earthquake exceeds five millions sterling.

-Four and a half millions of "edible" dogs are slaughtered annually in China for consumption by the people.

-In a strike riot between negroes and whites near Birmingham, Alabama, six men were killed and twenty wounded.

-A society of young women has been formed in America, who declare that they will have nothing to do with young men who smoke.

-The completed statistics of the Free Church of Scotland give a total membership of 344,082-an increase of 6,884 for two years.

-Sutherlandshire is threatened with a plague of adders, some caught being two feet in length. Their stings have proved fatal to cattle.

-President Cleveland has assented to the Bill admitting Utah as a State of the Union. This increases the number of States to forty-six.

-It is telegraphed from Rio de Janeiro that the insurgent Admiral da Gama has informed President Peixoto that he is willing to surrender.

-During the past twenty years the Jewish population of London has more than doubled. It is now estimated as between 100,000 and 120,000.

-Several villages in Bavaria have been destroyed by a cyclone. The harvest was destroyed, and the forests were swept away as if mown down by a scythe.

-An Italian force under General Baratieri attacked and captured Kassala, the chief stronghold of the dervishes in the Soudan. The loss on the Italian side was slight.

-Mr. Debs, the president of the American railway union and leader in the late strike, has been imprisoned on a charge of contempt of court. Meanwhile the strike has collasped and the railway union seems to be greatly disorganised; but the root of the matter has not been touched, and another outbreak is sure to follow.

-The Chronicle says that "a ride through England just now shows that 1894 bids fair to be one of the fat years for agriculture. Every sort of crop is looking at its best."

-In a Roman Catholic Church in London on a recent Sunday, a shirt of Sir Thomas More, who was killed in the time of Henry VIII., was exposed for veneration by one audience.

-Paolo Lega, who attempted to assassinate Signor Crispi, the Italian Premier, has been sentenced to solitary confinement for twenty years and seventeen days.

-A wealthy young Frenchman has constructed a bull-ring at his residence near Paris, wherein he purposes assembling his friends to witness his prowess as an amateur toreador.

-Madam Boulanger, the mother of the well-known French general, has just died in Paris. She had reached the advanced age of ninety-three, and remained to the last unaware of the downfall and death of her son.

-A serious accident occurred in the Solent, off the Brambles, resulting in the deaths of seven men engaged in blowing up a wreck. An unexploded charge went off unexpectedly, blowing the boat and men to atoms.

-The coal dispute has finally been settled. At a meeting of the Coal Conciliation Board, held at St. Martin's Town-hall, the proposed terms of settlement of the wages question were agreed to, and the proceedings terminated with a mutual exchange of compliments.

-A Bill has been introduced into the United States Senate asking for an appropriation of ?200,000 to pay for exterminating a weed known as the Russian thistle, which has overrun fifty counties in agricultural regions of the west.

-A terrible shipping disaster is reported from St. Petersburg. A steamer plying from Perm to Kasan, collided on the River Kama with another river steamer. The latter vessel sank almost immediately, twenty-eight of her passengers being drowned.

-A new railway bridge is to be built across the Hudson, connecting New York with Jersey City. There will be a single immense span over the entire river, and at its centre there will be a headway of 150 feet. The bridge, which is to have six lines of rails, and will accommodate 800 trains daily, is to cost eight millions sterling.

-Steamers arriving at Vancouver, B.C., with the mails from China and Japan, report that cholera is spreading with amazing rapidity throughout the Chinese Empire. It is stated that there have been 40,000 deaths in Canton alone. The Government is, however, reticent, and there are no means of arriving at the full extent of the scourge.

-The Porte has refused the Bulgarian Government authorisation to fly the Bulgarian flag on its warships, the only admissable flag being that of Turkey. The Bulgarian Government observe that Roumania, equally a vassal country to Turkey, flies its own flag, but the Porte has replied that this country has been authorised to do so by a special firman from the Sultan.

-A despatch from Vienna states that successful trials have been recently made by Di. Biliniski, president of the Austrian State Railways, in hosting the railway engines with petroleum. The firing material is the liquid residuum remaining from refined petroleum. So satisfactory was the result that there is little doubt that coal as firing material will soon be given up by the State railways.

-A French "Labour Congress" was recently held at Dijon, at which the subject of standing armies was considered. One speaker advocated the inauguration of a general strike of workingmen in two countries upon a declaration of war between them. This, he said, was the only practicable course open to the Labour party in their struggle against the military systems maintained by the rulers of Europe.

-July 17, at Birmingham, Mr. Walford Green was chosen by a large majority to succeed Mr. Pope as President of the Wesleyan Conference. The change of office was conducted without ceremony. "Here are the keys and the seal," said Mr. Pope, "and here is John Wesley's Bible," whereupon the new President, equipped for his work, began the business of the Conference year with the customary review of the position and prospects of Methodism.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

In the city of New York there is one post-office to every 50,000 inhabitants. In London there is one to every 5,248.

From what both High and Low Church papers say, it appears that the new Bishop of Bath and Wells is an advanced Ritualist.

In an interview with a correspondent of the World, General Schofield, of the United States Army, said that upon considering the recent strikes in that country, he thought an increase in the army by several thousand men was needed at once.

The Gospel of Christ is a Gospel of cleanliness and health. Far otherwise, in practical operation, is the religious system which sends men to Mecca on pilgrimages. Official figures show that last year 59 per cent. of the pilgrims succumbed to cholera.

A leading Methodist paper states that the Nonconformist objection to the Establishment is on the ground that one body should not monopolise the patronage of the nations. Without doubt this expressed the mind of very many who talk of disestablishment.

Men are by nature weak. Through prayer to God they gain strength. Yet, strange as it may seem, those who pray the least, and who are consequently the weakest, feel the strongest, while the more a man prays, the more conscious he becomes of his own weakness.

The Edinburgh correspondent of the Christian Commonwealth tells of a Scotch minister who objects to church bazaars, which he characterises as "gambling for things you don't want, to support a cause you don't care for." But the congregation decided that there must be a bazaar in order to lift the church debt, and the minister overcame his scruples sufficiently to announce it; and this was his method of announcement: "You are all aware that there is a considerable amount of debt hanging over this congregation. Now we have tried several means to raise the money, but without success; and the opinion of the managers is, that as we have exhausted every honest means of raising the money, there is nothing left but to have a bazaar."

It seems that it was a grave offence against Church discipline to have the Royal christening last week in a private residence. High Church papers protest, and a country vicar writes:-

How on earth are we to expect our country folk to bring their children to church for baptism if the Bishops, without rhyme or reason, consent to christen Royalty in drawing-rooms! It is simply dreadful.

A very good thing is reported of Bishop Ryle, of Liverpool. Some of the people of his diocese wished to present him with a pastoral staff, but he told them that he wanted no "Silver poker" carried before him, and that if one were sent he should lock it up in a cupboard, and never see it again. He said that a bishop needed a Bible, and not a pastoral staff. Whatever faults the bishop may have, he is to be credited with having passed the state of babyhood when one is pleased with a bright toy. Comparatively few men pass that stage.

A newspaper reports the finding of an inscription in Egypt recording a seven years' famine, and says that this "gives to Biblical scholars the fact that a seven years' famine such as we find recorded in the Bible is by no means impossible." But Biblical believers find it difficult to see why an inscription on stone by men should be considered of so much greater authority than the Bible record, which came not by the will of man. But it is the temper of some critics to disbelieve what the Lord says unless some evidence of man's production can be found to endorse the statement.

At the Canterbury Diocesan Conference Sir Dyce Duckworth well said that "no compulsion and no restraints would bring people to the right conception of the essentials of Sunday observance." The use of force in trying to make men conform to religious exercises never has accomplished the end aimed at, except when the end aim was to legalise the persecutor of conscientious people who could not sacrifice principle for the sake of simulated conformity.

"Sabbath and Sunday Observance" The Present Truth 10, 30.

E. J. Waggoner

At a recent meeting of the Canterbury Diocesan Conference of the Church of England, the question of Sunday observance came up for discussion, and one speaker moved the following resolution, which was carried:-

That beyond the essential duty of attendance at public worship, no uniform rule can be laid down for the mode of observance of Sunday, which must necessarily vary with different classes of persons, and be dependent upon urban and rural populations.

Nothing more clearly stamps the Sunday sabbath as a man-made institution than the fact that it is left wholly for men to settle the matter of its observance, and the means of its enforcement. Hence the frequent discordant discussions over the subject among Church people, and the abortive attempts made in various lands to secure its observance by all classes. Man is no more qualified to make and enforce a Sabbath than he is to create a world, and the effort to do so only reveals his inherent weakness and sinful folly.

But how different with regard to the Lord's Sabbath! Concerning that there is no question, for God Himself, who created the heavens and the earth, made it, and has clearly designated the manner of its observance. See Ex. xx. 8-11. Being a part of His own law, He also tends to its enforcement, for which, unlike man, He is fully competent. He does not compel any man to observe it against his will, but gives to all His Holy Spirit, so that they can keep it if they will, and leaves all free to follow their own choices, for which they must find the answer at the bar of His Judgment. Man, on the other hand, has no reason nor authority for instituting a Sabbath, nor any power to enable anyone to keep it after it has been made. By attempting to make a sabbath and lay down rules for its observance, man puts himself in the place of God. The Sabbath of the Lord-the seventh day-is still extant and in force; and if men would but recognise this fact, as it is plainly told them in the fourth commandment of God's immutable law, they would find in it just what they need, but what they will never attain by discussions over the question of what to do with an institution of their own.

August 2, 1894

"Loved unto the Death" The Present Truth 10, 31.

E. J. Waggoner

A God of freedom and liberty could not associate on equal terms with a slave. There must be some bond of sympathy, a common purpose, and a common life. Therefore those who associate with God, who will dwell with Him, must be free.

We should get no pleasure or satisfaction out of associating with a person who is compelled against his will to be in our company. Even though we desired the companionship, it would be intolerable if it were of force and compulsion. Just so it would not be pleasurable to God for man to be in His presence against his will.

Therefore those whom He desires to associate with Him must be just as free to take themselves away from His presence as they are to be there. When men who are perfectly free to reject the Lord choose His society and life, there is pleasure to God in that, and He is glorified in it. We are free to go, but we love His presence so much that we prefer to be with Him.

The Lord longs for the society of men, and He loves us to the death. He has such a longing for man's presence that He could not let him go. Man sold himself to the devil; but that grieved the heart of God. He so loved the world that He gave Himself. He could not endure the separation. He died for the love He had for us. Yes, He died of a broken heart, because of unrequited love. The death upon the cross was literally of a broken heart, and not because of the physical pains. That is the love that God has for men, and that love is still the power of the cross to draw men to Him.

It is love that draws; not force. A man does not win a wife by the exhibition of force; but it is the love that he exhibits that gains the affections. The love of God is exhibited on the cross, that culmination of love that was so great that it broke even the heart of God. "I, if I be lifted up," said Christ, "will draw all men unto Me." It cannot be that any soul who will look at Christ lifted up on the cross can fail to be drawn. There He shows how much He wants men to be with Him.

Much as He loves us, there could be no real communion if we were coerced. It is not simply personal contact with a loved one that a person wants. A man or woman might have their hearts broken by estrangement, even though the object of their love were with them personally. It is the fellowship of mind and heart that is wanted. So, even though we were taken to heaven, if that were possible, with the heart estranged from God, there would be the same separation that existed before. What God wants is not merely our contact, but our love. He uses language common to men; it is the same love, only of a degree infinitely higher than we can comprehend.

It is for us to be one with Him; to be friends with Him. He has not deviated from His original purpose. He changes not. He made man thus free in order that, choosing Him, there might be the most perfect union; no constraint, no barrier between them. So God leaves men free even in his wickedness. It is His love that leads men free to fight against Himself.

Oh, the longsuffering of God! He represents Himself as an husband with the wife whom he has loved estranged from him, and unfaithful to him. "Yet return again to Me, saith the Lord." Jer. iii. If there were that love in the human marriage relationship, that would bear with reproach, and which would not fail even though fought against, it would be a hard heart that would not yield to it in the course of time. So it is God's love for man that allows him to smite Him in the very face. Whatever was done to Jesus in the Judgment Hall, we do when we slight Him. Still He abideth faithful; He cannot deny Himself. It is this love and the heart that breaks down the enmity, and wins our souls to Him that hath loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood.

"The Measure of Greatness" The Present Truth 10, 31.

E. J. Waggoner

God in Christ came down to earth, making Himself on a level with men. He took on Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of sinful flesh. Humble and lowly in heart, He associated with men as with equals.

Yet He was far above them all. None of the disciples, with whom He associated so freely, ever presumed to take undue liberties with Him. They all recognised Him as Master and Lord.

Nor did they any less recognise Him as such when He was washing their feet at the last supper. In that humility was true greatness. Who is greatest in the kingdom of heaven? "He that will be greatest, let him be your servant."

Greatness in the kingdom of God, therefore, will be in accordance with the measure of service. Who then

482

will be the greatest, and always recognised as the greatest? The Lord Himself; because He has done the most service. He humbled Himself "more than any man."

He came to earth and associated with men as an equal, in order that men might associate with Him in heaven as equals; yet He will always be the greatest; always recognised as greatest, but with every barrier broken down. He has broken down in Himself the barriers, so that there is freedom such as never entered into the heart of man; and such as the world never has known nor ever can know save as they find it in Jesus Christ.

God is so great and has such power that He has broken down every barrier, and His subjects can freely come before Him and talk with Him, and can associate with Him in perfect freedom. Even now the Lord gives us the same access. "By whom also we have access by one Spirit to the Father." So that now, not simply in the world to come when we shall see Him with our eyes, but just now, we have access to the secret of His presence, and may abide in the holiest, even in the secret place of God. "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High, shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty." Ps. xci. 1.

Is not such liberty as this worth letting all the bonds go? He has loosed the bonds, and has opened the door of the prison, and no man can shut it. He has humbled Himself, and by His humiliation secured the keys of death and sin. Therefore there is not a power in earth or hell that can bind a single soul that is willing to be free. Whoever is in bondage is simply a willing prisoner. Whoever is in prison is there because he would rather be a slave than be free.

"Summary Settlement" The Present Truth 10, 31.

E. J. Waggoner

Speaking of the present controversy over the question of religious instruction in Board Schools, the Church Times says that "the sole point of difference between the majority and minority on the present Board is whether the doctrine of the Holy Trinity and the incarnation are part of the common creed of Christians or not." If they are, it would be allowable under the compromise to teach them; otherwise it would not.

This alone is sufficient to reveal the folly of the whole arrangement. A doctrine is to be taught the public children if it has a place in the popular creed, no matter what is said about it in the Bible; and if not found in a creed it must not be taught, be it never so plainly set forth in scripture. Conscience and truth must be sacrificed for the sake of the compromise; and this is what always follows a compromise in matters of religious faith and practice. As truth cannot compromise with error, or good with evil, and as there must be either a compromise or a controversy where conflicting interests are represented, the only consistent and peaceful solution of the problem is to leave religious teaching out of the schools entirely, and in the hands of parents and the church, where it belongs.

"Studies in Romans. Form and Fact. Rom. ii. 17-24" The Present Truth 10, 31.

E. J. Waggoner

In the first chapter, it will be remembered, we have a representation of the case of the heathen. In the second, as far as already studied, we have the case made general. In the verses immediately before us, we have in unmistakable language the direct, personal charge.

"THOU ART THE MAN." ROM. 2. 17-24

"Behold, thou art called a Jew, and restest in the law, and makest thy boast of God, and knowest His will, and approvest the things that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law; and art confident that thou thyself art a guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, which hast the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law. Thou therefore which teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal? Thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? Thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege? Thou that makest they boast of the law, through breaking the law dishonorest thou God? For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you, as it is written."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

To whom does the apostle now address himself?

"Behold thou art called a Jew."

In what does the one called a Jew rest?

"And restest in the law."

Of what does he boast?

"Makes thy boast of God."

What does he know?

"And knowest His will."

How is it that he knows God's will?

"Being instructed out of the law."

Knowing the will of God through being instructed out of the law, what is he able to do?

"Triest the things that differ." Marginal reading.

Of what does his knowledge of the law give him confidence?

"An confident that thou thyself art a guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes."

What, and what only, does he have in the law?

"Hast the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law."

What questions imply that he has not the fact, or the truth of the law?

"Dost thou steal?" "Dost thou commit adultery?" "Dost thou commit sacrilege?" "Through breaking the law dishonourest thou God?"

What shows that these leading questions are really positive charges of breaking the law?

"For the name of God is blasphemes among the Gentiles through you, as it is written."

A Professed Jew.-Are professed Christians to throw away this portion of the book of Romans as not applicable to them, since it is addressed to a professed Jew? By no means. Professed Christians are the very ones who are meant by the apostle. Read the description: Thou "restest in the law, and makest thy boast of God, and knowest His will, and approvest the things that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law; and art confident that thou thyself art a guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, which hast the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law." Whom does he address?-Every one who professes to know the Lord, no matter by what name he is called; every one who thinks himself fully qualified to instruct others in the way of the Lord.

"Called a Jew."-It should not be overlooked as a trifling matter that the apostle does not say, "Behold, thou art a Jew," but, "Behold, thou art called a Jew." People are not always what they are called, nor what they call themselves. Beginning with the seventeenth verse the apostle settles the question of who are Jews. Before we have finished the chapter it will seem that by using the word "called" he meant to intimate that the one addressed and described in the following verses is not really a Jew, and is not considered so by the Lord.

483

Claiming to Be Jews.-In Rev. ii. 9 we read, "I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan." And again, "Behold, I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie; behold, I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee." Rev. iii. 9. From this we see that to be a Jew indeed is so high an honour that many will falsely claim it. Yet the people called Jews have been held in contempt by the greater part of the world, for many hundred years.

At no time and in no part of the world, since the New Testament was written, has it ever been an object for anybody to claim that he was a Jew, in the common acceptation of the term. The Jews as a class have never been in such honor that it would benefit one's prospects to be called one. But it has been and is very often an advantage for a man to be known as a Christian, and very many have falsely made the claim, in order to better their business prospects.

Jew and Christian.-It is not straining the text at all to say that when "Jew" is used in these verses, it means what is now known as "Christian." This will be apparent if we consider what a real Jew is. We may quote enough to show that from the beginning a true Jew was one who believed in Christ. Of the head of the race the Lord Jesus said, "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day; and he saw it, and was glad." John viii. 56. He believed in the Lord, and it was counted to him for righteousness; but righteousness comes only through the Lord Jesus. Moses, the leader of the Jews, esteemed "the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt." Heb. xi. 26. The rebellious Jews in the wilderness tempted and rejected Christ. 1 Cor. x. 9. When Christ came in the flesh, it was "His own" that received Him not. John i. 11. And to crown all, Christ said that no one could believe the writings of Moses unless he believed on him. John v. 46, 47. Therefore it is evident that no one is or ever has been a real Jew unless he believes in Christ. He who is not a Jew indeed is of "the synagogue of Satan."

"Salvation Is of the Jews."-Jesus said to the woman of Samaria at the well of Jacob, "Ye worship ye know not what; we know what we worship; for salvation is of the Jews." John iv. 22. Christ himself was "made of the seed of David according to the flesh," and was therefore a Jew; and there is no other name than his "under heaven . . . whereby we must be saved." No other people on earth, besides the Jews, have ever had so high a name. No other people have been so highly favoured of God. "For what nation is there so great, who hath God so nigh unto them, as the Lord our God is in all things that we call upon Him for? And what nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day?" Deut. iv. 7, 8.

Resting in the Law.-As stated in the verse last quoted, the Jews had committed to them the most perfect law in the universe, God's own. It was called "the testimony," because it was for a witness against them. They were not taught that they could get righteousness out of it, although it was perfect, but the contrary. Because it was so perfect, and they were sinners, it could have nothing but condemnation for them. It was designed only to drive them to Christ, in whom alone they could find the perfect righteousness that the law requires. "The law worketh wrath" (Rom. iv. 15), and Christ alone saves from wrath. But they "rested in the law," and therefore rested in sin. They "trusted in themselves that they were righteous." Luke xviii. 9. They found no righteousness, "because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law." Rom. ix. 31, 32.

Boasting of God.-This is something different from making one's boast in the Lord. Ps. xxxiv. 2. Instead of rejoicing in the Lord's salvation, the Jews boasted over their superior knowledge of God. They did indeed have more than others, but they had nothing that they had not received, yet they boasted as though they had not received it. They glorified themselves, rather than God, for the knowledge that they had; and therefore they put themselves in the condition of the heathen who "when they knew God, glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful, but became vain in their imaginations." Whatever reader is inclined to censure the ancient Jews for their vain boasting, let him remember how he himself has often felt on comparing himself with the inhabitants of heathen countries, and with the "lowest class" in his own land.

God's Will His Law.-The apostle says that the Jew knows the will of God, because he is instructed out of the law. This is sufficient to show that the law of God is His will. Indeed, no argument should be needed on this point. The will of any government is expressed in its law. Where there is an absolute ruler, His will is always law. God is an absolute ruler, although not an arbitrary one, and as His will is the sole rule of right, it follows that His will is law. But His law is summed up in the ten commandments; therefore the ten commandments contain a summary statement of the will of God.

The Form of Knowledge and Truth.-Although the ten commandments contain a statement of the will of God, which is the perfection of wisdom and truth, they are only a statement, and not the thing itself, just the same as a picture of a house is not a house, although it may be a perfect picture. Mere words written in a book or graven in stone have no life; but we know that the law of God is life everlasting. Only in Christ can the living law be found, since He is the only manifestation of the Godhead. Whoever has the life of Christ dwelling in him, has the perfect law of God manifest in his life. But he who has only the letter of the law, and not Christ, has only the form of knowledge and of truth. Thus, the law is often rightly said to be a photograph of the character of God. But a photograph or other picture is only the shadow of the reality; it is not the very substance. He who has Christ has both the form and the substance, since one can not have a thing without also possessing its form. But he who has only the statement of the truth, without Christ who alone is the truth has the form of godliness without the power thereof.

Hard Questions.-In verses 21-23 the apostle asks some hard questions: "Thou therefore which teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal? Thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege? Thou that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law dishonourest thou God?" Let each soul that has been wont to pride himself upon the correctness of his life answer these questions for himself. It is easy and natural for a man to pride himself

484

upon his "morality." Men who are not Christians comfort themselves with the thought that they live "moral" lives, and that therefore they are as well off as though they were Christians. Let all such know that there is no morality except conformity to the law of God. Everything that is in any respect below the standard of that law is immorality. Knowing this, let them see if they have perfectly kept that law.

"Dost Thou Steal?"-Most people will say, "No; I am honest in all my dealing." Very well, but let us not decide the case offhand. Let us examine the Scripture. It says, "The law is spiritual." Rom. vii. 14. "The word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." Heb. iv. 12. No matter how correct we are in our outward acts, if in spirit or thought we have transgressed, we are guilty. The Lord looks at the heart, instead of the outward appearance. 1 Sam. xvi. 7. Again, it is just as wrong to steal from God as to steal from man; have you given God his due? Have you dealt in a perfectly honest way with him? Hear what He says: "Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed Me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed Thee? In tithes and offerings. Ye are cursed with a curse; for ye have robbed Me, even this whole nation." Mal. iii. 8, 9. Does this mean you? Have you rendered to God that which is his due in tithes and offerings? If not, what will you answer when the word of inspiration asks, "Thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal?"

"The Law Is Spiritual."-In the fifth chapter of Matthew the Saviour has set forth the spirituality of the law. He says that unless our righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, we can not enter the kingdom of heaven. What was their righteousness? He said to them, "Ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity." Matt. xxiii. 28. Therefore, unless we are righteous inwardly, we are nothing. God desires "truth in the inward parts." Ps. li. 6. Following on in the fifth chapter of Matthew, the Saviour shows that one may break the sixth commandment, which says, "Thou shalt not kill," by the utterance of a single word. He also shows that we may break the seventh commandment which says, "Thou shalt not commit adultery," by a look and a thought. The same principle of course obtains with all the commandments. This being the case, it becomes one to be very careful about saying that he has perfectly kept the law.

Some have said that the ten commandments are a very low standard, and that a man might keep them all and still not be worthy of admission into respectable society. Such know nothing about the law. As a matter of fact, a man may break all the commandments, and still figure as a shining light in the "best society."

Name of God Blasphemed.-"The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you, as it is written." Who has done this? The one who teaches the law, and who says that one who teaches the law and who says that one should not take the name of the Lord in vain. When David sinned in the case of Uriah's wife, God said to him, "By this deed thou hast given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme." 2 Sam. xii. 14. That is, he was a professed follower of the Lord, and by his violation of the law of the Lord he had given unbelievers a chance to say, "There, that is a specimen of Christianity." Who is there that can say that as a professed follower of the Lord he has always correctly represented the truth? Who is there that must not admit to himself and God that either by his words or actions he has very often misrepresented the truth which he professed? Who is there that has not by his failures, either in teaching or acting, given people a miserably inadequate idea of what true godliness is? In short, who is there that must not say yes to the apostle's question, "Through breaking the law, dishonourest thou God?" And since thus the name of God is blasphemed through professed Christians, who is there that can declare himself guiltless before God's law?

"Explaining Spiritualism" The Present Truth 10, 31.

E. J. Waggoner

It seems that science, so-called, has come forward in the person of Mr. F. W. H. Myers with another "explanation" of the phenomena of spiritualism. We are informed that this individual "gave a most interesting and eloquent address before the Psychical Research Society at the Westminster Town Hall on Friday evening [July 13], in which he attempted to indicate a possible explanation of certain spiritualistic phenomena, particularly those vouched for by or connected with the late Mr. Stanton Moses, the well-known spiritualist." Here is the "possible explanation," as summarised in Public Opinion:-

Mr. Myers then proceeded to suggest that as we acted on our hair or on any particular object by molecular action, and as we did the same on persons at a distance by means of telepathy, so it is at least conceivable that spirits have the power of acting on the molecules by some selective action at present unknown. He pointed out that this supposition of some unseen power being able to influence these molecules with something similar to the "soothing demons" postulated or imagined by the late Professor Clerk Maxwell in his statements of the molecular theory. The molecules might be varied either in speed or direction, and he thought that in this way there might be some explanation of the remarkable experiments with burning coals carried on by Mr. Hume. . . . Mr. Myers went on to say that he thought the great secret of life might possibly be found in the junction of biological and physical science, which must join somewhere, and he thought that the direction he indicated gave some slight augury of important discoveries in the years yet to be.

Here is the wisdom of man. Here is an illustration of the aid which "science" renders toward an understanding of spiritual truths. This is what we should have to take were it not for the word of God. But most fortunately we are not without that word. And so while volumes of unintelligible nonsense have been written to enlighten man concerning the occult matters of the spiritual world, a single phrase from the book of God makes the whole subject of Spiritualism clear to us, so far as it is important for anyone to understand it. "The spirits of devils working miracles"-these few plain words of Inspiration (Rev. xvi. 14) present the whole domain of spiritualistic phenomena before us in a moment, as a flash of lightning reveals the landscape hidden by the obscurity of night. But such is the blindness of unbelief that instead of taking the simple, plain statements which the Omniscient has given them on this subject, men prefer to take such "explanations"

485

as the foregoing, and base their beliefs on "molecules" (which no man has ever seen), "telepathy" (which is simply a name given to something that no one understands), and other things equally beyond the ken of human faculties. Such is the credulity of unbelief.

"The Soul, Resurrection, and Punishment" The Present Truth 10, 31.

E. J. Waggoner

The following statement and question has been sent in with a request for an answer:-

Man at his creation received a soul, or spirit, from God; in departing from God, man forfeited the life of God breathed into him. At the resurrection will that life, or spirit, or soul, be lent to him again, so that he can be punished, seeing that it was by the spirit or soul that he offended?

There seems to be a slight confusion in the mind of the questioner, as to the terms "soul" and "spirit," and in regard to the account of the creation of man. It may be sufficient to say of those terms that no definition can be given of them that will apply in every case. They are variously used in the Bible, and it is useless to attempt to define them. It is no more necessary that we should know just what portion of man is always referred to by the terms "soul" and "spirit," than that we should know the exact composition of our bodies in order to enjoy good health.

LIVING SOULS

In the record of creation, however, and in many other places, the whole man is called a soul. This is perhaps the most common use of the word. As such it is by no means synonymous with "spirit." In Gen. ii. 7 we read that "the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." Note well that it does not say that a soul was breathed in him, but that the man that God formed, himself became a living soul as soon as he received the breath of life from God.

The term "living soul" is not, however, distinctive. It is applied to the lower animals as well as to man. The same Hebrew words that in Gen. ii. 7 are translated "living soul," are in Gen. i. 24 translated "living creature." If in Gen. ii. 7 we had, "man became a living creature," it would be perfectly correct; so also would it be as proper to translate Gen. i. 24 thus, "And God said, let the earth bring forth the living soul after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth, after his kind." Indeed, even in the English translation the fact appears that the lower animals are called living souls, as in Rev. xvi. 3: "And the second angel poured out his vile upon the sea; and it became as the blood of a dead man; and every living soul died in the sea."

BREATH OF LIFE

Not only are the lower animals called living souls, but they are said to have the same breath of life that men have. In Gen. vii. 21, 22 we read of the flood: "And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man: all in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died."

So likewise we read in Eccl. iii. 19, 20: "For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them; as the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; so that a man hath no pre-eminence above the beast; for all is vanity. All go on to one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again."

Of man we read, "If He set His heart upon men, if He gather unto Himself His spirit and His breath; all flesh shall perish together, and man shall turn again unto dust." Job xxxiv. 14, 15. But of beasts we read likewise: "Thou hidest Thy face, they are troubled; Thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust. Thou sendest forth Thy Spirit, they are created; and Thou renewest the face of the earth." Ps. civ. 29, 30.

THE DIFFERENCE

Someone may say, "You are making out that a man is no better than a beast." Not so; there is a vast difference, and the Bible shall tell us what it is. Bear in mind that we are simply quoting the Scriptures, and not giving a theory of man's invention. The record of creation gives the relative position of man and all the lower animals. "And God said, Let Us make man in our image, after Our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth." Gen. i. 26-28.

So the Psalmist says, "For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet; all sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field; the fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas." Ps. viii. 5-8.

Man was made in the image of God, to be a companion for God and the angels. Yet he is as dependent upon God for life as are the beasts over which he was given dominion. There is no life but from God. In Christ all things were created, in heaven and on earth, and in Him all things consist. Col. i. 16, 17. His word gave existence to all in the beginning, and it is the same word that maintains their existence. Man has no more power in himself than the grass. "All flesh is grass." "Surely the people is grass." Isa. xl. 6, 7.

"All flesh is not the same flesh; but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds. There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial; but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another. There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for one star differeth from another star in glory." 1 Cor. xv. 39-41.

And yet it is the glory of God that shines in the whole heavens. But God has made each star to be the bearer of a certain amount of light, and the star that gives comparatively little light is just as perfect as the star that gives ten times as much; because equally with the other it is just what God designed it to be.

The vine is just as perfect a plant as the oak, although much smaller and more frail. The life of God makes each one just what God designed it to be. Although there is the same life power in each, there is the greatest difference between them.

So although beasts have the same breath of life from God that men have, there is the greatest difference between them. God designed the beast to be only a beast, and His life makes it what it is. Excepting what the beasts suffer on account of

486

man's sinfulness, they are perfect in their sphere, as God designed them to be.

But God made man alone in His own image. He was made to rule, and in that respect he was designed to be an associate of God, although inferior to and dependent upon Him. Man is capable of everlasting progression, providing he submits himself to the power of God's life.

MAN'S FALL

Things have changed since the creation. "God made man upright;" but now "they are all gone out of the way, but they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one." Rom. iii. 12.

God made man little lower than the angels, and crowned him with glory and honour; but now "every man at his best state is altogether vanity." Ps. xxxix. 5.

God made man to have dominion over the works of His hands; He put all things in subjection under his feet. "For in that He put all in subjection under him." Heb. ii. 8. "But now we see not yet all things put under him." Ib.

There is this difference between man and beasts, that man has been given the freedom of choosing for himself what he will be. The beast has no such choice. It is this freedom of will that gives to man the possibility of being a companion of God. The Creator has for ever set man's will free, and He Himself will not force it.

Now it is a sad fact that men have chosen evil instead of good. They have chosen their own way instead of the way of God; and consequently they have fallen as far below God's design for them as the earth is lower than the heavens. Isa. lv. 9. Still they have the power to choose whom they will serve. Josh. xxiv. 15. The Lord says, "See, I have set before thee this day, life and good, death and evil." "Therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed they live." Deut. xxx. 15, 19. "Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." Rev. xxii. 17.

But if they refuse this gracious invitation, the word is, "For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the Lord; they would none of My counsel; they despised all My reproof. Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices. For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them." Prov. i. 29-32.

It is often said that certain vicious men, are making beasts of themselves. This is a striking expression to indicate how low they have fallen. But it is not a fanciful idea. Thus the scripture says of those who trust in themselves and their riches, "Man being in honour abideth not; he is like the beasts that perish. This their way is their folly; yet their posterity approve their sayings. Like sheep they are laid in the grave; death shall feed on them; and the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning; and their beauty shall consume in the grave from their dwelling." "Man that is in honour, and understandeth not, is like the beasts that perish." Ps. xlix. 12-14, 20.

What a fall this is! from the position of lords over the earth, to the level of the brute, so that they die like brutes, with no hope! How does it come to pass!-By their not choosing the fear and knowledge of God. "Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools." Instead of allowing the life of Christ to work in them all that He has designed for them, and to perfect them in His Divine image so that they can be fit companions for Him, they allow the life to do for them only what it does for the beasts,-give them mere earth life. And so the utter destruction which they will finally suffer will be simply that which they have chosen for themselves.

THE RESURRECTION OF JUDGMENT

Jesus said, "As the Father hath life in Himself; so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself; and hath given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of man. Marvel not at this; for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation," or "of judgment." John v. 26-29.

There are two resurrections: one to life, the other to judgment and perdition. He who believes and obeys the Lord, shall not come into judgment or condemnation, but is passed out of death into life. John v. 24. Christ appears for them, because His life is their life. But all who reject Christ must come into judgment with no Advocate, and thus stand only in their own works; and as the way that they have chosen is the way of death, there will be nothing but death for them.

Only those who choose Christ, and abide in Him even unto death, so that they "sleep in Jesus," can be made alive in Christ. All others will be raised just as they went into the graves-"having no hope, and without God in the world."

The mystery of life can never be fathomed by man. Only the Author of it can understand it. We cannot know how God keeps us alive in this world, neither can we understand how He gives to us eternal life. It is enough for us to believe the fact, and leave Him to do the wonder. So we cannot understand the difference between the life of the Christian and that of the sinner. Yet there is a difference, for one is passed out of death into life, and the other abideth in death. 1 John iii. 14.

The same mystery will exist in the resurrection, only the difference will be far more apparent. The righteous will be raised immortal. The glory that was before in them unseen by the world, will then be revealed (Rom. vii. 18), and they shall "shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father." Matt. xiii. 43. But the wicked will appear just as they were. As they lived and died without Christ, so will they be raised without Him.

If the question be asked, "How can the wicked have a resurrection, and not to life?" the answer must be that it will be the same with them then as now. They will receive life from the Lord, and to all appearance have the same life that the righteous do, yet it is not the same. They pervert the gift of life, so that it is only death for them. We cannot understand how; we can only know the fact which the Bible states. God who keeps them in existence now, in order that they may have an opportunity to choose immortality and eternal life, can bring them up from the graves in the same condition, in order that they may see and receive the result of their choice. It is virtually the same as though their time in the grave had not been, but their life had continued without break until the final judgment.

Thus the part of the question is answered, which asks if at the resurrection the life which God gave man in the beginning is lent to him again, so that he can be punished. That life is lent to men during his whole career; otherwise he would have no chance of choosing eternal life. God gives to every man eternal life for him to accept or reject, just as he may choose, and He

487

gives to man the life by which he accepts or rejects that gift.

WHY RAISED TO JUDGMENT?

It may be asked, "Why should the wicked be raised at all, since it is only for death? When once they have gone into the grave, why not leave them there for ever? Could not God's wrath be satisfied without bringing them up for the purpose of formally consigning them to eternal perdition?"

Such questions are common, and very natural, but they show a failure to comprehend the object of the last Judgment. A few words will suffice to make the subject clear.

God is just. "The wages of sin is death." Those who sin against the light that He gives them, are treasuring up unto themselves wrath "against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God." Rom. ii. 5. God's justice demands that He give them that for which they have laboured. Let it also be remembered that the judgment of God is not retaliation. It is simply the giving to men of that which they have chosen. Moreover, the judgment is not simply for those who suffer the results of their own way, but for the benefit of all God's universe, that all His creatures may have the clearest evidence that He is just and true. This will be for their eternal comfort, because then there will be no shadow of a chance for anyone to doubt Him.

Thus: In the judgment God Himself is on trial, as well as the people. We read, "Let God be true, but every man a liar; . . . that Thou mightest be justified in Thy sayings, and mightest overcome when Thou art judged." Rom. iii. 4. Men, following the lead of Satan, have bitterly accused God of indifference to the needs of His creatures, and even of harshness and injustice. Many have died with that false charge upon their lips and in their hearts.

In the judgment everything will be set forth clearly before the eyes of all creatures. A panorama of the history of earth will be presented to them. It will not be such a history as men write, but everything will appear in its true colours. Now we see only a little of the ways of God and men, and only the surface of that. Then we shall see everything in one view, and the secret motives will appear. All the dealings of God will then be manifest, for it will be the "revelation of the righteous judgment of God." And every secret act and thought of men will also appear.

There will then be opportunity for anyone to step forward if he chooses, to impeach God to His face before the multitude. Men may then repeat, if they can, their charges of injustice on the part of God. Surely this is but simple justice to the wicked, to the righteous, and to God Himself.

But in all that vast multitude there will not be found one to repeat his accusations against God. They will then see that they have spoken evil of those things which they knew not, and every mouth will be stopped. Every knee shall bow to God, and every tongue shall "confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." Earth will join heaven in singing, "Thou art righteous, O Lord, which are, and wast, and shalt be, because Thou hast judged thus:" "Even so, Lord God Almighty; true and righteous are Thy judgments." Rev. xvi. 5, 7.

"The Pope Fulfilling Prophecy" The Present Truth 10, 31.

E. J. Waggoner

The tribute of adulation and worship which is paid to the Pope on occasions of his public appearance in St. Peter's Church, which adjoins the Vatican at Rome, is thus described by a writer in the Fortnightly Review:-

The scenes that have lately been witnessed in St. Peter's bear witness to what may be called an extraordinary recrudescence of Papal popularity. Imagine twenty thousand persons closely packed from early morning till six o'clock in the vast area beneath Michael Angelo's dome. At about five o'clock a wild shout was heard from the multitude in the distance outside. It was known that the Pope had left his apartments in the Vatican, and was descending by private passage into St. Peter's. The instant he entered, a cry of enthusiasm arose within at the bottom of the dim church, which was taken up by the expectant multitude. Very slowly borne high aloft by his guards, the old man moved up the middle aisle, seated on his royal throne, robed "in white samite, mystic, wonderful." He wore the red slippers and was shadowed by the tall peacock fans (imperial peculiarities imported from Persia by Caligula, and adopted by the Popes after the third century when the seat of government was removed to Constantinople and the Pope became joint magistrate of Rome and assumed imperial power). From the moment that Leo XIII. entered until he disappeared in the far distance, an almost invisible speck at the high altar, and the service commenced, the roar of enthusiasm never ceased rolling like thunder throughout the building. The scene was repeated as the Pope passed back again down the aisle at the close of the service. He rose majestically, and bowed in blessing to the right and to the left. It was a scene fraught with singular spiritual and temporal associations never to be forgotten. Leo XIII.'s personal popularity in part explains a reception which certainly no other potentate in the world could at present command.

How marked is the contrast between this scene and any scene in the life of the Saviour or of any of His apostles or prophets! The Son of God, at the end of His earthly life, was led bearing His cross amid the cheers and derision of the mob, to the place of crucifixion. His pretended vicar, at the close of his earthly career, sits in a magnificent temple, surrounded with every token of pomp and magnificence, and borne aloft above the heads of a vast audience, from whom he receives adulation and worship. Jesus said, "The servant is not greater than his Lord. If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you." These words alone are sufficient to stamp the Pope as antichrist.

But how forcibly such a scene calls to the mind of the Bible student the inspired language of Paul to the Thessalonians: "Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God." Thus does the Pope unwittingly fulfil the prophetic word.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 31.

E. J. Waggoner

-About 3,200 lives were lost in the recent Brazilian rebellion.

-The Queen is said to be mistress over ?3,000,000 worth of solid gold plate.

-No less than 87,000 gold claims have been registered in Mashoneland up to the present date.

-The reduction in the steerage rates to Europe is causing a great exodus from the United States.

-The difference of time between Greenwich and New York is 4 hours, 55 minutes, 56 seconds.

-Of the 440 disused burial-grounds in London, all but 172 have been turned into recreation-grounds for the living.

-Count Kalnoky's retirement from office is said to be forthcoming, the probable cause being his opposition to the Hungarian civil marriage Bill.

-The Mayor of Lyons has refused an offer of ?2,000 made hint by an Englishman for the carriage in which M. Carnot was riding when assassinated.

-Owing to the influx of persecuted Jews from Russia into Jerusalem, that city now has a population of about 50,000 inhabitants, against 20,000 in 1870.

-An outbreak of cholera at Adrianople is officially announced. Travellers proceeding from that city to other parts of Turkey have to undergo five days' quarantine.

-A hurricane, followed by a sudden fall of temperature, passed over various parts of Spain on July 25, causing great damage in the western, northern, and central provinces.

-The New Zealand House of Representatives has practically shelved the Bill to allow women to sit in the House. The Bill entitling women to hold any public office has been rejected.

-A German officer has reached Honolulu on his way to find an island in the Pacific, where he and his associates can live the life of monkeys, subsisting solely on fruits, and going naked.

-Experiments with the teleautograph were successfully tried between Dover and London. Facsimiles of the messages sent were reproduced, even to the dotting of i's and crossing of t's.

-Betsy Shelton, a resident of Kentucky, U.S.A., is ninety-six years old, and the parent of fourteen children, 117 grandchildren, 282 great-grandchildren, and nineteen great-great-grandchildren.

-According to a letter from the Congo, written by Baron Dhanis the murderers of Emin Pasha have been been captured and tried by a court-martial. Other captures have also been made.

-Scotland claims to have the highest factory chimney in the world. The Townsend shaft at Port Dundas is said to be 468ft. high. The highest American chimney is at Brooklyn, and has an elevation of 300ft.

-On a recent Sun day morning the Metropolitan, assisted by all the chief clergy of St. Petersburg, recited public prayers in the Cathedral of St. Isaac that the further progress of the cholera epidemic might be stayed.

-Mr. Pinkert, the inventor of a land-and-water tricycle, started recently from the French coast on his machine, intending to cross the channel to Folkestone. He was rescued by a shipping smack in mid-channel in a dangerous situation, having been unable to make the progress he anticipated, and suffering from a severe attack of seasickness.

-Insanity is raid to be greatly on the increase in England. The returns show that on January 1 there were 92,067 persons in our lunatic asylums, an increase of 2,245, this following an increase of 1,974 in the preceding year.

-It is announced from Odessa that the entire system of south-western railways in Russia will pass to the Crown during the autumn of this year, and that the Crown will begin the management of the railways from Jan. 1 next.

-Princess Alix, who has been betrothed to the Czarewitch, is reluctant to give up her religion and profess that of the Greek Church, as required by the Russian marriage law, and this is causing it some delay in the performance of the anticipated ceremony.

-In England 231 families live in houses which pay over ?1,000 a year rent; 9,211 pay between ?500 and 21,000; 8,033 pay between ?200 and ?500; 101,948 between ?650 and ?100; and 3,624,608 pay less than ?20 a year for the houses in which they live.

-The proportion of paupers in London in the middle of June was 224 per 10,000 of population, as compared with 226 in the previous month, and 214 in Juno 1899. In West Ham the rate per 10,000 was 225 last mouth. 249 in the previous mouth, and 201 in June, 1893.

-While in 1965 there were only 3,010 miles of ocean cable in existence, there are now between 150,000 and 160,000. Of that mileage probably ninety per cont. has been the work of private enterprise, at a cost of about ?57,010,000 sterling. The other ten per cent., carried through by various Governments, has involved en outlay of between ?1,000,000 and ?5,000,000 sterling.

-The coal strike in Scotland is still unsettled. At a meeting of coal masters in Glasgow. July 25, it was decided that it would serve no good purpose to meet representatives of the Miners' Federation. It was further stated that the coal masters cannot in the present state of trade give an advance in wages, but they are still quite willing to meet their own workmen in their respective districts.

-In the French Chamber of Deputies during the discussion of as clause in the Anti-Anarchist Bill prohibiting the publication of Anarchist trials, a remark was made which elicited loud protests from the Press gallery. The President at once ordered the expulsion of all the journalists present, and although they were afterwards invited to return, they refused to do so, M. Denoix, the offending deputy, was challenged by the Pressmen to a duel with one of their number, but the challenge was afterward withdrawn.

-A telegram dated at Athens, July 25, says: "Stormy weather has prevailed for some days past off the coasts of Greece, and several terrible boating disasters are reported. A boat capsized off the Island of Pores last night, and several persons were drowned. This, following on the tragic fate of M. Boudouris, master of ceremonies at the court, his wife, and the secretary of the Crown Prince, who were drowned near Phaleron on the previous day, and the loss of six young officers owing to a similar accident not long since, has cast a general gloom over the community hero."

-The difference between China and Japan relative to their respective interests in Corea seem now to have reached the stage of open conflict, though as yet there has been ho officially-reported declaration of war. China has recently sent 12,000 troops to Corea, and the Japanese garrison at Seoul have engaged in fighting with some native forces, but no definite and reliable reports of hostilities in the peninsula have yet been received. Meanwhile the "great powers" are jealously watching each other, in the fear that some one of them will attempt to reap undue advantage from the situation.

-Recently Mr. Ward, the ex-Mayor of Leeds, and Mr. Wilson, keeper of the Colosseum Theatre, were sued by the Lord's Day Observance Society for penalties under the semi-obsolete statute of 21 George III., c. 49, by which a fine art exhibition opened on Sunday may be proceeded against as a "disorderly house." The gist of the Leeds case was that a Sunday audience first paid to go into the Colosseum, and secondly, when inside, laughed at Mr. Max O'Rell's jokes and were visibly entertained by Mr. Fred Villiers. To be "entertained" or "amused" on Sunday is the mischief aimed at by the Georgian statute above alluded to. The jury felt bound to convict, but boldly told the judge that the law ought to be repealed. The final decision of the ease has not yet been reached.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 31.

E. J. Waggoner

A business man said: "Nothing required so much grace from God for me as to give Him a full tenth when I was making money very fast."

It is said that the Duke of Argyle does not allow a public-house on the island of Iona. The nearest public-house and the nearest policeman are six miles away.

China and Japan are called "heathen" nations to distinguish them from the "Christian" nations of the West. But is it suggestive to notice that they settle their differences quite after the manner of their Western neighbours.

The missionaries who are seeking to get into Tibet from the Indian frontier find both the Chinese and British authorities acting in concert to hinder them. Calcutta papers refer to the workers as "meddling missionaries."

"If you banish a Stundist you must cut out his tongue" is a saying that has passed into a proverb with the Russian police. The man who loves the Lord sufficiently to cling to Him under persecution does not keep still in his exile.

The overcrowding in the large cities of the world leads to disease and death, as well as low morals. Dr. Shaw, in the Century, says of Berlin that, "in a population of 1,315,000, the 73,000 people who lived in one-room tenement quarters supplied nearly half the entire number of deaths."

Official reports on the plague at Hong Kong state that up to June 120,000 persons had died of the epidemic. It had its origin in the filthy quarters of the city. The cholera that has been making its way westward to Russia this summer also follows the lines where least attention is given to cleanliness and sanitation. It is physically true that the pestilence walketh in darkness.

The managing director of the Cunard Steamship Company, Sir John Burns, having been appealed to by a British chaplain in the Mediterranean, has given directions that no ships belonging to that company shall work cargo on Sundays in ports abroad, any more than they would do so at home. The reason of the appeal is that Sunday cargo work in Foreign and Crown Colony ports puts an effectual stoppage to Sunday worship aboard British vessels.

A correspondent of The Morning Star, who is engaged in work for the Jews in Jaffa, writes: "At Jerusalem there is very great distress; the poverty and misery are beyond description." Yet he sees in the presence of those Jews in Jerusalem the beginning of the fulfillment of the prophecies of the glorious return of the Jews, when the Lord says, "For perhaps I will bring gold, and for iron I will bring silver, and for wood brass, and for stones iron; I will also make thy officers peace, and thine exactors righteousness." Isa. lx. 17.

Speaking of the agricultural outlook a newspaper says:-

The problem is indeed a difficult one to solve. English farmers are crying out about foreign competition, and yet the foreign competitors are complaining that they are all ruined. Labour leaders from all countries say that the state of agriculture is deplorable, and is seriously threatening the stability of their markets for labour. And yet look at the growing harvest-field of the world. In Southern Europe, where the new crop is coming to hand, it is exceeding the most sanguine expectations of its producers, and from all parts come similar reports.

Yet men's hearts are filled with forebodings for the future, and "for looking after those things which are coming on the earth"-"upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity." Luke xxi.

In a little work on the labour question in America, Mr. W. T. Stead says that the chief cause of the social troubles there, which are as formidable as the world has ever seen, is the gathering of wealth into the hands of the few. He says:-

The Americans possess sixty billions of wealth. Nine per cent. of the families own 71 per cent. of this, leaving but 20 per cent. to the remaining 91 per cent. of the families. The 9 per cent. is composed of two classes-rich and millionarires. Of the latter there are over 4,074 families.

So, in a degree, it is in all the world. Such wealth is not used, but simply hoarded, rusting and useless. The word of the Lord said that such things would come to pass. James says to these rich, "Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you. . . . Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days." But it is for the poor as well as the rich to beware of covetousness; for it is one of the sins which the Apostle said would make the last days perilous. A man's life does not consist of the abundance of the things which he possesseth.

The descendants of the mutineers of the Bounty, says the Portsmouth Evening News, seem to be bent on atoning, as far as they possibly can, for the sins of their forefathers. According to the latest reports from Pitcairn Island, they are a God-fearing set of men and women, and are strong in the faith of the Seventh-day Adventists. They actually have a mission schooner, which has made several cruises in the South Pacific, leaving teachers, medical missionaries, and literature in various groups. The schooner is manned in part by Pitcairners, and the Chief Magistrate of the island is with the ship as one of the Managing Committee, "as keen and practical and intelligent a man as though his life had been passed in any of our cities."

Here is an extract from a recent letter from a Pitcairner, which throws an interesting light upon the work of some of our naval officers of to-day:-"H.M.S.--- came in yesterday. Sabbath, the captain came ashore and attended the Sabbath school. He offered the opening prayer, reviewed the primary division, and at the close gave a parting address to the whole school. He expressed himself as highly pleased with our school system, and was so glad that all the people attended. He said our school is the best organised school he ever saw, and he had seen many, for when at home in England he was superintendent of a Sunday-school. He is a really Christian man."

August 9, 1894

"Temptation and Sin" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

Temptation and Sin.-"My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not." Prov. i. 10. To be tempted is not a sin, for Jesus Christ "was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin." Heb. iv. 15. The sin comes in only when the temptation is consented to.

"The World and Self" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

The World and Self.-"For all that is in the world, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world." 1 John ii. 16. "The world," therefore, is the natural, human heart, and the only way in which one can be separate from the world is to be separate from self.

"Christ for the World" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

Christ for the World.-"If any man sin we have an Advocate [Comforter] with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and He is the propitiation [sacrifice] for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world." 1 John ii. 1, 2. God is no respecter of persons, for Christ by His grace tasted death "for every man." "Whosoever will may come."

"Knowing the Right Way" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

Knowing the Right Way.-The Psalmist prayed, "Teach me Thy way, O Lord." Ps. xxvii. 11. What a blessed thing it is to know the way of the Lord,-to know His way in every affair of life; that is, to know His way of doing those things. If we knew His way, we should make no mistakes, for "as for God, His way is perfect." Ps. xviii. 30. May we indeed have the blessed privilege of knowing His way?-Yes, if we are willing; for the promise is, "The meek will He guide in judgment; and the meek will He teach His way." Ps. xxv. 9.

"A Strong Plea" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

A Strong Plea.-"Remember, O Lord, Thy tender mercies, and Thy lovingkindnesses; for they have been ever of old." Ps. xxv. 6. The Lord Himself, through His prophet, says, "Ye that are the Lord's remembrancers, take no rest, and give Him no rest." Isa. lxii. 6, 7. R.V. This is not because He is in danger of forgetting, but for our hope and courage. His mercies have been ever of old. He changes not, so that He is the same to-day. Therefore in order to receive Divine mercy, all that is necessary is for us to come to Him believing that He is, and to claim the mercy, not because we deserve it, but because His own nature demands that it be rendered.

"Boundless Mercy" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

Boundless Mercy.-"Let Thy mercy, O Lord, be upon us, according as we hope in Thee." Ps. xxxiii. 22. This prayer was inspired by the Holy Spirit, who alone can teach us what to pray for. The Spirit can teach us what to pray for, because He knows what we need, and what the Lord is willing and anxious to grant. Every inspired prayer is therefore the same as the promise of the Holy Spirit. So we are sure that we may have as much of the mercy of the Lord as we can hope for. "Hope maketh not ashamed."

"Thought and Deed" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

Thought and Deed.-"By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac; and he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten son." Heb. xi. 17. Yet Abraham did not slay his son, who lived to a good old age. The offering was made in the heart of Abraham. He had received his son from the Lord, and he gave him up at the Lord's call; but the Lord gave him back. God looks upon the heart. The gift which a heart makes, and which would be offered if there were the ability or opportunity, is counted by the Lord as already given. On the other hand, the evil which men meditate, but which circumstances, where lack of ability prevent, is counted to them as actually accomplished.

"Waiting for Fruit" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

"He spake also this parable: A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came and sought fruit thereon, and found none. Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, Behold, these three years I come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and find none: cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground? And he answering said unto him, Lord, let it alone this year also, till I shall dig about it, and dung it; and if it bear fruit, well: and if not, then after that thou shalt cut it down." Luke xiii. 6-9.

This parable is in the line of the words of the Saviour in John xv. 1, 2: "I am the true vine, and My Father is the husbandman. Every branch in Me that beareth not fruit He taketh away; and every branch that beareth fruit, He purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit."

These scriptures contain a lesson of encouragement and of warning. They show the longsuffering of God. He is not hasty in His judgments. He does not cut a man off at once, because of his failures. His word is, "All day long have by stretched forth My hands unto a disobedient and gainsaying people." Rom. x. 21. His great desire is to save, not to destroy. When professed Christians manifest impatience with the erring, and are ready to condemn them, they misrepresent God.

There is encouragement for those

498

who are conscious of their defects, and of the poor service which they render. After the man had borne with the fruitless tree for three years, it is not supposable that he would cut it down because the fruit which began to bear the fourth year was small. So after the Lord has borne with us for years in our utter neglect of Him, much more will He be merciful to us when at last we heed His voice. "If, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life." Rom. v. 10.

But the text contains a warning against presuming upon the mercy of God. We are not to continue in sin, that grace may abound. We are cautioned against thinking that we can freely transgress because we are under grace. It is not safe to trifle with God. "He that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy." Prov. xxix. 1. Therefore, as the Holy Ghost says, "To-day, if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts."

"The War Spirit" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

In that prophecy of Joel, concerning the time when "the day of the Lord is near," we read, "Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake up the mighty men, let all the men of war draw near; let them come up. Beat your ploughshares into swords, and your pruninghooks into spears."

This is the very spirit that is abroad in the nations to-day. There has always been war in the earth since sin entered. There never was a time, perhaps, when peace was more talked of than now. But the world has never seen such preparations for war as mark our own times. The produce of the ploughshare and pruninghook is literally being turned into swords and spears, and it seems to be counted a sure thing amongst the nations that the struggle must come, and that soon.

In the Revelation, John points to the fierce spirit of war as one of the conditions which should exist at the time of the end. "The nations were angry, and Thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged." Rev. xi. 18. As it was in the days of Noah-when violence filled the earth-so the Lord said it would be in the last days.

No one need expect anything other than violence in the earth so long as Satan is the god of this world. He it is that stirs up the fierce spirit of war, wherever it is. As the apostle saw almost the very end of the history of this world's sin, he saw the spirits that are manifestly already at work-"the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them together to the battle of that great day of God Almighty." Rev. xvi. 14.

"Indifference" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

The word of the Lord-and every word of God-is something to be lived. The temper of mind which discusses matters of truth theoretically, as simply so many facts to be determined and weighed, and properly labelled, as one would examine and ticket a specimen of rock or plant, is not the one that finds the truth as it is in Jesus.

Believing the truth is living it, and the man who lives, "by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God," knows that every word is a living, vital thing, and not to be treated indifferently. Although the Scriptures are so easy of access to-day, it is plainly apparent that indifference to what the Lord says is the characteristic of the age. Mrs. Lynn Linton recently summed up this condition as follows:-

"For liberty to worship God in the way which seemed to him the sole and only truth-for liberty to live the self-respecting life of a free citizen in a free land-a man would go to the stake in the days of a long ago; and the coward who would have faltered, the renegade who would have turned back, would have been of all men then the most miserable and accursed.

"Times are changed, and the supreme test of faith and valour no longer exist. We have loosened the bonds of personal and social obligation to their widest extent; and beyond obedience to the common law of the land, where disobedience would render us amenable to the policeman and the magistrate, we have no great principles to maintain. We have waxed fat, and we do what is right in our own eyes. Nothing is quite right, and nothing is very wrong; and things do not matter a hair's breadth one way or the other.

"The age has lost its perception of lines and colours. In place of the old broad black unmistakable lines of the archaic wood-block, we have come to the confused vagueness of the new process. Instead of the distinct dye, which left nothing uncertain, we have come to complex tints which are neither pink and yellow, neither blue and green. And in like manner, instead of things being absolutely right and absolutely wrong, we cherish an emasculate kind of via media, where the old distinct and separate spheres overlap and intermingle, and where we are not quite sure of anything. This is our predominant iniquity."

"Studies in Romans. Jew and Gentile. Rom. ii. 25-29" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

In these verses last studied we have had some sharp questions to those who are "called Jews," that is, who profess to be followers of the Lord. Mere form and profession do not constitute one a proper teacher of the truth of God. He who does not exhibit in his life the power of that which he professes, is only a detriment to the cause. In the verses now before us we have a brief but explicit statement concerning

CIRCUMCISION AND UNCIRCUMCISION

ROM. 2. 25-29

"For circumcision verily profiteth, if thou keep the law; but if thou be a breaker of the law, thy circumcision is made uncircumcision. Therefore, if the uncircumcision keep the righteousness of the law, shall not his uncircumcision be counted for circumcision? And shall not uncircumcision which is by nature, if it fulfil the law, judge thee, who by the letter and circumcision dost transgress the law? For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh; but he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What does the apostle say of circumcision?

"Circumcision verily profiteth."

When does circumcision profit?

"If thou keep the law."

What does circumcision sometimes become?

"Thy circumcision is made uncircumcision."

Under what circumstances does this take place?

"If thou be a breaker of the law."

What if the uncircumcised one keeps the righteousness of the law?

"Shall not his uncircumcision be counted for circumcision?

What is the relative standing of the

499

uncircumcised law-keeper and the circumcised law-breaker?

"Shall not uncircumcision which is by nature, if it fulfil the law, judge those who by the letter and circumcision dost transgress the law?"

Who is not a real Jew?

"He is not a Jew which is one outwardly."

What is not circumcision?

"Neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh."

Who is the true Jew?

"He is a Jew which is one inwardly."

Where is real circumcision?

"Circumcision is that of the heart."

Of what does it consist?

"In the spirit, and not in the letter."

Where is the glory and praise of real circumcision?

"Whose praise is not of men, but of God."

Definition of Terms.-The two terms "circumcision" and "uncircumcision" are here used not only to indicate the rite and the absence of it, but also to designate two classes of people. "The uncircumcision" evidently refers to those who were called Gentiles, those who worshipped other gods. This use of the terms is very plain in the following passage: "When they saw that the Gospel of the uncircumcision was committed unto me, as the Gospel of the circumcision was unto Peter (for he that wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, the same was mighty in me toward the Gentiles); and when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given unto me, they gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship; that we should go unto the heathen, and they unto the circumcision." Gal. ii. 7-9. Here we find that the terms "uncircumcision," "Gentiles," and "heathen," all refer to the same people.

Just what was the profit of circumcision, we are not told in this chapter. The statement of the fact was enough for this place, for the only point in the mind of the writer was to show what circumcision is, and who are the really circumcised. A great deal depends upon these few verses. They should be studied carefully, because upon them depends the proper understanding of a large portion of the prophecies of the Old Testament. If these verses had received the consideration that they ought to have by professed Bible students, there would never have been any "Anglo-Israel" theory, and the unprofitable and misleading suppositions about the return of the Jews to Jerusalem before the coming of the Lord would never have been made.

What Is Circumcision?-This question is answered in plain language in Rom. iv. 11, where the apostle, speaking of Abraham, the first one who was circumcised, says: "And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had yet being uncircumcised." To the question, therefore, "What is circumcision?" the answer must be, The sign of circumcision is a seal of righteousness by faith.

Circumcision Made Uncircumcision.-This being the case, it is evident that where there was no righteousness, the sign of circumcision was worthless. So the apostle says, "If thou be a breaker of the law, thy circumcision is made uncircumcision." As in the previous verses we learned that the form without the fact amounts to nothing, so here we are told that the sign without the substance is of no account. It is very easy for a poor man to put out a sign advertising boots and shoes; but to fill the shop with goods requires capital. If he has the sign, but has no boots and shoes, he is worse off than if he had no sign.

The Mistake of the Jews.-The Jews made a mistake of supposing that the sign was sufficient. They finally came to hold the idea that the sign would bring the reality, just as many professed Christians in these days suppose that the performance of certain rites will make them members of the body of Christ. But circumcision of the flesh alone could represent no righteousness, but sin. See Gal. v. 19-21. As a matter of fact, many of those whom they despised as "uncircumcised" were thus in reality "circumcised," while they themselves were not.

Circumcision of the Heart.-Real circumcision is a matter of the heart, that is, of the inner life, and not at all of the flesh. The apostle plainly declares that what is outward in the flesh is not circumcision, that is, which consists only in outward form; but "circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter." This is stated as a general truth. This was not a new departure in the days of Paul, but was the case from the beginning. In Deut. xxx. 6 we read the words of Moses to the children of Israel: "And the Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, that thou mayest live." All true Jews recognised that true circumcision was only of the heart, for Stephen addressed those who rejected the truth as "stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears." Acts vii. 51.

Righteousness in the Heart.-The Psalmist says, "Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts." Ps. ii. 6. Mere outward righteousness is nothing. See Matthew v. 20; xxiii. 27, 28. It is with the heart that man believeth unto righteousness. Rom. x. 10. When Moses, at the command of the Lord, rehearsed the law to Israel, he said: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart." Deut. vi. 5, 6. There can be no righteousness that is not the real life. Therefore, since circumcision is but a sign of righteousness, it is evident that there can be no real circumcision except circumcision of the heart.

Circumcised by the Spirit.-"For we know that the law is spiritual." Rom. vii. 14. That is, it is the nature of the Holy Spirit, for the word of God is the sword of the Spirit of God that can put the law of God into the heart of man. Therefore true circumcision is the work of the Holy Spirit. Stephen called the wicked Jews uncircumcised, because, said he, "Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost." Acts vii. 51. It seems evident, therefore, that, although the word "spirit" in Rom. ii. 29 is not spelled with a capital letter, it refers to the Holy Spirit and not merely to the spirit of man. Of course in the Greek there is nothing to indicate any difference, just as in English the word is spelled the same whether it refers to the Spirit of God or the spirit of man. If we remember that circumcision was given as the seal of righteousness by faith, and that the inheritance promised to Abraham and his seed was through the righteousness of the law (Rom. iv. 11, 13), and we shall see that circumcision was the pledge of the inheritance. Now read Eph. i. 10-13, where the apostle says

500

that we obtain the inheritance in Christ "in whom also, after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession." The possession promised to Abraham and to his seed was assured only through the Spirit of righteousness; therefore, from the very beginning there was no real circumcision that was not of the Spirit.

Circumcision through Christ.-Read Col. ii. 8-11. "Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. For in Him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. And ye are complete in Him, which is the head of all principality and power; in whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ." Circumcision must have meant as much when first given as it ever did. Therefore from the very beginning it meant righteousness through Christ alone. This is sufficiently shown in the fact that circumcision was given to Abraham as the seal of the righteousness which he had by faith, and that "he believed in the Lord; and He counted it to him for righteousness." Gen. xv. 6.

Who Are the Circumcision?-This question is answered by the Apostle Paul in Phil. iii. 3: "For we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh." And this is but saying in other words what we have in our text, "Circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God." Nobody therefore was ever really circumcised who did not believe and rejoice in Christ Jesus. That is the reason why Stephen called the unbelieving Jews "uncircumcised."

Meaning of Circumcision.-We have not space to go into this question in detail, but the above texts put us on the track. A careful study of the chapters in Genesis which speak of God's covenant with Abraham will also help to clear up the matter. We learn in Genesis xv. that God made a covenant with Abraham on the basis of his faith. The sixteenth chapter tells how Abraham listened to the voice of his wife instead of the voice of the Lord, and sought to work out the promise of God through the flesh and made a failure. His son was to be born of the Spirit, and not after the flesh. See Gal. iv. 22, 23, 28, 29. Then the seventeenth chapter shows the revival of Abraham's faith, and the renewal of the covenant, with circumcision as the seal. A portion of flesh was cut off to indicate that he was to have no confidence in the flesh, but was to expect righteousness and the inheritance only through the Spirit of God. The descendants of Abraham would thus have a continual reminder of his mistake and would be admonished to trust the Lord and not themselves. But they perverted this sign. They regarded it as indicating that they were better than other people, instead of looking upon it as an evidence that "the flesh profiteth nothing." But the fact that the Jews perverted and misunderstood the sign does not destroy its original meaning.

Who Are Jews?-We have seen in a quotation from the second chapter of Galatians that the term "uncircumcised" refers to those who do not know the Lord, or who are "without God in the world." See Eph. ii. 11, 12. The Jews are "the circumcision." But only those who rejoice in Christ Jesus are the circumcision, who have no confidence in the flesh. Therefore the real Jews are none other than Christians. "He is a Jew, which is one inwardly." There never was a real Jew in the sight of God who was not a believer in Christ. And every true believer in Christ is a Jew in the Bible sense of the term. Abraham, the father of the Jewish nation, rejoiced in Christ. See John viii. 56.

A Mark of Separation.-Many have entertained the notion that circumcision was given as a distinguishing mark between the Jews and the Gentiles. The fallacy of this idea is sufficiently shown by a study of the giving of circumcision, and by the statement of the apostle Paul of what it really signified. Others suppose that it was given to keep the Jews separate, so that the genealogy of Christ could be ascertained. This also is simply an unfounded guess. Christ was to come from the tribe of Judah, but as all the tribes were circumcised, it is evident that circumcision could not by any means preserve his genealogy. Moreover, circumcision in the flesh never did make any separation between the Jews and the Gentiles. It did not keep Israel from idolatry, and it did not keep them from joining the heathen in their idolatrous practices. Whenever the Jews forgot God, they mingled with the heathen, and there was no difference between them and the Gentiles. Circumcision did not separate them.

Still further, God did not wish the Jews to be separated from the Gentiles in the sense that they were to have no dealings with them. The object of his calling out the Jews from Egypt was that they should carry the Gospel to the heathen. He did wish them to be separate in character, but outward circumcision could never effect this. Moses said to the Lord, "Wherein shall it be known here that I and Thy people have found grace in Thy sight? is it not in that Thou goest with us? So shall we be separated, I and Thy people, from all the people that are upon the face of the earth." Ex. xxxiii. 16. The presence of the Lord in the heart of men will separate them from all others, although they live in the same house and eat at the same table. But if Christ is not in the heart of a man, he is not separated from the world, though he may have been circumcised and may live a hermit.

Literal and Spiritual Seed.-Much of the confusion that has existed in regard to Israel has arisen through a misunderstanding of these terms. People suppose that to say that only those who are spiritual are really Jews is to deny the literalness of the seed and of the promise. But "spiritual" is not opposed to "literal." That which is spiritual is literal, and real. Christ is spiritual, but He is the real, literal Seed. God is spiritual, and is only Spirit, yet He is not a figurative Being, but a real, literal God. So the inheritance of which we are heirs in Christ, is a spiritual inheritance, yet it is real. To say that only those who are spiritual constitute the true Israel is not to modify or turn aside the Scriptures, or to weaken in any way the directness and force of the promise, because the promise of God is only to those who have faith in Christ. "For the promise that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith." Rom. iv. 13. "And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." Gal. iii. 29.

"'Earthquakes in Divers Places'" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

The earth is waxing old like a garment. It has endured the reign of sin and the curse until it has grown old under it, and is groaning for its redemption. Speaking of the signs of His coming and of the end, the Lord said: "Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; and great earthquakes shall be in divers places, and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven." Luke xxi. 10, 11.

Take the earthquake record for this year. Greece and Turkey have been visited by a most destructive one, and severe shocks have occurred in Hungary, South America, and in the East. A newspaper says of the South Pacific regions:-

Several severe shocks of earthquake have been felt in Fiji lately, and some damage was done on the island of Ovalau, on which the large town of Levuka is situated. Earthquakes have been unusually frequent of late years in the Fiji Archipelago, and many fear that a heavy outburst may occur before long. Ambargo, the burning mountain in the New Hebrides, between New Caledonia and Fiji, has been active lately, and it is not at all unlikely that the activity may spread before long to other parts of the volcanic zone.

"Dogmas for Children" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

Dogmas for Children.-Mr. Mundella, in a recent speech at Chelsea in support of the compromise measure now in prospect of being set aside in the Board Schools, said it was a fact recognised by all authorities that it was pure folly to teach children of tender years the religious dogmas which would be placed in the curriculum if the efforts of Mr. Athelstan Riley and his co-workers were successful. This simply states the most self evident side of the truth on the subject of such teaching. It is not only unjust to teach children doctrines in the schools contrary to the wishes of their taxpaying parents, but it is folly to teach church dogmas to any person, young or old, unless they can be taught in the language of Scripture. The truth is that the Spirit of God, and not man, is the Teacher of all religious truth, and when man puts himself in the place of the Spirit, the result is simply a darkening of counsel by words without knowledge.

All persons, whether young or old, who experience the new birth, must become babes in Christ. The only food fit for a new-born babes is milk, and the only milk for babes in Christ is the Word. See 1 Pet. ii. 2. To read dogmas to infants out of the creed books of the Church is therefore not feeding them with the milk which they need to make them grow. And just as milk causes bodily growth in the infant, so the simple word received into the mind and heart causes Christian growth, because the truth stated therein is impressed upon the heart by the Spirit, who is able to teach even children of tender years. In all religious teaching, the truth must be impressed upon the heart by the Spirit, through the word of God. Any other kind of religious teaching is of no value.

"Fill Up with the Good" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

The only way to forget the things that are behind is to press on to the things that are before. The way to stop thinking of evil is to fill the mind with the good. It is the duty of parents not simply to warn against the evil, but to teach the little ones to be constantly employed in ways that are helpful and good and true. Dean Stanley once said:-

"Leisure misused, an idle hour waiting to be employed, idle hands with no occupation, idle and empty minds with nothing to think,-these are the main temptations to evil. Fill up that empty void, employ those vacant hours, occupy those listless hands; the evil will depart because it has no place to enter in, because it is conquered by good. It is a simple fact, and well known, that if a cup is full it can hold no more; and likewise the child whose time is fully occupied with good and useful occupation, will have no time for the sins which Satan always finds for idle hands to do. Idleness is an active as well as a passive evil. God made the child to be busy; and if it is not busy with good, it will be busy with evil."

"Nonconformist Disestablishment" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

The Nonconformists are not to have it all their own way in their attack upon the Established Church. The Church Family Newspaper has found a weak spot in Nonconformity, of which it proceeds to probe. Taking Dr. Parker's City Temple as a type, it shows that many of the arguments against the Church of England lie against the Nonconformist churches, as well, although of course not to the same degree. We wish for the sake of quotation that Dr. Parker's name were not used, as we are quite sure that he is not responsible for the state of things that exists, and that he does not ask help or recognition from the Government. The Church Family Newspaper expressly states that it does not design any invidious reference to Dr. Parker, but simply uses the City Temple as one of the best known and most important of the Nonconformist places of worship. Following are some of the points made:-

The State, through the Registrar General, has recognised and legalised Dr. Parker's chapel as a building erected and set apart for public worship, and in its character as such-different from its treatment of all other buildings devoted to secular purposes-the State has conferred on Dr. Parker's chapel certain valuable exemptions and privileges.

By virtue of the provisions of 39 and 89 Victoria, chap. 55, se, 150, 151, Dr. Parker's chapel-the City Temple-is exempted from the payment of rates and taxes. This itself is a State endowment of the building. By the Charitable Trusts Acts 1869, se 63, it exempts the City Temple as well as all certified Nonconformist places of worship, and the property thereto belonging, from the control of the Charity Commissioners, except so far as their advice may be voluntarily sought and their consent may be necessary in dealing with the property.

The State confers important legal privileges, which are, or might be, of considerable money value, upon the City Temple, as well as upon other Nonconformist places of worship, in that by 13 and 14 Victoria, chap. 28, it can, if need be, have new trust deed schemes drawn up, and new trustees appointed by the Charity Commissioners, the entire expense of which would have to be borne by the State, which really means the tax-payers of the country.

These points are well taken, although they do not prove what the Church Family Newspaper designs to prove by them. It thinks to show by them that the Church of England is all right. But it shows a very weak case when a man has no other reply to a charge of evil-doing than to say to his accuser, "You do the same thing yourself." The charge simply shows that Nonconformists, in the past, at least, have eagerly followed in the steps of the Established Church, and have been anxious for State patronage.

It now remains to be seen what Nonconformists will do with this charge. Nothing is more sure than that whatever church receives special favours from the State, is to that extent an established church. To the extent to which it receives favours from the State, it must consent to be controlled by the State. Of course the most, if not all, of the Nonconformists of the present-day had nothing to do with bringing about the state of things that exist. If they are consistent, they will acknowledge the justice of the charge, and plainly say that they are ready and willing for the State to withdraw from them all the patronage it has bestowed on them.

Of course the organs of the Established Church point out these things for the purpose of weakening the Nonconformist argument against the Establishment. If the Nonconformists do not come out and say that they do

502

not desire any support from the State, and that they are perfectly willing for the State to tax their church property whenever it pleases to begin, their argument against Church establishment will not only be weakened, but will be wholly nullified. It will show that the attack upon the Church of England is prompted by jealousy of her superior privileges, and is not a matter of principle. But it would be a grand thing if the charge should have the effect of causing Nonconformists to see that the real power of the Church of Christ consists in its entire independence of the State, and in its dependence for protection and support wholly upon the Spirit of the Lord.

We have spoken of the Nonconformist "attack upon the Church," and the fact that the force of this attack is weakened by the support which Nonconformity receives from the State. We would not wish to be understood as favouring this or any other "attack" upon the Church of England or any other body. The true business of the Christian is to live and preach the Gospel of Christ, and not to "attack" any man, nor any body of men. A straight message of truth, and a living representation of the principles of truth, form the best possible "attack" upon any erroneous position.

"Harmonising Scripture" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

Harmonising Scripture.-At a recent Sunday afternoon meeting of religious people in Westbourne Park, the discussion turned upon "Paul's Attitude toward Women," and the speaker who introduced the subject said that if Paul's teaching collided with Christ's, Paul's must go,-which sentiment elicited an expression of approval from the audience, and was endorsed by several speakers to follow. But who is to say whether Paul's teaching collides with Christ's or not? The Apostle Peter endorsed Paul's writings, for he said, "And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you; as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other Scriptures, unto their own destruction." 2 Peter iii. 15, 16. And Paul himself said, "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me;" and also, "I say the truth in Christ; I lie not, my conscience also bearing witness in the Holy Ghost." Gal. ii. 20; Rom. ix. 1. Those therefore who presume to question the harmony of Paul's writings with other portions of Scripture, assume to stand above Peter and Paul as expounders of Divine truth. But if such men wish their assumptions to be taken seriously, they should first show their ability to write something worthy of being compared with the epistles of either of those writers.

"Sunday 'Disorder'" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

The question of the proper observance of Sunday seems to be coming rapidly to the front in the United Kingdom. As is well known, there exist in England two organisations which are based upon opposite conceptions as to the character of the first day of the week; and these two bodies, which were always antagonistic in principle, have now come into open conflict. The occasion is a recent lecture delivered on Sunday by Mr. Max O'Rell, the clever Frenchman, in the Colosseum, at Leeds. By an Act of George III. any building in which entertainments of any kind are given on Sunday, where money is taken at the doors or people are entitled to admission tickets for subscriptions, is to be considered a "disorderly house," and the proprietor of the same becomes liable to prosecution. Under this law of the proprietors of the Leeds building have been prosecuted by the "Lord's Day Observance Society," for permitting the aforesaid lecture. The Sunday League, whose object is to secure recreation and pleasure for the people on Sunday, have taken up the gauntlet thus thrown down, and by their invitation Mr. O'Rell delivered the same lecture in St. James's Theatre, London, in order that the people of the Metropolis might judge concerning the nature of that which the "Lord's Day Observance Society" would put under the Sunday ban.

The Chronicle, in noticing the event, pertinently observes that "had the lecture delivered. . . by Mr. Max O'Rell, on British national characteristics, been given on a Sunday, instead of Tuesday, the theatre, according to a judicial decision, would have been condemned under an old statute as 'a disorderly house.' Not that there was anything in the lecture to which exception could be taken by the most prudish, unless innocent drollery, clever satire, and keen observation of character wittily expressed are to be put under a ban. The day on which a discourse is delivered, however, makes all the difference." In other words, that which is perfectly proper and right on a Tuesday, becomes "disorderly conduct" when it takes place on a Sunday! This is the logic (?) upon which rest numerous recent cases of prosecution for Sunday work in America, where conscientious and law-abiding citizens have been fined and put in gaol on the charge of becoming by such work a public nuisance. The only reasonable, consistent, and valid Sabbath law ever enacted, is that spoken by the Creator Himself from the quaking summit of Sinai, and which constitutes the fourth commandment of the decalogue. And that law commands the observance of "the seventh day," and therefore has nothing to do with Sunday. See Ex. xx. 8-11; Isa. lviii. 13. And as obedience to God's law must spring from love to Him, even from "faith which worketh by love," and can come in no other way, it is worse than folly for any human being or organisation of men to attempt to enforce that law by human penalties upon any portion of mankind.

"The Liberal Soul" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

As well might we urge a man to pray who does not want to, as to urge people to give when they do not wish to. Giving to the Lord's work is a privilege and duty, just as prayer is. The Lord's cause no more needs the gift that is given grudgingly than He needs the prayer that is offered as a matter of form, with the idea that He exacts it for His good.

The converted soul is a liberal soul, and needs no urging. There are many who satisfy the flesh by the form of religion, and who plan to have it cost as little as possible, whether the price of duty be money, or friends, or worldly ease. What they need is more Gospel. Bazaars and variety entertainments do not meet the case. A Nottingham vicar finds that people who consider the sermon cheap at a penny put the same price on the organ recital. He says in his parish magazine:-

At the recital on the Thursday evening, four "ladies" sat together in one party; they contributed one penny amongst them. At the same service, one "gentleman" was overheard saying to another, "Will you lend me a penny?-I haven't got a 'threepenny bit.'" And another "gentleman" went away with the remark, "Well, that's as good a threepennyworth as you get anywhere in Nottingham." A clergyman was preaching in our church a short time ago for a special object. Immediately in front of him sat a lady, a stranger, well dressed; the dress and rings and bracelets and ornaments must have a cost at least ?50, so he says. He thought he had made an impression,

503

and that at least ?1 would go to the plate for the benefit of the society. He was curious to watch her, but was disappointed when a penny was put in. I might multiply such instances indefinitely, but what's the good?

"Two Sides" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

The Congregationalist (Boston, U.S.A.) has a very interesting and instructive article about the "Taxation of Churches." The article is called out by the fact that there is a vigorous movement in some quarters against Roman Catholicism, a portion of the energy being expended in an effort to secure the taxation of church property. This, it is thought, will touch the Catholics most closely; but the Congregationalist says:-

That there are two sides to this question all will admit. But both sides must be clearly understood in order to any fair discussion. The amount of property in the United States in church buildings and equipment is very large, being in 1890, according to the census report, $679,604,439. But of this amount Roman Catholics control only ?118,000,746. If an attempt by Protestants to weaken the power of Catholics were wise under any circumstances, it evidently would not be wise for Protestants to advocate, for that purpose mainly, the taxation of church property.

"Happy is he that condemneth not himself in the thing which he alloweth." Rom. iv. 22. This is a most pertinent text in all Protestant attacks of Catholicism, and especially in this one. Through the non-taxation of church property, the people in general are being taxed to sustain Catholic worship. Certain professed Protestants see this, and think that by protesting against Church exemption from taxation they can strike a blow at the Roman Catholics. But, lo, they find out that they themselves are involved in the evil to a greater extent than the Catholics are, and so they conclude that they must seek some other point of attack.

It is most pitiful when professed Protestantism is forced to acknowledge that it cannot protect against Romish error, because it is involved in the same mischief. But it should serve as a valuable object lesson upon the difference between true and false Protestantism, and their different methods of working. True Protestantism is not an "attack" upon anybody. It never has to withhold its protest, even though the Protestant are not perfect, because it consists simply in holding up the true standard-Jesus Christ and His word-to which all alike should conform.

The form of the protest made by Wycliffe and Tyndale against Catholicism, lay in their giving the Bible to the people in their own tongue, and in teaching them to read and obey it. Luther's strongest protest against Rome was his preaching of justification by faith. True Protestantism is to "preach the word," no matter whose course is crossed by it. The true Protestant can never have his mouth stopped by the pointing out of the errors in his own course, for he will at once accept the reproof, and let his life conform more closely to the standard. The one proper work of all professed Christians is to preach the Gospel; and preaching the Gospel does not mean an attack upon any man or any body of men, but a presentation of truth which has power to convert both preachers and hearers.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

-The total strength of the Japanese army is returned at half-a-million.

-The Chilian Senate has passed a Bill granting an amnesty to political offenders.

-The appearance of the crops throughout Russia indicates that there will be an abundant harvest.

-An epidemic of suicides at Rome has been attributed to the intense heat which has lately prevailed.

-The Archduke William of Austria, while riding recently near Vienna, was thrown from his horse and killed.

-No fewer than 1,273,000 people and 75,000 vehicles crossed the Tower Bridge within twenty-four days of its opening.

-According to intelligence brought by the steamer Empress of India, from Yokohama, on the 16th inst., the plague in China is diminishing.

-An Italian pager which has been tracing out the family connections of Santo, the anarchist murderer, finds that four of his relatives died in a lunatic asylum.

-Earthquake shocks have been reported recently from Mercedonia; Old Servia, and Eastern Bulgaria, many houses having been injured at Varna. A number of lives are stated to have been lost.

-The aggregate tonnage of shipping peeing through the port of Liverpool during the past year was neatly ten million tons, an increase of about half a million on the previous twelve mouths.

-A dispatch from Calagaran, in the Island of Mindanao, announces that the Spanish troops attacked the Mussulman Malaya on July 24, and completely routed them, with the loss of some 250 killed.

-The Victorian Budget, which has been introduced in the Legislative Assembly at Melbourne, shows a deficit of ?1,801,000, caused chiefly by the financial crisis and the fall in value of raw products.

-There is war among the Moors in Morocco. A sanguinary conflict is reported to have occurred between the tribes of Mazuza and Ben Isicar, in which three persons were killed and about thirty wounded.

-The Paris Figaro's correspondent at Tangiers telegraphs that the Sultan has been ill for some days past, and has seen no one but Bahamet. It is believed his Majesty has narrowly escaped death by poison.

-The British schooner Mayer, of Gibraltar, was recently boarded by an armed band of Riff Arabs off the Morocco coast, and stripped of its contents, the British flag being rent In pieces and trampled upon.

-A detachment of British troops have been Ianded at Bluefields, Central America, from H.M.S. Mohawk. The Mosquitos have fortified the town and the river front in expectation of an attack by the Nicaraguans.

-The Wellman Arctic expedition, which was supposed to be lost, has been heard from. Their ship has been crushed in the ice, but the party are well, and in no immediate danger. A ship will be sent to bring them back.

-The cholera in its westward march has reached Rotterdam, and at Maastricht the scourge has almost assumed epidemic form, there having been thirty-two cases and sixteen deaths reported up to Aug. 2.

-The South African chief Malaboch has surrendered to General Joubort, in charge of the Transvaal troops, after making two desperate attempts to break the cordon round the caves in which the chief and his followers were hiding.

-The Horsham County Council have passed by-laws, fixing a penalty in the case of any person in a public place or highway singing or reciting a profane piece or using profane language. They should now pass an ordinance defining what "profane" language is.

-The little town of Cottel, situated in the heart of the Balkans, not far from Slivno, has been completely destroyed by fire. The inhabitants are camping out in the neighbouring fields and woods. Nothing is known as to the number of victims, which is believed to be large.

-The foundation stone of a new hospital for the treatment of fever and diphtheria, has been laid at Shooter's-hill, near Gravesend. It will increase the accommodation for London fever patients to 5,500 beds, one to every thousand of the population. The cost will be ?200,000.

-It is stated that the French postal authorities are contemplating the suppression of the employment of young women in the post-office, in consequence of the continuous complaints from the public as to their dilatoriness, and because it has been found that no saving has resulted from the experiment, owing to their inability to withstand fatigue.

-An alarming discovery was made recently on the tramway leading to the laboratory at Priddy's Yard powder stores, Gosport. Several match heads cut into minute pieces, it was found, had heel placed on the line. A workman stopped on a match-head, which exploded. Fortunately no loose powder was in the vicinity at the time, otherwise the consequence might have been disastrous.

-In view of the recent railway war in America the following figures are interesting. There are no fewer than 1,800 companies working 176,161 miles of railway, and employing 873,602 persons of all grades. Those railways carried in 1893 no fewer than 593,560,612 passengers and 745,119,482 tons of freight. To carry, these passengers and move the freight required 34,788 locomotives, 31,384 passenger cars, and 1,047,577 freight cars.

-Liverpool continues to be the most densely populated city of any in Great Britain. Taking the whole area-5,210acres- within the municipal boundaries, the density (says the Lancet) is 97.9 persons per acre, and excluding the space occupied by the docks and quays the density is 114 per acre. The total deaths were 13,919 last year-1,248 more than in 1892-giving a rate of mortality of 27.3 per thousand of the population.

-Danger lurks in the railway carriage. Some investigations made by German specialists revealed the following startling facts:-In fourth-class carriages the number of bacteria swept up from one square metre of surface was estimated at 12,624; in the third-class 5,481; in the second-class 4,247; and in the first-class 2,583. The presence of the Koch bacillus was proved in three oases, the result, doubtless, of expectorations from consumptive persons.

-Intense heat has prevailed over a large part of the United States during the latter half of July, and many fatalities from sunstroke are reported from New York and Chicago. In New Jersey and Wisconsin forest fires have resulted from the heat and drouth, and the railroads have sustained heavy losses. The town of Phillips, Wis., has been destroyed, leaving 500 persons homeless. The fires have been attended by considerable sacrifice of human life.

-War has finally been declared between Chins and Japan. Several naval fights are reported in the open sea off Korea, in which the Japanese were victorious, but in a severe land engagement in Korea the Japanese were defeated with heavy loss. Japan has probably involved herself in difficulty with England by the sinking of the Kow Shang, an English ship, while conveying Chinese troops to Korea, there having been no declaration of war made at the time China is sending large bodies of troops into Korea from Manchuria, her northern province. It is stated that England and Russia will act in concert in the effort to secure an early termination of hostilities.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

The census returns for India give 2,284,380 as the number of people professing Christianity. A quarter of a million of these are Europeans or Eurasians. The total population is 287,223,431.

Two young ladies of fortune have recently given an enormous sum to Roman Catholic institutions. Both are of Protestant parentage, and were put in a convent school for their education. The result is that the fortunes won by Presbyterian and Wesleyan families are turned over to the Church of Rome. Yet many Protestants are sending their children to such schools.

The National Federation of Sunday Societies, has, through its Executive Council, approved of a Bill which has been drafted by Mr. Mark H. Judge, to amend the Act of 21 George III., so as to "give greater freedom for the enjoyment of science, literature, and art, on Sundays." Here is where the National Federation of Sunday Societies gives its case away. By moving for the amendment of a Sunday law, they concede the righteousness of such laws. If they are going to deal with the law at all, they ought to move for its unconditional repeal. All such laws are simply relics of Paganism and of the Dark Ages.

The Bill referred to above provides that the application of the Act of George III. shall not extend "to a museum, art gallery, science or art exhibition, and garden, or library, as such, nor to a lecture on science, literature, art, or kindred subjects; nor to performances of music, provided they be under the management and control of a committee or society," which is specially defined. That is to say, the Act shall not apply to any reputable affair. But disreputable affairs are sufficiently provided for by laws applicable every day in the week alike; hence the uselessness of any Sunday law.

Like most of the great Foreign Missionary Societies, the Wesleyan Society has to face a large deficit. At the recent conference Dr. Jenkins held that this was not because of the depressed times altogether. "Money was never," he says, "spent with such profligacy for merely selfish pleasure, and this not only outside, but inside the church." The love of pleasure is abroad in the world, and every believer must be on his guard lest his love grow cold and his service formal.

At the recent Wesleyan Conference there was quite a discussion in regard to the reading of sermons. It was quite generally agreed that the practice is growing, but to the detriment of the church. One minister told of a conversation with a man whom he met in a railway train, who said that he was a Methodist, but that in his circuit conversations had gone out of fashion, because three out of their four ministers read their sermons. Rev. Mr. Wilkinson said that if they did not preach as their fathers did, Ichabod would be written on their walls.

Sympathy is literally a "feeling together." That is, the one who truly has sympathy for another, has the same feeling that that other one has. No one but a cripple can truly sympathise with a cripple. A strong man may feel sorry for one who is ill, but he cannot sympathise with him unless he has been similarly affected, and retains a vivid recollection of his sufferings.

No one, therefore, can sympathise with a sinner, except one who realises that he himself is a sinner. Every man is a sinner, but not every man realises that the same sin that appears in others is in himself likewise. Such ones can have no sympathy with those who are out of the way. Christ did no sin (1 Peter ii. 22), yet He was made to be sin for us. 2 Cor. v. 21. He "was it all points tempted like as we are." Heb. iv. 15. In all things He was "made like unto His brethren" (Heb. ii. 17), and therefore He sympathises with the sinful and has "compassion on the ignorant, on them who are out of the way." Heb. v. 2. Only the consciousness of the fact that the sinless One has a fellow-feeling for sinners, enables us to come with boldness to the throne of grace.

"A Safe Position" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

A Safe Position.-"And now little children, abide in Him; that when He shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before Him at His coming." 1 John ii. 28. They who are in Christ are as safe as He is, and may be as free from fear; but they who are without will have no shelter from the storm. The one class are at home at the seat of glory, for glory is their inheritance; the other class have rejected true glory, and when it bursts upon them they are dazzled and overpowered by it.

"A Political Prayer" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

A Political Prayer.-The papal encyclicals counsel peace, but in Austria the clerical party came dangerously near disturbing the peace by their strenuous efforts to defeat the desire of the Hungarian people to be freed from priestly control in civil matters. Now the clergy have secured a special prayer from the Pope to be used as a campaign document. The Times correspondent says:-

The prayer is addressed to St. Stephen, the first king of Hungary, and to the Virgin Mary, and craves for deliverance from the enemies of the Roman Catholic Church. An indulgence of 300 days is conceded to all those offering up the prayers once a day in the manner prescribed.

"Gruesome Calculation" The Present Truth 10, 32.

E. J. Waggoner

Gruesome Calculation.-Terrible as war has always been, the modern improvements in arms must make the carnage more terrible than ever. Military authorities have to reckon with this, and must plan for the care of the wounded and mangled victims on different lines from those heretofore employed. It is discussed in as matter-of-fact a way as a farmer would talk of getting in his harvest. Of course it must be, and yet it only shows the cold-blooded horror of war, when a newspaper which has much to say of military matters writes as follows:-

The hail of bullets which will sweep over the battlefield of the future will have little regard for the Geneva Cross, and the surgeon will undoubtedly perish with the wounded whom he has come to succour. We would substitute for the present system an organisation which would attempt to grapple with the problem of treating the wounded by the aid of the field hospitals well in the rear, to which no one would be brought till the fighting had ceased. The idea of carrying off the wounded from the modern battlefield while the fight is still raging is utterly absurd, and should be dismissed at once, while the system which would needlessly sacrifice the lives of the majority of our army surgeons, at the very time when they would be most useful, is utterly indefensible, and opposed to all experience and common sense. The lot of the wounded in the next European war will be terrible enough in any case; it will not be improved by a measure of the doctors.

August 16, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

Hunger suggests food; so the sense of sin suggests Christ, who saves from sin.

It is God who gives the sinner the consciousness of sin; for "by the law is the knowledge of sin." Rom. iii. 20.

Sin is separation from God. As soon as the sinner realises his sin, he is conscious of separation from God, and a sense of helplessness, and a feeling that he is lost, comes upon him.

The first effect of this consciousness of sin is commonly a feeling of despondency and almost despair. This feeling often comes upon the Christian who has been allowing more place in his heart to the world than to Christ. That is simply the emissaries of Satan saying, "There is no help for thee in God."

But the fact that it is God Himself who gives the consciousness of sin, is sufficient evidence that there is hope. It is He who makes us feel our need, in order that we may be reminded of the help that He has provided, just as the feeling of hunger makes a man think of food, or the cold makes him think of fire.

The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses from all sin. 1 John i. 7. "In Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ." Eph. ii. 13. "Christ also hath once suffered" for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God." 1 Peter iii. 18. Therefore although sin is separation from God, the very moment we become conscious of that separation, we are reminded of the blood which brings us near again. So God causes the light to shine out of darkness, and makes His strength perfect in weakness, if we but heed His word.

"'The Sinner'" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

"The Sinner."-The literal rendering of the publican's prayer is, "God be merciful to me, the sinner." See margin of Revised Version. That presents the most marked contrast to the prayer of the Pharisee, who saw everybody's sins except his own. The publican saw himself as the only sinner. That is the characteristic of true conviction of sin. He who has learned of the Lord, will see himself to be so great a sinner that he cannot imagine anyone else as bad as himself. So Paul said, "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief." The closer we get to the Lord, the keener becomes our consciousness of imperfection, and therefore the farther we are from criticising our neighbours.

"Trusting and Rejoicing" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

Trusting and Rejoicing.-"But let all those that put their trust in Thee rejoice; let them ever shout for joy, because Thou defendest them; let them also that love Thy name be joyful in Thee." Ps. v. 11. Although this was written by David, it is the language of the Holy Spirit. Now when the Lord says, Let a thing be, it is the same as saying, It shall be. When the Lord said, "Let there be light," it meant, There shall be light. When He says, Let it be, it is so. Therefore we may read this psalm, as it is indicated in the margin of the Revised Version. "All those that trust in Thee shall rejoice; they shall ever shout for joy, because Thou defendest them; they also that love Thy name shall be joyful in Thee." If we are not rejoicing, that is evidence that we are not trusting the Lord.

"Joy in the Lord" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

Joy in the Lord.-I suppose that the most common idea of God is that He is gloomy and austere, and too much absorbed in the great business of managing the universe to take any pleasure. Satan likes to have men think of God as unattractive. But the fact is that God is joy itself. "In Thy presence is fullness of joy; at Thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore." Ps. xvi. 11. The kindness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost." Love and joy are the very first among the fruits of the Spirit. Joy is inseparable from the Lord. Therefore everyone who knows the Lord must be joyful. When professed followers of Christ give unbelievers the idea that if they begin to serve the Lord they will have to become gloomy, they misrepresent the Lord. The only strength of the Christian is the joy of the Lord.

"Preaching the Word" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

In Rom. iii. 10-18 we have an illustration of the way in which the apostles used the Old Testament, the only portion of Scripture in their possession. They wasted no time criticising it, or discussing its credibility, but quoted it as final authority. The following quotations are taken from the passage above indicated, and the references are to the places in the Old Testament, from which the apostle cited them. As it is written,

"There is none righteous, no, not one: there is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there

514

is none that doeth good, no, not one." See Ps. xiv. 1-3; liii. 1-3.

"Their throat is an open sepulcher; with their tongues they have used deceit." See Ps. v. 9.

"The poison of asps is under their lips." See Ps. cxl. 3.

"Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness." See Ps. x. 7.

"Their feet are swift to shed blood; destruction and misery are in their ways; and the way of peace have they not known." See Prov. i. 16; Isa. lix. 7, 8.

"There is no fear of God before their eyes." See Ps. xxxvi. 1.

This is an illustration of what is meant by the command, "Preach the word." 2 Tim. iv. 2. It does not mean to quote a verse at the beginning of a discourse, and then to evolve the rest out of one's own head. That is not preaching in the Scripture sense, no matter how good the talk is. To preach the word means to present the word pure and unadulterated, leaving it to accomplish that for which it is sent.

"Walking in Light" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

One way of stating the difference between a Christian and one who is not a Christian, though he may claim and appear to be such, is to say that he who loves the light is a Christian, and that he who loves not the light is not a Christian. The light is the truth; and he who loves not the truth does not please God. Those who are afraid to hear and know all the will of God, which may be known from His word, lest they should thereby learn of disagreeable duties, are not in harmony with God. If God were first in their love, and if they had faith in Him, they would feel no hesitation in such a matter, but would desire to know more and more of the will of God, because they had pleasure in doing it. Conversion is something more than mere outward conformity to some part of the will of God, even though that conformity may cover all that the individual knows of His will. There must be also a love of the truth. Those who have not the love of the truth will not keep the truth when they receive it. And such, says the Apostle Paul, are the ones in whom Satan will work "with all deceivableness of unrighteousness," making them his dupes and causing them to believe the worst of lies. 2 Thess. ii. 9-12.

The wicked will be condemned in the Judgment not only for the truth which they heard and knew, but for that which they might have known yet refused to know. And since the result of turning away the ears from hearing the truth is to be turned unto fables (2 Tim. iv. 4), they will incur further condemnation for the lies which they have thereby been made to believe and practise. Those who excuse themselves now from doing God's will, by refusing to hear and learn that will, will not dare to utter their excuse at the bar of God. Their course only proves that they love self more than God. "For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved; but he that doeth truth cometh to the light, lest hid deeds should be reproved; but he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God." John iii. 20, 21. "God is a Spirit; and they that worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in truth." Chap. iv. 24.

"Studies in Romans. The Sum of the Matter. Rom. iii. 1-18" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

We have now finished the study of the first two chapters of the book of Romans, and it is time to take a brief review. It is not really correct to say that we have finished the study of these two chapters, because we can never finish the study of any portion of the Bible. After we have put the most profound study upon any portion of the Scripture, the most that we have done is only a beginning. If Newton, after a long life of study of natural science, could say that he seemed to be as a child playing on the seashore with the vast ocean before him unexplored, with much more aptness can the same be said by the greatest student of the Bible.

Let no one therefore think that we have by any means exhausted this portion of the book. When the reader has the text well in mind, so that he can quite distinctly recall any passage at will, and can locate it with reference to the connection, he has just got where he can begin to study with real profit. Therefore let the reader who is anxious to acquire an understanding of the Scriptures for himself, dwell upon the words as though he were digging in a sure place for treasure. An inexhaustible one awaits his search.

We found that the first portion of the first chapter, containing the salutation, some personal remarks, and the statement of the theme, really contains an epitome of the whole Gospel.

Then we have the record of how men who knew God lost their knowledge of Him, and became fools, the chapter closing with a description of the condition of men who forget God.

Leaving out the introduction, we might say that the first chapter is devoted to a statement of the origin of heathenism, and the condition of the heathen world.

The second chapter is really summed up in the first verse, "Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest; for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things." The remaining verses are but an amplification of this statement.

Thus, we find that there is no exception to the fact that the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. Hearing and knowing the truth is not a substitute for practicing it. God is no

515

respecter of persons, but will punish sin wherever it is found.

Following this general statement of the case, we have an appeal directly to those who have the greatest amount of light and knowledge. In that it is shown that mere profession counts for nothing. The man who is nominally in the church, but who is guilty of the practices against which he preaches, is no better than the worldling who does the same things. Not only so, but he himself is actually a worldling. Circumcision is make uncircumcision through disobedience. The professed Christian who does not know the Lord is counted as the heathen who does not know the Lord; only the one who has the greater light is the worse of the two, and will be held accountable for more.

Accepted with God.-In the house of Cornelius the apostle Peter made a statement: "Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons; but in every nation he that feareth Him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with Him." Acts x. 34, 35. There are men in heathen lands who may never have heard the name of God, or seen a line of His written word, who will be saved. God is revealed in the works of creation, and they who accept what they see of Him there are accepted with Him as surely as they who have learned much more of Him.

God's Impartiality.-The Scriptures bring to view the fact that there will be in the kingdom of God representatives from every people, and every class of people in the world. "After this I beheld, and lo, a great multitude which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands; and cried with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb." Rev. vii. 9, 10. Thus at the last will it be revealed most emphatically that all sinners are "without excuse." No people can come up in the Judgment and say to the Lord, "You did not give me a fair chance," because right before them, among the saved, will be some from their own time and nation, thus showing that God is not only willing that all should come to repentance, but that He has also given all an opportunity to repent.

OBJECTIONS ANSWERED

The first part of the third chapter of Romans consists of questions and answers. The thoughtful reader of the epistles of Paul must have noticed the frequent occurrence of questions in the midst of an argument. Every possible objection is anticipated. The apostle asks the question that an objector might ask, and then answers it, making his argument more emphatic than before. So in the verses next following it is very evident that the truths set forth in the second chapter would not be very acceptable to a Pharisee, and he would combat them with all his might. The questions raised by the apostle are not difficulties that lie in his own mind; this is clear from the parenthetical clause in verse 5, "I speak as a man." With this in mind, we may read Rom. iii. 1-18:-

"What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision? Much every way; chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God. For what if some did not believe? shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect? God forbid; yea, let God be true, but every man a liar; as it is written, That Thou mightest be justified in Thy sayings, and mightest overcome when Thou art judged. But if our unrighteousness commend the righteousness of God, what shall we say? Is God unrighteous who taketh vengeance? (I speak as a man.) God forbid; for then how shall God judge the world? For if the truth of God hath more abounded through my lie unto His glory; why yet am I also judged as a sinner? And not rather (as we be slanderously reported, and as some affirm that we say), Let us do evil, that good may come? whose damnation is just. What then? are we better than they? No, in nowise; for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin; as it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one; there is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips; whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood; destruction and misery are in their ways; and the way of peace have they not known; there is no fear of God before their eyes."

As this text consists almost wholly of questions and sharp, clear answers, we shall not, as heretofore, specially question the text. Read it carefully.

"The Oracles of God."-An oracle is something spoken. That which was emphatically spoken by the mouth of the Lord is the ten commandments. See Deut. v. 22. Stephen, speaking of Moses receiving the law, said, "This is he, that was in the church in the wilderness with the angel which spake to him in the Mount Sina, and with our fathers; who received the lively oracles to give unto us." Acts vii. 38. The ten commandments are primarily the oracles of God, because they were uttered by His own voice in the hearing of the people. But the Holy Scriptures as a whole are the oracles of God, since they are the word of God, spoken "in divers manners" (Heb. i. 1), and because they are but an expansion of the ten commandments. Christians are to shape their lives solely by the Bible. This is seen from the words of the apostle Peter: "If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God." 1 Peter iv. 11.

The Law an Advantage.-There are many who think that the law of God is a burden, and they imagine that the advantage of Christians is that they have nothing to do with it. But on the contrary, John says, "This is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not grievous." 1 John v. 3. And Paul says that the possession of the law was a great advantage to the Jew. So Moses said: "What nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day?" Deut. iv. 8. All who truly love the Lord, count it a great blessing to have God's holy law made plain to them.

"Committed."-The advantage of the Jew was not simply in the fact that to them were made known the oracles of God, but that "unto them were committed the oracles of God," or "they were intrusted with the oracles of God." That is, the law was given to them to hold in trust for others, and not simply for their own benefit. They were to be the missionaries to the whole world. The advantage and the honour conferred upon the Jewish nation in intrusting them with the law of God to make it known to the world, can not be estimated.

Tell It to Others.-When Peter and John were arrested and threatened for preaching Christ who is simply the living law in perfection, they said, "We can not but speak the things which we have seen and heard." Acts iv. 20. They who appreciate the gift which God commits to them must tell it to others. Some think that it is useless to carry the Gospel to the heathen when they hear that God justifies the heathen who walk according to the little light that shines to them just the same as he does the person who walks according to the light that shines from the written word. They think that the wicked heathen are in no worse case than the unfaithful professed Christians. None who appreciate the blessings of the Lord could think so. Light is a blessing. The more people know of the Lord, the more they can rejoice in Him, and all who truly know the Lord must be desirous of helping to spread the "good tidings of great joy" to all the people for whom it is designed.

God's Faithfulness.-"What if some were without faith? Shall their want of faith make of none effect the faithfulness of God?" A very pertinent question. It is an appeal to the faithful of God. Will He break His promise, because of man's unbelief? Will He be unfaithful because man is unfaithful? Will our wavering cause God to waver? "That can not possibly be;" for this is the force of the

516

expression which is incorrectly rendered, "God forbid." God will be true even though every man be a liar. "If we believe not, yet He abideth faithful; He can not deny Himself." 2 Tim. ii. 13. "Thy mercy, O Lord, is in the heavens; and Thy faithfulness reacheth unto the clouds." Ps. xxxvi. 5.

Power and Faithfulness.-Some one might hastily affirm that this overthrows the previous statements, that only those who have faith are heirs of the promise; for "how can it be that only the faithful are Abraham's seed, and thus heirs, if God will fulfil His promise even though every man disbelieves?" Very easily, when we consider the Scriptures and the power of God. Listen to the words of John the Baptist to the wicked Jews who could be fitly characterised only as "vipers:" "Think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our father; for I say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham." Matt. iii. 9. God will bestow the inheritance only on the faithful; but if every man should prove unfaithful, He who made man of the dust of the ground can of the stones raise other people, who will believe.

God Justified.-"That Thou mightest be justified in Thy sayings, and mightest overcome when Thou art judged." God is now accused by Satan of injustice and indifference, and even of cruelty. Thousands have echoed the charge. But the judgment will declare the righteousness of God. His character, as well as that of man, is on trial. In the judgment every act, both of God and man, that has been done since creation will be seen by all in all its bearings. And when everything is seen in that perfect light, God will be acquitted of all wrongdoing, even by His enemies.

Commending God's Righteousness.-Verses five and seven are but different forms of the same thought. God's righteousness stands out in bold relief in contrast with man's unrighteousness. So the caviler thinks that God ought not to condemn the unrighteousness which by contrast commends his righteousness. But that would be to destroy the righteousness of God, so that He could not judge the world. If God were what unbelieving men say He ought to be, He would forfeit even their respect, and they would condemn Him more loudly than they do now.

"I Speak as a Man."-Was not Paul a man? Most certainly. Was he ever anything other than a man? Never. Then why the expression, "I speak as a man"? Because the writings of Paul, like those of the ancient prophets, were given by inspiration of God. The Holy Spirit spoke by him. We are not reading Paul's view of the Gospel, but the Spirit's own statement of it. But in these questions the Spirit speaks as a man; that is, the Spirit quotes the unbelieving words of man in order to show the folly of that unbelief.

Unbelieving Questions.-There is a great difference in questions. Some are asked for the purpose of gaining instruction, and others are asked for the purpose of opposing the truth. So there must be a difference in answering them. Some questions deserve no more notice than would be given the same unbelief if uttered as a positive statement. When Mary asked, "How shall this be?" (Luke i. 34) with a desire for further information, she was told how. But when Zacharias asked, "Whereby shall I know this?" (Luke i. 18), thus plainly showing his disbelief of the angel's words, he was punished.

Wickedness Exposed.-When the objector says, "If the truth of God hath more abounded through my lie unto His glory, why yet am I also judged as a sinner?" the swift retort comes, in effect: "You might rather say, what you really mean is, Let us do evil that good may come." The real intent of these unbelieving questions is that what which is called evil is really good; people are really righteous, no matter what they may do, so that good will at last come out of evil. This is the substance of modern Spiritualism and of Universalism, which teach that all men will be saved.

Evil Is not Good.-There are many besides Spiritualists who virtually say, "Let us do evil that good may come." Who are they? All who claim that man is able of himself to do any good thing. The Lord declares that only God is good, and that good can come only from good. See Luke xviii. 19 and vi. 43-45. From man only wickedness can come. Mark vii. 21-23. Therefore he who thinks that of himself he alone can do good deeds, really says that good can come from evil. The same thing is said by the one who refuses to confess that he is a sinner. Such an one is placing himself above God, for even he can not make evil into good. God can make an evil man good, but only by putting his own goodness in place of the evil.

"All Under Sin."-The objector is silenced by the exposure of his infidel sentiments; the damnation of those who hold such positions is just; and now the conclusion is emphatically stated, namely, that all men, both Jews and Gentiles, are alike under sin. Thus the way is fully prepared for the further conclusion that there is but one way of salvation for all men. The one who has been brought up within the sound of church bells and who hears the Scriptures read every day, has the same sinful nature and the same need of a Saviour, that the savage has. No one can justly despise another.

All Out of the Way.-When the apostle wrote concerning both Jews and Gentiles, "They are all gone out of the way," he was but repeating what Isaiah had written hundreds of years before: "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all." Isa. liii. 6.

"The Way of Peace."-"The way of peace have they not known" because they refused to know the God of peace. It has already been shown that God's law is His way; therefore, since He is the God of peace, His law is the way of peace. So He says, "O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea." Isa. lviii. 18. "Great peace have they which love Thy law; and nothing shall offend them," or, "they shall have no stumbling-block." Ps. cxix. 162. So he who prepares the way of the Lord, by giving knowledge of remission of sins, guides our feet into the way of peace (Luke i. 76-79), because he brings us into the righteousness of God's law.

"Subject to the Pope" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

Every trivial detail of the life of the Roman clergy would seem to be subject to the Pope. "Our Rome correspondent informs us," says the Chronicle, "that the Vatican has recently decided that the clergy may use bicycles if the needs of the ministry require it."

"Not Learned of Christ" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

The Christian signifies a follower of Christ, but in conventional usage it may have a very different meaning. For instance, a contemporary reports that "every native in Samoa is a professing Christian in connection with some denomination, and Protestants are the most numerous." At the same time we learn from a Reuter's despatch that "desultory fighting still continues in Samoa between the King's warriors and the insurgents, and several men have been killed and wounded on both sides. Both parties continue the practice of beheading their prisoners."

Yet they doubtless still profess to be Christians, and excepting perhaps the practice of beheading prisoners, there are many who would not consider them inconsistent in holding to the profession while engaged in war.

But no one ever learned fighting of Christ. The Samoan simply lapses into his former nature when he starts out to kill a brother islander. And who can set up one standard for the South Sea islander and another for the European? Does the Christian German shoot his brother Christian on the French side of the line by authority of the text, "Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God"?

"Giving to the Lord" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

No person is ready properly to give anything to the Lord until he is ready to say with the Psalmist, "The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein." The very essence of giving is acknowledgement that God is, independently of anything we may do, the rightful owner of all things; that the thing we give is His, and was His before we gave it.

It would not be possible to give that which is due the Lord from us, in any other way. Thus we find in the ninety-sixth Psalm the exhortation, "Give unto the Lord the glory due unto His name." Verses 7, 8. But what glory and strength has man to give unto the Lord? Even if man possessed some glory and strength, how could he possibly give to the Lord "the glory due unto His name?" It is very evident that all any person can do to this end is simply to confess that infinite glory and strength belong to God, and that God has them. And so likewise in presenting any other gift to Him, as a gift of money, we must give it as an acknowledgment that all our wealth really belongs to Him. Nor can we say that we have given ourselves to Him unless we did it as a confession that we were His already, both because He created us by the blood of Christ.

Yet, though we have nothing worth giving to the Lord, He has wonderfully and graciously provided that in offering Him this feeble praise we should actually glorify Him, and He accepts our "gifts" as graciously as though He were on even terms with us, and gives us all the credit of having done Him a service.

"Believing unto Righteousness" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

The difference between a righteous man and a sinner is much more than a mere difference of belief. It is more than a mere arbitrary reckoning on the part of God. It is a real difference, and one that is exactly expressed by the difference in the terms by which they are designated. When God calls a man a sinner, he is a sinner; and when He calls a man righteous, he is righteous in reality, as much so as if he had never sinned. There is no virtue in mere intellectual assent. God never declares a person righteous simply because he makes an acknowledgement of the truth. And there is an actual, literal change from the state of sin to righteousness, which justifies God in making the declaration.

It is with the heart, and not with the mind merely, that man believeth unto righteousness. Rom. x. 10. Heart belief represents not only an acknowledgement of the truth, but a love of it. And love of the truth is but another expression for love of God; for all truth is a manifestation of God, and all truth culminates in Him. Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." To love the truth which God has revealed is to love Him; and to love Him is to open our hearts to Him so that His will may have free course in our lives. When the heart is open to God freely, He comes and dwells in it; not by a figure of speech, but actually, and His presence there is made manifest by love, for God is love, and love has no other source. "We know that we have passed from death into life, because we love the brethren." John iii. 14.

"With God is the fountain of life." Ps. xxxvi. 9. Hence that heart in which God dwells has in it the fountain of perpetual youth; so that "though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." 2 Cor. iv. 16. The inward man is the new creation, which is wrought by the presence of God, wherever, and whenever His will has free course. We are exhorted to "put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness." Eph. iv. 24.

Though our outward man perish, and give no indication of any difference between us and those who know not God, there is nevertheless a new creature with which we are identical, and that new creature is righteousness, as are all creatures when they come from the hand of God. Therefore by opening our hearts to God we become truly and literally righteous, so that it is no figure of speech on the part of God to pronounce us so, and no fact is set aside by His declaration. He is the Creator; and as such He can create us new within, even though the new creature be not visible to human sight, as easily as He could create man at the beginning.

And when Christ shall appear again in the clouds of heaven to receive His people, this mortal will put on immortality, and in the twinkling of an eye these bodies will be changed to correspond with the new creation within, which has been made in righteousness and holiness. That will be a change of the outward man, by the same power which has wrought the invisible change within, and it will make the righteous to shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.

"Bulgaria Needs the Gospel" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

The idea that the ministry may be chosen as a profession, as one would choose a business calling, is unfortunately not unknown in our own country; but in Bulgaria it seems to be the accepted thing. The very idea shows that the one entertaining it regards the duties of religion just as any pagan priest regards the service of his gods-as a round of ceremonials to be mechanically performed. In his recently published book on Bulgaria, Professor Dicey speaks of the difficulty which the bishops of the Bulgarian Church find in filling the ranks of the clergy with people of intelligence, the more able men choosing other callings. He says:-

"I am told, too, that the post of pope, as the village priests are called, has become much less attractive than it used to be owing to the changed condition of the country. In the Turkish days the pope was usually given the privilege of keeping the village

518

liquor store. This is now altered, and the popes, therefore, are neither so well-to-do nor so influential in position as they were formerly. Moreover, in Bulgaria, as in most other countries where the Greek Faith is the national religion, the priesthood is almost always recruited from the lower ranks of the community. Ritual, as I have said, is more important than dogma; to intone well is a gift of more value to a parish priest than to possess the power of preaching. The high aspirations which, in other lands, lead men to become ministers of the sanctuary in the hope of saving souls, can hardly find much scope in a church where the possession of a fine figure and a flowing beard are indispensable requisites for high ecclesiastical preferment."

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

-Suicides continue to be on the increase in Paris.

-Naturalists assert that a healthy swallow will devour 6,000 files every day.

-Buildings covering half a square mile have been destroyed by a fire in Chicago.

-Korea umbrellas are of oiled paper, have no handles, and are simply worn over the hat.

-The value of real estate in London is estimated at ?888,500,000; and that of Paris at ?583,500,000.

-The town of Minsk, in Russia, has been visited by a disastrous fire, supposed to be the work of an incendiary.

-Official despatches received at Washington from Nicaragua, state that Blueffields has been captured by the Nicaraguan army.

-Reports received August 9 from Galicia and Bukowina show that cholera prevails in seventeen administrative districts in those provinces.

-The Russian Government is trying the experiment of growing tea in the Caucasus. The results so far are said to be very successful.

-Attempts were recently made in America to rob the grave of President Andrew Jackson, and to kidnap the children of President Cleveland.

-A severe earthquake shock was felt in the island of Sicily, August 8. Many buildings were shaken down, and some loss of life is reported.

-A well-known sculptor is at work in Rome preparing the tomb for Pope Leo. It is to be of black marble, surmounted by the figure of a lion.

-A telegram from Charkoff, in Russia, states that a powder magazine, near Stavropol, has blown up, ten persons being killed. The cause of the disaster is not known.

-The Turkish authorities have ordered the repair, at a cost of ?80,000, of the old aqueducts of Solomon at Jerusalem, which were in working order to the time of Christ.

-A poverty-stricken man and wife poisoned themselves in London rather than enter the work-house. This and similar incidents has led to an agitation for reform in the administration of these institutions.

-An infant was suffocated by its veil in London while being carried by its mother. The coroner warned mothers against placing veils over infants' faces. Their breath makes the veil wet, and they are in danger of suffocation.

-An insurrection has broken out in Peru. A telegram from Valparaiso states that Trujillo has been captured by Seminario's forces, and that the Government troops sent to attack the rebels at Junin have declared in favour of the insurgents.

-For some time past bears have appeared in Finland in unusually large numbers, end their ravages among sheep and cattle have been so serious that the Government has decided upon sending out detachments of troops to hunt them down.

-A council of all the Roman Catholic bishops and suffragans in India will be held at Goa towards the beginning of next December. The last occasion of the holding of such an assembly was in 1606. The prelates will be accompanied by numerous theologians.

-There are now eleven cables across the Atlantic and the twelfth is being put down. In the whole world there are 150,000 miles of submarine cable, representing ?40,000,000 of capital, and there are 2,000,000 miles of overland wire, representing ?65,000,000 of capital.

-The Pope has issued a new Encyclical, which concludes by counselling the Bishops to found charitable associations of laymen, and after reminding them that the Press is a secular weapon which ecclesiastics should know how to employ, declares that they should also make political elections the object of their care and solicitude.

-There is a momentary lull in the war tempest which has been raging about Korea, for the reason, as is supposed, that the belligerent powers are occupying themselves with preparations for a decisive struggle. A long and bitter contest between them is expected. Meanwhile the Russian troops are said to have been reinforced on the Korean frontier.

-An English journal states that the density of the population of China is to that of she population of England as one is to six; and in a list of the countries of the world arranged according to the proportion which their population boars to their extent, the Celestial Empire would come it long way after Scotland, and not over-much in advance of Norway.

-A serious religious riot occurred August 7, in Quebec. A French Baptist mission was wrecked by a mob of French Canadians, and the missionaries in the building barely escaped with their lives. The mob afterwards attacked the French Anglican mission and the Salvation Army Barracks, much damage being done. The police finally dispersed the rioters.

-Some "shining specks" which have been noticed on the planet Mars, now in a favourable position for observation, have led to much speculation among scientists and others, from which have come theories of snow-capped mountains illuminated by the sun, forest fires, and even of signals to earth by the Martian inhabitants.

-Details have been received of the destruction by fire of the town of Kazan, in Bulgaria. The flames raged for thirty-six hours, destroyed all the public buildings, and three parts of the town. Up to the present time 130 bodies have been recovered from the dÈbris. The Government have sent tents and provisions for the homeless people, together with 50,000 francs in money.

-Railways are comparatively few in Norway, owing to the cost of construction in a mountainous country, and to the disinclination of the apple to speculative enterprise. The highways, however, are excellent, and one may "travel post" almost anywhere in a public carriole or post-chaise. The post stations are seven miles apart, and the traveller changes vehicles at each station.

-The United States Senate has passed an anti-Anarchist measure, by which no alien Anarchist is permitted to enter the United States. The Bill provides that a thorough inquiry shall take place before any intending immigrant is rejected. Inspectors are appointed to examine all passengers, and any Anarchist who makes a second attempt to land is liable to four years' imprisonment.

-In Russia, about 100 days per year are devoted to ecclesiastical "fasts and festivals." The priests commonly celebrate these occasions by getting drunk, and their flocks largely follow their example. Those of the peasantry who have attained to a religion which is a real power upon character, the Stundists, namely, have broken from orthodoxy, and given evidence of their Christianity and their common sense by devoting these aforetime worse than wasted days to sober and cheerful industry.

-The American Methodist Episcopal Church South took the following step regarding Church discipline at its late meeting: "Let all our preachers and members abstain from the manufacture or sale of intoxicating liquors to he used as a beverage, from signing petitions for such sale, from becoming bondsmen for any person as a condition for obtaining a licence, and from renting property to be used for such sale. If any member shall violate any of the provisions of this paragraph, he shall be deemed guilty of an immorality."

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

The following bit of wisdom is credited to Philip Skelton, an Irish clergyman of the eighteen century: "The devil has more authority in this world than some people are apt to think; he is called in Scripture the god of this world, the prince of this world, the prince of the power of the air, and accordingly disposes of many places a profit in it, bestowing high offices on persons of his own choosing."

The Echo says that millions of people in Italy are so poor that they are compelled to restrict their consumption of so cheap an article as salt; and then it ironically adds, "But have they not just had a glorious compensation? Their newly-launched monster of a battle-ship can steam three miles an hour faster than any other monster in the world." Strange to say, many of those who are deprived of the necessaries of life in order that these monsters of destruction may be manufactured, will take off their hats and shout at the thought of the military "glory" of their country.

The sculptor is at work upon the tomb designed for the Pope. One design in the monument is a figure holding a lighted torch in one hand and the Holy Scriptures in the other. It is meant to signify that the Papacy is a friend to the Holy Scriptures; but in view of the testimony of history as to the many times the hand of Rome has applied the lighted torch to the Scriptures, even the Roman Catholic can hardly blame us if the figure suggests the historical attitude of the Church of Rome toward the word of God.

We have heard criticism of the PRESENT TRUTH, which very much pleases us. One lady who had read a few numbers of the paper, but declined to take it in any longer, saying, "It doesn't contain anything that I cannot find in the Bible." May it ever be thus. We have no ambition to be considered wise above that which is written, when it is written in the law of the Lord. "If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God," whether he speak with an audible voice, or on paper.

It is a curious spectacle which is presented in the far East, as well as a mournful one; a spectacle unique in human history,-two heathen nations fighting each other with the weapons and the methods furnished them by their civilised, "Christian" neighbours. Having invented and perfected weapons of awfully destructive power, these "Christian" nations furnish them for a good price to two semi-civilised powers, and then look on with great interest at the slaughter. It is verily a curious kind of Christianity which allows a nation to help its neighbours to fight, to say nothing of incurring great expense in order to be ready itself to fight at any moment. Christians are not fighters, but peacemakers.

"Publications Issued" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

Publications Issued.-Some figures from the annual summary of business done by our publishers, the International Tract Society, will be of interest to many. Publications have been sent out during the fifteen months ending June 30, as follows 73,038 tracts, 3044 pamphlets, 30,799 volumes of books. The list value of these is ?15,907. A large proportion of these publications have been sold in the colonies.

"Gambling" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

Gambling.-A writer in the Echo on the betting evil now and a generation or so ago, says:-

The betting of ninety years ago is not known to have run high; and what there was of it was confined to the rich-the gambling among working-women, and lads and lasses, which is prevalent in the manufacturing towns to-day, was absolutely unknown then.

Thus, while the evil was perhaps more shamelessly indulged in by the rich then, now it has permeated all classes, and is doing more to demoralise the people than ever in the past.

"Plain Words" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

Plain Words.-Preaching in Westminster Abbey recently, Archdeacon Farrar is reported to have said:-

Now, as of old, the deadliest peril to Christianity rose from the unreality of Christians. He had long been convinced that many of their opinions and principles in these days differed enormously from the simple Gospel which Christ preached. They much more resembled the dead Judaism of priests and Pharisees; while in the world self-seeking, worldly torpidity, and the semblances of religion prevail among trimmers and half-and-half people, or people who were nothing at all except in church. If these were bitter truths, it was their duty to speak truths, however bitter, rather than soft platitudes and silken euphemisms.

He urged his hearers to "burn up the ecclesiastical superstructures of wood, hay, straw, stubble," and return to the simplicity which is in Christ Jesus.

"Our Strength" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

Our Strength.-The word of God is always ready with an answer for all the doubts and discouragements of human nature. To the thought that you are too weak to overcome, and therefore might as well give up, the answer of Scripture is, "Strengthened with all might." Col. i. 11. Were the power offered us any less than this we might have cause for discouragement; but with "all might" working in us against sin and temptation, we can no more be overcome than can God Himself.

"Not an Ideal Settlement" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

Not an Ideal Settlement.-A Sicilian correspondent of Dalziel's news agency describes an Anarchist settlement on the island of Ustica, to which the Italian Government has been sending its more dangerous Anarchists. The average militant Anarchist is evidently not inclined to work when he can avoid it; for we read:-

Ustica, a rocky islet, about four hours' sail from this port, has a population at present of about 570 Anarchists and a few officials. By far the greater number of the Anarchists simply idle the time away, absolutely declining to work, and are quite content to live on the 70 centimes a day allowed them by the Government. The industrious portion of the prisoners numbers about 140, of whom about seventy are engaged in agricultural labour and the remainder occupy themselves as tailors, shoemakers, etc.

"China and Opium" The Present Truth 10, 33.

E. J. Waggoner

China and Opium.-Mr. J. G. Alexander, of the Society for the Suppression of the Opium Trade, has lately visited China. He saw the leading statesmen of the empire, and found all of them of one accord against the trade, but feeling that they can do nothing to avert the ruin that opium is working so long as the British Government upholds the traffic. Of his interview with a Peking official of the Foreign Board of China, Mr. Alexander says:-

Speaking as official representative of the Board, he assured me that the Government of China is just as much opposed to the opium trade as ever it was; that it considers itself bound to admit opium by its treaty engagements with Great Britain; that it dares not close its ports to India and opium, lest it should bring on another opium war; and that we can best help China in the matter by persuading our Government to stop the export of opium from India to China.

August 23, 1894

"The Harvest" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

"The harvest is truly great, but the labourers are few; pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that He would send forth labourers into His harvest."

Does the Saviour mean by this that the Lord of the harvest is indifferent to the needs of the field, and must be moved to take an interest in it? Not by any means; for He Himself is loudly calling, "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" Isa. vi. 8.

Then what does He mean by telling us to pray that He will send forth labourers into His harvest? The answer is suggested by the prayer which Isaiah, his lips burning with holy fire, uttered just after hearing the Lord's call. Isaiah said, "Here am I; send me."

Isaiah had no sooner prayed thus to the Lord, than the answer came, "Go." The Lord immediately sent him forth into the harvest-field. This commission was to last "until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land be utterly desolate." Verse 11. That is, until the end of the world. It therefore includes us.

Therefore the answer which we are to expect to our prayer that the Lord of the harvest would send forth labourers, is, "Go." Only unselfish prayers may be expected to be answered, and no unselfish person would ask the Lord to send somebody else to do work which he himself is not willing to do.

But where are we to ask Him to send us? "Into the harvest," for that is what He tells us to pray for. And where is that? "The field is the world." Matt. xiii. 38. Christ's parting words were, "Go ye into all the world." Mark xvi. 15.

But someone will say, "I am ready to go, but I am waiting to find out what part of the world He wishes me to go." What! have you not learned the prayer? Read the command again. It does not tell us to pray that the Lord would send us to some particular spot, but into the harvest, which is the world. Well, you are there now, are you not? Then if you have a mind to work your prayer is answered. What shall you do?-"Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do."

It is a strange idea that many have, that they must get away from where they are, in order to be missionaries in the Lord's harvest-field. People who live in England, or in any other country, are in the world just as much as they would be if they should cross the ocean. The same principle that would make it necessary for them to leave the place where they are, in order to enter the harvest-field, would oblige them to leave any other place where they might be located. Thus they would continually be moving, accomplishing nothing.

He who cannot work for the Lord where he is now, will certainly not be able to work for Him in any other place where he may be. The journey from one place to another does not make one a missionary. A man may have travelled round the world, and still not be a missionary. It is very evident that what a man is in his native land, that he will be in any other land. He who does the work of the Lord where he is now, will be likely to keep on doing that work if duty calls him somewhere else.

To be a missionary in the great harvest-field, therefore, is simply to "let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in heaven." It is "to do all things without murmurings and disputings; that ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world; holding forth the word of life."

Christ did not send,
But came Himself to save;
The ransom price He did not lend,
But gave.

"Heresy and Heretics" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

The word "heretic" occurs but once in the Bible; the word "heresy" occurs four times, once in the singular, and three times in the plural. The full meeting of the word "heresy" is very concisely put by Mr. Gladstone, in his article on "The Place of Heresy and Schism in the Modern Christian Church," in the current number of the Nineteenth Century. He says of heresy, "It means self-chosen and self-formed opinion. The Gospel is not chosen or formed by us: but fashioned by God, and tendered for our acceptance."

That is the whole case in a nut-shell. God is the only Source of truth. Only those are heretics who will not accept the word of God. He who accepts God's will as final is not an heretic, although he may be alone in his belief. Since God, and not the church, is the standard authority, and the source of truth, a man is not necessarily an

530

heretic because he is not in harmony with what is called "the church." As a general thing it is the majority of "the church" who are "heretics," that is, choosers of their ways rather than of God's, while those who cling closely to the word of God are the few.

God is no respecter of persons; all are alike before Him. Therefore one man has as much right to choose for himself as any other, or as all other men. Therefore heresy is not a term that can properly be applied to a man because of any relation that he sustains to "the church." Heresy can exist only in relation to God.

This fact was recognised by the Apostle Paul when he was accused before Felix. He did not admit that he was an heretic, but said, "After the way which they call heresy, so worship I the God of my fathers," and then showed that he was not an heretic, by adding, "believing all things which are written in law and in the prophets." Acts xxiv. 14.

As no one on earth has the power to define and set the limits of the truth of God, no one has the authority to declare any other one an heretic. Men have no right to go beyond the inspired instruction, "Preach the word." If the church of Christ does this, it may leave the responsibility of choosing for themselves or allowing God to choose for them, to those who hear; and to God may be left the responsibility of deciding who has chosen well.

"Faith Shown by Works" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

Faith Shown by Works.-"Show me thy faith without thy works," writes the Apostle James, "and I will show thee faith by my works." James ii. 18. Many people to-day are deluding themselves with what the apostle calls "dead" faith, which is your profession. "It is very easy for a man to deceive himself as to his real love of God unless he translates his spiritual affections into deeds. What passes for real love of the Heavenly Father may easily be only sentiment, or vacuity, or even sloth and self-seeking. . . . What visions of devotion, what scenes of heroism, what deep and beautiful thoughts of heaven sometimes float before the idle contemplation of a thoroughly selfish man! But rouse him-touch him with the spear's tip of the angel-and his airy fancies vanish like smoke, and nothing is left but the noisome sight of self crawling off as fast as it can to hide itself."

Works, however, do not come first, for good fruit cannot proceed out of a corrupt tree, and all men are by nature corrupt. Nor does a good tree exert itself to bring forth good fruit. Faith is the gift of God, bestowed on whosoever will yield himself to God; and this gift, by the power inherent within it, transforms itself through the man into good works.

"Studies in Romans. A Wonderful Manifestation. Rom. iii. 19-22" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

The portion of Romans thus far studied has shown us both Jews and Gentiles in the same sinful condition. No one has anything whereof to boast over another. Whoever, whether in the church or out, begins to judge and condemn another, no matter how bad that other one may be, thereby shows that he himself is guilty of the same things that he condemns in the other. Judgment belongs alone to God, and it shows a most daring spirit of usurpation for a man to presume to take the place of God. Those who have the law committed to them have a wonderful advantage over the heathen; nevertheless they must say: "Are we better than they? No, in no wise; for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin." Rom. iii. 9. And now we come to the beginning of

THE GRAND CONCLUSION. ROM. 3. 19-22

"Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law; that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in His sight; for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What do we know?

"Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law."

To whom does it speak?

"To them who are under [within the sphere of] the law."

What is the object of its speaking?

"That every mouth may be stopped."

Under what circumstances only may every mouth be stopped?

"All the world may become guilty before God."

What then is the conclusion?

"Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in His sight."

Why not?

"For by the law is the knowledge of sin."

What is now manifested?

"But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested."

How is righteousness manifested?

"Without the law."

Whose righteousness is it that is thus manifested?

"The righteousness of God."

What credentials has this righteousness?

"Being witnessed by the law and the prophets."

Where it is manifested?

"Unto all and upon all them that believe."

How is it manifested?

"By faith of Jesus Christ."

Within the Law.-This is not the place to consider the force of the term "under the law," since it does not really occur here. It should be "in the law," as in Rom. ii. 12, for the Greek words are the same in both places. The words for "under the law" are entirely different. Why the translators have given us "under the law" in this place, and also in 1 Cor. ix. 21, where the term is also "in the law," as noted in Young's Concordance, it is impossible to determine. There certainly is no reason for it. The rendering is purely arbitrary. What the verse before us really says is, "Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are in the law," or, "within the sphere or jurisdiction of the law." This is an obvious fact, and in view of what immediately follows, it is a very important fact to keep in mind.

"What the Law Saith."-The voice of the law is the voice of God. The law is the truth, because it was spoken with God's own voice. In the covenant which God made with the Jews concerning the ten commandments, He said of the law, "Now therefore, if ye will obey My voice." etc. Ex. xix. 5. The commandments were spoken "in the mount out of the midst of the fire, of the cloud, and of the thick darkness, with a great voice." Deut.

531

v. 22. Therefore when the law of God speaks to a man, it is God Himself speaking to that man. Satan has invented a proverb, which he has induced many people to believe, to the effect that "the voice of the people is the voice of God." This is a part of his great lie by which he causes many to think themselves above the law of God. Let every one who loves the truth, substitute for that invention of Satan the truth that the voice of the law of God is the voice of God.

Every Mouth Stopped.-The law speaks that "every mouth may be stopped." And so every mouth would be, if men would only consider that it is God that is speaking. If men realised that God himself speaks in the law, they would not be so ready to answer back when it speaks to them, and they would not frame so many excuses for not obeying it. When some servant of the Lord reads the law to people, they often seem to think that it is only man's word to which they are listening, and so they feel themselves privileged to parley, and debate, and object, and to say that, although the words are all right, they do not feel under obligation to obey, or that it is not convenient. They would not think of doing this if they heard the voice of God speaking to them. But when the law is read, it is the voice of God now just as much as it was to the Israelites who stood at the base of Sinai. People often open their mouths against it now, but the time will come when every mouth will be stopped, because "our God shall come, and shall not keep silence." Ps. l. 3.

The Law's Jurisdiction.-What things soever the law says, it saith to them who are within its sphere, or jurisdiction. Why? "That every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God." How extensive, then, is the jurisdiction of the law? It includes every soul in the world. There is no one who is exempt from obedience to it. There is not a soul whom it does not declare to be guilty. The law is the standard of righteousness, and "there is none righteous, no, not one."

No Justification by the Law.-"Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in His sight; for by the law is the knowledge of sin." One of two things must be the case whenever a man is justified by the law, namely, either the man is not guilty, or else the law is a bad law. But neither of these things is true in this case. God's law is perfectly righteous, and all men are sinners. "By the law is the knowledge of sin." It is obvious that a man can not be declared righteous by the same law that declares him to be a sinner. Therefore it is a self-evident truth that by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified.

A Double Reason.-There is a double reason why no one can be justified by the law. The first is that all have sinned. Therefore the law must continue to declare them guilty, no matter what their future life might be. No man can ever do more than his duty to God, and no possible amount of good deeds can undo one wrong act. But more than this, men have not only sinned, but they are sinful. "The carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." Rom. viii. 7. "For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary the one to the other; so that ye can not do the things that ye would." Gal. v. 17. Therefore, no matter how much a man may try to do the righteousness of the law, he will fail to find justification by it.

Self-justification.-If one were justified by the deeds of the law, it would be because he always did all that the law requires. Note well that it would be he that did it, and not the law. It would not be that the law itself does something to justify the man, but that the man himself does the good deeds required. Therefore if a man were justified by the law, it would be because he has in him by nature all the righteousness that the law requires. He who imagines that he can do the righteousness of the law, imagines that he himself is as good as God is, because the law requires and is a statement of the righteousness of God. Therefore for a man to think that he can be justified by the law, is to think that he is so good that he needs no Saviour. Every self-righteous person, no matter what his profession, exalts himself above the law of God, and therefore identifies himself with the Papacy.

Righteousness Without the Law.-Since because of man's weak and fallen condition no one can get righteousness out of the law, it is evident that if any man ever has righteousness he must get it from some other source than the law. If left to themselves and the law, men would truly be in a deplorable condition. But here is hope. The righteousness of God without the law or apart from the law, is manifested. This reveals to man a way of salvation.

Righteousness "Manifested."-Where? Why, of course where it most needs to be manifested, in people, that is, in a certain class described in the next verse. But it does not originate in them. The Scriptures have already shown us that no righteousness can come from man. The righteousness of God is manifested in Jesus Christ. He himself said through the prophet David: "I delight to do thy will, O my God; yea, Thy law is within my heart. I have preached righteousness in the great congregation; lo, I have not refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest." Ps. xl. 8, 9.

"Witnessed by the Law."-Let no one imagine that in the Gospel he can ignore the law of God. The righteousness of God which is manifested apart from the law, is witnessed by the law. It is such righteousness as the law witnesses to, and commends. It must be so, because it is the righteousness which Christ revealed; and that came from the law, which was in His heart. So, although the law of God has no righteousness to impart to any man, it does not cease to be the standard of righteousness. There can be no righteousness that does not stand the test of the law. The law of God must put its seal of approval upon every one who enters heaven.

Witnessed by the Prophets.-When Peter preached Christ to Cornelius and his family, he said, "To Him give all the prophets witness, that through His name whosoever believeth in Him shall receive remission of sins." Acts x. 43. The prophets preached the same Gospel that the apostles did. See 1 Peter i. 12. There is but one foundation, and that is "the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner stone." Eph. ii. 20.

This also suggests another thought about "witnessed by the law." It is not simply that the righteousness which is manifested in Christ is approved by the law, but it is proclaimed in the law. In the portion of Scripture specifically known as "the law," the portion written by Moses, Christ

532

is preached. Moses was a prophet, and therefore he testified of Christ the same, "for he wrote of Me." John v. 46. More than this, the very giving of the law itself was a promise and an assurance of Christ. This will appear when we come to the fifth chapter of Romans.

The Righteousness of God.-While there is no chance for the despiser of God's law to evade its claims under cover of the expression, "the righteousness of God apart from the law," there is also no need for the lover of that law to fear that the preaching of righteousness by faith will tend to bring in a spurious righteousness. Such is guarded against by the statement that the righteousness must be witnessed by the law, and further by the statement that this righteousness which is manifested apart from the law is the righteousness of God. No one need fear that he will be wrong if he has that righteousness! To seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness is the one thing required of us in this life. Matt vi. 33.

"By Faith of Jesus Christ."-In another place Paul expresses his desire when the Lord comes to be found "not having mine own righteousness which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith." Phil. iii. 9. Here again we have "the faith of Christ." Still further, it is said of the saints, "Here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus." Rev. xiv. 12. God is faithful (1 Cor. i. 9) and Christ is faithful, for "He abideth faithful." 2 Tim. ii. 13. God deals to every one a measure of faith. Rom. xii. 3; Eph. ii. 8. He imparts to us His own faithfulness. This He does by giving us Himself. So that we do not have to get righteousness which we ourselves manufacture; but to make the matter doubly sure, the Lord imparts to us in Himself the faith by which we appropriate His righteousness. Thus the faith of Christ must bring the righteousness of God, because the possession of that faith is the possession of the Lord himself. This faith is dealt to every man, even as Christ gave Himself to every man. Do you ask what then can prevent every man from being saved? The answer is, Nothing, except the fact that all men will not keep the faith. If all would keep all that God gives them, all would be saved.

Within and Without.-This righteousness of God, which is by the faith of Jesus Christ, is unto, literally into, and upon all them that believe. Man's own righteousness, which is of the law, is only on the outside. Matt. xxiii. 27, 28. But God desires truth in the inward parts. Ps. li. 6. "These words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart." Deut. vi. 6. And so the promise of the new covenant is, "I will put My law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts." Jer. xxxi. 33. He does it, because it is impossible for man to do it. The most that men can do is to make a fair show in the flesh, to gain the applause of their fellow men. God puts His glorious righteousness in the heart. But He does more than that, He covers men with it. "I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for He hath covered me with the robe of righteousness." Isa. li. 10. "He will beautify the meek with salvation." Ps. cxlix. 4. Clothed with this glorious dress, which is not merely an outward covering, but the manifestation of that which is within, God's people may go forth, "fair as the moon, clear as the sun; and terrible as an army with banners."

"Secret Societies of Islam" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

In the Pall Mall Gazette a writer describes the secret societies which exist in the interests of Mohammedanism. Northern Africa is said to be honeycombed with these societies. This chief order, known in the East as the Jesuits of Islam, was established about fifty years ago. The writer says of it:-

"The rulers of the order are very severe, and its doctrines absolutely fanatical. The present chief is El Mahedi, the son of the Sheik Mohammed, who died in 1869, and the entire body of the affiliated is as thoroughly under his control as if it were formed of none other but slaves. He transferred the seat of the order to an oasis in the centre of the Libye desert-to Djerboub, where stood the ancient temple of Jupiter-Ammon-and there he lives, like Alexander Selkirk, the lord of all he surveys, and rules the entire Mussulman world, just as the Pope-and more influentially than the Pope-rules the Roman Catholic world. His emissaries, who are legion, carry his orders, which they see are obeyed, throughout the whole of Mohammedan Africa, and to the Mussulmans of Eastern Russia, China, and British India.

"Djerboub is a fortress full of arms and ammunition, and is defended by a resident guard of 3,000 fanatical warriors; but these measures of defence are scarcely necessary, for it is not at all likely that an army, either small or large, would march through the sea of sand which surrounds the oasis. The zaouias-leaders-meet there about once every two years, for the purpose of regulating the religious and political interests of the association. That it is a threatening influence operating unceasingly against European dominion in North Africa there can be no doubt; as there is no doubt that it is at the bottom of all the political intrigues against which foreign Powers have to contend; and, moreover, it is certain that El Mahedi has as many fanatics subject to his authority in Persia and Afghanistan as he has in North Africa."

"The Communion of Saints" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

Speaking of the memorial service for departed ministers, which was a feature of the recent Wesleyan Conference, the Church Times says:-

It is characteristic of our time that there is among Christians a growing desire to return to the ancient and Catholic view of the intermediate state. Among ourselves, for instance, the practice of holding a memorial service is a sign that the modern Protestant idea of an absolute separation between those on earth and those in Paradise is losing its hold upon men's minds. And we may feel confident that in time the bareness and want of meaning in such memorials will come to be felt, and the doctrine of the Communion of Saints will be fully grasped. The memorial service having found its way into Methodism, we may hope that the more timid amongst us will take courage and rise to the Catholic level of intercession for the dead.

The Biblical doctrine of the communion of saints is the doctrine of the "fellowship of the Spirit." No other kind of fellowship is from the Christian standpoint profitable or desirable. The nature of this fellowship is set forth by Paul in the epistle to the Philippians. "If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels and mercies, fulfil ye my joy, that ye be likeminded, having the same love, but being of one accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory, but in holiness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves." Phil. ii. 1-3.

This is the only true fellowship in communion of saints. But it is not that communion which the Times

533

hopes to see prevailing among the professed followers of Christ; for the fundamental idea of that communion is the participation in it of the departed saints. And as the saints are supposed to know a great deal more after death than they did before, they naturally assume the position of teachers to those still in the flesh, thus destroying that perfect equality which is a feature of the communion set forth in Scripture, and also usurping the place of the Holy Spirit, which is the divinely-appointed Teacher and Guide into all truth.

From the communion of which Paul writes, the dead are evidently shut out, for it is clear that he is addressing only the living. Nor do the Scriptures anywhere address the dead as conscious intelligent hearers; but of them it declares that "the dead praise not the Lord" (Ps. cxv. 17), and that they "know not anything" (Eccl. ix. 5). Therefore they can have no communion with either the living or each other. But this supposed communion with departed saints is the main foundation upon which the doctrines of Rome rest; and in accepting that doctrine and following out the line of its teaching, an individual will speedily and surely find, as the above writer suggests, the level of Roman Catholic doctrine. The person who believes in the communion of the living with the dead, and is determined to hold to the doctrine in spite of the plain statements of Scripture such as have been quoted, might as well join hands with Rome at once.

It is a deplorable and alarming "characteristic of our time that there is among Christians a growing desire to return to the ancient and Catholic view of the intermediate state." It is alarming that so many persons are ready to adopt any other view of the subject than the one supported by Scripture.

"The Soul's Rudder" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

The Soul's Rudder.-"Behold, also the ships, which though they be so great, and are driven of fierce winds, yet are they turned about with a very small helm, withersoever the governor listeth. Even so also the tongue is a little member, and boasteth great things." James iii. 4, 5. Every unwise use of the tongue turns the soul out of its proper course and into the channels that lead to destruction. As great care should be exercised in the use of the tongue as in the handling of the rudder of a ship at sea. The scriptural rule is, "If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God." 1 Peter iv. 11. And in order to speak and say nothing contrary to the Divine oracles, one must be thoroughly familiar with them. We cannot possibly keep ourselves in the right path unless we become acquainted with the word of God.

"A Sunday Memorial" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

We have received from the "Working Men's Lord's Day Rest Association" a copy of a memorial to the Prime Minister, Lord Rosebery, with the request that it be signed and returned to the secretary of the association. The memorial reads thus:-

To the Right Hon. The Earl of Rosebery, K.G.,

First Lord of the Treasury.

We, the undersigned, feeling the necessity of preserving Sunday as a day for all classes to rest from labour, express our earnest hope that Her Majesty's Government will refuse to encourage any proposal to open National Museums and Art Galleries on the Lord's Day, but will, on the contrary, extend the opportunities for visiting the National Collections on week-day events.

We have not signed this petition, and cannot; and we give the following reasons, which ought to be sufficient, if known, to prevent anybody from signing it.

In the first place, the memorial is misleading. It conveys the idea, which no doubt the ones who sent it out honestly entertain, that Sunday is the Lord's Day. Now all that may be known of the Lord is found in the Bible, and therefore all that may be known of the Lord's day must be found there. Perhaps many may have signed the memorial without any question; but if there are any who have not, we should like to have them first settle the question,

WHAT IS THE LORD'S DAY?

The expression, "Lord's day," occurs but once in the Bible, namely, in Rev. i. 10, where John says, "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day." There is nothing in the text or the context to indicate what day of the week this was. We simply learn from it that the Lord has a day which He claims as His own. What day that is, we shall have to find out in other portions of the Scriptures.

Before reading the positive statements, there is a negative argument which may be noticed. It is this: The same John who wrote the book of Revelation, also wrote the fourth Gospel, wherein he twice mentions "the day called Sunday," and each time he names it simply "the first day of the week." Of course this is only negative; still it is a significant fact that nowhere in the Bible is the day called Sunday given in the other title than its numerical designation, "the first day of the week."

Some person will hastily retort to us, "That is an argument that works both ways; for the fact that the seventh day of the week is called simply the Sabbath, and is nowhere named the Lord's day, is evidence that in Rev. i. 10 the writer has some other day in mind; for if he had meant the seventh day of the week, he would have used the term Sabbath instead of the Lord's day." This is a very common statement, but it is one that is made without consulting the Scriptures; for the Bible does declare in most explicit terms that the seventh day is the Lord's day. Let us read it.

In Ex. xx. 8-10 we read a portion of the fourth commandment, as follows: "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work," etc. Here the seventh day is said by the Lord Himself to be the Sabbath, and, moreover, to be His Sabbath. That it is the seventh day of the week, and not some indefinite seventh part of time that is the Sabbath, is evident from Luke xxiii. 54-56, and xxiv. 1, where we learn that the Sabbath immediately follows "the first day of the week." So when we read that "the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord," we may understand without any doubt that the seventh day of the week, commonly called Saturday, is the Sabbath of the Lord. Consequently the seventh day of the week is the Lord's day.

Further, we read these words in Isaiah lviii. 13, 14; "If thou turn thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on My the day; and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; and shalt honour Him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord."

Here we have the direct statement by the Lord that the Sabbath, which is none other than the seventh day of the week, is His day; that it is holy and honourable; and that our own labour and pleasure are to be kept out of it. So although the exact words, "the Lord's day" are found but once in the Bible, we have the direct testimony that the seventh day of the week is the Lord's day. But no intimation

534

can be found to the effect that the Sunday is also His day. On the contrary, the Sunday is one of the six days in which the Lord says that we should labour.

Here then is reason enough why we cannot sign this petition, and why nobody should sign it. We are not at all concerned to have museums and art galleries open on Sunday. We should by no means sign a petition to have them open; for whether they are open or shut on Sunday is a matter of indifference to us. But we certainly cannot take any steps to preserve Sunday as a day of rest from labour, when the Lord Himself has declared in tones of thunder that work should be done on that day the same as on other days; and we are in duty bound to protest against any petition that calls Sunday the Lord's day, when the Lord claims the seventh day, and that alone, as His holy day.

SUNDAY AS LORD'S DAY

Of one thing we may be sure, and that is that the application of the term Lord's day to Sunday, did not have its origin in the Bible. As Dr. Scott says in his comments on Acts xx. 7, the change from the observance of the Sabbath to Sunday was "gradually and silently introduced, by example rather than by express precept." What caused this gradual change? A few paragraphs will show us.

All church historians are united in saying that after the first century the Christian bishops began to bid for the patronage of the pagans. In order to win the heathen to the church, they thought it necessary to make the Christian rites and ceremonies as nearly as possible like those of paganism. They also "purposely multiplied sacred rites for the sake of rendering the Jews and the pagans more friendly to them." So that as Mosheim says, even in the second century a large part of the Christian observances and institutions had the aspect of pagan mysteries. (Ecclesiastical History, Cent. 2, part 2, chap. 4.)

Still further, the teachers in the church were very early recruited from the ranks of pagan philosophers, who "were induced to embrace Christianity without feeling it necessary to abandon scarcely any of their former principles." The consequence was that in a short time the so-called Christian church was only heathenism slightly modified, and with a change of name. Of course there were real Christians, who were loyal to Christ and the Bible, but these were in a very small minority-so small that they are practically ignored in ecclesiastical history.

Among the heathen, the first day of the week had been from time immemorial a festival in honour of the sun, which was almost universally worshipped. It was, under various titles, the chief god among all nations. The Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia has this note under the heading of Sunday:-

Sunday (Dies Solis of the Roman calendar; "day of the sun," because dedicated to the sun), the first day of the week, was adopted by the early Christians as a day of worship.

It should be understood, however, that they made a distinction between this festival day and the Sabbath. In their writings this distinction is very clear, as they always call the seventh day the Sabbath, and never apply that term to the first day of the week.

It should also be understood that although the first day of the week was a festival in honour of the sun god as early perhaps as the sun was worshipped, it was by no means regarded as a sabbath. It was not a rest day, but a holiday, in which all manner of sports, and all the revelry that characterised heathen worship, were indulged in. And thus it was regarded by the first professed Christians who accepted it. Mosheim says that in consequence of Constantine's Sunday law the day was regarded more sacredly than before; yet that law granted full liberty to all who lived in the country to carry on their agricultural labour the same as on other days. Of this law, "Chambers's Encyclop?dia" says:-

Unquestionably the first law, either ecclesiastical or civil, by which the Sabbatical observance of that day is known to have been ordained is the edict of Constantine 321 A.D.

Before this date, however, the first day of the week had been called the Lord's day. It is not difficult to see how this came about. In observing the chief festival of the sun, the professed Christians persuaded themselves that they were worshipping, not the ruler of the day, but "the Sun of righteousness." It would very naturally follow that it would in time come to be called the Lord's day. Indeed it may have been known by that title even among the heathen; for they had "lords many and gods many." Indeed, the name "Baal," whose worship was simply sun-worship, means nothing but "lord." The sun was regarded as the chief lord of all, so that it would be sufficiently designated as the lord, and therefore his day as the lord's day.

The Council of Laodicea, in the latter part of the fourth century, ordained that Christians should not be idle on Saturday, and that, if possible, they should do no work on Sunday. But nothing was said about their playing, and so the day remained a holiday until the time of the Reformation. In all Roman Catholic countries it is still regarded the same, the only requirement being that people shall attend mass on that day. Sunday is classed in Catholic works with other church festivals, and the statement is made that "Sundays and holydays all stand on the same foundation, namely, the authority of the church."- Catholic Christian Instructed.

This non-observance of Sunday as a sacred day continued in the Church of England after its break with Rome. Clergymen of the Church of England wrote against those who would observe it more strictly, showing that Sunday is not the Sabbath, and that sports could properly be enjoyed on that day, as well as on other days.

The Puritans, however, did not wish to have the appearance of likeness to the Catholics, and so they contended for a strict observance of Sunday. But they were met with the unanswerable retort that Sunday itself was an institution of the Catholic Church, and that if they really wished to have nothing of the Roman Catholic Church in their practice, their only way was to keep the Sabbath of the commandment, the seventh day of the week, and to ignore Sunday entirely. This they were unwilling to do, and in order to persuade themselves that they were justified in their course, they invented the idea that Sunday was really the day enjoined in the commandment. Dr. Nicholas Bound published this theory in 1595, and it was adopted by others, and in course of time became quite general. Sunday, therefore, by a piece of Jesuitism as great as any that was ever practiced by the church against whose Jesuitism they protested, was fully elevated to the place of the Sabbath of the Lord. To ask a Protestant to petition for the preservation of such an institution is virtually to ask him to renounce his Protestantism.

SELF-DECEIVED

Since Sunday as a professed Christian institution is one of the basest of frauds, it is but natural that deception should be practised in the efforts to maintain it. This does not necessarily mean that those who are interested in it are dishonest, or that they would by any means wilfully deceive. Lack of information is responsible for their

535

action. Moreover, men who might safely be trusted with uncounted gold, seem to be unable to distinguish between things that differ when the Sunday is concerned. The reason is that Sunday is in direct opposition to the law of God. "No lie is of the truth." Neither can a lie ever be supported by the truth, for the truth would kill it. But Sunday as a so-called Christian institution is a lie against the truth of God; therefore it is impossible that it should be sustained by straightforward argument.

It is worthy of note in this connection that although these Sunday associations are said to be in behalf of the working men, they are carried on largely by men who do not engage in manual labour for a living. The real working men are not very much concerned about having Sunday observance established by law. For those working men who really believe that Sunday is the Lord's day, and have love for the Lord, will keep it without any Government aid; and those who have not such conscientious scruples in regard to it, wish to have the day for rest or work as they may choose.

If the working men were much concerned for Sunday, or if they felt oppressed because its observance is not strictly enough enforced, they would soon let it be known. When it is a question of wages, they usually make themselves heard. It may be said that they are afraid to protest against Sunday labour, lest they should lose their situation; but this loses all its force when we remember how many thousands have again and again voluntarily given up their situations-struck-because of dissatisfaction with their wages. The fact is that all these efforts are for the protection of Sunday, and not for the benefit of the working men.

But the petition which we are considering is accompanied by statements of some who labour, who plead for a cessation of Sunday work. Yes, "A Tired Musician" submits that "the professional musician requires Sunday as a day of rest if anyone does." Then let him take it. Why should the man who does not wish to rest, be compelled to do so because somebody else wants to? Why should all be compelled to take their rest at the same time and in the same way that a few do?

It is true that one labouring man is quoted as saying that he is opposed to Sunday labour, because he believes that it is contrary to God's word. Then by all means let him abstain from Sunday labour. But there is very little conscientious conviction manifested in an appeal which virtually says, "I think it is a sin to work on Sunday; pray induce Her Majesty's Government to stop me from doing it."

There was once a time in Great Britain when thousands of men stood loyally by their religious convictions although all the strength of Government was arrayed against them. Men now speak loudly in honour of them, but do not like to follow their example. The religious world is becoming intoxicated with the fallacy that the function of Government is "to make it as easy as possible to do right, and as difficult as possible to do wrong." They wish to prove that the Saviour was mistaken when He said that the way to life is narrow, and that His followers would meet with much tribulation in this world. But we are sure that the men who would do what they thought right, even though that way was made difficult, have not all vanished from the earth, and that there are many left who ask for no other help to do right but the help of God.

One thing more we must note. The memorial has blank spaces, not only for the name and address, but also for the "position or occupation" of the signer, together with the "name of the society you represent," and the number of members. And still further spaces left for answering the question, "Do you sign this officially, or in your individual capacity?"

We have heard something of "official" and "representative" signatures. For instance, a Sunday petition to the United States Congress a few years ago was counted as having been increased by over 7,000,000 names, simply because Cardinal Gibbons had signed his approval of it. At another time over four million signatures to a Sunday-law petition were reported from a State that has less than two million inhabitants all told.

Now we do not call attention to this for the purpose of reproaching those who are concerned in it. They doubtless think that the end justifies the means, and are so convinced of the sacredness of Sunday that they suppose that nothing that is done to advance its interest can be wrong. But it is a grave mistake. A good cause can never be benefited by wrong methods. We refer to these things only because we would have people see that there must be something inherently wrong in an institution that will admit such methods.

THE LORD'S MEMORIAL

From what has been said about Sunday not being the Lord's day, some might hastily conclude that we would favour such a petition if it were in behalf of the genuine Lord's day. Not by any means. The Lord wishes people to be reconciled to Him and His law, but reconciliation can never be effected by force. The Sabbath of the Lord is a matter of spirit, and not of mere letter. "God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in truth." To ask for Government protection of the Sabbath of the Lord, would be to deny the Lord's power and authority. The only reason why the Government aid is solicited in behalf of Sunday is that it has no Divine sanction. If it had, men would be content with that.

The Sabbath of the Lord is God's own memorial, and it is a memorial in behalf of the labouring man, too. It is the badge and the surety of the rest and perfect liberty which He gives. It is more than simply twenty-four hours' cessation of toil. It is the renewal of life.

Men want a human law which will assure them that they will be in no danger of losing their position and their support if they keep Sunday. But the Sabbath has God's own law to maintain it, and it brings to those who take it as it is in Christ, the power to keep it in the face of certain loss of position. The reason is that it is the memorial of God's power and love. To keep the Sabbath as God designs that it should be kept, is to know God, and to know that His power which created and upholds the universe is abundantly able to sustain those who obey Him.

"Dethroning God" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

Dethroning God.-While some people reject God because His ways are not satisfactory to human critics, there could be no greater calamity come upon the world and the universe than that God should become such a one as they would approve of, and whose ways they would endorse. He who can properly criticise another, must know at least as much about the subject of criticism as the one whom he criticises; and a god whose ways these critics would endorse would be just as good and wise as they are themselves, and no more so, since he would have to do things just as they viewed them, or become subject to their criticism.

536

A man might just as well proclaim himself a god as to make God such a one as themselves. Therefore he who criticises God or (what is the same thing) His word, says in his heart, "There is no God."

"Ancient Writing" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

Through the kindness of the publishers of the Oxford Bible, we are able this week to present two more specimens of the plates contained in its "Helps to the Study of the Bible." The Publishing of these plates in connection with the Bible, enables the reader to get the benefit, at a trifling expense, of some of the treasures in the British Museum, which enliven the pages of the history of Bible times.

Doubtless many who have heard about how much the discovery of ancient monuments and clay tablets has corroborated the Bible narrative, and has also served as connecting links between different portions of it, have wondered how the inscriptions upon them could be read with any certainty. Some have thought that it is all conjecture; but it is not. The story of how scholars became acquainted with those long-buried records in a language that was forgotten long before the English language existed, is very interesting. Plate III from the Oxford Bible "Helps," which is here given, tells a part of the story.

It will be noticed that there are three divisions in the characters upon the "Rosetta Stone." The lowest is in Greek, the middle one is in the "demotic," or writing of the people of Egypt, and the topmost is in hieroglyphics, or the writing of the priests.

Of course scholars could read the Greek writing without much difficulty. Then it was naturally supposed that the other two kinds of writing were the same inscription as the Greek. This proved to be the case. Using the Greek as a key, the others were deciphered, and the value of the different characters was fixed. The picture, it may be necessary to state, is very many times smaller than the stone itself, so that the characters are actually much larger than the illustration.

This stone furnished a key to the Egyptian writing only. It was not too many years later that the Assyrian and Babylonian cuneiform (wedge-shaped) writing was deciphered, and then many treasures were opened to the world. Many things mentioned in the Bible, which had previously been difficult, were now made clear. Critics had declared that certain names mentioned in the Bible were absolutely wrong, and that no such people had ever existed; but the inscriptions on the monuments and the tablets showed that they had existed, and gave their place in history.

Dr. A. H. Sayce, in "Social Life Among the Assyrians and Babylonians," says that the Babylonians "were essentially a reading and writing people. In spite of the intricacy of their system of writing, with its multitudinous characters, each of which had more than one phonetic value, and might be used to express an idea or a word, books were numerous, and students were many. The books were for the most part written upon clay with a wooden reed or metal stylus, for clay was cheap and plentiful, and easily impressed with the wedge-shaped lines of which the characters were composed."

One of the cylinders is represented in Plate LI. They may be seen in the British Museum in all sizes, from two feet in length to those so small that a dozen might be carried in the pocket. Dr. Sayce says:-

"The use of clay for writing purposes extended, along with Babylonian culture, to the neighbouring populations of the East. In the century before the exodus, recent discoveries have shown that clay libraries existed, and that an active correspondence was carried on by means of clay

537

tablets in all parts of the Oriental world."

"The cuneiform system of writing," says the above writer, "allowed the use of many abbreviations-thanks to its ideographic nature-and the characters were frequently of a very minute size." As a consequence, a great deal of matter could be written upon a single tablet.

"Where it was found impossible to compress a text within the limits of a single tablet, it was continued on a second, a very clever arrangement being adopted in order to facilitate reference. The tablets were called 'the first' or 'second' of a series, which received its name from the first word or line of the work inscribed upon them, and the last line of the first tablet was repeated at the beginning of the second. In this way the librarian and readers were able without loss of time to refer to any tablet which was required in a particular series or work. Of course the scribes who copied the tablets endeavoured to make each tablet correspond with what we should call a chapter, so that the several tablets of a series may be described as the successive chapters of a book."

Whole libraries were thus preserved, and the evidence is clear that people read as much in those days as they do now, although it is doubtful if their minds were weakened by so much trash as is now devoured. There were critics that were chiefly noted for their collections of books. Thus in Judges i. 11-13 we are told of the capture of Kirjath-Sepher by Othniel, who received Caleb's daughter as a reward. Kirjath-Sepher means "the city of books." It is quite likely that some of these ancient "book towns" may yet be discovered, and so much more light be shed upon the people of the past.

"We already know enough, however, to see that education was by no means backward in the old empires of Western Asia. As in Egypt, so too in Babylonia, if not in Assyria, a knowledge of reading and writing was widely spread, books were multiplied, and there were plenty of readers to study them. So far from being illiterate, the ancient civilised East was almost as full of literary activity as is the world of to-day. The so-called critical judgments that have been passed upon it, begotten of ignorance and prejudice, must be revised in the light of the full knowledge which we now possess."-Sayce, "Social Life Among the Assyrians and Babylonians," p. 43.

The Bible says that in the last days "many shall run to and fro, and knowledge of the increased." Dan. xii. 4. Many have supposed that this indicates that the last generation will be wiser than any previous generation in the world; but we shall do well to restrain our conceit. The only real wisdom of this or any other age comes from some of the most ancient records of the past. The Bible is full of the perfection of wisdom. It is not the production of an age of ignorance, but it is a revelation from God, the Source of all wisdom, to a people who were in no degree inferior to the wisest of their time. Dr. Sayce says:-

"The Israelites in Canaan were surrounded by nations who were in the enjoyment of ancient cultures, and abundant stores of books. There is every reason for believing that the Israelites also shared in the culture of their neighbours, and the literary activity implied. We now know that the Egyptians and Babylonians wrote and read, not only in the time of David and Solomon, but ages before; why should not the Hebrews also have done the same? If the historical authority of the Old Testament Scriptures is to be overthrown, it must be by other arguments than the unwarranted assumption that letters were unknown in the epoch which they claim to record."

And most conclusive all are these words from the one who was "learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians": "Behold, I have taught you statutes and judgments, even as the Lord my God commanded me, that ye should

538

do so in the land whither ye go to possess it. Keep therefore and do them; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, which shall hear all these statutes, and say, Surely, this great nation is a wise and understanding people." Deut. iv. 5, 6.

"The Seed and the Harvest" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

When Jesus taught the people, it was by such simple lessons that all might understand. He most often talked of common things that even the children knew all about, and He used these things to teach truths about Himself and His care for us.

He talked about sowing and reaping, about the flowers and the grass and the birds, about fruit trees and vineyards, and the work of the fishermen and shepherds. Everyone knew about these things, and so the Lord talked of them, just to show how simple the Gospel is, and how easy it is to learn of Him.

A SERMON BY THE SEA

We will put together some of the things said about sowing seed, and the harvest, and see how easy it is to understand what He says. He spoke from a boat to the multitude gathered on the seashore. Perhaps in the fields, a little way off, men were sowing the corn very much as we have seen the farmers do in the country. Or it may be the farm labourers had slipped the bag of seed off their shoulders, and had come to the shore to hear the words of the Teacher; for the common people flocked to hear Him.

"A sower went out to sow his seed." Luke viii. He was teaching them of something far more important than the seed-sowing they knew about. "The seed," He said, "is the word of God."

THE LIFE OF THE SEED

As the little seed has life given to it, so that it grows after being put into the ground, so the word of God has life to grow and bear fruit when it is sown in our hearts. And the word that has this life in it is the very word that we read when we open the Bible. It is not like any other book, but is something that really lives, and has power to work. It was God's word as He spoke it, but that made the earth bring forth trees and grass and flowers on the third day; and the same word works to-day to do the same thing, and it can work in our hearts and lives also. It is a solemn thing to be able to open a book, and have God's own voice to speak to us in it. Yet He wants us to come now to hear His voice just as trustingly as the people gathered about the boat that Jesus was in. But those who know what the word of God is, can never read it lightly or treat it jestingly.

HARD SOIL-FORGETFUL HEARERS

As we read of the sower, remember that the seed is the word of God. As he sowed, "some fell by the wayside; and it was trodden down, and the fowls of the air devoured it." "Those by the wayside are they that hear; then cometh the devil, and taketh away the word out of their hearts, lest they should believe and be saved."

The seed had the life in it, and if it had only been taken in and held, it would have sprung up. But it was forgotten as soon as it was heard. Sometimes people hear the word preached, and then think no more of it; and that one who watches to take all the good from them catches the words they have heard or read away from their hearts, and they forget all about it. We ought to keep the heart's door shut against this evil one, who is always hovering near, and think about the word and remember it.

SHALLOW SOIL HEARERS

"And some fell upon a rock; and as soon as it was sprung up, it withered away, because it lacked moisture." "They on the rock are they, which, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and these have no root, which for a while believe, and in time of temptation fall away."

Some who have given themselves to the Lord, have thought when they did so that they would never again be tempted to do wrong. But after a time it was found that old playmates would say and do things which were wrong, and the temptation kept coming to join with them. Or perhaps the old temper would rise up and make the heart think angry words. Then they tired of watching and watering the seed that was growing. That is what many do, old people as well as young.

THORNS-HALF-AND-HALF CHRISTIANS

"And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprang up with it, and choked it." "And that which fell among thorns are they, which, when they have heard, go forth, and are choked with cares and riches and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to perfection." The fruit does not get fully ripe.

The world is full of thorns. It is not the older people and the rich, or the men of large businesses who alone are in danger of having the word choked by thorns. Did you ever know anyone who thought he had so much to do that he did not have time to read the Bible? It may be it was work, or play, or reading other books,-whatever it was, it was a thorn growing into the heart and choking the life of the seed which had started to grow. Sometimes it may be that playmates are not as they should be, and yet we still go with them, thinking we shall not be harmed by their ways. But this has choked the good seed out of many hearts. Look out for the thorns, and get away from them or root them up.

GOOD GROUND-FRUITFUL HEARERS

"And other fell on good ground, and sprang up, and bare fruit an hundred-fold." "But that on the good ground, are they, which in an honest and good heart, having heard the word, keep it, and bring forth fruit with patience." This is what we want-to hold the good seed and let it grow up into our life and bear fruit. The way to have it so is to read the word and study it, and listen to it, receiving it as God's word.

Those who do this will find it something that is just as really alive as the plant growing in the field. And it will just as surely bring forth fruit in them as the corn in the field ripens and yields its fruit. The fruit that it will bear is told in Galatians v. 22, 23. Read those verses, and see if it is not a beautiful field that the Lord wants us to be when He comes to gather the harvest of the earth.

THE REAPING TIME

And the harvest will surely come. The Lord said, "The harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels." Matt. xiii. 39. Those who will take the word of God, the good seed, into their hearts and keep it, will be found in that day as the wheat in the field, ripe and fruitful, and the angels will gather them as sheaves for the kingdom of God. But, sad to

542

say those who will not let the word grow in their hearts will not be able to stand with the fruitful wheat, but will be only tares and weeds which the Lord cannot take into His kingdom.

In the Revelation the Apostle John tells of this harvest day, which the Lord showed to him in a vision of the future. He says:-

"I looked, and behold a white cloud, and upon the cloud one sat like unto the Son of man, having on His head a golden crown, and in His hand a sharp sickle. And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to Him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in Thy sickle, and reap; for the time is come for Thee to reap; for the harvest of the earth is ripe. And He that sat on the cloud thrust in His sickle on the earth; and the earth was reaped." Rev. xiv. 14-16.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

-China is endeavouring to raise a war loan of ?10,000,000 in Berlin.

-A new gas has been discovered in the atmosphere, of which it constitutes about one per cent.

-The various water companies of the Metropolis gave a daily supply last month of 216,653,000 gallons.

-Nearly the whole population of a village in Poland fell ill after eating diseased herring, eighteen dying.

-About 400 Anarchists are believed to have arrived in England recently, to escape the wholesale arrests on the Continent.

-The North Metropolitan Tramway Company in twelve months carried close upon eighty-three million passengers.

-Some Fijians raided several towns on their islands, and after killing the inhabitants ate their bodies. This is the first known case of cannibalism in Fiji for twenty years.

-Three cases of cholera occurred in Amsterdam, August 16. At Haarlem there were one case and two suspected oases of the disease, and one case at Maastricht.

-The new tariff bill for the United States, over which there has been a long and bitter struggle in Congress, has been finally passed, and sent to President Cleveland for his signature.

-A train wrecked by miscreants in Nebraska, U.S.A., fell through a bridge. The engine boiler exploded, and the wreckage taking fire, twenty-four passengers were burned to death.

-In lieu of the ordinary postcard a person may now take any plain card of the proper size, write a letter upon it, affix a halfpenny adhesive stamp, and have it transmitted through the post.

-The Mikado of Japan has just issued a decree permitting native women to remain single if they so choose. Hitherto if found unmarried at a certain age a husband was selected for them.

-The Governor of Formosa has issued a proclamation offering pecuniary rewards of varying amounts and the promise of Paradise for Japanese heads and the destruction of Japanese warships.

-Caserio Santo, the young Italian murderer of President Carnet, was executed at Lyons. The youth was livid and trembling on being led to the scaffold, and died with a feeble exclamation of "Viva l'Anarchie!"

-At Shuklung, China, a lady missionary who had been condemning Chinese idolatry, was rescued by the captain of a British man-of-war after being almost stoned to death. The mission stations were burned.

-A fated boating accident occurred off Deal Island, Maryland, where a camp meeting was being held on Aug. 12. A sailing-boat is supposed to have capsised, resulting in the drowning of twenty-one persons.

-Recent experiments are said to have shown that people, after recovering from cholera, whilst pursuing their business, carry infection with thorn for a period of six weeks, and are able to propagate the disease during that time.

-The corner-stone of a building to be erected in Fourteenth-street, New York, by the Salvation Army, as a memorial to the hate Mrs. Booth, was laid August 14. The cost of the building, which is to be used as the headquarters of the army in America, will be 350,000 dollars.

-On the night of August 13 a fire broke out in the Flums harbour, Hungary, in a wharf, which was soon reduced to ashes. The fire rapidly spread to the next storehouse, where goods worth 5,000,000 florins (?400,000) were destroyed. It is the greatest fire which has taken place in Hungary for twenty years.

-The Kaffirs are again causing trouble in South Africa. A despatch from Pretoria says: "A commando of 100 Boers is proceeding to the relief of the occupants of the Government buildings at Agatha, who are besieged by the Kaflirs. The rebels are murdering Boor farmers and burning homesteads."

-A new life saving apparatus for miners has been devised by Dr. J. S. Haldane. He claims that by means of a steel bottle of compressed oxygen, it will be possible for miners who are below when an explosion takes place to walk about for an hour without succumbing to the deadly effects of afterdamp.

-An explosion, supposed to have boon caused by an Anarchist, occurred on Tuesday night at the post-office in New-Cross-road, from a small packet supposed to contain gunpowder, which had been dropped in the letter-box. Not much damage was done, but considerable alarm was caused in the neighbourhood.

-The Carlist propaganda is again active throughout Spain. One section of the Spanish press attributes to the Carlist movement the extraordinary military aril other precautions now being adopted near the residence of the royal family, and the special measures taken for the protection of the Premier.

-Several of the members of the organisation known some months ago as the Commonweal Army, who have been reduced to a state of extreme destitution, made an attack on Mr. Corey, their late leader, at Baltimore, United States, August 15, He escaped serious injury by mounting his horse and riding away.

-An annual religious carnival has recently taken place in the Flemish town of Furnes. It dates from remote times, and is in reality a Passion Play acted in groups. The forty groups in the monster procession represented the Stable at Bethlehem, and all the episodes in the Saviour's life, ending with the Crucifixion scene. The procession attracted enormous crowds of sightseers from all parts of Belgium.

-The first detachment of African pioneers has recently left Marseilles for Madagascar, to choose a favourable spot for the establishment of an agricultural colony in accordance with the plans of the late Cardinal Lavigerie. They will be followed shortly by 100 others, while other parties are being organised to prrceed to the French Soudan, the French Congo, and the banks of Lake Tehad.

-The attempt of the French Government to treat theoretical and violent Anarchists as belonging to one class, has been defeated by the Courts, which acquitted twenty-seven out of thirty persons tried for bolding anarchical opinions. This has given great satisfaction to the Radicals and Socialists, who regard it as a triumphant vindication of liberty of thought. The Government papers, on the other hand, consider the verdict disastrous.

-A cyclone in Spain did great damage at Herencia, in the province of Ciudad Real, on August 19. All the crops were destroyed, and the loss is estimated at 3,000,000 pesetas. The storm was accompanied by a fierce shower of hail, the hailstones being of extraordinary size, and causing injuries to some 200 persons. Several thousand head of cattle and other domestic animals were killed. The river Amarguilla has overflowed, devastating a vast extent of arable land, including many fields and vineyards.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

A writer in a New Zealand paper gives statistics showing that the annual cost of the liquor traffic in that country is ?3 15s. per person.

The war in the East is already creating some difficulties for missionaries in China and Japan. But the Lord is able to send onward the Gospel of peace even in the midst of the Satanic propaganda of war.

The British representatives in Lagos, West Coast of Africa, who recently took part in the dedication of a Mohammedan mosque, told the people that the religion of Mohammed "does not differ materially from Christianity in its main doctrine." Yet he would doubtless feel it an insult if one were to insist that he had not the slightest idea of what Christianity is.

The Lord has given the word that the Gospel must go to all, and no power on earth can shut out the sound of it. Dr. A. T. Pierson recently said:-

In 1866, when I was first in Europe, I could not carry a copy of the Bible inside the walls of Rome. Last year there were twenty-nine Protestant chapels in the city of Rome, and preaching openly carried on in them with impunity, the Pope and cardinals finding it impossible to interfere.

The speech made by Lord Salisbury as president of the British Association, at its recent meeting, is worthy of all the notice that it has received, and more. It was a review of the scientific discoveries of the past generation, but for a different purpose than such reviews are generally made. Instead of boasting of the wonderful amount that we know, and flattering ourselves that we are so much wiser than our ancestors, as is usually the case, Lord Salisbury pointed out how little we know. He showed that in regard to some of the most important points that have been the study of science for years, and about which great boasts have at times been made, we are as ignorant as we ever were, and that the discoveries that have been made have only served to emphasise our ignorance. Such a rehearsal is a refreshing change from the ordinary boasting of how far "science" has advanced beyond the Bible.

Following is one of the points which Lord Salisbury made in his recent speech before the scientists. Speaking of the elements, and of the knowledge of them that has been gained through spectrum analysis, he said:-

It is a great aggravation of the mystery which boasts the question of the elements, that among the lines which are absent from the spectrum of the sun, those of oxygen and nitrogen stand first. Oxygen constitutes the largest proportion of the solid and liquid substance of our planet, so far as we know it; nitrogen is very far the predominant constituent of our atmosphere. If the earth is a detached bit whirled off the mass of the sun, as cosmogonists love to tell us, how comes it that in leaving the sun we cleaned him out so completely of his nitrogen and oxygen that not a trace of these gases remains behind to be discovered by the sensitive vision of the spectroscope?

In connection with the talk of reunion of churches that is going on at present we notice that it is insisted that "mutual concessions" must be made in order to unite. But it is not by making concessions that Christian unity is secured. It is by studying the word of God and believing it that people are welded into unity by the Spirit. The Bible says the same thing to all. Interpretations differ, but the word speaks the same thing. Conferences to study the word of God are needed more than conferences devoted to the rearranging and adjusting of ecclesiastical machinery.

The first person to whom Jesus came with Divine light and comfort after His resurrection, was a woman out of whom He had cast seven devils! Mark xvi. 9. He passed by even the "beloved disciple," and Nathanael, the pure Israelite, in whom was not guile, and manifested Himself first to Mary. There is a world of encouragement in this for those who are conscious of having wandered very far from God. A person can hardly be worse off spiritually than was Mary in the possession of seven demons; and on the other hand no one was better off than was the same Mary at the feet of her risen Lord when He had appeared to her first of all. The Saviour makes no favourites of the upright and respectable, and manifests Himself to none more readily than to those who most need His help.

There are said to be over 100,000 lepers in India, while Japan has 200,000 known cases, and in China there are probably as many as in both these countries.

"A Great Fall" The Present Truth 10, 34.

E. J. Waggoner

A Great Fall.-John Wesley, speaking of the "conversion" of Constantine, said:-

Persecution never did, never could, give any lasting wound to genuine Christianity. But the greatest it ever received, the grand blow which was struck at the very root of that humble, gentle, patient love which is the fulfilling of the Christian law, the whole essence of true religion, was struck by Constantine the Great, when he called himself a Christian, and poured in a flood of riches, honours, and power upon the Christians, more especially upon the clergy. . . . From the time that the Church and the State, the kingdoms of Christ and of the world, or so strangely and unnaturally blended together, Christianity and heathenism were so thoroughly incorporated with each other that they will hardly ever be divided till Christ comes to reign upon the earth.

This is sadly true as to the fall. But there can be no blending of Christianity and heathenism. There can be no concord between the temple of God and idols. Nor is the individual Christian to wait supinely for the Lord to come to separate the good and evil. The separation comes before the coming of the Lord. To every man God now says, "Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate." Again, in the words of the Revelation, spoken of a time just before the coming of the Lord, we read, "Come out of her, My people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues." Rev. xviii. 4.

August 30, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

"Seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter therein, and they to whom it was first preached entered not in because of unbelief: again, He limiteth a certain day, saying in David, To-day, after so long a time; as it is said, To-day if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts." Heb. iv. 6, 7.

A striking comment on this text is furnished by the Saviour's parable of the supper. After many had excused themselves from coming, and the poor, the maimed, the halt, and the blind had been brought in, and still there was room, "the lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled." Luke xiv. 23.

A promise had been made to Abraham, that his seed should inherit the earth; but "God, willing more abundantly to show unto the heirs of promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath: that by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us." Heb. vi. 17, 18.

What stronger consolation and than this could we have? God has provided a feast and an inheritance, and has sent out His invitations. Men may treat the invitation as a light matter, but it is a serious matter with God. His honour is at stake. He has declared that the table shall be filled, and the inheritance fully occupied. He has pledged His very existence to that. Therefore "some must enter therein." So necessary is it, that if all the men on earth should refuse to come, God would raise the children to Abraham from the stones of the ground. Matt. iii. 9.

The call is, "Come; for all things are now ready." Luke xiv. 17. "The works were finished from the foundation of the world." Heb. iv. 3. Nothing is lacking except the guests. There is no limit. "Whosoever will, may come." No matter what their condition, whether poor, ragged, weak, diseased, maimed,-all are welcome. His love and power will make them fit to sit at the table, and to associate with the family of God in heaven. The deaf are made to hear; the blind to see; the impotent to walk; to the poor is given gold tried in the fire; and the ragged are clothed with the robe of righteousness. If those who are called are only willing, He will make them "to the praise of the glory of His grace," for they are already "accepted in the Beloved."

But none need think that they can impose upon the goodness of the Lord, or presume upon the necessity under which He has placed Himself to furnish His table with guests. Of those who make excuse it is said that they shall not taste of the supper. He is able to make fit guests out of the stones, and therefore is not under obligations to any person. But to the one who was willing, and who offers himself as a candidate, leaving himself wholly in the Lord's hands, there is a world of comfort in the thought that no one can pluck him out, and that God's very existence is pledged that he shall have a part in the everlasting feast.

"The Work of the Spirit" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

When the return captives of Israel were about to undertake, in the face of great difficulties, the restoration of the temple and wall of Jerusalem, the word of the Lord came to them by Zerubbabel saying, "Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord of hosts." Zech. iv. 6.

The working of the Spirit of God is not by a manifestation of the might and power of men. This is just the opposite of what we would naturally suppose, since it is not natural for any great force to manifest itself among men without some imposing display on the part of those through whom it works. Human nature likes to make a show; but in the work of God, human nature with its likes and dislikes has to be laid aside, and the Divine nature and mind substituted in its place. The glory belongs to the Lord, and He does not derive His glory from any display on the part of man.

We must learn, at the very outset, that the work of the Spirit of God is not attended by great display of anything that pertains to man, be it wealth, enthusiasm, power, or wisdom. If there is any display, it will be, as in the deliverance of Israel from Egypt, so entirely disassociated from and superior to the power of man, that it will be evident to all that man had nothing to do with it, and that the glory belongs to God, and to Him alone.

This great truth was illustrated in a visible and most striking manner before the prophet Elijah, when, thinking that he alone and all Israel remained a true servant of the Lord, he had fled at the threats of Jezebel and had come to Horeb, the mount of God. See the account in 1 Kings xix.

546

Something more than mere fire and burning zeal is produced by the Spirit of God. Even the Pharisees had great zeal, and compassed sea and land to make one proselyte, but when they had drawn him into their ranks he was still the "child of hell." The fruits of the Spirit are not summed up in zeal and enthusiasm-a grand parade and a great noise-but those fruits are "love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness," etc. Gal. v. 22, 23. See also 1 Cor. xiii. It is the man who has not the Spirit who is anxious, as Jehu was (2 Kings x. 16), to display his zeal for the Lord.

After all the mighty display and commotion of the whirlwind, the earthquake, and the fire had passed by, there came a "still, small voice," and that was the presence of God. That was the manifestation of the Spirit; and when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went forth to commune with the Lord. And the Lord met him, and gave him a message and a work. The "still, small voice" was the voice of God, and wherever that voice is, there is the presence of the Spirit. In other words, the Spirit accompanies the word of the Lord. And therefore they who are bearing the word of the Lord are the ones who are doing His work and have His Spirit in their midst.

God's word is the Bible; and that word is going to "every nation and kindred, tongue" on the earth, not with great display and noise and commotion, but as a "still, small voice," that speaks to the listener's heart; and it will gather out of them all a people prepared for His appearing. Amid all the parading and shouting and blustering, the display of power and magnificence, this work is moving calmly and steadily forward, simple in its grandeur and silent in its omnipotence, bearing on its front the motto, "Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord of hosts."

"Knocking" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

Knocking.-The Saviour says, "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: for every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened." Matt. vii. 7, 8. This is said to show how surely prayers to the Lord are answered. Yet many people fail to receive any answers to their prayers. Why is it?-Very often it is because they do not stay to see the door opened, but, like the mischievous boy in the street, run away as soon as they have knocked. People are in too great a hurry to be off. The instruction is, "Wait on the Lord, be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart; wait, I say, on the Lord." Ps. xxvii. 14. And David said, "O Lord, in the morning shalt Thou hear My voice; in the morning will I order my prayer unto Thee, and will keep watch." Ps. v. 3, R.V.

"Discerning the Righteous and the Wicked" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

The righteous man is the man in whose heart abides the word of God. And this fact is not apparent through his outward circumstances. If we could look upon the heart as God does, and see with the clearness of His vision, we should be able to discern there either the presence or the absence of faith, and by that and that only we should know to which of the two great classes any particular individual belonged.

Faith being the source of righteousness, its absence, and that alone, is the cause of wickedness. For all men are by nature wicked, having carnal hearts that are "not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." And the same human nature that manifests itself in murders, and drunkenness, and the lowest forms of vice and crime, is the common nature of all men. Only the accident of circumstances prevents its being manifested in all men alike. The highly respectable member of society, who yet knows not God, has nothing to boast of over the man whom society brands as an outcast, for the difference between them is not a difference in nature, but merely in fortune, for which he can take no credit to himself.

When Adam sinned, he acquired a fallen and carnal nature, and only that nature could he bequeath to his children. All his descendants thus acquired his nature, it being transmitted by each parent in turn. And thus all men have received the fallen nature which Adam had, and only variations in the process of transmission, and in the circumstances with which men have been surrounded, have, outside of the grace of God, produced the differences in their life records. But with those who have received the grace of God, there has been a change in nature; and to this, and not to any variations of fortune, has the success of their lives been due. Even the Apostle Paul testified of itself, "By the grace of God I am what I am," and said, "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Cor. xv. 10; Gal. vi. 14.

And therefore it is true that the man who is farthest away from God is he who least feels his need of Divine grace and of a different nature from the one which He has. This is illustrated by the parable of the Pharisee and the publican, who went to the temple to pray. The Pharisee thought that he had a better nature than other men, so he thanked the Lord that He was not as they were; but the publican, feeling his need, exclaimed, "Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner," and went down to his house justified.

No men are so hopelessly wicked as those who feel satisfied with themselves; and those who are most nearly self-satisfied are not the ones who manifest the greatest weaknesses and are guilty of the most crimes, but those who are able to make their lives conform to the world's standard of morality and respectability.

We may know how we ourselves stand before God, for that is a simple matter of knowing whether or not we believe His word. That word tells us to have all confidence in God and none in ourselves, or in the flesh. If we say amen to this, God by His creative power makes us righteous, and we stand justified in His sight.

We cannot know the standing of others, because we cannot, as God does, look upon their hearts. We could only look upon the outward appearance, which is not an index to the nature of the life within. Therefore the exhortation is given us, "Judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the heart." 1 Cor. iv. 5.

So in Malachi we read of the time when the Lord will make up His jewels, and "will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him." This indicates a time when those who do not serve Him will not be spared. "Then," says He, "shall ye return, and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth Him not." Mal. iii. 17, 18. That will be the time when judgment is given to the saints of the Most High, and the saints possess the kingdom (Dan. vii. 22) at the first resurrection. See Rev. xx. 4-6.

It is not our business now to know the hidden thoughts and motives of

548

men's hearts. Such knowledge would do us much more harm than good. All that concerns us here is to believe God's word for ourselves and sow the seed of His truth beside all waters, passing no place by because it seems to be unfavourable, but having hope for all, through the mercy and grace so abundantly given to all in the Gospel.

"Papal Dignities" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

The Lord told His disciples that among the Gentiles the great of earth were concerned about titles and dignities, but among His followers it was not to be so. There is but one Lord and Master, and he who is most truly the servant of all, is the greatest of all.

The Papacy developed on principles exactly opposite, and the exaltation of one above another in honour has naturally followed the self-exaltation which led to the apostasy. In his last encyclical, the Pope referred to his predecessor as "of holy memory," but there is evidently much conventionality in such references. A writer in the Contemporary shows how jealous the present Pope is of praise bestowed upon Pious IV. Failure to sufficiently guard against this once led to the publican humiliation of the learned Cardinal Pitra. The reviewer, who writes as a Catholic, says:-

This venerable Benedictine wrote a letter a few years ago to the clerical editor of a Catholic periodical in Amsterdam, in the course of which he recalled with melancholy pleasure the zeal and self-sacrificing spirit of Pius IX., during whose reign the Catholic cause was everywhere in honour. This eulogy of the dead Pope was held to be in some sort an insult to his living successor, and Cardinal Pitra was compelled to publish an abject apology, and to express his heartfelt regret for having unwittingly hurt the delicate susceptibilities of Leo XIII., whose diplomatic successes have rendered such incalculable services to religion.

"Studies in Romans. The Justice of Mercy. Rom. iii. 23-26" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

The last lesson showed us that since all men are declared guilty by the law, there can be no righteousness in the law for any man, and that, as a consequence, if men were left alone with the law there would be no hope for any. The law is only the written statement of the righteousness of God, and therefore can impart no righteousness; but God is a living God, and His righteousness is a living righteousness; His Spirit has all-pervading power, and therefore He can put His own righteousness into and upon all that believe; for faith is the reception of God into the heart. In the reception of this righteousness "there is no difference; for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus; whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time His righteousness; that He might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

How is the righteousness of God manifested apart from the law?

"By faith of Jesus Christ."

In whom is it manifested?

"Unto all and upon all them that believe."

What distinction is made between people?

"There is no difference."

Why not?

"For all have sinned."

In sinning, of what have men come short?

"All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God."

While in this state, what do those who believe receive?

"Being justified."

How justified?

"Freely."

By what?

"By His grace."

Through what?

"Through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus."

How did this come about?

"Whom God hath set forth."

What for?

"To be a propitiation."

"By what means?

"Through faith in His blood."

What does He declare?

"To declare His righteousness."

Whose righteousness does He declare?

God's righteousness-the righteousness of Him who set Him forth. See Ps. xl. 6-10.

For what is God's righteousness declared in Christ?

"For the remission of sins that are past."

Of what is this a manifestation?

"The forbearance of God."

Why is it that God's own righteousness is declared for the remission of sins?

"That He might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus."

"No Difference."-In what is there no difference? There is no difference in the way in which men receive righteousness. And why is no difference made in the manner of justifying men? Because "all have sinned." Peter, in relating to the Jews his experience in first preaching the Gospel to the Gentiles, said, "God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as He did unto us; and put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith." Acts xv. 8, 9. "Out of the heart of men," not of one class of men, but of all men, "proceed evil thoughts," etc. Mark vii. 21. God knows the hearts of all men, that all are alike sinful, and therefore He makes no difference in the Gospel to different men.

"One Blood."-This lesson is one of the most important to be learned by the missionary, whether laboring at home or abroad. Since the Gospel is based on a principle that there is no difference in men, it is absolutely essential that the Gospel worker should recognise the fact, and always keep it

549

in mind. God "hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth." Acts xvii. 26. Not only are all men of one blood, but they are also of "one kind of flesh." 1 Cor. xv. 39. The great burden of the epistle to the Romans, as has appeared up to this point, is to show that so far as sin and salvation therefore are concerned, there is absolutely no difference between men of all races and conditions in life. The same Gospel is to be preached to the Jew and to the Gentile, to the slave and to the freeman, to the prince and to the peasant.

Coming Short.-People are fond of imagining that what are called "shortcomings" are not so bad as real sins. So it is much easier for them to confess that they have "come short" than that they have sinned and done wickedly. But since God requires perfection, it is evident that "shortcomings" are sins. It may sound pleasanter to say that a bookkeeper is "short" in his accounts, but people know that the reason for it is that he has been taking that which is not his, or stealing. When perfection is the standard, it makes no difference in the result, how much or how little one comes short, so long as he comes short. The primary meaning of sin is "to miss the mark." And in an archery contest, the man who has not strength to send his arrow to the target, even though his aim is good, is a loser just as surely as he who shoots wide of the mark.

"The Glory of God."-From the text we learn that the glory of God is His righteousness. Notice, the reason why all have come short of the glory of God is that all have sinned. The fact is plain that if they had not sinned they would not have come short of it. The coming short of the glory itself consists in sin. Man in the beginning was "crowned with glory and honour" (Heb. ii. 7) because he was upright. In the fall he lost the glory, and therefore now he must "seek for glory and honour and immortality." Christ could say to the Father, "The glory which thou gavest Me, I have given them," because in Him is the righteousness of God which He has given as a free gift to every man. It is the part of wisdom to receive righteousness; and "they that be wise shall shine."

"Being Justified."-In other words, being made righteous. To justify means to make righteous. God supplies just what the sinner lacks. Let no reader forget the simple meaning of justification. Some people have the idea that there is a much higher condition for the Christian to occupy than to be justified. That is to say, that there is a higher condition for one to occupy than to be clothed within and without with the righteousness of God. That cannot be.

"Freely."-"Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." That is, let him take it as a gift. So in Isaiah lv. 1: "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price." It was the epistle to the Romans that accomplished the Reformation in Germany. Men had been taught to believe that the way to get righteousness was to purchase it either by hard work or by the payment of money. The idea that men may purchase it with money is not so common now as then; but there are very many who are not Catholics who think that some work must be done in order to obtain it.

Making Prayer to Be a Work.-The writer was once talking with a man in regard to righteousness as the free gift of God, the man maintaining that we could not get anything from the Lord without doing something for it. When asked what we must do to win forgiveness of sins, he replied that we must pray for it. It is with this idea of prayer that the Roman or Hindu devotee "says" so many prayers a day, putting in an extra number some days to make up for omissions. But the man who "says" a prayer, does not pray. Heathen prayer, as for instance when the prophets of Baal leaped and cut themselves (1 Kings xviii. 26-28), is work; but true prayer is not. A man comes to me and says that he is starving. Afterwards he is asked if anything was given him, and he says that he received some dinner, but that I made him work for it. When asked what he had to do for it, he replies that he asked for it. He could hardly make any one believe that he worked for his dinner! True prayer is simply the thankful acceptance of God's free gifts.

Redemption in Christ Jesus.-We are made righteous "through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." That is, through the purchasing power that is in Christ Jesus, or "through the unsearchable riches of Christ." Eph. iii. 8. This is the reason why it comes to us as a gift. Some one may say that everlasting life in the kingdom of God is too great a thing to be given to us for nothing. So it is, and therefore it had to be purchased, but since we had nothing that could buy it, Christ has purchased it for us and He gives it to us freely, in Himself. But if we had to purchase it from Him, we might as well have bought it in the first place, and saved Him the task. "If righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain." Gal. ii. 21. "Knowing that ye were redeemed, not with corruptible things, with silver or gold, from your vain manner of life handed down from your fathers; but with precious blood, as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot, even the blood of Christ." 1 Peter i. 18, 19. The blood is the life. Lev. xvii. 17. Therefore the redemption that is in Christ Jesus is His own life.

Christ Set Forth.-Christ is the one whom God has set forth to declare His righteousness. Now since the only righteousness that is real righteousness is the righteousness of God, and Christ is the only one who has been ordained of God to declare it upon men, it is evident that it can not be obtained except through Him. "There is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." Acts iv. 12.

A Propitiation.-A propitiation is a sacrifice. The statement then is simply that Christ is set forth to be a sacrifice for the remission of our sins. "Once in the end of the world hath He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself." Heb. ix. 26. Of course the idea of a propitiation or sacrifice is that there is wrath to be appeased. But take particular notice that it is we who require the sacrifice, and not God. He provides the sacrifice. The idea that God's wrath has to be propitiated in order that we may have forgiveness finds no warrant in the Bible. It is the height of absurdity to say that God is so angry with men that He will not forgive them unless something is provided to appease His wrath, and that therefore He Himself offers the gift to Himself, by which He is appeased. "And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled in the

550

body of His flesh through death." Col. i. 21, 22.

Heathen and Christian Propitiation.-The Christian idea of propitiation is that set forth above. The heathen idea, which is too often held by professed Christians, is that men must provide a sacrifice to appease the wrath of their god. All heathen worship is simply a bribe to their gods to be favorable to them. If they thought that their gods were very angry with them, they would provide a greater sacrifice, and so human sacrifices were offered in extreme cases. They thought, as the worshipers of Siva in India do to-day, that their god was gratified by the sight of blood. The persecution that was carried on in so-called Christian countries in times past and is to some extent even now, is but the outcropping of this heathen idea of propitiation. Ecclesiastical leaders imagine that salvation is by works and that men by works can atone for sin, and so they offer the one whom they think rebellious as a sacrifice to their god not to the true God, because He is not pleased with such sacrifices.

Righteousness Declared.-To declare righteousness is to speak righteousness. God speaks righteousness to man, and then he is righteous. The method is the same as in the creation in the beginning. "He spake, and it was." "We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." Eph. ii. 10.

God's Justice In Redemption.-Christ is set forth to declare God's righteousness for the remission of sins, in order that He might be just and at the same time the justifier of him who believes in Jesus. God justifies sinners, for they are the only ones who need justification. The justice of declaring a sinner to be righteous lies in the fact that he is actually made righteous. Whatever God declares to be so, is so. And then he is made righteous by the life of God given him in Christ. The sin is against God, and if He is willing to forgive it, He has the right to do so. No unbeliever would deny the right of a man to overlook a trespass against him. But God does not simply overlook the trespass; He gives his life as a forfeit. Thus He upholds the majesty of the law, and is just in declaring that man righteous who was before a sinner. Sin is remitted sent away from the sinner, because sin and righteousness can not exist together, and God puts His own righteous life into the believer. So God is merciful in His justice, and just in His mercy.

"There's a wideness in God's mercy,
Like the wideness of the sea;
There's a kindness in His justice,
That is more than liberty."

"Holy Scripture or Tradition?" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

FOUR WITNESSES, ON THE BASIS OF SUNDAY OBSERVANCE

We might make it fourteen or forty, but will give space for only four to testify to the grounds of Sunday observance.

TERTULLIAN SAYS TRADITION

Tertullian is the first ecclesiastical writer who applies to Sunday the term "Lord's day," although he makes it plain that in his time it was a day of special merth and license, the idea of Sabbath rest not entering into it. He wrote about A.D. 200, but already the larger portion of the church had taken the leap headlong into the apostasy which the Apostle Paul saw at work in the church even in his day. Of the origin of "offerings for the dead," the sign of the cross, and the manner of Sunday observance, Tertullian says:-

If, for these and other such rules, you insist upon having positive Scripture injunction, you will find none. Tradition will be held forth to you as the originator of them, custom, as their strengthener, and faith as their observer. That reason will support the addition, and custom, and faith, you will either yourself perceive, or learn from someone who has.

THE CHURCH OF ROME SAYS TRADITION

We have only to choose between many of authoritative utterances on the question made by Rome, but the following from the "Doctrinal Catechism," a standard work, will suffice:

QUESTION.-Have you any other way of proving that the Church has power to institute festivals of precept?

ANSWER.-Had she not such power. . . she could not have substituted the observance of Sunday, the first day of the week, for Saturday, the seventh day, a change for which there is no scriptural authority.

THE SACERDOTALIST SAYS TRADITION

Canon Knox-Little is an able spokesman for the Sacerdotal party in the Church of England, and in his appeal in behalf of the authority of "the Church" he finds in the common practice of Sunday observance an admission on the part of the Protestant wing of the Anglican Church of the very thing involved in the Sacerdotal controversy-the superiority of tradition over the Scriptures. Arguing for "fasting communion," which his Protestant opponents declare to be unscriptural, he says in his work "Sacerdotalism," published this year:

It is certain that our Lord when on earth did observe Saturday, and did not observe Sunday; but no one, as far as I know, has ever been called a "sacerdotalist" for departing from His undoubted habit of "resting the seventh day."

Again he says:-

Their effort to strictly adhere to our Lord's example to the letter, in spite of the usage of the Church, implies that they know better what our Lord desired than His Church. If they are consistent, as I have said, they must keep Saturday, not Sunday, as the day of rest.

THE AMERICAN EPISCOPACY SAYS TRADITION

The "Explanation of the Catechism," put out by the Protestant Episcopal Church of America, the American branch of the Church of England, says of the Sunday:-

The day is now changed from the seventh to the first day, . . . but as we meet with no scriptural direction for the change, we may conclude it was done by the authority of the Church.

Who cannot see by these testimonies that the Sabbath question involves the whole question of loyalty to God or to men, of the word of God or the word of man? The Apostle Paul said that the apostasy that was to come would exalt man above God. The apostasy came, and has developed before the world, and every step in the development has been taken in the name of the Church and Church authority. But we have only to go to the word of the great Head of the church, and to His life as our example to learn the truth.

"The Lord's Prisoner" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

Such was the Apostle Paul, as he frequently testifies in his epistles. He was taken prisoner on his way to Damascus, where he was about to make prisoners of those who believed in the Lord. The Lord frequently arrests people in their career of sin, to bring them for a moment to a realisation of their own helplessness, in order that they may see where they stand, and have a favourable opportunity to choose the way of life.

But the Lord never keeps anyone a prisoner against his will. His prison is not a dungeon; for the Lord does not need to shut a person up in order to have possession of him. Nor are His bonds such as those which confine men kept in custody by the powers of earth. They are bonds which do not in any wise interfere with the captive's liberty. They do not hold him in one place, but draw him about, it may be to the most remote parts of the earth.

551

"The love of Christ constraineth us," said the apostle; and this is the bond which holds every prisoner of the Lord. The Lord desires and seeks to bind every person to Himself by the cords of love. Such bondage could never make any person sad, for love is the only thing in the world that can make one happy; and being bound to Him, He is in the same bondage that we are in. Happy is that person who, when the Lord arrests him, is willing to continue His prisoner.

"A Healthy Constitution" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

Every medical man knows the importance of a good constitution and healthy blood and tissue in cases of wounds. Many men who appear in good health find by some accident, not serious in itself, that they really are not in sound health, and are retarded in the process of recovery by conditions of which they were ignorant. The following from a medical journal shows one of the advantages of careful and hygienic living which physicians are well acquainted with:-

A young labouring man was brought to a certain hospital with a badly lacerated hand. He had fallen upon an old cotton hook, and it had gone entirely through the palm of his hand, carrying with it rust and dirt. The wound was kept open so that it would suppurate freely and be readily cleansed.

As time passed on, the hand became very much swollen, and turned black, and the surgeons watched very carefully for signs of blood poisoning, fearing that the entire hand would have to be amputated to save the life of its possessor.

These signs not appearing, it then became the question whether more of the hand could be saved than the thumb and the first two fingers. As the hand became no worse, the surgeon delayed operating on it, and after a time, it began to mend, and finally healed entirely, to the surprise of the surgeon.

"Young man," he said to the patient, as the danger was passing away, "do you use alcohol in any form?"

"No, sir."

"Do you use tobacco?"

"No, sir."

"That is what saved your hand."

"Rescuing the Children" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

Among all the philanthropic agencies, there are perhaps none that appeal more strongly to the sympathies than those engaged in rescuing the children from the streets and slums of our towns, and from depravity and destitution everywhere. This is building a barrier along the edge of the precipice, to keep little feet from falling into the abyss of vice and lifelong uselessness.

Foremost in this work are Dr. Barnardo's Homes, so well known to all. At the present time there are nearly five thousand children cared for in the Homes, being taught and useful trades and discipline, and surrounded by an atmosphere of home, so far as it is possible to provide this in a large institution.

We are able to give from Dr. Barnardo's monthly organ, Night and Day, some sketches from life of the kind of candidates for training that are constantly presenting themselves for admission, or are being sent in by those co-operating with the Homes. The group of boys in the picture were admitted on a day. The Doctor says of them:-

"After inquiring minutely into their antecedents, I found that there was not one of them who had at any time been charged with dishonesty, or been guilty of any graver fault than playing pitch and toss in the streets, a form of gambling to which almost every street boy gives way at some period or other of his life.

"Is it not magnificent work to take such lads as these away from the allurements as well as from the sufferings of a street life, to a place them under firm discipline, to teach them the duty and privilege of hard work, and then, after a sufficient period of testing and training, to send those who have proved themselves worthy of it out to a colonial life?"

Such specimens of boy life we all are familiar with. In the ordinary course of street development we might predict

556

with tolerable certainty their evolution into the hopeless, drink-sodden, and perhaps criminal adult life which present so difficult a problem to the Christian worker. Happy indeed is the lot of the boy who is snatched away from this and turned into promising channels of usefulness.

It is a far cry from a London slum to the broad prairies of the West, where the free expanse of land and air, and the possibilities within reach of the strong arm and ready mind are enough to awaken the feeling of manly independence and self-respect in the heart of almost any youth. But last year 834 of the young people were thus sent to Canada. Of the 24,000 children who have passed through the Homes, nearly seven thousand are working their way into manhood and womanhood in other and less crowded lands.

Another picture, a little girl awaiting admission on the door-steps of the Home in Stepney Causeway, gives another view of the raw material that is taken in to be worked up. It is sometimes a mystery how some of the applicants contrive to secure their tattered clothing to their bodies.

The work of such Homes as these represents more than simply an effort to clothe and feed destitute children. Any municipal or state institution might undertake that. But no such public institution can supply the Christian motive, the love for souls, and the influence begotten of this. This is the secret of the success of such work. Mere philanthropy, as the word is commonly understood, might supply the machinery, but only the real love of Christ and of souls that are precious to Him can do the work which the little waifs and strays of our streets need to have done for them.

"Doing Something Great" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

Did you ever wish you might have a chance to do something very good and great?

The three Hebrew captives boldly refused to bow down to the image of Nebuchadnezzar. Daniel went into the lion's den rather than conceal the fact that he prayed to God. Peter and John answered without fear when the Jewish rulers commanded them to stop their preaching. Paul preached before Felix, the Governor, Herod the King, and Nero, the great Emperor of Rome. Since that time men like Wycliffe, Luther, and others, about whom we have read, have had the same boldness to be true to God, when almost all the world were against them.

"But no such chance will ever come to me," I hear someone say.

Don't be too sure of that. The opportunity to be true to God comes every day to every one. What we must learn is to make use of it. "Redeeming the time," is what we are told to be doing in Ephesians v. 16. If you will look at the same first in the Revised Version you will find it is written in the margin, "Buying up the opportunity."

Those whom we have just mentioned, and the scores of others whose names will be thought of by every one who reads the Bible stories, simply bought up the opportunities that came to them.

Sometimes the most difficult things are not the facing of lions, or imprisonment. One of the greatest things that can be done is to keep one's temper when angry words have been spoken. Or it is to tell the exact truth when tempted to tell a lie. Or it may be to stand true when those we are with are planning some mischief or undertaking that a true manly or womanly child of God could not join in with a clear conscience; or to speak for God and truth when others laugh at us and think us simple.

These may not seem great things, but they are. The Lord knows that we need His power to give us the victory in fighting against our evil ways and dispositions-and such a victory is as great a one as the world knows. Solomon says, "He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city." Prov. xvi. 32. There is a chance for every one of us to do mighty deeds.

The longing to do some great thing-such as the world calls great-has kept many from doing the really great things. And it is good of the Lord, too, that He has made it so that the great things in His sight are such as even the youngest can do.

GREAT DEEDS

In Matt. xxv. we read that "when the Son of man shall come in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him," then He will give every man his reward. And what kind of deeds do you think the Lord will speak of in that great day? Read these verses and see:-

"Then shall the King say unto them on His right hand, Come, ye blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was an hungered, and ye gave Me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave Me drink; I was a stranger, and ye took Me in; naked, and ye clothed Me; I was sick, and ye visited Me; I was in prison, and ye came unto Me."

To do such things for the Lord Himself is surely as great a service as anyone could do-as great a thing as we could think of, and how had they done this? They do not remember that they had ever done such wonderful things, and so they ask the Lord when all this happen. This is His answer:-

"Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these My brethren, ye have done it unto Me."

Then the great things with God are those things that men call little, and we have the chance of doing them every day. The little kindnesses, the cheery word, giving food to the hungry, clothing to the naked, these are the things that show the real love there is in the heart.

These words show us that Christ is not ashamed of the hungry, and ragged, and destitute. Do you think He loves those children who have clean and pleasant homes more than those who have no real home or mother's care? Of course not; for He loves us, and not because we are good, but because He is good. It is because we need Him so much that He has such a pity for us. He calls the needy ones His "brethren," and that high honour is just as freely given to the child in rags and tatters as to the nicely-clothed and well fed.

In that day when the Son of man comes in His glory, there will be many also who have really done some things that they thought were great. They will say to the Lord that they have done "many wonderful works." Matt. vii. 22. But He will say He does not know them, because they did not give Him food when hungry, and clothing with naked, and did not visit Him when sick or in prison. They will be greatly surprised-as greatly surprised as the others were when He said they had done these acts-and these last will ask when they fail to do these things for Christ when He was in so great need. He will then say:-

"Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to Me."

They were longing to do something great, and had not done the things which the Lord calls great. They had not bought up the opportunities that came to them almost every day. It was because they did not have the real love of God, and the love for others in need which that love always gives.

There are many ways in which even

558

our little folks may bring some joy and happiness into the lives of those who have little of either. A good text to think of is found in Luke xiv. 12-14. As you think about it, I am sure the meaning of it will be plain to you.

Do not dream about doing great deeds sometime. The greatest deed a man can do is to do his duty, and this we can do every day.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

-A plot against the life of the Emperor of Austria has been discovered.

-Negroes are said to be flocking to England from America in large numbers.

-The great Russian Army man?uvres at Smolensk have for some unexplained reason been countermanded.

-The great fire in Flume Harbour, Hungary, continued to burn for six days, in spite of all attempts to subdue it.

-It is reported that the Nicaraguans are imprisoning and murdering some of the foreign residents at Bluefields.

-During a regatta at St. John, New Brunswick, the yacht Primrose sank, and the owner and seven of the crew were drowned.

-A large brick building in Worcester, Mass., collapsed Aug. 21, and three men and twelve children were buried in the ruins.

-After all that has been written about feathered women, it is said that birds are to be worn this autumn in hats and bonnets.

-Mr. Altgeld, Governor of Illinois, has issued a proclamation appealing for help on behalf of the starving strikers and their families in the town of Pullman.

-Over 11,000 textile workers employed in the mills at New Bedford, U.S., have struck owing to a reduction of their wages by the owner.

-At San Jose, Cal., a large chimney fell at night on a small brick house, in which two families, consisting of sixteen persons, were living, and killed fourteen of them.

-At Sacramento, Cal., two houses were completely demolished and six persons instantly killed by a dynamite bomb, Aug. 21. There is every reason to suppose that the act was due to Anarchists.

-It is said that in Switzerland a milkmaid or man gets better wages if gifted with a good voice, because it has been discovered that a cow will yield one-fifth more milk if soothed during the milking by a pleasing melody.

-There seems to be a substantial shrinkage in the professional incomes of men at the bar just now. Lawyers complain that work of every kind is very scarce, and the practices of even well-known men are seriously reduced.

-According to information from Kingston, Jamaica, despatches have been received there from Port-au-Prince, stating that President Hippolyte is seriously ill and not expected to live. A revolution in Haiti is said to be inevitable.

-The Kaybles of Morocco have revolted, defeated the Spanish force sent against them, and inaugurated what promises to be a serious rebellion. Warships have been dispatched thither by the British, Spanish and Italian Governments.

-A serious riot arising from popular prejudice against sanitary precautions took place in the Cosack village of Borgustan, in the Caucasus, and many of the people were ordered to charge them.

-The official cholera bulletin issued at Berlin by the Imperial Boarde of Health reports that from noon on the 13th to noon on the 20th instant, there were twenty-three deaths from the disease, and thirty-two cases in the German Empire.

-Skeletons of a human family have been found in Moravia along with mammoth bones. The skeleton of the man was of enormous size. This find is said to dispose of the theory of scientists who contend that man did not exist during the mammoth period.

-Ritualism appears to be rampant in Canterbury. It is stated that many parents have removed their children from some local Church schools on the ground that they object to their children being taught to bow and cross themselves.

-The tramway cars at Chemnitz, in Saxony, have no conductors, and the payment of fares is left to the honour of the passengers. There is a fare box at either end of the cars, which are moved by electricity on the trolley system. By doing away with conductors a saving of 44,000 marks has been effected.

-The Italian Colonial authorities are endeavouring to colonise Massowah. A number of Italians at Tunis have been engaged to proceed thither, where they will be given land grants. They receive a free passage with board and lodging until settled on the land. Only single men are selected, but about 6,000 have already been engaged, most of them being Sicilians.

-A number of Government scientists who have been engaged in a survey of Popocatepetl, Mexico, have now reached the summit of the volcano, whose altitude they have fixed at 19,648 Spanish feet above the level of the sea. The circumference of the crater is 14,000ft. An elaborate study is being made of the smoking rents and other phenomena of the volcano.

-About 99 per cent. of the operations for cataract are now successful. Experts assert that the other 1 per cent. would not be unsuccessful but for the fact that some patients are handicapped with impurities of the blood that increase the difficulties following the operation. The removal of cataract has ceased to be esteemed a very serious matter for either patient or surgeon.

-While no very reliable news has been received concerning the war in the East, it is reported that the Japanese have been defeated at Ping Yang, to the north of the Korean capital, with great slaughter. The Chinese, it is said, followed up their success, and drove the Japanese out of Chung Hwa. The news is discredited by the Japanese officials. The Japanese are reported to have come to an agreement with the King of Korea who has declared his independence of China, and has appointed a Reform Cabinet. Japanese nobles have subscribed 80,000,000 dollars for war expenses, which they have loaned to the Government without interest.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

The Assyriologists at the British Museum have discovered, some contract tablets brought from Babylonia, a tablet recording the sale of a Babylonian "beer-house." It dates from over 2,000 years B.C.

An Indian correspondent reports discontent and dissatisfaction amongst the natives of India. Of rice, the chief food supply, he says, "Last year they suffered from scarcity, from which they have not yet got over, and in the event of another such year as the last there is sure to be a famine, with all its horrors."

In an interview, a native of West Africa, a Methodist, who is now in London, was asked if the Roman Catholic form of worship, with its ritual and mysticism, did not have a special attraction for the native mind. He said:-

I don't know what their service is like in England, but their service on the West Coast does not attract the people. The natives look upon it as another form of their own worship-that is, they believe them to be European idol-worshipers, and even call them by that name, so that we have nothing to fear from them.

The National Protestant Church Union publishes an appeal and memorial addressed to the Bishops of the English Church, calling attention to the fact that "not a few of the distinctive errors of the Church of Rome" are taught by service books which are being widely used in the Establishment. The Bishops are appealed to to take steps to discountenance and suppress these works. But it is a well-known fact that the bench of Bishops is a most unsatisfactory court of appeals for the Protestant.

In one of the Catechisms to which the attention of the Bishops is called the question is asked, "By what means are sins forgiven?" It would be a simple thing to quote any one of a score of texts giving a direct answer to the question; but it is not to teach the word of God that these books are written. The answer given is, "Sins are forgiven chiefly by the Sacraments of Holy Baptism and Penance." Prayers and sacrifices for the dead, the sacrifice of the Mass, the real presence, confession to priests, and many other ultra Romish practices are taught in these manuals, and are being received on every side by people who have been taught to look to men's teachings rather than to the Bible for themselves.

"Not Yet" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

Not Yet.-"We must hope that we are entering on a period when in every nation the idea that man should be suppressed in the name of religion will be rooted out. Charity alone can lead souls to the light." These are the words of a Roman Catholic authority, recently uttered in New Zealand. But the Church which he represents has acted contrary to the sentiments in every line of her history, wherever the power has been in her hands. And the spirit of the Papacy finds so natural a home in the natural heart, that the lesson of history, to say nothing of the word of Scripture, must teach us that so long as sin is in the earth, so long will men be oppressed in the name of religion.

"Whose Image and Superscription?" The Present Truth 10, 35.

E. J. Waggoner

We are sure that our readers will find the article on page 546, entitled "The Pope's Bell Ringing in Basel," very interesting. The story, however, is not yet finished. The article came just too late for last week's paper, and since then there have been new developments, of which we have been informed by letter. We will therefore in few words bring the account as nearly as possible up to date.

The article closes with the sale of household goods of the director of the publishing house, who is our correspondent. Before he had reached his home after the sale, he was summoned to appear before the court again, to answer for Sunday labour. Concerning this Brother Holser writes:-"The result of our trial last Thursday was that they fined me 200 francs, and sentenced me to three weeks in prison besides. In case they do not pay the fine, it will take forty days in prison to satisfy that." This will make a total of sixty-one days' imprisonment for labouring peacefully on the first day of the week, after having "rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment."

Brother Holser presented before the court the Bible reasons for his course, and why it was not possible for him as a Christian to observe Sunday. But the prosecuting attorney said that he seemed to be ignorant of the fact that "the State had no creed, i.e., nothing to do with religion." But if the State has nothing to do with religion, why does it seek to compel men to rest on Sunday?

Some will doubtless think that the city of Basel is simply "guarding the right" of other people to rest on Sunday, and protecting them from disturbance. But it can be clearly shown that this is not the case. Directly in front of the office where the work is done, for which Brother Holser is to be imprisoned, is a large green where there are foot-ball games, companies of soldiers drilling, officer's shouting commands, target-shooting, etc. Whatever noise might be made in the printing office is more than drowned by the noise on the green, yet no one thinks of being disturbed by that. The conclusion is inevitable that there is a "disturbance" occasioned by Sunday labour, except when the labourers keep the Sabbath of the Lord.

By the labour that has been done in the Imprimerie Polyglotte, nobody has been injured in the slightest degree. Nobody has been molested, nobody has been hindered for keeping Sunday, nor disturbed in his rest. There has been no damage to life or property. Yet fines and imprisonment are imposed. We emphasise this, not for the purpose of holding up the Government to reproach, but to show the nature of the Sunday institution. No such arbitrary action would be possible in connection with any really Christian institution.

The Gospel brings freedom. It knows nothing of force. And the fact that the Sunday institution allows and even demands persecution in its behalf, is in itself sufficient evidence that it is wholly opposed to the Gospel. There are absolutely no grounds upon which fines and imprisonment for Sunday labour can be defended, except on the papal ground that the traditions of men are above the law of God.

Brother Holser writes: "Personally I care not a straw about the inconvenience of a little of prison life. This is so little in comparison with what others have suffered, that I should be ashamed to mention it as a hardship." It is with no spirit of complaint or fault-finding that this matter is set forth, but that all who will read may see the ground on which Sunday observance stands. It has only the arbitrary and cruel power of man; the gentle power of God is not in it.

September 6, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

"The meek will He guide in judgment; and the meek will He teach His way." Ps. xxv. 9.

But there is nobody who is naturally meek. "For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness." Mark vii. 21, 22. "Pride compasseth them about as a chain."

Meekness can be learned only from Christ. He says, "Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall find rest unto your souls." Matt. xi. 28, 29. To be meek is to be like Christ.

"The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance; against such there is no law." Gal. v. 22, 23. Meekness then is identical with perfect obedience to the law of God through the Spirit. It is the same thing as love, which "vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own." 1 Cor. xiii. 4, 5. And "love is the fulfilling of the law."

In Christ "are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." Col. ii. 3. He is "the power of God, and the wisdom of God." 1 Cor. i. 24. The Spirit of the Lord is "the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of the fear of the Lord." Isa. xi. 2. Therefore he who learns of Christ, the meek and lowly One, and possesses the Spirit, whose fruit is meekness, must necessarily have sound wisdom and knowledge and discretion.

We read, "Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves." Phil. ii. 3. This is an exhortation to meekness, but how shall the thing be done? It is not an easy thing for a man to think others better than himself.

The answer is indicated in Rom. xii. 3, where the exhortation is repeated: "For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith." Faith is the gift of God (Eph. ii. 8), and the measure of faith which He has dealt to every man is "the faith of Jesus," which of course carries with it His meekness.

It is not possible that any man should of himself think others better than himself. But when God reveals Himself to him, and he realises his own sinfulness by contrast, it is impossible for him to imagine that any other can be as bad as he is. Thus he can, with Paul, declare himself to be the chief of sinners.

There are very many who have this experience at times; to be continually in that condition is another matter. How can it be maintained? Only by "looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher (Perfecter) of faith." His faith, His trust in the Father, by which self was kept out of sight that the works might be seen to be only the Father's, will work the same in us. Then may be fulfilled in weak men and women the words of Christ, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on Me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto My Father." John xiv. 12. The power that can do those works through human agents, can also preserve in them the meekness that will not become puffed up by them. Thus meekness brings wisdom and power.

"Possibilities of Deception" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

Some of the things into which self may enter and deceive the soul are mentioned by Paul in the first epistle to the Corinthians: "Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing." 1 Cor. xiii. 1, 2.

The apostle does not say that faith, and the gift of prophecy, and all knowledge, can be possessed by a person without charity, for that would be manifestly impossible. Faith works by love (or charity) and all the gifts of God come through faith; hence faith and all the gifts are inseparable from charity. Gal. v. 6.

But we may think that we have great faith, or the gift of prophecy, or some other gift, and that we are accomplishing a great work for the Lord, when it is only the work of self; or false prophets may arise, and show great signs and wonders, to deceive if possible even the very elect; and we

562

must know that without charity all these manifestations are spurious. We are not to base our confidence upon these. Even "though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing." The world would call this charity of a remarkable kind; but God, who looks at the heart, calls only that charity which has no taint of self. Not the love of self, but the love of God, is charity.

"The Spiritualist Family" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

A new Spiritualist journal called The Unknown World, has just made its appearance. In order that our readers may know from its adherents just what Spiritualism embraces, we make the following extract from the prospectus of the journal, most of the words of which we think they will be able to comprehend:-

The department of occult science embraced by the present editorial scheme are: White and Black Magic, Necromancy, Divination, Astrology, Alchemy, Witchcraft, Crystallomancy, Elementals and Elementaries, the Rosicrucians, the Illuminati, Esoteric, Freemasonry, the Mysteries, the Mystics, Hermetic Philosophy, the Arch?ology of the Secret Sciences.

We do not know if the above is the whole of the Spiritualist family, but it is sufficiently large.

"Missions and Tobacco" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

Do the members of the churches spend more money for tobacco than for foreign missions? A statement has been made by someone among the Baptists that they spend more for tobacco than for missions, and the London organ quotes the statement as possibly correct. And there is no reason for supposing the Baptists anymore given to the consumption of nicotine than others.

In the Church Intelligencer, Archdeacon Collison writes from the North Pacific concerning his Indians:-

Almost all the young men have given up the habit of smoking. One of them, who had realised a profit of five dollars on the sale of tobacco in a small trading store kept by him, brought this money and gave it me to assist in the purchase of a new bell for our mission church. I would to God that our young men at home might be influenced to deny themselves and devote the money spent in smoking to the work of fulfilling our Lord's command, the sending of the Gospel to every creature.

Whatever men may say of the use of tobacco, it is surely a serious problem that is put before them in the suggestion that they who profess to acknowledge the Lord's command are spending more in smoke than in sending the Gospel to the perishing. And others besides smokers may well ask whether they are not spending more money on needless luxuries than in the service of God. Statistics sometimes reveal surprising comparisons.

"Studies in Romans. Establishing the Law. Rom. iii. 27-31" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

We now come to the close of the third chapter of Romans. We found that righteousness is the free gift of God unto every one who believes. It is not that God gives a man righteousness as a reward for believing certain dogmas; the Gospel is something entirely different from that. It is this, that true faith has Christ alone as its object, and it brings Christ's life actually into the heart; and therefore it must bring righteousness. This act of mercy on the part of God is eminently just, because in the first place the sin is against God, and he has a right to pass by offences against Him; and, further, it is just, because He gives His own life as an atonement for the sin, so that the majesty of the law is not only maintained, but is magnified. "Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other." Ps. lxxxv. 10. God is just and the justifier of him who believes in Jesus. All righteousness is from Him alone.

"Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay; but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. Is He the God of the Jews only? is He not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also; seeing it is one God, which shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith. Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid; yea, we establish the law."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What have we previously learned as to the condition of all men?

"Guilty before God." "For all have sinned."

What is God to them that believe?

"The justifier of him which believeth in Jesus."

How does He justify those who have sinned?

"Freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus."

What righteousness does the man so justified have?

"The righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ."

Where is boasting then?

"It is excluded."

By what law? Of works?

"Nay; but by the law of faith."

What then is the conclusion?

"Therefore we conclude that a man if justified by faith without the deeds of the law."

Is God the God of the Jews only? Is He not of the Gentiles also?

"Yes, of the Gentiles also."

What is the proof?

"Seeing it is one God, which shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith."

Do we then make void the law through faith?

"God forbid." (Not by any means.) "Yea, we establish the law."

No Boasting.-Since righteousness is a free gift of God through Jesus Christ, it is evident that no one can justly boast of any righteousness that he has. "For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast." Eph. ii. 8, 9. "Who maketh thee to differ from another? and what hast thou that thou didst not receive? now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?" 1 Cor. iv. 7.

What Boasting Proves.-"Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him; but the just shall live by his faith." Hab. ii. 4. Boasting therefore is an evidence of a sinful heart. But suppose a man boasts of his righteousness, as, for instance, when a man says that he has lived without sin for so many years? "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." 1 John i. 8. But are not the grace and power of God manifested in Christ to cleanse and keep us from sin? Most certainly; but only when in humility we acknowledge that we are sinners. "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." 1 John i. 9. When we say that we have no sin, that very thing is evidence that we have; but when with faith in the word of the Lord we say that we are sinners, then the blood of Christ

563

cleanses us from all sin. In the plan of salvation there is no place for human pride and boasting.

No Boasting in Heaven.-The result of boasting in heaven is seen in the case of Satan. Once he was one of the covering cherubs above the throne of God. But he began to contemplate his own glory and goodness, and his fall was the consequence. "Thou hast sinned; therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God; and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire. Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness." Eze. xxviii. 16, 17. If the saints after their translation should begin to boast of their sinlessness, they would be as bad as they ever were. But that will never be. All who are admitted to heaven will have fully learned the lesson that God is all and in all. There will not be a voice or a heart silent in the song of praise, "Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever."

The Law of Works.-The law of works does not exclude boasting. If a man were justified by works, he would have whereof to boast over another who had the same privilege, but did not use it. In that case the righteous could boast over the wicked; and people would continually be comparing themselves with one another to see who had done the most. The law of works is simply the ten commandments in form only. Compliance with the law of works enables one to appear outwardly righteous, while within he is full of corruption. Yet the one who follows the law of works is not always necessarily a hypocrite. He may have an earnest desire to keep the commandments, but may be deceived into thinking that he can work them out of himself.

The Law of Faith.-This has for its object the same thing as the law of works, namely, the commandments of God, but the result is different. The law of works deceives a man with a form; the law of faith gives him the substance. The law of faith is the law "as it is in Jesus." The one may be a sincere attempt to keep the law; the other is the actual accomplishment of that desire, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. The ten commandments as given by the Lord are only a law of faith, since God never designed that they should be taken in any other way; and He never expected that anybody could get righteousness from them in any other way than by faith. The law of works is man's perversion of the law of God.

Faith Without Works.-"Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law." Because there is no other means by which he could be justified! We have before seen that all men are sinners, and that no man has power in himself to perform the deeds of the law, no matter how strong his desires. "Not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified." Rom. ii. 13. But "by the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified in His sight; for by the law is the knowledge of sin." Rom. iii. 20. Therefore whoever is justified, or made righteous at all, must be made righteous by faith alone, wholly apart from the deeds of the law. This is of universal application. It means that justification, first, last, and all the time, is by faith alone. The Christian cannot be justified by works any more than the sinner can be. No man can ever get so good and strong that his own deeds can justify him.

Faith and Works.-But that is not to say that works have nothing to do with faith. Justification means making just, or making righteous. Righteousness is right doing. Faith which justifies, therefore, is faith which makes a man a doer of the law, or, rather, which puts the doing of the law into him. "For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." Eph. ii. 10. "It is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure." Phil. ii. 13. "This is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works." Titus iii. 8. A man is not justified by faith and works, but by faith alone, which works.

One God for All.-There is but "one God and Father of all." Eph. iv. 6. He "hath made of one blood all nations of men," "for we are also His offspring." Acts xvi. 26, 28. "There is no respect of persons with God." Rom. ii. 11. "In every nation he that feareth Him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with Him." Acts x. 35. The Scripture saith: "Whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed. For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek; for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon Him." Rom. x. 11, 12.

One Means of Justification.-The fact that justification is only by faith, and that God "commandeth all men everywhere to repent" (Acts xvii. 30), shows that God regards Jew and Gentile alike. Nor is there any evidence that He ever did put any difference between them. A believing Gentile was always accounted righteous, and an unbelieving Jew was never considered by the Lord any better than any other unbeliever. Remember that Abraham, the father of the whole Jewish nation, was a Chaldean. The Jews were related to the Chaldeans who remained in their native land, just as surely as they were to one another in the land of Canaan. Unfortunately, they forgot this; but they are not the only ones in the world who have forgotten that all men are their brethren.

In the statement, "It is one God, which shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith," there is no need of stumbling over the prepositions. Bear in mind how often we use the words "by" and "through" interchangeably, to indicate means, and there will be no difficulty. The emphatic word is "faith." Both circumcision and uncircumcision are justified through, or by means of, faith.

Making Void the Law.-Making void the law does not mean abolishing it. There is no question as to the perpetuity of the law. It is so plainly eternal that the apostle Paul never wastes space in arguing about it. The only question is as to how its claim may be satisfied. The Saviour said that the Jews made the commandment of God of none effect through their tradition. So far as they were concerned, they made it void. No man could by any action or lack of action abolish or in any way affect the law of God. But anybody may by his unbelief obliterate it from his own heart. The question then is, Do we by faith make the law of God of none effect? Or, more plainly still, Does faith lead to the transgression of the law? The answer is, "Not by any means."

Establishing the Law.-That which has been said in regard to making void the law of God will apply here also.

564

That is, no action of man can make the law anything different from what it actually is. It is the foundation of the throne of God, and as such it will ever abide, in spite of demons and men. But it is left for us to say whether or not we will have it obliterated from our hearts, or have it established there. If we choose to have it established in our hearts, we have only to accept Christ by faith. Faith brings Christ to dwell in the heart. Eph. iii. 17. The law of God is in the heart of Christ (Ps. xl. 8), so that the faith which brings Christ into the heart establishes the law there. And since the law of God is the establishment of His throne, the faith which brings the law into the heart, enthrones God there. And thus it is that God works in men both to will and to do of His good pleasure.

"'Brain-Power' of Plants" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

It is doubtless well know that it is very difficult to draw the line of division between plants and the lowest forms of animal life. Some so-called plants have the power of locomotion, and some things that are classed as animals are permanently fixed to one spot. The difference between the lowest forms of animals and plants is far less than the difference between many well-known animals, and so students are beginning to conclude that the difference between the animal and the vegetable kingdom is one of degree rather than of kind. The following from an article in the National Review emphasises this likeness:-

"The botanist of to-day seeks to unravel the mysteries of plant life. For him the plant is no longer an inanimate being, but stands revealed as an organism exhibiting animal functions, such as breathing, circulation of blood or sap, various complex movements, and sleeping, which are as certainly equally well defined as are the analogous traits in the existence of the animal. We have seen that all these functions in the animal kingdom cannot be performed except by the agency of the various nerves, etc., and that there must be a source of power behind the different nerve cells of which the brain is composed. The brain itself can, therefore, be looked upon as an intermediate motor which only serves for the more perfect transmission of impulse. This motor is absent in plants; but does it necessarily follow that the power or force itself is non-existent?-Certainly not. There is any amount of evidence to the contrary.

"Some say that this power is merely instinct; but. . . . instinctive actions moved only in one direction, and cannot adapt themselves to circumstances. But all those who have studied the habits of plants know full well that they have the power of adapting themselves to circumstances, and have many movements and traits that are the very reverse of automatic. Numerous instances might be pointed out, in which not only are the signs of sensibility as fully developed in the plant as in the animal, but, as I have before hinted, many phases of animal life are exactly imitated. Take, for example, those wonderful plants, the mimosa, sensitive of the most delicate touch:-

"'Weak with nice sense, the chaste mimosa stands;
From each rude touch withdraws her timid hands;
Oft as light clouds o'erpass the summer glade,
Alarmed, she trembles at the moving shade,
And feels alive through all her tender form,
The whispered murmurs of the gathering storm;
Shuts her sweet eyelids to the approaching 'night,
And hails with freshened charms the rising light.'

"The manner in which this plant closes its stalks and leaves at the approach of darkness, is very interesting. As the gloaming gently falls, the leaves move upward toward each other till they touch; the secondary leaf-stalks slowly droop till they are nearly parallel with the main leaf-stalks, which in their turn fall till they point to the ground. Thus it folds itself at the close of the day, and there is no doubt, if it were not allowed to sleep, it would, like ourselves, soon die. This is not only an example of the necessity of sleep for the repairing of nervous energy and recuperation of brain-power, but a proof of the existence of the same in the vegetable kingdom.

"Then there are the carnivorous plants, the Venus's fly trap (Dkonaea), for instance, which will digest raw beef as readily as its insect prey. From glands with which its leaf is provided, fluids are poured out which resemble the gastric juice of the animal stomach in its digestive properties. The matter of the insect's body or meat is thus absorbed into the substance and tissues of the plant just as the food taken into the animal stomach is digested and becomes part of the animal fabric. In the animal, digestion can only be commenced by the brain-force acting by means of a nerve upon the gastric glands; we may, therefore, concede that it is the action of the same power in the plant that produces the same effect.

"There is no structure in plants, so far as its functions are concerned, more wonderful than the tip of the radicle. The course pursued by other radicle in penetrating the ground must be determined by the tip. Darwin wrote: 'It is hardly an exaggeration to say that the tip of the radicle, as it is, with such diverse kinds of sensitive dust, that acts like the brain of animals; the brain being seated within the extreme end of the body, receiving impressions from the sense organs, and directing the several movements.'"

The writer next refers to the different directions invariably taken by the radicle and the plumule of sprouting seeds, as in the pea, the bean, etc., the radicle always going downward, and the plumule upward, and asks:-

"What causes the radicle to descend and the other to ascend? If the seed is so placed that the radicle comes out at the top, the result is the same; for the radicle immediately turns round and grows downward. It cannot be gravitation, although Darwin thought it was, because that would have the same effect upon the plumule. There can only be one reason, and that, the existence of a directing force, or brain-power.

"A still more remarkable instance of intelligent plant movement is found in one of the lowest forms of the vegetable kingdom; namely, the Peronospora infestans, the well-known potato fungus. I need not go into the life-history of this plant, it being more especially in the spores that the existence of a power of movement according to circumstances is marked. When the spore-cases burst, a multitude of little bodies escape; if these bodies gain access to water, they develope a couple of curious little tails, and by means of these tails they swim about after the manner of tadpoles. Surely this is something higher than a mere automatic or instinctive movement."

These are the facts. The question is, What do they teach? The evolutionist sees in them evidence that all life proceeds from a single germ, and that the highest forms of animal life are but the more complete maturity of the lowest forms. That is the same mistake that the ancient heathen made when they "changed the truth of God into a lie." Instead of recognising the power of the Creator in the things that He had made, they looked upon them as virtually self-created.

565

One thing these facts are designed to teach us, and that is that there is but one source of life for everything in the world. The living God is the source of all life. Not only do we "live, and move, and have our being," but "in Him all things consist." "Of Him, and through Him, and to Him, are all things; to whom be the glory for ever."

The Lord, through the prophet, tells us that "all flesh is grass." This is spoken with special reference to the frailty of man, and therein it shows the truth which we would point out, namely, that both plants and animals, including man, derive their life wholly from God. There is but one life in the universe,-the life of God,-but it is manifested in an infinite variety of ways, because God is infinite. The life of God in each created thing makes that thing just what God designed it to be. Men have resisted the gentle but powerful influences of the Life, and so have perverted it; but when they yield to it they become "trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified."

Therefore that which our author calls "brain-power" in plants, is simply the evidence of the life of God, which is the source and preserver of all things. All have the same life, and yet are not developed one from another, but come from God who in the beginning made each creature "after its kind." At His word they came into existence; by His word they are preserved. His word is life, "and this is the word which by the Gospel is preached unto you."

"God's Appointment" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

God's Appointment.-The Lord has made an appointment with all men; not an appointment with them in general, but with each one in particular. We read that "it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the Judgment" (Heb. ix. 27), but the appointment to death was made by man himself, and not by the Lord. God has appointed the Judgment, also, which all must attend, and which men naturally associate with the thought of Divine wrath. But there is an appointment that He has made with men, which they are at liberty to keep or to disregard; and that is an appointment to salvation. "For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Thess. v. 9. The place of punishment-the lake of fire-is prepared not for man, but for the devil and his angels. Matt. xxv. 41. God's will concerning men is that all of them should be saved (1 Tim. ii. 4), and this is His appointment with them. It is an appointment to meet Him, and He has designated the place; it is at the cross of Christ. All who will keep this appointment of the Lord's will be saved.

"The Fountain of Anarchy" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

We live in an age when society and civil government have seriously to reckon with anarchy as one of the most formidable among the various foes arrayed against them. While there are comparatively few of avowed Anarchists in the world, and while these are undoubtedly abhorred and detested by the vast majority for their murderous counsels and deeds, the spirit of anarchy is, in various guises, spreading far and wide. The gigantic labour troubles which have been, and are now, so agitating some of the leading nations, furnish a vast hot-bed in which the seeds of anarchy spring up and develop with the most alarming rapidity; and these troubles, which give such an impetus to anarchy, show no tendency to diminish either in number or dimensions.

The spirit that is behind all these manifestations, prompting the ones to produce them, is the spirit of self,-of disregarding the interests of others and seeking to promote the interests of self at their expense. Selfishness is the tap-root from which anarchy and all forms of social disturbances spring, and until this tap-root is destroyed it will be impossible to eradicate the things which grow out of it. And therefore it will be impossible ever to eradicate these evils by human laws, because no such law can touch the selfishness in a man's heart.

Selfishness is not, as a principle, contrary to the laws of man; but it is directly contrary to the law of God, for that law requires that a person should love the Lord with all his heart, mind, and strength, and his neighbour as himself. Matt. xxii. 36-40. The principle of anarchy, therefore, has its origin in disobedience to the law of God. And whatever tends to set aside that law, tends directly to the production of anarchy and disorder. These are facts which lie at the foundation of a correct understanding of the situation which confronts us, and of the outcome that is before us.

If then anarchy is the result of disobedience to the Divine law, does it not follow that the governments of earth should work to suppress anarchy by enforcing the law of God? By no means; for that law is a law of love-supreme love to God, and unselfish love to men,-and only that power which can put love into the human heart and enforce the law which commands it. This no human power can do; for love is of God, and comes into the heart as the gift of God and not by the will of man. It comes by a voluntary opening of the heart to God and to His Spirit, so that God, who is love, can come in and dwell there; and not as the result of any compelling force. An individual could not compel himself to love, even should his mind consent to it and desire it; much less, then, could he be compelled to love by a law outside of himself, and acting against his will.

No human efforts, therefore, can do anything toward fulfilling the law of God. Nor is any effort of man needed in this direction, for God Himself has made ample provision for enabling every person on earth to keep His law, through the grace which He gives to all men by the Gospel. Through faith the heart is opened to God to be His dwelling place, and only thus can that love which is the fulfilling of the law abide in the heart.

But it does follow from the foregoing facts that every effort to set aside and nullify the law of God helps to produce the very evil which many who thus treat the Divine law are loudly crying against. For that law has been slighted and set aside by men, even by those who profess to be the servants of God and the followers of Jesus. By some of this class it is even declared that God's law has been abolished,-that law which says, "Thou shalt not kill;" "Thou shalt not commit adultery;" and "Thou shalt not steal."' What effect can the preaching of the abolition of this law have upon men but to break down the barriers of moral restraint about them and give loose rein to all the evil tendencies of their hearts.

Others preach that the law of God does not mean what it says, since, for example, it affirms that the seventh day-not the first-is the Sabbath, and also that the earth and all that in them is in six days; whereas the "higher" critics and the theologians all agree that the first day is the Sabbath, and that the heavens and the earth and all that in them is came by the process of evolution, through a long, indefinite period of time, covering millions of years. What effect can such preaching

566

have other than to make men believe they cannot understand what the Lord has told them, and that they cannot be held strictly accountable for not fulfilling His word? All such preaching tends directly to make men disregard and treat with contempt the law of God, and thus to open wider the floodgates to lawlessness of every kind.

This spirit which leads men thus to set aside the law of God, did not originate in the nineteenth century, nor did it find first lodgment in the hearts of any of those who have stood forth as Anarchists before the world, it originated with him who first spoke against the law of God and rose up in opposition to it; that is, the devil. He is a great Anarchist, and all lesser Anarchists but partake of his spirit. He is the lawless one, the originator of rebellion against law, and all whom he can inspire with his spirit are made lawless like himself. When a mighty angel in heaven, he sought to exalt himself to the place of God (Isa. xiv. 12-14), thus striking directly against the law of supreme love to God. Being cast out of heaven he has carried on his "mystery of lawlessness" (2 Thess. ii. 7, R.V.) on the earth, by leading men to fight against the law of God and set it aside by their own commandments and traditions.

Of this the Papacy affords a prominent example, with its "man of sin," "who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped" (2 Thess. ii. 3, 4), and who claims the power and the right to change the law of God and substitute for it the law of man. This is anarchy in its worst form; and the spirit of the Papacy-the spirit of self-exaltation-is fast permeating all religious bodies throughout the world. Preaching self instead of Christ, and the word of man instead of the law of God,-this it is that has done more than anything else to let loose the lawlessness of the human heart and break down respect for all law, both human and Divine.

It is the Spirit of God that is the restraining power in the earth, and not the laws or the authority of man. The Spirit of God restrains the wickedness of the human heart and also the "spiritual wickedness in high places," so that the earth is not overwhelmed in a mighty flood of iniquity and ruin. But as men slight the mercy of God and resist His Spirit, this restraint is gradually withdrawn, and men are given over to their own evil lusts and the control of evil spirits, which will cause the most fearful scenes of lawlessness to be enacted. Human laws, however severe, will be powerless to stay the tide. The most they can do is to dam it up for a time, but the flood still flows on from its sources beyond the reach of human law, and sooner or later the barrier is swept away, and the ruin is worse than before. There is no safety for the world, but there is safety for individuals, and their only safety is in yielding to the control of the Spirit of God.

Let all who desire to see their fellow-beings saved from the tide of anarchy and ruin raise their voices earnestly and fearlessly in advocating the claims of the law of God and teaching men to reverence and obey it, laying aside opposing doctrines and traditions of men. Loyalty to the law and government of God should be the watchword now for all who profess His name. And this loyalty is represented by a living faith in His word. Everything that rests not upon this word is anarchy, either open or disguised; and every person who takes not his stand upon that word is arrayed with the forces of anarchy, and will involve himself in its ruin.

"Jews and Israelites" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

A strange misapprehension has arisen in the minds of many concerning the promises of God to Israel. An idea has gained currency that the Jews and Israelites are two distinct peoples, and that when we read in the Bible about a Jew, it is a gross error to speak of him as an Israelite. There is no need of any controversy or speculation over the matter, when we read the truth so plainly in the Scriptures. Let us note a few texts.

In Rom. iii. 1, 2 we read, "What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision? Much every way: chiefly that unto them were committed the oracles of God." Here we learn that the law was given to the Jews. But we read in Ex. xix. 1, 2, that it was the children of Israel that camped before the mount in the third month after their departure from Egypt; and in Mal. iv. 4 we read, "Remember ye the law of Moses My servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel." And again in 2 Cor. iii. 13, 14, that Moses put a veil upon his face when he came down from the mount, on account of the blindness of the minds of the children of Israel, which blindness remains unto this day. In the case of the giving of the law, therefore, we see that the terms "Jews" and "children of Israel" are used interchangeably.

Again, when the Apostle Paul had been seized by the Roman soldiers, and was about to be scourged, he said in reply to the centurion's question as to who he was, "I am a man which am a Jew of Tarsus." Acts xxi. 39. He also said that he and Peter were "Jews by nature," as distinguished from Gentiles. Gal. ii. 15. And yet he said, "I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin." Rom. xi. 1. The Jew and the Israelite are one and the same man.

When the angel foretold the birth of Jesus, he said, "The Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of His father David; and He shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever: and of His kingdom there shall be no end." Luke i. 32, 33. But David reigned over all Israel, and Jacob is Israel, so that reigning over the house of Jacob means reigning over the house of Israel. Thus we read, "And thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto Me that is to be Ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting." Micah v. 2.

"The twelve tribes of Israel" are often mentioned in the Scriptures, referring to the twelve sons of Jacob, who is also called Israel. The city of the saints of God, the New Jerusalem, which comes down from God out of heaven, will have on its twelve gates twelve names, "which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel." Rev. xxi. 12. This shows that all who have right to the tree of life, and enter in through the gates into the city will be Israelites.

That this is so may be further seen from the meaning of the name Israel, and the reason why it was given. When the Lord changed Jacob's name to Israel, He gave as the reason for the change, "For as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed." Gen. xxxiii. 28. Israel, therefore, means one who prevails, an overcomer. Now read the words of the Lord, "To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with Me in My throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with My Father in His throne." Rev. iii. 21. None but overcomers will enter the kingdom of God. They will all be princes, sons of God. That is, they will all be Israelites. None but Israelites

567

will be in the kingdom of Christ, for He is the King of Israel; yet men will be there "of all nations and kindreds, and people, and tongues," because "God is no respecter of persons; but in every nation he that feareth Him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with Him."

This definition of Israel corresponds exactly to the description of true Jews. The Israelite is the one who prevails, and the power by which he prevails is the power of the Spirit. He is one in whom is no guile. John i. 47. So likewise "he is a Jew which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the Spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God."

It is true that after the death of Solomon the kingdom was divided, and the two divisions were known as the kingdom of Judah and the kingdom of Israel; nevertheless they were all Israel, and the two kingdoms were embraced in "the twelve tribes of Israel."

The facts are, therefore, that the people who are now generally known as Jews, are the same as those who in Scripture are called both Jews and Israelites. Those terms are used, however, much the same as the words "church" and "Christian" are used. That is, they are used to designate the people who profess to serve the Lord, although their profession may be a false one. As the real christians are those who love and serve the Lord, no matter by what name they are known, so the real Jews or Israelites are and always were those who "worship God in the Spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and put no confidence in the flesh;" and it matters not in what country they may live, nor what their birth may be. The tabernacle of David, that is fallen down, is to be built up again by the preaching of the Gospel to the Gentiles. See Acts xv. 14-18.

When men cease to be "aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise," they become "fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God." Eph. ii. 12-20. The branches from the wild olive tree are grafted into the tame olive tree, and partake of its fatness, but only by faith. In like manner the natural branches which were broken off because of unbelief, are grafted in again, "if they abide not in unbelief." "And so all Israel shall be saved." How?-By the uniting of both Jews and Gentiles to the body of Christ by faith. This thing is certain, that whether we use the term Jews or Israelites, they are the descendants of Abraham: "and if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." Gal. iii. 29.

"Resolutions" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

The New York Observer has the following on the resolutions which it is so convenient for most people to make as a substitute for action:-

Poor weak human nature ever feels that it has done something when it has resolved. We have enjoyed many a good meeting thoroughly up to the moment when some speaker has sought to concentrate it all in half a dozen Wheresos, and a series of Resolved's. We could furnish a cart-load of gold-framed resolutions, did we know of any demand for the article. The resolutions are not brand-new, but they are just as good as new, for they have positively never been used.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

-In Hungary 100 soldiers were prostrated by sunstroke during the military man?uvres.

-Behauzin, the ex-King of Dahomey, it is reported, is about to embrace the Roman Catholic faith.

-After heavy fighting in the Transvaal, the Kaffirs have been defeated and are now suing for peace.

-An inventor claims to have produced a perpendicular paddle capable of propelling steamers fifty miles an hour.

-A panic has been caused amongst the Christian population of Cyprus by the withdrawal of the British garrison.

-The annual International Peace Congress began its annual session at Antwerp Aug. 29. Representatives were present from Great Britain and the United States.

-A wealthy Jewish farmer and his whole family of eight persons were murdered at the village of Boschewin, in Austria. The crime seems to have been the result of race hatred.

-One hundred armed peasants stormed a castle in the Russian township of Crottnign, because the eerier had made a distraint upon certain tenants, and seized thirty head of cattle. The attacking party were beaten old.

-Artificial birds for the adornment (?) of ladies head gear are now made in such perfection, from the feathers obtained from poulterers, that it is to be difficult to distinguish them from nature, either in shape, size, or colour.

-Further particulars of the fighting near Ping Yang, in Korea, are given from Chinese native sources, according to which the Japanese suffered very heavily, and were completely routed by General Yeh. The Koreans, it is said, flocked to the Chinese standard.

-The Bible, Education Council has issued a manifesto to the School Board electors of London in favour of the maintenance of the compromise of 1871. The signatories include Archdeacons Farrar and Sinclair, and clergymen and ministers of various denominations.

-Telegrams from Sebastopol report that a terrible hurricane has passed over the Sea of Azoff. In some places the sea invaded the land, and entire villages wore swept away by the waves. Several steamers with their crows have been lost.

-A Roman Catholic cathedral is to be built in London, close by Westminster Abbey, at a cost of ?280,000. It will be 350 feet long, 170 foot wide, and 100 feet high, and will accommodate 10,000 persona. There will he also a monastery in one part for monks and "lay brethren."

-Two youths, while ascending the Ort Alp, in the Austrian Tyrol, without a guide, fell over a precipice 400ft. high. One of them was killed on the spot, while the other remained suspended to a birch tree for seventeen hours, when he was rescued alive from his perilous position.

-The scheme for tunnelling through the Simplon has been approved by the Swiss Federal Council. It will take five and a half years to complete with a single line of rails, and will coat 54,000,000 francs. The construction will admit of a second line of rails being added later.

-Another earthquake shock of short duration was felt in Greece on the morning of August 26. The disturbance was felt at Athens, Corinth, Vastizza, Zante, Thebes, Chalets, and Atalanti. At some of these places the inhabitants were terror-stricken, and fled from the houses in panic.

-According to official despatches the Dutch troops in the East Indies have suffered a serious reverse, the whole force being cut up in detachments by the Lombok natives. Several gnus were loft behind, and the Dutch remnant made for the coast, whore they were under the protection of the fleet.

-A demonstration against the House of Lords, organised by the National League for the Abolition of the House of Lords, was held in Hyde Para Aug. 26, and was attended by about 60,000 parsons. Speaking took place from eleven plat-forms, at each of which a resolution demanding the abolition of the Second Chamber was carried by acclamation.

-According to the latest mail advices from Cuba, brigandage has again broken out in the island. Nineteen persons have been murdered by the brigands, who have, moreover, caused a dynamite explosion and kidnapped six of the wealthier inhabitants. The authorities are organising the dispatch of military detachments against the chief robber bands.

-In Austria tobacco of all forms is a Government monopoly, and the Government makes enormous profits out of the cigarettes alone. In 1893 there were 1,416,600,917 sold, and in the first quarter of 1894 forty-four million more cigarettes were sold than in the same quarter of last year. In the course of last year twelve million florins were spent in cigarettes alone in Austria.

-The Anarchists are still busily at work in the capitals of Europe. In Bedweis, Bohemia, an Anarchist plot has been discovered. Eight Anarchists had planned the robbing of a rich church at Gutwasser, containing the shrine visited by the Corodo pilgrims, in order to furnish Anarchist with the necessary funds for carrying out their nefarious designs. The plot was discovered just in time. The Vienna police are in possession of exact knowledge relating to many complicated Anachist plots in Austria.

-A terrible storm raged on the awning of Aug. 27 at Laurahutte, Silesia, and in the surrounding country. Thousands of windows were smashed by hailstones, which wore of astonishing size, and fell in dense showers. Large trees were torn up by the roots, and chimneys without number were blown down. Much other damage was also done. The wind blew with such terrific force that some railway carriages standing on the line were swept along the track at great speed, and three workmen were run over before they had time to escape. Two persons were killed by lightning.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

The operations of the British and Foreign Bible Society have been prohibited in the Russian province of Kieff.

Enemies of the Gospel in China are renewing the agitation against foreigners, and outrages are reported from various mission stations. It is only in the Gospel that men apprehend the truth that God hath made of one blood all nations of men.

The appeal of the manager of our Central European publishing house, whose prosecution for Sunday labour we reported a week ago, came from the Court of Appeals Basel (Switzerland) last week, and the decision of the lower court was sustained. Opportunity was given for appeal to the Supreme Court, which was taken. In our next we will give a summary of the appeal laid before the court.

While affirming the decision under the unjust religious law, the judges evidently were not at ease in using the law to try to compel a man to violate his conscience in the name of religion, and indulged in some amusing theological arguments. Thus the force of attempting to make men religious by law, which has been played ever since the rise of the Papacy, still goes on. The Gospel invites: The law of men would compel; but the Gospel will triumph in the end, for it is the power of God.

An Odessa correspondent reports the rise of a strangely fanatical sect in one of the Volga provinces. Russia is full of religious fanaticism. This follows repression and intolerance in the religious world, as surely as Nihilism follows despotism. Those real Protestants, however, as the Stundists and others, to whom the ecclesiastical rulers charged all the religious difficulties in Russia, are the very ones who cannot be led into either fanaticism or rebellion.

The unsettled condition of affairs in all nations is evidently only the beginning of such conditions as our Lord referred to in His instructions regarding the days of His second advent. The perplexity and lack of confidence in the business world is a striking comment on Luke xxi. 25, 26. A London banker said the other day that in all his forty years banking experience he had never seen the bank rate so low as now, one-half per cent. People who have money fear to invest it as freely as formerly. It is a good time to lay up gold and silver where moth and rust does not corrupt, and where there is no danger of losing it.

The Gospel is making its way among the people in China, notwithstanding the powers arrayed against it. "I could walk," says a missionary, "from Canton to Shanghai, over a hundred miles, not walking more than twenty miles a day, and could sleep every night in a village or town that has a little Christian community."

"Examine Yourselves" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

Examine Yourselves.-From Paul's second letter to the Corinthians (last chapter) we learn that they at one time sought a proof that Christ was speaking in Paul to them. The apostle answered them, "Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves." The trouble was not with Paul, but with them. If they had been in the faith, they would not have been seeking a proof of Paul's apostleship. When we are not right ourselves, we begin at once to question whether others are right. But the important question is not, Is Christ in him? but, Is Christ in me? If he is in me, I shall know His voice whenever I hear it; but if He is not in me, I cannot possibly find out whether or not He is in anyone else.

"Is it 'Pleasant'?" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

In the editorial columns of Light, a Spiritualist paper, we find the following paragraph:-

It is pleasant to know, on the high authority of M. Chatulets, that certain African tribes hitherto regarded barbarous idolaters, or fetish worshippers, are genuine Theists, with a very strong tinge of Spiritualism of a low order. Their supposed idols are really talismans or charms, usually believed to be vehicles of spirit-influence. They believe in minor deities just as the ancient Greeks or Romans did, though many of them are of a less poetic kind. The spirits are regarded as the representatives of natural forces, who act like men in the matter of likes and dislikes. They are open to entreaty, and can be propitiated with bribes in the form of sacrifices. Their priests or mediators are simply mediums, and their main act of worship is the attempt to secure the good-will of the spirits.

This is an admission from the parties themselves, of what we have often stated, namely, that Spiritualism is identical with heathenism. Some readers will say, "Well, what of that? we don't know anything about Spiritualism, and are not at all concerned with it." Not so fast. There is something more to this which may not be so "pleasant" to the reader as to the editor of Light. We hope it will not be. It is this:-

On the authority of Spiritualists themselves, "the whole of Spiritualism is summed up in the teaching that man has a conscious existence in death-that, in fact, there is no death, because man has life in himself." This is Spiritualism, and Spiritualism is heathenism. We will not trace the line any further, but will commend it to our friends who think that men have by nature life in themselves, irrespective of their character or of their relation to Christ.

"God or Man?" The Present Truth 10, 36.

E. J. Waggoner

Men who have any convictions to follow are liable to be called upon to choose between God or man wherever any body of religionists have control of the civil power. In the Review of the Churches we are told of intolerance in Germany, under the Lutherans, who doubtless are nonetheless vigorous in denouncing the persecution of their co-religionists in the Baltic provinces at the hands of the Russian Church.

In Dresden Baptists are denied the right of public worship, and are threatened with fire or imprisonment if they announce their hopes of worship at the entrance to their meeting places. Nevertheless they go on with their services. Pastor and people are convinced "they ought to obey God rather than men," and they are resolved to do so at all risks.

There is of course no chance here for the charge that the Baptists are disturbing anyone, except as some men are disturbed because someone differs from them. It is simply a set of men who have the power of the law saying to others, We will make you conform to our religious opinions and practices, or punish you. In what respect is such Lutheranism less papal in its spirit than Romanism?

September 13, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

"Then drew near unto him all the publicans and sinners for to hear him. And the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them." Luke xv. 1, 2.

The Pharisees thought this the worst reproach that they could bring against Jesus. They did not realise that it was His glory, and the reason why He came to earth. "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners." 1 Tim. i. 15. And He says, "Him that cometh to Me, I will in no wise cast out." John vi. 37.

Strange as it may seem, there are very many people to-day as ignorant of the mission of Christ as the Pharisees were. They are deterred from coming to the Lord, by the thought that they are great sinners, when that is the very reason why they should come. Not only does He receive them, but He invites and urges them to come. "All day long," He says, "I have stretched forth My hands to a disobedient and gainsaying people." Rom. x. 21.

The two parables that follow the verses in Luke above quoted, illustrate the relation of Christ to lost sinners. The man went to search for the lost sheep, because it was his own. The woman searched for the lost piece of silver, because it belonged to her. So when Christ comes to seek and to save that which is lost, He is seeking His own. This should at once set at rest all doubts as to whether or not He will receive and accept us. He has already accepted us, and will receive us if we will come.

But how will He receive us? The next parable, that of the prodigal son, answers this question. He receives us gladly, because He is looking and longing for us. "When He was yet a great way off," the prodigal's father "saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him." Christ has shown how greatly He desires us, and that "He gave Himself" for us. Gal. i. 4.

How did the prodigal son come home?-Just as he was,-starving and in rags. He could not come any other way. He had spent all he had, and there was no one to give him anything. He could not come dressed in fine clothes. If he had waited to make himself respectable, he would have died. Moreover, there would have been nothing to call forth compassion, if he had come well-dressed and strong. It was his weak and dejected appearance that called out all the father's pity.

There was no hesitation on the part of the father because the son came in rags. In this respect also the picture is true to life. The true parent loves a child, and not the clothes that it wears. Clothing makes no difference with the love of a father for his son. The father was not mourning for the fine clothes that his son took away. He had clothing enough for himself and for his son. What he mourned was his lost child. So when the son returned, the father was content, in the condition in which he came made no difference. This is given to show that God's love for us is not diminished by the fact that we are covered with the filthy rags of sin. He has righteousness enough to supply all our lack.

And so we come back to the first word: "This Man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them." To those who are "wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked," He says, "Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any man hear My voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me." Rev. iii. 21. Best of all, He Himself provides the feast. He is the bread and water of life. His flesh and blood are true food and true drink. "Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies; Thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over."

"Roman Catholic Progress" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

It requires no very keen observation to see that the Roman Catholic Church is on the alert, and active in making use of every situation in the affairs of nations that can advance its interest. It inherits honestly the craft by which it is enabled to "prosper and practice."

The current in Protestantism which is running toward Roman methods, and setting the customs of the Church-many of them received from Rome-against the word of God, is doing the work which gives Rome her opportunity. The rationalist that openly undertakes to undermine the Bible, and every one who indirectly undermines it by contending that the Scriptures do not really mean just what they say, are helping to build up the Papacy, which rests upon the principle of self exalted above God.

In England the activity of Roman Catholics in every direction is noticeable,

578

and new churches and cathedrals are being opened or built. In Germany they have just been holding their forty-first annual Congress. The following summary (from the Echo report) of the topics of discussion shows how boldly and confidently they are planning to further their interests, making use of all the temporal power they can obtain control of:-

(1) The re-admission of the Jesuits into the German Empire; (2) the restoration of the Pope's secular monarchy; (3) the maintenance of "the Christian School" at State cost; (4) the relation of the Church to the modern demands of the workers; (5) the support of the Roman Catholic newspapers. The president, Dr. Orterer, declared amidst loud cheers, that the Jesuits were already in Germany. "We are all Jesuits nowadays," said he, "I am an arch-Jesuit." Professor Schoepmann, of Holland, said that his own country set a noble example to Germany. The Dutch soil is as free to the Jesuit as to every other religionist. "For my own part," exclaimed this enthusiastic son of Loyola, "I regard the Jesuit as the man in whom the ideal Christ is incorporated."

The attempt to keep down the power of the Jesuits and the power of the Romanist in Germany by repressive laws has signally failed. Cannot every Protestant see that the only weapon that can successfully resist the Papacy is the word of God-the word which accomplished such wonders when the early Reformers let it loose in their days? The trouble since their days is that instead of going on to know all the word of God to men, too many have ceased to go forward and are content with the traditions received from their fathers, who themselves protested that they saw not all the truth, and urged their successors to search for every ray of light which God has given.

"How Can We Know?" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

How can we know whether we are serving God or serving self? The Apostle John answers this question. "If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth." "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." 1 John i. 6, 8. "He that saith, I know Him, and keepeth not His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him." "He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until now." Chap. ii. 4, 9. Hatred of our brother is a sure indication of love of self; but love toward our brother is an evidence that self-love is gone. "We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren." Chap. iii. 14. And who is our brother? The Apostle Paul answers the question by declaring that God "hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth." Acts xviii. 26. "One is your Master, even Christ, and all ye our brethren." Matt. xxiii. 8. The tie of brotherhood is just as extensive among men as the authority of Christ is over them. And therefore when we have brotherly love we have love toward all men, and it will be our desire and aim to do good unto all, even to our enemies. When we love all, our enemies included, we may know that we have passed from death unto life, and have not the spirit of self, but of God.

"Simplicity of Faith" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

There is nothing in the world more simple than faith. Faith is dependence upon God-resting upon His word; and it is easier and simpler to depend upon God than upon self, because it is easier to let someone care for us than to take care of ourselves. It is easier to rest upon something than to hold ourselves up. We have neither the strength nor wisdom to take care of ourselves, and when we attempt to do so the result is much worry and useless expenditure of effort, with failure at the end.

But God has invited us to let Him take care of us. His word says, "Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and He shall sustain thee." Ps. lv. 22. And this burden includes "all your care." 1 Pet. v. 7. And your care includes yourself.

Faith is the simplest means of knowledge. It is easier to learn a thing by being told by someone who knows, than to discover it by our own investigations. And we cannot know the truths which God tells us except by taking His word, for they lie altogether beyond the range of our human powers. Through faith we understand these things although we cannot grasp them by any process of reason or experiment. And we know they are so, for faith is not blind, but sees them. We cannot reason out all the knowledge that we have, or that one mind can receive from another. A look of the eye, a touch of the hand, can convey knowledge from heart to heart without reason being called into action,-knowledge which we would not trust reason to give us. Is it strange then that the Spirit of God can reveal to us deep mysteries by its action upon our hearts, by the simple means of faith?

But faith does not lead to idleness and supine indifference; quite the contrary. For while this would be the result of allowing one like ourselves to care for us in all things and tell us what we need to know, faith puts God within us, there to will and to work His pleasure; thus making our activity greater and wiser than when we moved in our own strength and wisdom. Nor does it make us machines; for when our own wills cease to cooperate with God, He at once ceases to work in us.

"What Is Love?" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

Love is not a mere sentiment in the mind, nor does it find expression merely in words. "If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, and one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?" Jas. ii. 15, 16. Love is not a profitless thing, either to the giver or the receiver. The love of God toward men is manifested in every good and perfect gift, which "cometh down from the Father of lights" (Jas. i. 17), both upon the just, and upon the unjust; and this same love, flowing through our hearts to our fellow-men (and this alone is love) will find expression in the same way, to the extent of our powers and opportunities. In true love, self is forgotten. Its claims are neither heeded nor heard, and there is no thought of it, more than of that which does not exist. The Christian is dead to self, and alive unto God through Jesus Christ.

"Studies in Romans. The Blessing of Abraham. Rom. iv. 1-12" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

It is not necessary to repeat the analysis that has been given in the preceding studies in Romans. The ultimate object of studying any book in detail is to be able to take in the entire book at one glance. So we may cover in a few words the three chapters that we have been studying. We may say that the first chapter, after the introduction and the laying out of the theme of the epistle, sets before us the condition of those who are known as heathen. The second chapter and the first portion of the third, give us the information that all men are in the same deplorable condition. We who are inclined to boast of our privileges, and to be harsh in our judgment upon those who are gross sinners, have a check given to our pride, by the statement that if we know enough to condemn others, we therefore seal our own judgment, because we do the same things. Thus all men are found to be "guilty before God." Then comes the brighter side in the last part of the third chapter, in which the free grace of God is set forth in Christ as the Saviour of sinners. No one has anything whereof to boast over another, for no one can do anything that has sufficient merit in it to win righteousness.

It has been shown that the Jews, those who had received the greatest revelations from God, and to whom had been intrusted His law, were not justified by works any more than the heathen; and now in the fourth chapter

581

we have the final argument concerning justification by faith, made from

THE CASE OF ABRAHAM

"What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found? For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory; but not before God. For what saith the Scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works, saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. Cometh this blessedness then upon the circumcision only, or upon the uncircumcision also? for we say that faith was reckoned to Abraham for righteousness. How was it then reckoned? when he was in circumcision, or in uncircumcision? Not in circumcision, but in uncircumcision. And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had yet being uncircumcised; that he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised; that righteousness might be imputed unto them also: and the father of circumcision to them who are not of the circumcision only, but who also walk in the steps of that faith of our father Abraham, which he had being yet uncircumcised."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What is the theme for consideration in this chapter?

What "Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found."

What would Abraham have if he were justified by works?

"If Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory."

But can he glory?

"Not before God."

How is this proved?

By "the Scriptures."

"What saith the Scripture?"

"Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness."

What was counted unto him for righteousness?

His faith.

How would the reward be reckoned if it were the reward of works?

Not of grace, but of debt.

How is it to him that worketh not?

"His faith is counted for righteousness."

Whom does God justify?

"The ungodly."

Who describes this blessedness?

"David also describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works."

In what words?

"Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin."

What important question arises here?

"Cometh this blessedness then upon the circumcision only, or upon the uncircumcision also?

"What gives rise to this question?

"For we say that faith was reckoned to Abraham for righteousness."

How was it reckoned to him? When he was in circumcicion, or in uncircumcision?

"Not in circumcision, but in uncircumcision."

What did Abraham receive?

"He received the sign of circumcision"

What was the value of this sign?

"A seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had."

When did he have this righteousness of faith?

"Yet being uncircumcised"

Why was his faith reckoned to him for righteousness when he was yet uncircumcised?

"That he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised."

Of whom else is he the father?

"The father of circumcision."

To what circumcised ones is he the father?

"To them who are not of the circumcision only."

What must the circumcised children of Abraham necessarily have in addition to their circumcision?

"That faith of our father Abraham, which he had being yet uncircumcised."

"As Pertaining to the Flesh."-Abraham was not the father, or ancestor, according to the flesh, of all those to whom Paul addressed the epistle. The question under consideration is justification by faith. If now it can be shown that even Abraham received no righteousness through the flesh, but that it was only by faith, the case will be practically settled.

Glorying.-If in the plan of salvation there were any such thing as righteousness by works, then there would be provision made for boasting. For if one may be saved by works, then all men may be; and then those who were saved might boast of their superiority to others in like circumstances. But we have already learned that boasting is excluded. "God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; and base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to naught things that are; that no flesh should glory in His presence."

Glorying In, and Glorying Before.-If Abraham were justified by works, he might glory; but the fact is that he can not glory before God; and the proof of this is found in the words of Scripture: "Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness." A man can be justified by works when it can be shown that he has done no wrong. In that case he needs no faith; his works speak for themselves. But Abraham was justified by faith, and therefore it is evident that he was not justified by any works. He who is justified only by the works of God, will glory only in those works. That is glorying in God, and is far different from glorying before God.

Paul and James.-Here is where nearly everybody quotes the words of James, "Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son upon the altar?" James ii. 21. Unfortunately this text is usually quoted as a disparagement of the words of Paul. It seems to be taken for granted that there is a contradiction between Paul and James; and sympathy naturally leans to James, because people like to believe that there is some merit in their own works, and they imagine that this is what James teaches. Indeed, there are some who hold that James wrote for the purpose of correcting Paul's "extreme views" of justification by faith. We may well throw all such foolish and wicked ideas to the winds. No one need hope to come to an understanding of the Scriptures until he approaches them with the settled conviction that "all Scripture is given by inspiration of God." The Holy Spirit does not at one time inspire words which must later on be corrected.

Faith Working.-The trouble with those who thus read the words of James is that they suppose that the apostle says that Abraham was justified by his own works of faith. "Seest thou how faith wrought?" That is

582

ever the mark of living faith, as the apostle is showing. And that is just the statement of the apostle Paul. The last verse of the third chapter of Romans tells us that by faith we establish the law. Moreover, the very term "justification" shows that faith performs the requirement of the law. Faith makes a man a doer of the law, for that is the meaning of the term "justification by faith." So in James we read that the works of Abraham simply showed the perfection of his faith. "And the Scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness." The apostle James, therefore, teaches the same kind of justification that Paul does. If he did not, one or the other or both of them would be discredited as apostles. Justification by faith which works is the only kind of justification known in the Bible.

Debt and Grace.-"Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt." It is necessary to keep in mind what the apostle is writing about. The subject is the means by which a man is justified. To him that works for justification, the reward of righteousness is not a gift of grace, but the payment of a debt. That is, it would be so if there were any righteousness by works. In that case, the man would come to the Lord and demand of Him his due. But no man can put the Lord under obligation to him. "Who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again?" Rom. xi. 35. If any one could do something for the Lord for which the Lord would be under obligation to Him, then all things would not be from him. That is to say, the idea of justification by works is opposed to the fact that God is the Creator of all things. And, conversely, the recognition of God as Creator is the acknowledgement that righteousness comes from Him alone.

Justifying the Ungodly.-God justifies the ungodly. No others need justification. But mark that He does not justify ungodliness. That would be to call evil good, and to deny Himself. But He justifies or makes righteous the ungodly, and that is just what they need. He justifies the believing sinner by making him a new man in Christ Jesus, and this He can do and still be just. To make a new man in righteousness is perfectly in harmony with His own character as Creator.

Working Not.-"But to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness." Bear in mind that justification is the subject under consideration. When the apostle speaks of not working, it is evident that he means not working in order to be justified. A man is not made just by works, but the just man works yet always by faith. "The just shall live by faith." It is faith that makes him continue to live justly. The reality of the works of faith is made more prominent in the latter part of this chapter.

The Blessedness Described.-The blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works is the blessedness of sins forgiven, and of freedom from the power of sin. God will not impute sin to the man who lives by faith in Christ, so that Christ's works are his works. "As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him; . . . for in Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And ye are complete in Him." Col. ii. 6-10.

Blessings to Jew and Gentile.-This blessedness comes alike to the circumcision and to the uncircumcision. We have here a repetition of the truth set forth in the third chapter, namely, that there is no difference in the matter of justification. Abraham is the father of the Jewish nation after the flesh, but the blessing which he received was while he was uncircumcised, the same as any other Gentile. Therefore he can be the father of both the Jews and the Gentiles. His blessing was received by faith, and therefore "they which be of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham." Gal. iii. 9.

How the Blessing Comes.-We have some time ago seen that the blessing came to Abraham through Christ. In another place the apostle Paul tells us that "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us; for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree; that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith." Gal. iii. 13, 14. Whatever was promised to Abraham was all contained in the blessing which David described. God sent His Son to bless us in turning every one of us away from our iniquities. Acts iii. 26. It is the cross of Christ that transmits the blessings of Abraham to us. Therefore the blessings are spiritual. None of the blessings promised to Abraham were merely temporal. And this further shows that the inheritance promised to Abraham and his seed is only to those who are the children of God through faith in Christ Jesus.

Circumcision is Nothing.-The advantage of those who are circumcised was that to them were intrusted the oracles of God; but that did not come to them through circumcision. Circumcision was only a sign; it was not the thing itself. It was given to Abraham as a token of the righteousness by faith which he already possessed. Therefore it could not signify anything more to anybody else. If any who were circumcised did not have righteousness, then their circumcision did not signify anything. "Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God." 1 Cor. vii. 19. So Abraham was the father of the circumcised, provided they were not of the circumcision only, but had righteousness by faith, which is the one necessary thing.

Everything in Christ.-Speaking of Christ, the apostle says, "All the promises of God in Him are yea, and in Him Amen, unto the glory of God by us." 2 Cor. i. 20. There is no promise of God to any man that ever lived on earth, or that will ever live, except through Jesus Christ. The promises to Israel, especially, which most concern us, are those that were first made to Abraham. But "he believed in the Lord; and He counted it to him for righteousness." Gen. xv. 6. Therefore "if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." Gal. iii. 29. So then, the promises to Israel come through the cross of Christ; and none are Israel except those who have personal, saving faith in Him.

"What Saith the Scripture?" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

This question cannot be answered without an appeal to the books of the Old Testament. This fact is made prominent all through the New Testament writings, and especially so in the epistles of Paul. The question raised by the apostle (Rom. iv. 3; Gal. iv. 30) is as pertinent to our

583

day as it was in his, to an understanding of the truth; and the answer must be the same now as it was then. There is no antagonism, no difference in character, between these two portions of the Bible. The one is not set off against the other, any more than is the upper half of a building set off against the lower half. The statements of the Old Testament constitute the foundation upon which are based the conclusion set forth in the New.

For example, in the fourth chapter of Romans, the apostle, speaking of the justification of Abraham and of all the faithful, quotes from Gen. xiv. 6, "Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness;" and also builds upon statements contained in Genesis xvii. and xviii. and Ps. xxxii. Without the record in Genesis the apostle's argument in Romans could not have been made; and if the former record be not reliable, the conclusions reached by him are also worthless. The doctrine stated by Paul was not a new one, but one drawn from the writings of Moses and the ancient prophets. If the latter be swept away, the former must also fall: nor can we expect to understand what we read in the New Testament without beginning at the foundation, and learning, "What saith the Scripture?" in the Old.

"Saint-Making in the East" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

According to the Scriptures, all who accept the call of God are "called to be saints." Not that any are saints by any merits of their own; for it is all by grace, and not one of all the redeemed will have whereof to boast.

The practice of saint-making is a denial of the Gospel, as it is based on the idea that men may lay up a store of merits by their own deeds. It is justification by works, the root principle of every false religion, as justification by faith alone is the vital principle of the Gospel of Christ.

Proceeding on the idea that man can make themselves saints, the Catholic Church assumes the authority of pronouncing them such. It is all of man, and all comes of self exalting itself above God, and setting itself forth as God. This is human nature always, and in this matter of saint-making, as in a multitude of other details, it works the same in other false religions as in Roman or Greek Catholicism. The last Contemporary Review has a contribution on "Saint-Making in the East," which shows the similarity, proving the common origin of the idea of the beatification of mortal, sinful men:-

"There are three principal modes of beatification as practised in the East. The commonest method is by the voice of the people. 'He was a Saint!' they explain on the death of some remarkable man, and the priests acquiesce, for each new saint brings grist to their mills. When the voice of the people is silent, then the priest, in their own interests, proclaim saints, and demand shrines for them. These two methods are especially characteristic of Hindustan. A distinguished writer has compared the process of beatification, canonisation, or deification-whichever term we like to use-to the ascent and descent of Jacob's ladder. 'The Hindus,' he says, 'construct for themselves Jacob's ladders between earth and heaven; the men are seen as ascending until they become gods; they then descend again as embodiments of the divinities; insomuch that it may be almost doubted whether any god, except the Vedic divinities and other obvious Nature gods, comes down the ladder who had not originally gone up as a man, and an authentic man.' The Hindu, in a certain stage of the enlightenment, is inclined to deify any notable person, not necessarily waiting for his death. While Warren Hastings was on his trial in England it was stated as an argument in his favour that he was being worshipped in his appropriate temple in India.

"But, interesting and important as the Hindu methods of deification are, those of the Chinese are far more curious. In China the Emperor claims power, not only over his subjects (and indeed, for that matter, the whole inhabited world), but also over the realms of departed spirits. These he beatifies, canonises, decorates with titles, mentions with approval in the Pekin Gazette when they do anything to deserve that honour, and actually degrades and uncanonises if he sees just cause. In the latter respect his power over the departed clearly exceeds that even of the Pope himself. For example, the Emperor Hieng-fung elevated the god of war to an equal rank with Confucius, who previously had been chief among the State gods. Sir Alfred Lyall has drawn attention to some amusing extracts from the Peking Gazette, illustrating the way in which the Chinese treat their deities. Thus the Gazette of November, 1878, has the following: 'The Governor-General of the Yellow River requests that a tablet may be put up in honour of the river-god. He states that during the transmission of relief-rice to Honon, whenever difficulties were encountered through shallows, wind, or rain, the river-god interposed in the most unmistakable manner, so that the transport of grain went on without hindrance.-Order: Let the proper office prepare a tablet for the temple of the river-god."

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

-Several Egyptian Pashas are on trial at Cairo, charged with dealing in slaves.

-The climate of Japan ranges from an almost Arctic cold in the north to a nearly tropical heat in the south.

-A Socialist congress which was to have been held at Imola, has been prohibited by the Italian Government.

-A party of excursionists who were sailing in Morecambe Bay were capsised, and twenty-five were drowned.

-Twenty-three per cent. of the land in Australia has been sold or alienated, the remaining 77 per cent. belongs to the State.

-A revolt has broken out among the Kabyles in Morocco. They are beleaguering Morocco City, and fears are entertained for the garrison.

-The use of furnaces to destroy a city's refuse is growing in favour. There are now fifty-five municipalities in England where the system is used.

-The rudder of the Cunard steamship Campania consists of a single plate of steel 22 by 11 feet 6 inches and 11 inch thick. It was rolled at Krupp's German gun factory.

-By the suppression of a certain number of officers in all branches of the service, and other reforms, the Italian Minister of War expects to be able to save a million of lire.

-The inventor of a water cycle recently 'rode' his machine across the Bristol Channel from Newport to Weston-super-Mare, doing the journey of 25 miles in 3? hours.

-Cholera is increasing on the Continent. The Austrian Autumn Man?uvres have been, in part, abandoned, and the Emperor has given up an intended journey in Galicia owing to the spread of cholera in that part of Europe.

-The maxim "Murder will out" is disproved by statistics. In the ten years ending 1886 there were 1,766 murders committed in England and Wales, and in 1,094 of those cases no trace of the criminal was ever found.

-The proposal to construct, as the great attraction of the French Exhibition of 1500, a monster telescope able to show the inhabitants, if any, of the moon has been revived, and M. Bisohoffscheim is said to be willing to advance 2,000,000f. towards the cost.

-The existence of the Colossus of Rhodes is considered by some historians extremely doubtful. There is no evidence that the ancients were able to cast pieces of metal of such size as must have entered into its composition.

-A paste of linseed oil varnish, and iron filings rubbed on the soles of new shoes is said to keep the leather flexible, and give greater resistance to wear than the best nails. The invention is to be tried at the German man?uvres.

-Despite the measures which have been taken during the past two years to drain the bog upon which the town of Eislebon, the home of Martin Luther, is built, the houses continue to sink more and more, and of late the subsidence has become so alarming that it is said that the population are seriously thinking of abandoning the town.

-Disquieting rumours constantly reach Aden from the interior of Yemen, and it is stated that another revolt of the Arab tribes is imminent. The Turkish garrison in Yemen has been considerably diminished by disease and by withdrawals, so that the chiefs hostile to Turkish rule are encouraged to make an attempt to assort their independence.

-The office of one of the largest Athenian daily papers, The Acropolis, was totally wrecked by a party of 150 officers of the garrison, accompanied by soldiers bearing axes and revolvers. The attack was planned at the club by all the officers at Athens, because the tone of the paper, in speaking of the excesses committed about town by them was insulting.

-A unicycle has been invented in America which runs by its own momentum after it has been set going by the usual pedalling method. A forward inclination of the rider's body keeps the wheel revolving, a backward inclination stops it, and in turning a corner the rider leans as he wants the machine to go. The wheel has no steering gear is 6 feet in diameter, and weighs 1851bs.

-A scourge of anthrax is devastating the Siberian province of Oussouri. Several persons and some 700 horses have succumbed to the disease within it short time. This large mortality among the horses has seriously affected the postal service in the province, where no letters or papers have been received from Russia for the last two months, and some localities have been without any postal service for even a longer period.

-The most terrible and disastrous forest fires ever known in America began in the pine region of Northern Minnesota and Wisconsin September 2, and raged for several days following. In Minnesota, nine towns are reported to have been totally, and four to have been partially, destroyed. In Wisconsin, some twenty towns are said to have been totally destroyed. Between 400 and 500 persons perished in the flames, and property valued at $2,500,000 was destroyed.

-It is announced in a well-known Kieff newspaper, that in a short time a list of questions is to be sent to governors of provinces in Southern Russia with reference to the condition of the Jews within their jurisdiction. The questions, which will be of a most searching and inquisitorial nature, will inquire into the economical position of the Jews, their methods of trading, and their moral and religious state.

-The Chronicle's Rome correspondent says that the Patriarch of the Syrian Catholics, Father Benni, who is staying at Rome, has Informed the Pope that Turkey is favourably disposed towards the return of the dissenting Oriental Christians to Roman Catholicism. The Congregation of the Propaganda has received similar information from the Armenian Bishop Adana. The Propaganda have sent a priest of the Greek Rite to Prince Nicholas of Montenegro. The Eucharistic Congress is now sitting at Turin in the interests of an ecclesiastical reconciliation of East and West.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

We find the following words of "Saint" Francis quoted as a gem of thought in a Catholic paper; "If I met a priest or an angel on the same road, I should at once kiss the hands of the priest before attending to the angel."

The man who studies the Bible to find an argument may get an argument; but that is all he will get. He who studies it to find the Lord, fresh bread from the words of God for the Christian life, will get the Lord and His life. One of the saddest sights is to see a person clinging to an argument without the life.

We can no more excuse ourselves from doing what God wants us to do than we can condemn Him who wants us to do it; and it is just as impossible to condemn Him as to unseat Him from the throne of justice. The devil has been trying to do this for six thousand years, but he is as far from success to-day as when he began. There is no excuse to be made to the Omniscient. "If I justify myself, my own mouth shall condemn me." Job ix. 20. Only God can justify us; and He does this when we, by confession, justify Him. Ps. li. 4.

The difference which it is the fashion to make between war as the great powers of Europe engage in it, and the wild but less sanguinary methods of unskilled warfare, is a distinction which the untutored savage is unable to grasp. Bishop Whipple, of North America, once reproved a chief of the Dacotahs for engaging in a scalp-dance over a murdered Chippeway, and threatened him with Divine vengeance. The old chief smiled, took his pipe from his mouth, blew a cloud of smoke upwards, and said:-

White man go to war with his brother in same country; kill more men than Wabasha can count in all his life. Great Spirit smile; says, "Good white man; he has My book; I love him very much; I have a good place for him by and by." The Indian is a wild man; he has no Great Spirit book; he kills one man; has a scalp-dance; Great Spirit is mad, and says, "Bad Indian; I will put him in a bad place by and by." Wabasha don't believe it.

The Women's Christian Temperance Union in a United States is in trouble. The white ribbon has been adopted as the badge of the American Railway Union, and was worn by the strikers, many of whom were intemperate. And now the question is, How will it be possible to distinguish the temperance folks from those who use intoxicating liquors? Can anybody suggest a way?

"Peter's Pence" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

Peter's Pence.-According to Roman journals the Vatican is concerned over the decrease in "Peter's Pence," and schemes are being urged for the purpose of drawing more pilgrims to Rome. The sale of indulgences is not so profitable a traffic as formerly. Still there are said to be the vast quantities of gold and silver gathered in by Pius IX., millions of which are simply hoarded in Rome where they produce no income. The authorities of the Church of Rome join with the rich in treasuring up gold and silver until it becomes cankered and rusted. It was Pope Innocent IV., we believe, who, as he was watching men carrying treasure into the Vatican, said to a cardinal, "You could say, 'Silver and gold have I none.'" "Yes," was the cardinal's reply, "and the day is also passed when she could say to the paralytic, 'Rise up and walk.'"

"In Heaven" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

In Heaven.-When Jesus talked to Nicodemus of heavenly things He said that no one could make them known except "the Son of man which is in heaven." John iii. 13. John also tells us that the only begotten Son "is in the bosom of the Father." John i. 18. Christ was on earth when He was talking to Nicodemus, yet He was in heaven. That is, heaven is wherever Christ is. He brings heaven to earth. So that those who "rejoice in Christ Jesus," have a heaven in which to live while going to heaven. The song therefore, tells Scripture truth when it says,

"Amazing grace! 'tis heaven below,
To feel the blood applied."

"Spiritualism" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

Spiritualism.-The growth of Spiritualism, a term which may be taken to include all the family of correlated cults, is a fact which every Christian believer must reckon with. It is thus stated in a Spiritualistic paper:-

It is idle to deny that at the present moment, just at the close of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century, there is a wave of Spiritualism over-spreading all lands of the known world, and increasing daily in intensity.

The whole subject of man's nature is involved in the claims of Spiritualism, and it behoves every Christian to study his Bible for himself if he would not be deceived by "signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect."

"'On Humane Principles'" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

"On Humane Principle."-Speaking of the sinking of the Chinese transport by the Japanese, a contemporary says: "It is, however, hardly to be expected that these heathen nations, accustomed to centuries of cruelty, should be capable of conducting war on humane principles." But a writer on naval affairs, who does not make this fine distinction between heathen and Christian warfare, has inconsiderately shown that every step in the war between China and Japan is paralleled by the record of modern European warfare. War is war, and it is inhumane every time. There is no Christian way of conducting a campaign, although in the treaty between Mexico and the United States it is provided that in case of disputes between the countries the war is to be carried on on Christian principles!

"One Talent" The Present Truth 10, 37.

E. J. Waggoner

One Talent.-Because in the parable of the talents the man who did nothing was the man with one talent, many people who have, or who think they have, only one talent, seem to think that it is decreed that they shall never accomplish anything, and that it is useless to try. Thus they fall into the error of the man in the parable. His fault was not in having but one talent, but in doing nothing with that one. If the man with two and five talents had done as he did, they would receive the same sentence; and if he had done as they did, he would have received the same commendation. The same use which doubles two or five talents, will double one, and then the two may be increased in like manner. Since both the talents and the increase are the gifts of God, He who is faithful in that which is little is precisely on a level with the one who is faithful in a great deal.

September 20, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

"How think ye? if a man have an hundred sheep, and one of them be gone astray, doth he not leave the ninety and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh that which is gone astray? And if so be that he find it, verily I say unto you, he rejoiceth more of that sheep, than of the ninety and nine which went not astray. Even so it is not the will of your Father which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish." Matt. xviii. 12-14.

Sometimes men and women get discouraged, and think that the Lord does not care for them. They do not consciously charge the Lord with being unsympathetic and forgetful, but they feel their own failings so keenly that they do not think they are worth being cared for. They feel as though the loss of one insignificant person would make no difference to the Lord. It is to such people at such times that the Saviour's words are of peculiar importance.

The man who had an hundred sheep did not think it a trifling matter that one had gone astray. He might have said, "It is only one, and I will not bother with it." But men who talk in that way do not preserve their property. He who should talk like that about one sheep, because it is only one, would say the same of every other one, and so one by one they might wander away until he had none left.

The shepherd well knows that the preservation of his entire flock depends upon his watchful care over each member of the flock. To be indifferent to the fate of any one, because it is only one, is in reality to be indifferent to the fate of the whole. Therefore since the safety of the whole depends upon the shepherd's care for each one, it is really the case that his solicitude is the same for each one as for the whole.

Even so it is with the Great Shepherd and His flock. His care for each individual is equal to His care for the whole. Christ "died for all" (2 Cor. v. 15), but He tasted death for every man. Heb. ii. 9. Each individual receives as much of the merits of Christ as does the whole world. To say that the Lord is unmindful of anyone of His creatures, is the same as saying that He does not care for anybody.

It is not in reality, therefore, a sense of our own unworthiness that causes us to become discouraged, but ignorance or forgetfulness of God's character. He who knows the Lord, must trust Him. "They that know Thy name will put their trust in Thee." Ps. ix. 10. It is thought to be a terrible thing for the infidel to charge God with cruelty and indifference; but how much worse it must seem for a professed Christian to say what amounts to the same thing! They who know the Lord will not become discouraged because they know that He does not forsake those who trust in Him.

"A Marvellous Thing" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

A Marvellous Thing.-There was one thing at which our Lord Himself marvelled while here on the earth, and that was unbelief. Many things cause great surprise to His disciples and the multitudes that attended Him, but the most surprising thing to Christ Himself was the blindness and hardness of the human heart. This so hindered in His own country that He could do no mighty work there; and "He marvelled because of their unbelief." Mark vi. 5, 6. Also when He healed the centurion's servant (Luke vii. 2-9) He marvelled, not because the centurion had faith, but because His own people had less faith than did this Roman. Unbelief is a stranger thing than is the mightiest miracle ever performed; because there has been a cause for every miracle, but for unbelief there is no cause. It is not strange that God can do most astonishing things, for He is omnipotent and omniscient; but it is strange indeed that man will not believe His word. It is so strange as to be absolutely without reason. Do you believe the Lord? If not, why not?

"The Chief of Sinners" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

If you were told to point out the greatest sinner that you know, whom would you name? Perhaps some might think it too delicate a task to give names. But if every one had the knowledge of the Gospel that the Apostle Paul had, there would be no difficulty either in asking or answering the question in public.

There were many wicked men in the apostle's day, but when he looked into the royal law of God, at the righteousness of God, as in a glass, beholding what manner of man he was, he said, "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief." 1 Tim. i. 15.

He had had many years of service for his Master; but he does not say, "I was chief," but "I am chief." The man who follows the inspired injunction to look "into the perfect law

594

of liberty, and continueth therein," will never forget that in himself dwelleth no good thing, and he will know that in himself, his flesh, are all the sins that are inseparable from the carnal nature, ready to spring upon him the moment he puts confidence in the flesh. And he knows more about his own weakness and sinfulness and need of salvation than he can know of anybody else.

Sometimes people who have learned something of the Lord seem afraid to acknowledge that they are really sinners. We have even heard of mission preachers making efforts to find if there was a sinner in the audience. But Paul knew the Lord so well that he was not ashamed to confess himself-so far as he personally was the judge-the chief of sinners.

The nearer we come to the Lord, the closer view we get of His righteousness-the righteousness of the law of God; for

"In Thy life the law appears,
Drawn out to living characters."-

the more we sense our own sinfulness and need. This for ever shuts out spiritual pride.

The moment our own sinfulness seems a small thing, it is evident that we are so far from the Lord that we cannot see His righteousness. We never get beyond the prayer of the publican, "God be merciful to me a sinner." And it is a blessed confession; for Jesus came into the world to save sinners. The publican was justified; and praying that prayer from the heart of faith continually is living by faith-the faith that justifies, the faith of Jesus.

"Works of Supererogation" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

"Supererogation" means works above what are required; and works of this nature are very common among men, whether in the Catholic Church, or out. It is a propensity of human nature to be willing to do either more or less than God requires, but not exactly what God requires. The Lord addresses people of this class by the prophet Isaiah, saying, "When ye come to appear before Me, who has required this at your hand, to tread My courts." Isa. i. 12.

Every work which the Lord has not required is a work of the flesh. The Lord's will is that we should be perfect and holy, as He is perfect and holy; and as nothing can go beyond perfection, and perfection is what is required, every work not required must fall short of this, and only serve to condemn us. And one plain thing which God has not required is the observance of the first day of the week, by which men think to honour Christ; for it is also a propensity of human nature to be willing to honour God in every other way than the way which He has designated.

"Reunion with Rome" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

Last week, at Preston, Cardinal Vaughan defined the Roman Catholic position on the reunion question. The only possible ground of reunion is the acceptance of Rome's claims, and she has nothing to concede. She knows well enough that she is the real home of all who want a church authority apart from the authority of the Scriptures, and so she waits and works, and glories in the progress being made. The growth of Romish principles and practices in the churches separated from her in ecclesiastical government is the main point for congratulations. Cardinal Vaughan sees this amongst both Nonconformists and Anglicans. His hopes of submission to Rome on the part of an ever-increasing number of Anglicans rest on the following facts-and that they are facts every observer must admit:-

1. The growing realisation of the Catholic, and therefore of the non-national character of the church of Christ, and the increasing distrust of national limitation in the idea of religion; 2. The growing appreciation of Catholic doctrines and devout practices, and a sensible diminution of the difficulties and prejudices that have hitherto obscured them. Contrast the churches of the Establishment of sixty or seventy years ago-closed from week end to week end; no daily service, no festivals and saint's days kept, the communion service read three or four times a year, everything dry, cold, and formal-with the present churches, which are often distinguishable only with extreme difficulty from those belonging to the Church of Rome. The study of the patristic, of the theological, ascetical, devotional, liturgical, and rubrical writers of the Catholic Church has brought about a change in the mind, feelings, and tastes of an ever increasing section of the Anglican Church, which has been simply a revolution. The doctrines of the Catholic Church, which had been rejected and condemned as blasphemous, superstitious, and fond inventions, have been re-examined and taken back, one by one, until the thirty-nine articles have been banished and buried as a rule of faith. The real presence, the sacrifice of the mass, offered for the living and dead-sometimes even in Latin-not unfrequent reservation of the sacrament, regular auricular confession, extreme unction, purgatory, prayers for the dead, devotions to Our Lady, to her immaculate conception, the use of her rosary, and the invocation of saints, are doctrines taught and accepted, with a growing desire and relish for them, in the Church of England. A celibate clergy, the institution of monks and nuns under vows, retreats for the clergy, missions for the people, fasting and other penitential exercises-candles, lamps, incense, crucifixes, images of the Blessed Virgin and the saints held in honour, stations of the cross, cassocks, cottas, Roman collars, birettas, copes, dalmatics, vestments, miters, croziers, the adoration of an ornate Catholic ritual, and now recently an elaborate display of the whole ceremonial of the Catholic Pontifical-all this speaks of a change and a movement towards the Church that would have appeared absolutely incredible at the beginning of this century. And what is still more remarkable is that the movement has been stronger than the rankest Protestantism, stronger than the bishops, stronger than the lawyers and the Legislature. A spasmodic protest, a useless prosecution, a delphic judgment, and the movement continues and spreads, lodging itself in Anglican homes and convents, in schools, churches, and even cathedrals, until it is rapidly covering the country. Has there ever been seen a more marvellous change, and this within half a century!

"Tampering with God's Word" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

Tampering with God's Word.-The English Churchman, speaking of the prevailing laxity of Sunday observance, says, "In England, the Bible and the Sabbath observance have been great blessings; but now, men are tampering with God's word, and encouraging the idolatrous system of Rome." Yet the Churchman accepts and defends, almost in the same breath, one of the worst results of tampering with God's word, which is seen in the almost universal disregard of the true Sabbath, "the Sabbath of the Lord." Tampering with God's word is not a recent innovation; it was seen centuries ago, when pagans in the guise of Christians began to substitute the Sunday institution for the seventh-day Sabbath. It is useless to try to defend the truth without an appeal to God's word. The trouble with regard to Sunday observance is that there is nothing with which to produce a conviction in men's minds that it is a sacred day and ought to be observed. It takes nothing short of the plain, direct word of the Lord to strike that conviction to the soul which will turn

595

it from a course of worldliness into the path of obedience to God. And therefore, since there is no word of the Lord to support the Sunday Sabbath, it is useless to attempt to institute a reform in its behalf. The only way of Sabbath reform is to call the attention of men to the true Sabbath which rests upon the word of the Lord, in contradistinction to the first-day institution, which has no support but the traditions of men. Let all who desire a reform in Sabbath observance join in presenting the claims of God's holy day, which are plainly set forth in His word; and they will have the satisfaction of knowing that their efforts will not be in vain.

"Studies in Romans. 'Heir of the World.' Rom. iv. 13-15" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

In our lesson last week we began the study of Abraham as a special illustration of the doctrine of justification by faith. We found that Abraham could not glory before God, because he was justified by faith only, and not at all by works. But the verses which follow will involve a sufficient review of the first part of the chapter, and therefore we will at once proceed to the study of

THE INHERITANCE AND THE HEIRS

"For the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void, and the promise made of none effect; because the law worketh wrath; for where no law is, there is no transgression." Rom. iv. 13-15.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What promise was made to Abraham?

"That he should be the heir of the world."

To whom was this promise made?

"To Abraham" and "to his seed." "Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made." Gal. iii. 16.

Who is the seed?

"He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ." Gal. iii. 16.

Is Christ in His own person the only seed?

"And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." Gal. iii. 29.

Of what are Abraham and his seed heirs?

"Of the world."

On what basis was this inheritance promised?

"The promise that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith."

If they which are of the law be heirs, what is the result?

"Faith is made void, and the promise made of none effect."

Why so?

"Because the law worketh wrath."

If there were no law, what would there not be?

"Where no law is, there is no transgression."

Why is it, then, that the law worketh wrath?

Because "by the law is the knowledge of sin." Rom. iii. 20.

WHERE IS THE PROMISE?

A very natural inquiry upon reading the thirteenth verse would be, Where is there any promise that Abraham and his seed should be heirs of the world? Many think that no such promise is contained in the Old Testament. But there can be no doubt about the matter, for the apostle says that there was such a promise. If we have not found it, it is because we have read the Old Testament too superficially, or with minds biased by preconceived opinions. If we consider the connection, we shall have no difficulty in locating the promise.

Of what is the apostle speaking in this connection? Of an inheritance through the righteousness of faith, and also of the fact that circumcision was given to Abraham as a seal of this righteousness which he had by faith, and therefore as the seal of the inheritance which was to come thereby. Now where in the Old Testament do we find the account of the giving of circumcision, and of a promise in connection therewith? In the seventeenth chapter of Genesis. Then that must be the place for us to look for the promise that Abraham should be the heir of the world. Let us turn and read.

"And I will establish My covenant between Me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee and to thy seed after thee. And I will give unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and I will be their God. . . . And ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin; and it shall be a token of the covenant betwixt Me and you." Gen. xvii. 7-11.

The reader will at once say: "Yes; it is plain enough that there is a promise here; but what we are looking for is the promise that Abraham and his seed should inherit the earth; and I do not see that here. All that I can see is a promise that they should inherit the land of Canaan." But it is certain from the connection in Romans that we are on the right track, and we shall soon see that this is indeed the promise that Abraham and his seed should be heirs of the world. We must study the details of this promise. And first let us note the fact that the inheritance promised in this place is

AN EVERLASTING INHERITANCE

The Lord said to Abraham, "I will give unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession." Note well that both Abraham and his seed are included in all the promise. The inheritance is not to be merely in the possession of Abraham's seed for ever, but Abraham himself is to have it for an everlasting possession. But the only way in which both Abraham and his seed may have everlasting possession of an inheritance is by having everlasting life. Therefore we see that in this promise to Abraham we have the assurance of everlasting life in which to enjoy the possession.

This will appear still more clearly when we consider that the inheritance is

AN INHERITANCE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

"For the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith." Rom. iv. 13. That is just what we have in the promise recorded in the seventeenth of Genesis. For that covenant was sealed by circumcision (see verse 11), and circumcision was the seal of righteousness by faith. See Rom. iv. 11.

Someone may say that this does not appear from the Old Testament itself, and that therefore the Jews could not be expected to have understood it; we have the New Testament to enlighten us. It is true that in studying the Old Testament we owe much to the New Testament,

596

but it is also a fact that there is no new revelation in it. One may see from the Old Testament alone that the inheritance promised to Abraham and to his seed was only on the condition of righteousness by faith.

This is the natural conclusion from the fact that the inheritance is to be an everlasting possession. Now the Jews well knew that everlasting life belongs to the righteous alone. "The righteous shall never be removed; but the wicked shall not inhabit the earth." Prov. x. 30. "For evildoers shall be cut off; but those that wait upon the Lord, they shall inherit the earth." Ps. xxxvii. 9. "For such as be blessed of Him shall inherit the earth; and they that be cursed of Him shall be cut off." Verse 22.

The fifth commandment reads, "Honour thy father and thy mother; that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee." The keeping of the commandments has never made any difference in the length of men's lives in this present world. But the inheritance which God promised to Abraham is one that will be everlasting because of the righteousness of its possessors.

THE PROMISE AND THE RESURRECTION

Another point from the promise is recorded in Genesis, if we read carefully. The promise was to Abraham and to his seed. Now Stephen stated as a well-known fact that Abraham did not have so much of the promised land as he could set his foot on. Acts vii. 5. We may learn this from the Old Testament record, because we are told that he had to buy from the Canaanites, whom God had promised to drive out, a spot of land in which to bury his wife. As for his immediate descendants, we know that they dwelt in tents, wandering from place to place, and that Jacob died in the land of Egypt.

Further than this, we read the words of David, whose reign was at the time of the highest prosperity of the children of Israel in the land of Canaan: "Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear unto my cry; hold not Thy peace at my tears; for I am a stranger with Thee, and a sojourner, as all my fathers were." Ps. xxxix. 12. See also his prayer at the consecration of the gifts to the temple, when Solomon was made king. 1 Chron. xxix. 15.

Still further, and this is most positive of all, we have the words of God to Abraham when he made the promise. After telling him that He would give the land of Canaan to him and to his seed, the Lord said that his seed should first be slaves in a strange land. "And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be buried in a good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again." Gen. xv. 7, 13-16. Thus we see that Abraham was plainly told that he should die before he had any inheritance in the land, and that it would be at least four hundred years before any of his seed could inherit it.

But Abraham died in faith, and so did his seed. See Hebrews xi. 13. "These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth." They died in faith, because they knew that God could not lie. But since God's promise must be fulfilled, and they did not receive the promised inheritance in this present life, we are shut up to the conclusion that it can be obtained only through the resurrection from the dead.

This was the hope that sustained the faithful Israelites. Abraham had faith to offer Isaac upon the altar because his faith was in God's power to raise the dead. When Paul was a prisoner on account of "the hope and resurrection of the dead" (Acts xxiii. 6), he said, "And now I stand and am judged for the hope of the promise made of God unto our fathers; unto which promise our twelve tribes, instantly serving God day and night, hope to come." And then, to show the reasonableness of this hope, he asked, "Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you, that God should raise the dead?" Acts xxvi. 6-8.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the pledge and surety of the resurrection of those who believe on Him. See 1 Corinthians xv. 13-20. The apostles "preached through Jesus the resurrection from the dead." Acts iv. 2. And one of them says for our benefit, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to His abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time." 1 Peter i. 3-5. And then he adds that this faith is tried that it may "be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ." And this brings us to the conclusion of the matter, namely, that the promise to Abraham and to his seed that they should be heirs of the world, is

THE PROMISE OF CHRIST'S COMING

The Apostle Peter says that it is necessary to remind us of the words that were spoken by the holy prophets because "there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." 2 Peter iii. 1-4. Note in this text that the promise of Christ's coming is connected with the fathers. The promise was made to the fathers, yet, say the scoffers, it has not been fulfilled, but everything continues as it was from the beginning of the creation; and therefore they do not believe in the promise at all.

But they do not reason well, "for this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water, whereby the world that then was being overflowed with water, perished; but the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men." 2 Peter iii. 5-7.

Take notice that not only has the promise something to do with the fathers, but it concerns the whole earth. The complaint of the scoffers is that since the fathers fell asleep all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation. But the apostle shows that when they say so they shut their eyes to the fact that the same word that in the beginning made the heavens and the earth, also destroyed the earth by the flood. Also the earth is by the same word now preserved until the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men, when it will be destroyed by fire. "Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth,

597

wherein dwelleth righteousness." 2 Peter iii. 13.

According to What Promise?-Why, according to the promise to the fathers, which was that Abraham and his seed should inherit the earth. It has been a long time, as men count, since that promise was made, but "the Lord is not slack concerning His promise." It has not been so long since it was made that He has forgotten it; for "one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." The reason why He has waited this long is that He is not willing that any should perish in the fires that will renew the earth, but He desires that all should come to repentance.

And so we find that we have as great an interest in the promise to Abraham as he himself had. That promise is still open for all to accept. It embraces nothing less than an eternal life of righteousness in the earth made new as it was in the beginning. The hope of the promise of God unto the fathers was the hope of the coming of the Lord to raise the dead, and thus to bestow the inheritance. Christ was once here on the earth, but then He did not have any more of the inheritance than Abraham had. He had not where to lay His head. God is now sending His Holy Spirit to seal the believers for the inheritance, even as He did to Abraham; and when all the faithful shall have been sealed by the Spirit, "He shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you; whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began." Acts iii. 20, 21.

The reason why in the promise to Abraham only the land of Canaan was mentioned, although the promise included the whole earth, will receive a brief consideration in a separate article entitled, "The Heavenly Canaan."

"Penance in China" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

The Catholic doctrine of penance was borrowed from the old pagan idea that the favour of the gods was to be won by bodily torture and meritorious works. The servants of Baal cut themselves with knives in their efforts to get the attention of their god, when Elijah challenged them to the test before Israel. The doctrine is current amongst all pagans, for it is only the natural outgrowth of the religion on self. Many professed Christians, even, think to make themselves better by punishing themselves in various ways. The following words of a missionary in China show how fully the Buddhist priests are in harmony with the Catholic idea:-

It is no uncommon sight to meet a priest in China going about begging, with four or five long skewers run through his forearm, and little ribbons hanging therefrom. Two I have met had long iron rods running through their cheeks, and they had made oath to remove them only when they had collected a certain sum of money sufficient to repair their temples. One has had the iron rod through his face for over four months, living the while on soup and tea only. Another way of raising money is for a priest to take his seat in a little brick sentry box, and let himself be walled in, leaving only a small window, through which he can see, and pull a rope by which a big bell is sounded and the attention of passersby is attracted. Here he will sit for months. I have known one to remain in his box for nearly a year without being able to lie down or stand up, but apparently perfectly happy, and always ready to have a bit of gossip.

"The Heavenly Canaan" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

It is not at all surprising that the casual reader of the Bible should conclude that all that God ever promised to Abraham and his seed, was the possession of what was and is known as the land of Canaan. But it is surprising that men should insist that an earthly inheritance was all that was promised them, after they read that the promise was that they should be heirs of the world, and that it was such an inheritance as could be obtained only by faith in Christ.

First, let it be remembered that if it were true that the promise was that Abraham should have a temporal inheritance in the land of Canaan, then the promise failed, because he did not have it. God "gave him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot on; yet He promised that He would give it to him, and to his seed after him, when as yet he had no child." Acts vii. 5. But God's word cannot fail. Nothing can frustrate His promises, but every one of them will be fulfilled to the minutest detail. Sometimes we hear it said that God tried one plan, and that when that failed, He tried another. But that cannot be. God "worketh all things after the counsel of His own will." Eph. i. 11. He is true, although every man fails.

Neither did Abraham's descendants possess the inheritance that God promised them. Isaac and Jacob, as well as Abraham, "sojourned in the land of promise as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles." Heb. xi. 9. They "confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth." It is true that when God led the children of Israel out of Egypt, He did give to them the inheritance, and they began to possess it by faith; but they did not keep the faith, and so they put from them the inheritance. They did not realise how great a thing God had given them, and so they let it slip from their grasp. As it could be gained only by faith, so it could be held only by faith; but we are told that the word preached to them did not profit them, because faith was lacking. "So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief." Heb. iii. 19. This refers not only to those who died in the wilderness, but to those whom Joshua led into the land of Canaan, because we read that Joshua did not give them rest. Heb. iv. 8.

CANAAN'S IMPORTANCE

The land of Canaan, and especially the locality of Jerusalem, has from the earliest times been prominent in God's plan. It was there, on Mount Moriah, that Abraham offered Isaac, and found a ram to offer in his stead. Gen. xxii. 2, 14. On that same spot the plague was stayed in the days of David, and there the temple of Solomon was built. 2 Chron. iii. 1. It was of this place that Moses in his song after the passage of the Red Sea, said, "Thou shalt bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of Thine inheritance, in the place, O Lord, which Thou hast made for Thee to dwell in, in the Sanctuary, O Lord, which Thy hands have established." Ex. xv. 17.

In this last text we have reference to the Sanctuary of which Christ is Minister, "the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man." Heb. viii. 1, 2. Take this with the verses immediately following the one quoted from Exodus, "The Lord shall reign for ever and ever;" and also with the statement that Abraham "looked for a city which have foundations, whose builder and maker is God" (Heb. xi. 10), and we shall see that none of the faithful had the idea that they were to possess a temporal inheritance in this present world, but that they desired "a better country, that is, an heavenly." Heb. xi. 16.

If we are children of Abraham, then "

598

our citizenship is in heaven." Phil. iii 20, R.V. We have "come unto Mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the Firstborn, which are written in heaven." Heb. xi. 22, 23.

A CITY WITH FOUNDATIONS

Abraham looked for "a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God." Read in Rev. xxi. 14-20 the description of the foundations of the city of God. The heavenly Jerusalem, therefore, it is the city for which Abraham looked. "Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all." Gal. iv. 26. But this Jerusalem is coming down from God out of heaven, to be the capital of the new earth. "And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. And I John saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God." Rev. xxi. 1-3.

And where will the heavenly Jerusalem come down? The prophet tells us that in the time of the great battle of the day of the Lord, "His feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south." "And the Lord my God shall come, and all the saints with Thee. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the light shall not be clear nor dark." That is, as stated in the margin, it shall not be clear in some places and dark in other places. "But it shall be one day which shall be known to the Lord, not day, nor night; but it shall come to pass, that at evening time it shall be light. And it shall be in that day, that living waters shall go out from Jerusalem; half of them toward the former sea, and half of them toward the hinder sea; in summer and in winter shall it be. And the Lord shall be king over all the earth; in that day shall there be one Lord, and His name one." Zech. xiv. 1-9.

Even if the Jerusalem that is now on the earth were a fit place for the tabernacle of God, it is altogether too small for all Israel. "The children which Thou shalt have, after Thou hast lost the other, shall say again in Thine ears, The place is too strait for me; give place to me that I may dwell." Isa. xlix. 20. The text from Zechariah tells us how the place will be made large enough. We have read that in that day living waters shall go forth from Jerusalem. That is because the tabernacle of God is with men, and from His throne proceeds a "clear river of water of life." Rev. xxii. 1. Then will Abraham and his seed inherit the land of Canaan.

BOTH SPIRITUAL AND LITERAL

But some one will say that we are spiritualising the text, when it ought to be taken literally. No; we are taking it literally, for the city will be a very real city. "Spiritual" is not opposed to "literal." The law of God, even the whole Bible, is spiritual, yet it is very real. God Himself is spiritual, yet He is a very real, living God. The trouble with so many who read the promises to Israel is that they forget that the word is spiritual, and so leave Christ out of them. The promise is the promise of the Spirit, and the inheritance will be shared only by those who are spiritual, but it is so real that it will endure when everything else passes away. The promise that Abraham and his seed shall inherit the land of Canaan will be fulfilled to the very letter.

Now it is easy to see that the possession of the land of Canaan is in reality the possession of the whole earth. For when the New Jerusalem comes down and all the saints with it, the earth will be made new, and the Lord will be King over all the earth.

"But why did not the Lord say 'the heavenly Canaan,' instead of simply Canaan, when He made the promise to Abraham, so that we need not make so great a mistake?" Well, in the first place, it is no more strange that He should say simply Canaan, than that He should say simply the earth, instead of "new earth," in the promise, "Blessed are the meek; for they shall inherit the earth."

And secondly, the Lord made it so clear that He meant an heavenly and not an earthly inheritance, that Abraham understood Him, and looked only for an heavenly country. If Abraham could understand the promise, there is no reason why we should make a mistake in regard to it. And now that we know what the promise is, let us remember that they who do His commandments, through faith in Christ, "may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city." Those gates have on them the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel (Rev. xxi. 12), so that the gathering of the saints of God into the New Jerusalem is the fulfilment of the promise through the prophets, that Israel shall return to Jerusalem.

"Addition and Multiplication" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

Addition and Multiplication.-"Giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity." 2 Pet. i. 5. God only asks us to work by addition, but He Himself works for us in a different way. What that way is we are told in the second verse of the same chapter,-"Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord." Jude also writes,

599

"Mercy unto you, and peace, and love, be multiplied." Verse 2. The promise to Abraham was a promise of multiplication (Heb. vi. 13, 14; Gen. xxii. 17), and this promise was many times repeated to his descendants. The Lord is never stinted and niggardly toward us, but bestows His favours, unmerited as they are, in the most generous manner possible. He always gives us more and greater blessings than we know how to ask of Him.

"Unquenchable Fire" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

The most appalling conflagration ever known in America, in point of fatality to human life, swept over the pine forest region of Minnesota and Wisconsin, Sept. 2-4. According to the accounts of survivors, the disaster came in the form of a veritable storm of fire, moving with the swiftness and fury of a tornado. The unfortunate inhabitants of the towns and villages in its path had no more opportunity of escape than had the citizens of ill-fated Pompeii when it was buried beneath the outburst from Vesuvius. To frail mortals who stood before its power, it must have seemed a type of that greater conflagration to come, when, the harvest of the world being ended, and the wheat to be gathered into the garner, the chaff will be burned up with unquenchable fire.

The last great judgment of God upon the earth will have been preceded by many minor judgments. Some of these, sacred history has recorded. In times when the wickedness of man has risen up to most daring heights, His judgments have fallen to check the spread of people. Thus it was in the days of Noah. There was a flood of wickedness over the earth, and God sent upon it a flood of water. Of the two the latter was infinitely preferable. But His judgments have also come in the form of unquenchable fire. We read that "Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, in giving themselves over to fornication and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire." Jude 7.

The fire which God rained upon those wicked cities was unquenchable, though it has long since ceased to burn. And these cities are set forth as an example of the judgment which will finally overtake the ungodly. 2 Pet. ii. 6. "Unquenceable fire" is fire which burned until it utterly consumes that upon which it feeds. Its unquenchable character is demonstrated by the fact that it does this, in spite of all efforts that may be made to prevent it. And this is the effect it will have in the Judgment day upon the wicked. It will consume them, one and all, so that they will be utterly destroyed, and become "as though they had not been." Obadiah 16.

"Taught of God" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

The Lord teaches all persons who are willing to be taught of Him. The text-book is His word, and the knowledge to be gained is the knowledge of Him. To know Him is to become wise unto salvation, but to be ignorant of Him is to walk in the path of darkness and death. It is a mistake to say that "the proper study of mankind is man." The study of man by man, with a view to learning moral and spiritual truth, is heathenism. The proper study of mankind is God; and the proper teacher for mankind is God. Only God Himself knows what knowledge is essential for man's highest welfare, and only He is competent to teach us the truth concerning Himself.

But God's school, in which He instructs mankind, is the school of adversity. This is so not because God ordained it thus, but because of the perversity of human nature. Men are very rarely able to learn what is good for them to know through prosperity. And therefore, while God delights to bless His creatures with the good things of this life, He is very often obliged to withhold them in order that men may learn that lesson so necessary to life, of entire dependence upon Him.

When we remember that the best men of all ages have been fitted for their work in this way, and that only so have they been able to learn the highest lessons of truth, we should view adversity in a different light from that in which it is seen by the world, and should meet it not with a rebellious or despairing spirit, but with a spirit of resignation and even of welcome. The Psalmist says, "Blessed is the man whom Thou chastenest, O Lord, and teachest him out of Thy law." Ps. xciv. 12. When chastening comes, it is but the hour of the Lord's instruction, when He will reveal to us wondrous things out of His law. We shall then learn precious lessons if we do not close up the avenues of communication with Him by murmurings and repining. In that hour we must see with the eye of faith, and by that we shall understand that what seems a grievous calamity is in reality a blessing, and that it is sent in order that in the real day of adversity we may be hid. For that is never a calamity which does not sever the soul's connection with God, and whatever binds the soul more closely to Him is the greatest blessing.

If we understand the meaning of adversity, we shall know that it does not mean that God has forsaken us. For faith says, "The Lord will not to cast off His people, neither will He forsake His inheritance." The idea which comes so naturally at such times that God has forsaken us, is from the devil, he suggests it to us, for from the first, in his warfare against God, he has sought to gain his point by misrepresentation. So he suggests that God has cast us off, that we have done

600

nothing to deserve such affliction, and that therefore God is unjust and not to be depended upon, and His service unprofitable. It was the devil who brought the trouble, and this was his object in bringing it. But God turns the weapons of Satan into a means of grace to all those who will let Him do with them as He will; and through the very clouds and darkness cast about man by the prince of evil, He reveals more clearly the light of His love and mercy, and His power unto salvation.

Happy is that man who is able to discern the Divine hand in his afflictions, as well as in the blessings that belong to prosperity. If men will but open their minds and hearts to him, it will not take Him long to teach them the great lesson of entire dependence upon Him, and Him alone. "He doth not willingly afflict, nor grieve the children of men;" but because men are slow to learn, the affliction and grief are often long drawn out. Job sat many days in sackcloth and ashes while God was teaching him the lesson of justifying Him rather than self, but when at last the time came for God to reveal Himself, a single glimpse of Him caused Job to exclaimed, "I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes." And no man, having the view of God that Job then had, could have said otherwise. It is only because men know not God and will not let Him reveal Himself to them as He longs to do, that they continue to admire and trust in themselves. No one who will let God teach him of Himself as fully as God desires Himself to be known, can fail of eternal life. John xvii. 2.

"A Wonder of the Deep" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

A strange-looking creature this, is it not? It seems to be almost half head. And how fierce it looks, with its great, staring eyes, and its wide, open mouth lined with sharp teeth. But what is that thing rising up from its nose? That is the most wonderful of all, for it is a torch. This fish is called the torch-fish. Its scientific name is Linophryne Lucifer. Perhaps you may know that "Lucifer" means "light-bearer." A very appropriate name that, for a fish that carries a torch, is it not?

But what is the torch for? How does the fish use it? Well, sad to say, he does not use it for the good of his fellow-fishes. Instead of using it to light up the dark places in the deep sea, where it lives, so that others may be guided in the right way, the torch-fish uses his torch to lure smaller fishes to destruction. It is not lighted all the time, but only when its owner pleases. When meal time comes, he lights his torch, and the small fishes, thinking that it is a phosphorescent insect like the glow-worm, dart for it, and find themselves, or rather lose themselves, in the huge creature's mouth.

That is the way in which this lucifer-fish uses his light. Who thinks that it is a proper use of it? Is it not rather an abuse of it? Did God make the torch-fish to prey upon and destroy his fellows? Did He give him that wonderful lantern, for the purpose of luring others to destruction? Good Dr. Watts wrote,

"Let dogs delight to bark and bite,
For 'tis their nature to;
Let bears and lions growl and fight,
For God has made them so."

But is that true? Did God design that any of His creatures should tear one another to pieces? Who thinks that He did? Perhaps you all think so. Let us see what the Bible says about it.

After God had created all things on the earth, and in the air, and in the sea, and had given man dominion over them, He said to man, "Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to use it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the air, and to everything that creepeth upon the earth, where in there is life, I have given every green herb for meat." Gen. i. 29, 30.

So we see that God's original design was that men should eat grain and fruit. And that the other creatures should eat herbs and grass. He did not design that there should be any killing and devouring.

We know this also from what we are told of the new earth. The earth is to be restored as it was in the beginning, and of that time we read, "The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice' den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain." Isa. xi. 6-9.

Thus it will be when sin is removed, and the earth is restored to its first condition; and so it was before sin entered. Man sinned, and all creatures on earth have suffered in consequence. The gifts which God bestowed on men in order that they might be a blessing to others have been perverted, and are used for their destruction.

Satan, who is the originator of sin and death, was once in heaven. Jesus said, "I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven." His name was Lucifer, and the prophet Isaiah, addressing the king of Babylon who in his pride was exalting himself against God, uses terms which must apply to Satan in heaven, when his pride was causing him to rebel against God:-

"How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High." Isa. xiv. 12-14.

The prophet Ezekiel also describes his beauty and brighteness:-

"Son of man, take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus, and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord God; Thou sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty. Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold; the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so; thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee. By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned; therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God; and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire. Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness; I will cast thee to the ground, I will lay thee before kings, that they may behold thee.

606

Thou hast defiled thy sanctuaries by the multitude of thine iniquities, by the iniquity of thy traffic; therefore will I bring forth a fire from the midst of thee, it shall devour thee, and I will bring thee to ashes upon the earth in the sight of all them that behold thee." Eze. xxviii. 12-19.

He was a beautiful angel in heaven, a light-bearer. Then his light was a blessing to all. But now he has perverted that gift, so that when he chooses he "is transformed into an angel of light" (2 Cor. xi. 14), only for the purpose of luring people to destruction.

All creation has partaken more or less of Satan's spirit. Men to whom God has given powerful minds, so that they can discover great wonders, use their intellect to the hurt of their fellow-men. Some spend all their time and thought to discover ways of killing others. The man who can invent a machine that will kill the most people in the shortest time, receives great honour. This is not what God intended that men should do, nor what He is now pleased with.

In the same way the lower animals have become perverted in their natures. Instead of living together in peace, they prey upon those that are weaker. We know what the torch-fish does with his lantern, but we do not know what God designed that he should do with it. But we do know that He did not make it that he might the more easily destroy others.

The Apostle John had a vision of what shall be hereafter, and this is what he says about it: "And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever." Rev. v. 13. That will be the time when "there shall be no more death," because death itself will have been destroyed. Then, if we have allowed the Lord to work His own will in us, we shall have all eternity in which to study the wonderful works of God, and shall see as we cannot now, His perfect design in all that He has made.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

-We import from other lands ?120,000,000 worth of food supplies yearly.

-The preparation of the human hair for the market gives employment to 7,000 Parisians.

-The value of British trade for the first half of the year was ?12,000,000 in excess of that of the corresponding period of 1893.

-Forest fires are still reported from America, while in Algeria and Sicily forest fires were burning last week, and destroying large amounts of timber.

-Moseley says, in regard to the ocean, that probably all is dark below 200 fathoms excepting in so far as light is given out by phosphorescent animals.

-Even the Vatican is disturbed by rumours of Anarchist plots. Special precautions are taken to guard the buildings, and last week two armed men were arrested in the Vatican gardens.

-The telegraph service is carried on at an annual loss-the deficit last year being ?473,000. But the Post Office meets this deficit and makes a profit of nearly three million pounds.

-Japan began to build railways in 1870, and she has now nearly 2,000 miles. China, on the contrary, has, as yet, only 200 miles in actual work. The contrast is all the more striking if we consider the vast area of the one country and the comparatively diminutive size of the other.

-At the recent Trades Union Congress it was voted that forty-eight hours should constitute a week's work in all trades, and that all the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be collectively owned and managed by the community. This commits the Unions to Socialism.

-Those who can think in large figures may be interested in the fact that the Post Office last year carried 2,799,500,000 letters, etc., besides 54,034,000 parcels. There are 74,819 persons permanently employed in handling the mails, and another 61,000 persons are employed more or loss.

-People who do not think may like to hear that 18 million letters, etc., were sent to the Returned Letter Office. Of course a large proportion of these were wrongly or insufficiently addressed. No less than 34,000 letters were posted without any address at all, and more than 2,000 of these had money enclosures.

-France has been "protecting," Madagascar for a long time, and now it is generally expected that a quarrel with the natives will soon be the occasion for taking the island over entirely. It is 080 miles in length, and contains 230,000 square miles-about equal to four time the area of England and Wales. The French journals urge that France must make it their chief colonial possession.

-The King of Korea is between the two stools-China and Japan. But he is a philosopher. He is on the best of terms with the Japanese, who are in possession of his capital, and has concluded an alliance with them and asked them to be good enough to drive the Chinese out. He has, at the same time, sent costly presents to the Empress Mother of China as a mark of his respectful satisfaction on her attainment of her 60th birthday.

-West Australia has the excitement of a gold find which is drawing the people somewhat as California and South Africa did. There are said to be immense areas of rich gold deposits. The party which first discovered gold got out ?17,000 worth in six weeks, with the most primitive appliances. Mining towns are springing up, and wealth will doubtless be quickly gained by the fortunate and lost by the unfortunate.

-The Russians have lately had a celebration at the completion of the first 500 miles in Asia of their trans-Siberian railway. They are hastening the work along, but it is an enormous undertaking, and must consume considerable time. Authorities on commercial and military problems in the East point out the enormous advantage such a railway will be to Russia in her apparent designs on the British supremacy in the trade of the East.

-The passion for doing something difficult or new, just for the sake of doing it, is being cultivated and exercised to an abnormal extent in a great variety of ways. One of the latest enterprises is that of a Russian who has started to go round the world on foot. This same foolish ambition is responsible for most of the deaths which occur in mountain climbing, which are annually reported about this season.

-The average price of wheat has seldom gone lower than 24s. For the week ending Sept. 1st., however, it went down to 22s. 7d., the lowest average price during the present century. The reports state that apparently it will decline still further. This is doubtless one reason why so many farms are lying idle, and so many villages being partially depopulated. Apiculture seems to have received a hard blow in many of the counties of England.

-The cost of transportation and the profits of the middlemen are keeping the producer and the needy consumer out of reach of one another. So we read of the need in one part of the world, and of surfeit in the supply in another. The consul in Smyrna says that in Turkey horses and cattle are being fed on raisins and other dried fruits. The prices offered in Turkey are so low that the cultivation of the vine will be largely discontinued if there is no change for the better.

-All is not peaceful for the rulers in South-Eastern Europe. The King of Servia was stoned by a mob last week, as he rode in his carriage. Ferdinand of Bulgaria is in difficulty with his great minister, Stambouloff, and partisan feeling runs high. And the news comes that a plot has been discovered against the Austrian Emperor in Eastern Galicia. The spirit of unrest and discontent seems to increase, and self-restraint becomes a rarer virtue.

-The Chinese have long been known as hard and industrious workers, and they have made their way into many western countries, where their competition in the labour market is being felt. They are now being encouraged by the Brazilian Government to enter that country. A Brazilian company has contracted with the government to bring in a million coolies. In Australia the Chinaman has demonstrated his abilities as a farmer and gardener, and Brazil is likely to gain by introducing the Chinese among their lazy easy-going native stock.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

The Pope has decided to convoke a conference next month of all the Oriental Patriarchs to discuss the question of the reunion of the Oriental churches with the Roman See.

The infinite variety of living forms with which the Creator filled the earth affords constant surprises to the naturalist. A work just published, dealing with the classification of fishes, shows that over 300 species of fish hitherto unknown have been discovered in the lakes of Borneo.

The Church Times, in behalf of High Church, repudiates Cardinal Vaughan's contention that Ritualism is a nursery for the Roman Church. It is claimed that it prevents many from going over to Rome by supplying them with the Catholic doctrine and practice for which they seek within the English Church. It is certainly being supplied.

The President of the Trades Union Congress truly said that the workers "have more to fear from drinking and gambling than from all the capitalists put together." The man who has a tyrant as an employer may be still a free man. But one who is a slave to his own passions and nature is a slave indeed.

The strained feelings between the Hindus and Mohammedans in Poona led to a riot last week in which four thousand combatants engaged. The Mohammedans in a mosque claimed to be disturbed by the singing of Hindu processionists and attacked the singers, and the riot began.

We charge the rioting between Hindus and Mohammedans to their ignorance of the Gospel. But the Mohammedan might ask the reason for the strange feeling between the Roman and Greek and Armenian Catholics in Palestine. A friend just returned from a visit to the Holy Land says that it is still everywhere noticeable that the presence of the Mohammedan soldiers is all that restrains the fanatical Catholic rivals from doing violence to one another. The reason is the same, the utter ignorance of the Gospel.

Moral back-bone is what we all need, and it is what the Gospel gives. But so many people make themselves miserable by refusing to learn its power. A missionary in India, writing to the Woman's Signal of the great need of temperance work there, says that a society lady recently said to him:-

Oh, this cruel custom! I know every time I give my guests wine I may be leading somebody to ruin, but there is no help for it; my husband's social position gauges his whole Indian career, and I cannot be the means of ostracising him. I must give wine. Ah, zenana might well turn the tables now, and make their way in Anglo-Indian homes, and plead with the English-women to break their own fetters, and so deliver those native society people who are following English customs.

The demand of custom, society, or business is making slaves in all the world. The only man who is absolutely free is the one who has learned the giving up of all things, if necessary, to follow the right. Such an one cannot be driven in the slave-gang of custom.

The sums per head spent by nations on military purposes usually far exceeds that spent on education, says the Echo, although we prate about intellect and pretend to detest brutality. Both England and France show a fat war budget and a lean educational one, but of all countries in Europe Russia shows the greatest disproportion, her war expenses towering aloft and hiding the dwarf column of her school expenses. Switzerland is the only country that spends more on educating her people than in teaching them to kill and maim-the only European country, that is, for the United States can claim to do the same. Denmark spends more on education than any other nation, but her army bill is far larger, although the disproportion is not so disgraceful as in the case of England, France, and Russia. Mental culture is, after all, a hors d'?uvre with us. We talk about brains, but we believe in blood.

God is worshipped only in Spirit and in truth, and His worship is not something apart from life. In every false system of religion, however, the performance of certain rites and ceremonies is supposed to constitute worship, and the ordinary daily life is something quite divorced from religion. How completely Romanism leads its blind votaries toward the same point is illustrated by what Archdeacon Farrar says of a French king:-

One of the vilest and wickedness of kings-Louis XV. of France-got out of his carriage and went on his knees in the mud before the host, and the mob cheered him as a very religious king for performing this act; and yet he did it coming from the Capre? of his loathly palace, and returning to the sty of his habitual vice.

It is on the same principle that the Italian or Mexican bandit or thief prays to the Virgin Mary for her aid in his criminal undertakings. And the difference is only one of degree when anybody loses the real vital experience of the power of Christ in his life, but satisfies the conscience by continuing the forms of religion which mean nothing to him.

The mortality in India from the bite of snakes in one recent year is put by statistics at the shocking figure of 19,025 human beings. The death of human beings and cattle from the attacks of snakes and wild beasts during the year was 21,988 persons, and 81,668 head of cattle. It seems a terrible list to come from India alone.

A rich French man has introduced bull-fighting as an amusement for himself and friends on his estate near Paris. It is the first time this brutal amusement has ever been brought into Northern France, and the Society for the Protection of animals is urging that it be suppressed by the public prosecutor.

"Obedience and Affliction" The Present Truth 10, 38.

E. J. Waggoner

Obedience and Affliction.-Obedience to God brings tribulation; for "all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer perseuction." 2 Tim. iii. 12. But the peculiarity about this tribulation is that it is entirely compatible with peace and joy in the heart of the one afflicted. Thus Paul said, "I am exceeding joyful in all our tribulation" (2 Cor. vii. 4); and David testified, "It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might learn Thy statutes; the law of Thy mouth is better unto me than thousands of gold and silver." Ps. cxix. 71, 72. All who are willing to let the Lord try them will be able to say Amen to these words.

September 27, 1894

"Ready to Forgive" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

Ready to Forgive.-"If he trespass against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day turn again to thee, saying, I repent; thou shalt forgive him." Luke xvii. 4. We are to forgive even as God has for Christ's sake forgiven us (Eph. iv. 32); and of God's readiness to forgive, we read, "Thou, Lord, art good, and ready to forgive, and plenteous in mercy to all that call on Thee." The Lord does not ask us to be more kind in forgiving than He is; therefore we may know that whenever we turn to the Lord, saying, "I repent," we are forgiven. "For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved." Rom. x. 13.

Faith Needed.-When Jesus told His disciples how ready they should be to forgive, they immediately said to Him, "Increase our faith," or, Give to us faith. They recognised the fact that it is not in human nature to forgive so freely. It is not so difficult to forgive an occasional offence, provided it is not a very great one; but to forgive a persistent offender,-one who repeats the same injury time after time,-is a rare thing. Without faith it cannot be done. What does faith do?-It lays hold of God's righteousness, and appropriates it for the forgiveness of our own sins. When our faith makes real to us the fact that God freely forgives us, although we have repeatedly committed the same transgressions against Him, then, and only then, can we be longsuffering with our fellow-men. This instruction with regard to forgiving, therefore, is not simply an admonition, but a wonderful comfort, since it shows us how God forgives us.

"'The Measure of Faith'" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

"The Measure of faith."-The apostle tells us that "God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith." Note that he does not say a measure of faith, but the measure of faith, indicating that there is but one measure. All men receive the same measure of faith. What is that measure? Two or three texts will show it clearly. "By grace are ye saved, through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God." Eph. ii. 8. The measure of faith, therefore, is the measure of the gift of God's grace. Now we read that "unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ." Eph. iv. 7. Therefore the measure of the gift of faith is the measure of the gift of Christ, who is given without reserve to every man. The faith which the saints have is "the faith of Jesus." Rev. xiv. 12.

Thinking Soberly.-Now read, "For I say, through the grace given to me, unto every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith." Rom. xii. 3. That is, the measure of faith which God has dealt to men, is the only means by which they may be kept from being intoxicated with selfish pride. But that measure is the measure of the gift of Christ. He who keeps the faith thus dealt to him, has Christ dwelling in him in His fulness, so that he is "filled with all the fulness of God." Eph. iii. 17-19. It is impossible for a natural man to do any work and not be proud of it, at least in his own heart. But he who keeps the faith of Jesus, has the same power to enable him to think soberly, by which Christ, the Son of the Highest, dwelt in the flesh as a man, veiling His heavenly glory.

"Covetousness Is Idolatry" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

This is plainly declared to be so by the word of God. The Apostle Paul wrote, "Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry." Col. iii. 5. Again, we find the same fact stated in Eph. v. 5.

This being so, the civilised races of the earth have no cause for glorying in this respect over races that bow down before wood and stone. We read also about "idols of silver, and idols of gold" which will in the last great day be cast "to the moles and to the bats." Isa. ii. 20. These are the idols of the covetous person. A savage idolatry is no worse in the sight of God than a civilised idolatry. It is no worse to violate the first commandment that to break the tenth.

Idolatry consists in trusting in some other person or thing than God; and covetousness is simply a more indirect and "reasonable" way of manifesting this false trust than is bowing down to an idol. God is able and willing to do all things for the person who trusts in Him. Therefore there can be no occasion for covetousness; and he who covets thereby shows that he does not

610

trust the Lord. He reaches out after something which is not from the Lord, as though something more than God has given him were necessary to his existence or his happiness, and thereby shows that he does not wholly depend upon God.

But to do this is to deny God, for if He be not all-sufficient, He is not God at all. All men are dependent upon God, and on Him alone. To depend upon something else, is to make that thing a god. Whatever we seek, we must seek from the Lord, and when we get any good thing we must recognise it as coming from Him. In this way we recognise God as God, and give Him the glory due unto His name. If we do this, the idolatry of covetousness will find no place in our hearts.

"Esteeming Others Better" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

The only way for a man to love his neighbour as himself, as the law of God commands, is for him to esteem others better than himself, as he is also enjoined by the word of God. And every man can do this if he will be strictly honest with himself; for every man knows more of his own faults than he does of the faults of others.

It is not by exalting poor, frail, erring mortals to some high plain where, in his imagination, he has placed himself, but by putting himself down upon the common level of humanity, and acknowledging himself to be, as the Bible declares, no better than others, that a man can fulfil this seemingly hard requirement. We must descend to the level where God meets man, and that is the level of the cross of Christ, where self dies. And we can descend there by letting that mind be in us which was in Christ, which prompted Him to sacrifice Himself and become "obedient unto death." Phil. ii. 5-8. God will put that mind in us if we will let it come in.

"Ancient Finance" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

The record in Genesis xxiii. of the purchase of the cave of Machpelah, of Ephron, the Hittite, shows that it was as business-like and definite a transaction as though it had been done in the present commercial age.

"Abraham weighed to Ephron the silver, which he had named. . . . four hundred shekels of silver, current money with the merchant. And the field of Ephron, which was in Machpelah, which was before Mamre, the field, and the cave which was therein, and all the trees that were in the field, that were in all the borders round about, were made sure unto Abraham for a possession in the presence of the children of Heth, before all that went in at the gate of his city."

The long-buried records of the past that are being brought to light by students of Assyriology add interesting facts to what the Scripture tells us of commercial transactions in the ancient days.

Only recently the authorities of the British Museum have placed in the Assyrian Department an ancient weight, of hard polished stone, about four inches high, which was used for weighing silver in ancient Babylonia. The ten lines of the inscription tell us that it was made by Nebuchadnezzar, B.C. 605, and that it is exactly copied from the original standard weight, the maneh, authorised by Dungi, King of Babylon, over 2,000 years B.C.

The "current money of the merchant" very probably was weighed according to the Babylonian standard. It was not until later Babylonian times that money was stamped as coin. In Abraham's day the Hittites seem to have been a thoroughly commercial people, and even after the overthrow of the Hittite empire the Assyrians had, besides their own "royal maneh," the Hittite standard of the "maneh of Carchemish."

Carchemish was a great trading emporium. Situated in Northern Syria, it was on the highway of traffic between the East and the West, and doubtless profited by the trade of Assyria and the commerce of Phoenicia. The latter country, with which David and Solomon had such intimate business relations also left its mark on the business transactions of the Eastern empires, as shown by Assyrian weights. The bronze lion weights, discovered by Layard in the Palace Nimroud, are also exhibited in the Assyrian Department at the Museum. They are of various sizes, and many are marked by both cuneiform and Phoenician inscriptions, showing that the standard weights were internationally recognised.

The people among whom Abraham lived and preached the Gospel were not a barbarous, unlettered people. The little business transaction recorded in Genesis xxiii. shows fixed commercial methods.

"The Lord's Day Again" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

The readers of PRESENT TRUTH will remember an article in the issue of August 23rd, entitled, "A Sunday Memorial," In which some strictures were made upon a petition circulated by the "Working Men's Lord's Day Rest Association," asking for the closing of museums on Sunday, which was characterised as "The Lord's Day." We have received from the Secretary of the above-named Society a reply to our article, and in accordance with his request we publish the letter herewith. It is as follows:-

SIR,-My attention has been called to an article in your impression of the 23rd ult. in which you refer to this Association, and to the views advocated by its members. In this article you object to sign a memorial against opening museums on Sundays because the memorial "conveys the idea that Sunday is the Lord's Day," and to imply that when John said "I was in the Spirit of the Lord's Day," he did not refer to "the first day of the week," the glorious resurrection day of his beloved Lord and Saviour, but to the Sabbath of the Fourth Commandment, and you further urge that "the Bible does declare in most explicit terms that the seventh day is 'the Lord's Day,'" and in proof you quote the words from the Fourth Commandment "the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God."

This construction of John's words appears to me to be contrary to the truth. John was the most loving of all the disciples. His heart was full of the Saviour. Every circumstance connected with his Lord's life would be cherished by John, and the day of the resurrection of his Lord and Master would naturally be looked upon by John and the other disciples as the most glorious consummation of the great work of redemption. This resurrection day would stand out with more splendour to John than all other days in the Saviour's life. It would naturally be hallowed and reverenced more than all other days, because it was the day when their beloved Master was miraculously restored to them after His crucifixion and burial. So much was this resurrection day honoured, that the disciples at once began to meet on that day. As soon as the news spread of Christ's resurrection, on the same day, in the evening, the disciples assembled and Jesus came

611

and stood in their midst and said, "Peace be unto you" (John xx. 21, 22), and after eight days (on the first day after the seventh day) again the disciples were within and Jesus again stood in their midst, and again said, "Peace be unto you" (John xx. 26). Later on we find in Acts xx. 7 that "upon the first day of the week the disciples came together to break bread" and "Paul preached unto them:" and Paul in his first epistle to the Corinthians, chap. xvi. verses 1, 2, clearly shows that the Christians met on the resurrection day: "Now concerning the collection for the saints, upon the first day of the week [the resurrection day] let every one of you lay by him in store as God hath prospered him."

Now we urge, that with all those facts fully before him-the resurrection, the regular meetings of the disciples on the first day, the repeated appearance of the Saviour to them in their assemblies on the first day, the preachings and collections on the first day,-it was nothing but natural for John the loving disciple to refer to this day as "The Lord's Day," and it would be a forced and unnatural construction of the passage to say that John referred to the Sabbath of the Decalogue, when he said "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day." His mind was brimful of the Lord, and the Lord's resurrection day was undoubtedly to him "The Lord's Day." This is the common sense view of the passage in question, and the practice of Christians from the resurrection to the present day, supported by the opinions of theologians, confirms this view.

From the very day of the resurrection the observance of the first day by Christians was as Dr. Scott says "gradually and silently introduced by example rather than by express precept."

Christians readily admit that the example of the Apostles in other matters relating to the Christian life should be our guide, and why not on this question of the Lord's Day. Although we call our Sabbath Lord's Day, it still comes to us every seventh day; we still set apart a seventh portion of our time. Our forefathers before Christ kept the seventh-day Sabbath because "on the seventh day God ended His work which He had made, and He rested on the seventh day for all His work which He had made. And God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it because that in it He had rested from all His work which God created and made" (Genesis ii. 2, 3). The Creation Sabbath celebrated the completion of creation. The Christian Sabbath celebrated the completion of Christ's work of redemption. Thus we have the Creation Sabbath and the Christian Sabbath beautifully blended in that glorious resurrection day which in honour of our Lord God and Saviour we call the Lord's Day.

Another point in the article referred to merits notice. The writer says "these Sunday Associations are carried on largely by men who do not engage in mental labour for a living. The real working men are not very much concerned about having Sunday observance established by law."

The Sabbath rest was not appointed by God solely for the benefit of men who work at manual labour. Brain workers need the rest of the Lord's Day as well as limb workers. But it is not true that the working men of the country are indifferent to this question. "The Parliament of labour" called The Trades Union Congress has on five different occasions passed resolutions in favour of protecting their much valued day of rest from the encroachments of labour. Mr. Henry Broadhurst M.P., by trade a mason, when resisting the opening of museums on Sunday said, "It is in the interests of labour that we should keep the Sunday as free and as fully relieved from the Associations of labour as it is possible for us to do;" 213 of the leading trade unionists of this country signed the following petition to Directors of the Chicago Exhibition: "We the undersigned feeling the national importance of preserving the Sunday as a day of rest from labour for all classes desire to express our hope that the Columbian Exhibition may be closed on the day of rest." No less than 2,412 Working Class Organisations having more than 501,000 members, supported Mr. Broadhurst M.P. in his successful resistance to the Sunday labour which would be caused by the opening of museums on the rest day, Mr. Benjamin Pickard M.P., a miner by trade, and the leader of some 300,000 miners, said at a great meeting of the Working Men's Lord's Day Rest Associaiton in May, 1885, "I believe everyone in this vast assembly is of one opinion that the Sabbath day which we now have and enjoy we shall rigidly maintain against all opponents. As far as the working man is concerned I believe it would be a serious matter for him if the days of labour were increased to seven." Let me give one more (out of many) authority on this branch of the controversy. Mr. Gladstone in a letter to M. Leon Say, the French Minister of Commerce, on September, 1889, wrote, "It seems to me unquestionable that the observance of Sunday rest has taken deep root both in the convictions and the habits of the immense majority of my countrymen. If it appears to many of them a necessity of spiritual and Christian life, others not less numerous defend it with equal energy as a social necessity. The working class is extremely jealous of it, and is opposed not merely to its avowed abolition, but to whatever might indirectly tend to that result. Personally, I have always endeavoured as far as circumstances have allowed, to exercise this privilege, and now nearly at the end of a laborious public career of nearly fifty-seven years I attribute in great part to that cause the prolongation of my life and the preservation of the faculties I may still possess. As regards the masses the question is still more important; it is the popular question par excellence."

I am, Sir,

Your obedient servant,

CHARLES HILL, Secretary.

Absence from the city, making it necessary that the letter should be forwarded to me on the Continent, has prevented an earlier publication of it. In

OUR REJOINER

which follows, we shall, in order to avoid circumlocution or the repetition of proper names, use the correct address, so that the article may be considered as a friendly letter in response to the one from Mr. Hill.

Beginning with the last portion of the letter, I would say that the question is not as to the value of a weekly rest day. There are just two points at issue, and these are, (1) What is the Lord's day? and (2) Should the Lord's day be the subject of legal enactments? Let us keep these points clearly before us.

I note the citation from Mr. Gladstone, and think that it is as good testimony as is needed against asking the Government to take any action regarding Sunday. It is so conclusive that I will repeat a portion of it. He says:-

It seems to me unquestionable that the observance of Sunday rest has taken deep root both in the convictions and the habits of the immense majority of our countrymen. If it appears to many of them a necessity of spiritual and Christian life, others not less numerous defend it with equal energy as a social necessity. The working-class is extremely jealous of it, and is opposed not merely to its avowed abolition, but to whatever might indirectly tend to that result.

If this is true, what possible necessity can there be for a law to prevent its being used as a working day? Do you say that it is needed to prevent capitalists or Government officials who might be indifferent to the wishes of the labouring class, from exacting labour on that day? If so, I ask, What difference does it make how little employers regard the Sunday rest, if the employÈs are opposed to working? If they refuse to work on Sunday, that settles the matter.

You say that the labouring men are afraid to go contrary to the wishes of their employers in respect to Sunday work, lest they should lose their places? Then what becomes of your argument that the great body of working men are opposed to Sunday work? There certainly would be no danger of their losing their places unless as many men were working and anxious to work on Sunday. There is a plain inconsistency here. If the majority of working men are, either conscientiously or otherwise, opposed to Sunday labour, there is no need of a law forbidding them to work. For no matter how much capital a man has, he is powerless if labouring men refuse to work. They have the matter absolutely in their own hands. But if they are willing or anxious to work on Sunday when opportunity offers, then it is clearly unjust to forbid them so to do.

THE BETTER WAY

In Paris, the Syndicated Grocers have been brought to engage to close their shops on Sunday, only, however, as a trial, "M. Leon Say, in congratulating the League on this victory, advised them never to ask the State to help them. State help was a remedy that often killed where it meant to cure. The recent legislation to limit the hours for the employment of women, was depriving them of work. It was better to gain one's object by transforming habits and ideas than by rigid laws, the working of which was sure to oppress."

This is quoted from the religious paper, which says, "the movement may not, at present, have much connection with evangelical religion, but it must be favourable to it." This points to the fact that the ultimate result, if not the object, of all Sunday legislation, of whatever character, is the advancement of religion, and not a mere social well-being. And who needs to be told

612

that true evangelical religion cannot be advanced by human laws? Even from a social point of view, M. Leon Say advises the working men not to ask the State for help, as it will be a disadvantage to them. How much more must this be the case with religion? From whatever point of view we look at it, therefore, we see that there is really no need of any legislative action being taken in the matter.

REPRESENTATIVE SIGNATURES

I am sorry that you forgot to explain the matter of representative signatures. Your petition asks signers to state what society they represent, and how many members it has, and also to state whether they sign it officially or in their individual capacity. Now it must be evident that such representation may result in very much misrepresentation. Thus, the chief officer of some society may sign the petition, stating that the society which he "represents" has five hundred members. Then his signature will be counted as five hundred. Yet the matter may never have been brought before the society. In that case there is clear misrepresentation, although he may not have intended to misrepresent, but may have followed the directions of the memorial without thought.

Again, the petition may have been brought before a meeting of the society, and endorsed by a majority vote. Now if there were any votes at all against it, it is clear that it is a misrepresentation to count the whole five hundred members in favour of it.

Further, it is very seldom that all the members of any society are present at any regular meeting, or even at a meeting specially called. Therefore even if the vote in favour of the petition were unanimous, it would still be a misrepresentation of the truth to count the entire membership as having endorsed it.

Still further, the petition may be signed by several officers of a society, each of whom will sign it "officially," and will therefore state that he "represents" so many hundred members. It was thus that, in petitions concerning one matter to which you refer-the Sunday closing of the World's Fair in Chicago-more people were counted as having signed in one or two States than the entire population of the States, by some million or two. It is evident, therefore, that this signing of memorials "officially," gives no true idea whatever of the actual sentiments of the people. It is in this way that sentiment is "made" in favour of Sunday laws.

In attention to this, I wish to repeat what I said in my former article, that I have not the slightest thought of imputing any wrong motives to your Association. Your attention has doubtless before been called to the fact that not only may unscrupulous people take advantage of such petitions, but that it is absolutely impossible to ascertain the true sentiments of the people by such "representation." It is more than probable that your figures would be very much modified if no one spoke for anyone except himself.

"DISTINGUISHED THEOLOGIANS"

All this, however, does not touch the real point at issue, namely, What day is the Lord's day? This is to be decided by the plain statements of the Bible. "Distinguished Theologians" are no authority whatever here. We do not ask what somebody thinks, but what the Bible says. When we read a plain statement in the Bible, we do not ask to have it interpreted. It must be allowed to stand for just what it says. The Bible is the word of God, and it must be allowed that the Holy Spirit has at least as good command of language as any man. Therefore God is able to express His will in terms so clear that they need no interpretation. As Protestants we acknowledge no Pope, to stand between us and God's word. A child may understand the Bible as well as a Doctor of Divinity, because it interprets itself. Jesus said, "I thank Thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes." Matt. xi. 25. The reason why they are revealed to babes rather than to the wise and prudent, is that children take the Bible as it reads, without trying to find some other than the apparent meaning.

NO CONSTRUCTION

The Apostle John says, "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day." There is no construction to be put on these words. They must be taken as a simple statement of fact. They do not define anything as to the day. How shall we find out what that day is? Shall it be by the Bible, or by the custom of men? It is not a question for sentiment or emotion. To say that it evidently refers to the first day of the week, because it is generally so regarded, is to beg the question entirely. We are not to inquire what people think or do, in order to know what the Bible means, but we are to inquire what the Bible says, in order to learn what people ought to think and do. Let it be noted that in what follows we do not put any construction on any text, nor draw any inference. Every text stands for just what it says, and no more.

SEVENTH DAY, LORD'S DAY

Does the Bible anywhere say that the first day of the week is the Lord's day? It certainly does not. This is a question that anybody who can read can settle for himself. You yourself do not claim that it does. You simply say that "it would naturally be hallowed," that it "would naturally be looked upon by John," etc. Such important questions as this are not to be settled so lightly. It is not what we may think would be natural under any circumstances, but what the Bible says, that must determine the matter. The question is, Has God anywhere in the Bible said that the first day of the week is the Lord's day? The answer must always be, No.

Again, the Lord spoke by the Holy Spirit through the prophet Isaiah, seven hundred years before Christ. No one questions the fact that at that time the seventh day of the week was regarded as the Sabbath by all people who worshipped only the one true God. At that time the Lord spoke of the Sabbath distinctly as "My holy day." Isa. lviii. 13.

Still further, on one occasion Jesus was upbraided by the Pharisees for allowing His disciples to pluck and eat corn on the Sabbath day. There is no question as to what day the Pharisees called the Sabbath. It was the seventh day of the week. Jesus showed that His disciples were guiltless, and said, "The Son of man is Lord even of the Sabbath day." Matt. xii. 8.

Here then we have three separate and distinct Scripture texts showing that the seventh-day Sabbath is the Lord's day.

Now let it be remembered that the Scriptures did not come by the will of man: "but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost."

613

2 Peter i. 21. The Apostle John wrote by the same Spirit. This must be admitted, or else all that he wrote is discredited, for he says, "I was in the Spirit." We have not to ask what John's ideas or natural conclusions might have been, for we are not dealing with a human production. We are dealing with the words of the Holy Spirit. The Scriptures show us that the Holy Spirit calls the seventh-day Sabbath the Lord's day. Therefore that must settle the matter. Whenever the Spirit may mention the Lord"s day, we know what is meant.

"THE SAME DAY"

Although the Scriptures given above are conclusive, I will yet notice your arguments for the Sunday. Speaking of the first day of the week, you say:-

So much was this resurrection day honoured, that the disciples at once began to rest on that day. As soon as the news spread of Christ's resurrection, on the same day, in the evening, the disciples assembled, and Jesus came and stood in their midst, and said, "Peace be unto you." John xx. 21, 22.

Let us see about this. There is considerable said about that first day, and it will pay us to study it. If the day of the resurrection of Christ is to be observed as the Sabbath, we ought to find some statement to that effect. If in the mention of the day we find no hint that it should be observed, then we may be permitted to disregard it.

We have the statement that "the same day at evening," Jesus appeared to the disciples as they were together. Now let us read further about that day. In the last chapter of Luke we read that very early in the morning of that first day, certain women came to the sepulcher and found it open, and were told by two angels that Jesus was risen, and were also reminded of His words before His crucifixion. "And they remembered his words, and returned from the sepulchre, and told all these things unto the eleven, and to all the rest. It was Mary Magdalene, and Joanna, and Mary the mother of James, and other women that were with them, which told these things unto the apostles. And their words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not." Luke xxiv. 8-11.

Afterwards, as Mary Magdalene lingered about the sepulchre, Jesus appeared to her, and she believed. "And she went and told them that had been with Him, as they mourned and wept. And they, when they had heard that He was alive, and had been seen of her, believed not." Mark xvi. 9-11.

As yet we have not found much encouragement for believing that they began at once to celebrate Christ's resurrection by keeping the first day. Let us look further.

Returning to the last chapter of Luke, we find in verses 13-35 the account of His appearing to two of the disciples as they went into the country. They did not believe that He was risen, and did not recognise Him. He explained to them the Scriptures concerning Himself, and finally consented to stop with them when they reached their home, as it was almost night. Then as they sat at supper, He was made known to them. He at once disappeared, and they rose up the same hour and returned to Jerusalem, and told the other disciples that they had seen Him. Read the entire account, which I have summarised to save space.

Now turn to the reference to this affair in the book of Mark. Here it is: "After that He appeared in another form unto two of them, as they walked, and went into the country. And they went and told it unto the residue; neither believed they them." Mark xvi. 12, 13. This was near the close of that same first day, yet the disciples did not believe that Jesus was risen. Then of course they were not celebrating His resurrection.

The record in Mark continues: "Afterward He appeared unto the eleven as they sat at meat, and upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them which had seen Him after He was risen." Mark xvi. 14.

This was "the same day at evening," as recorded by John. In Luke we learn that it was while the two were still telling how they had seen Him. "And as they thus spake, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. But they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit. And He said unto them, Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself; handle Me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see Me have. And when He had thus spoken, He showed them His hands and His feet. And while they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, He said unto them, Have ye here any meat? And they gave Him a piece of a broiled fish, and of an honeycomb." Luke xxiv. 36-42.

Now what have we as the sum of the whole matter?-Simply this: With the exception of Mary Magdalene, none of the disciples believed that Christ was risen until near the close of that first day of the week. When it was nearly night He was recognised by two of them as they sat at supper, and they returned to Jerusalem, a distance of several miles, and found the apostles at supper, and told them that they had seen the Lord. But the apostles did not believe them. Then while they were still talking about it, Jesus appeared unto them, and with difficulty convinced them that He was indeed risen. As final proof, He asked them for something to eat, and they gave Him a portion of their meal. In Acts i. 13 we learn that they all lived together; so we know how they came to be assembled.

A POINT TO BE NOTED

The phrase, "The first day of the week" occurs but eight times in the New Testament. Of these eight times six refer to the day of the resurrection, the day of which we have just been reading. But instead of any intimation being given that it was to be regarded as the Lord's day, and to be kept in honour of the resurrection, they are simply used to give us the information that the disciples did not believe in the resurrection. You see, my dear friend, how uncertain a thing inference is. You inferred that the disciples were celebrating the resurrection; the facts are, as seen by the plain statements of Scripture, that they were eating their supper when Jesus appeared to them, and did not believe that He was risen.

But while these references to the resurrection day afford no support to the theory that Sunday is the Lord's day, they do offer positive testimony as to the day of the Sabbath. In Mark (xvi. 1) we read that when the women came to the sepulchre very early in the morning of the first day of the week, "the Sabbath was past." Matthew's record says that they prepared their gifts on the preparation day, and "rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment," and then came to the sepulchre on the first day of the week. Luke xxiii. 54-56; xiv. 1.

Now note, (1) That the Sabbath day is the day before the first day of

614

the week. (2) That the day immediately before the first day of the week, is "the Sabbath day according to the commandment." (3) That no matter how early we rise on the morning of the first day of the week, we shall be too late to find the Sabbath, because it is then passed.

And note further, as the most important point of all, that these words that we have quoted are the words of the Holy Spirit. The New Testament, to say nothing of the Old was written for the church of Christ. It was written years after the resurrection and ascension of our Lord. It was inspired by the Holy Spirit. Therefore the language that it uses, is the language that Christians ought to use. Years after the resurrection, the Holy Spirit referred to the seventh day of the week as "the Sabbath," as distinguished from the first day of the week. There can therefore be no question among those who recognise the authority of the Holy Spirit, that the seventh day and not the first is the Sabbath. If the seventh day had ceased to be the Sabbath, then the Holy Spirit, in words written years afterward, would not have called it the Sabbath. Some intimation would have been given that a change was made. The whole question is reduced simply to this: Shall we follow the New Testament or not?

"THE EIGHTH DAY"

Again I quote from your letter:-

After eight days (or, the first day after the seventh day) again His disciples were within, and Jesus again stood in their midst, and again said, "Peace be unto you."

Can you tell me where you found your new method of reckoning? And what authority have you for making that addition to the Scripture? There are but seven days in a week. Then how can Sunday be both the first day and the eighth?

But did you not notice that the Scripture says nothing even about the eighth day? It says, "after eight days." After eight days from when? Why, from the time just mentioned,-the day of the resurrection. Now please take a calendar and begin to count the days of the week. Remember that the first day of the week is past, so that it cannot be counted. Now count eight days. I will go over them with you. Monday (1), Tuesday (2), Wednesday (3), Thursday (4), Friday (5), Saturday (6), Sunday (7), Monday (8). There we have the eight days. But the Bible says, "after eight days." Therefore the next meeting could not have been before the next Monday night, and might have been later.

SUNDAY COLLECTIONS

I see that you make the common inference from 1 Cor. xvi. 2, namely, that the apostle there enjoins that when the people assembled on the first day of the week they should take up a collection. Shall we not read the verse, and see if it says anything of the kind? "Upon the first day of the week let everyone of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come."

This says nothing about a meeting on the first day of the week. Neither does it say anything about collections. It says, "Let every one of you lay by him in store." But when a man goes to church and drops a penny or six pence in the box, he does not lay anything by him. Each one was to lay something by him, and keep it in store until Paul should come, when he would take it to Jerusalem. There is no hint that they were to go to meeting at all. The only certain thing is that they were to be at home when they laid their offering by in store.

So far as I know, there are no people in the world who obey this injunction of the apostle except those who keep the seventh day of the week. I am sure that as a general thing those who keep the first day do not regard it. But, as a rule, Seventh-day Adventists do obey the injunction. "First-day offerings," is a common expression among them. They do not ordinarily go to meetings on that day, but it is a practice among them, among other business done on the first day of the week, to lay by a certain sum for the poor, and for general missionary purposes. Each one lays it by him, and keeps it in store until some appointed time as the apostle directed.

APOSTOLIC EXAMPLE

You say that we should follow the example of the apostles. Well, we have examined every occurrence of the term "first day of the week," with only one exception, and have found not the slightest hint that it was regarded by them as in the least degree sacred. There is in whole Bible, just one solitary case of a meeting on the first day of the week, and that is the case recorded in the twentieth chapter of Acts. We might let this pass without any comment, because the fact that the disciples met once on the first day of the week proves nothing. Those who keep the Sabbath often have meetings on the first day of the week. In fact, I myself am accustomed to preach every Sunday night; yet I do not keep the day, but spend nearly the whole of it at work.

But the facts must be told even here, and they are that according to the Bible reckoning, that night meeting on the first day of the week, must have been on what we commonly call Saturday night. If it had been on the night following the first day of the week, it would have been on the second day of the week, because the first day, like all others, begins and ends at sunset. It was the closing meeting of a week's series, and Paul was about to depart on the following morning, namely, Sunday morning. This fact is recognised and treated as a matter of course by Coneybear and Howson in their "Life and Epistles of the Apostle Paul." Of this event we read:-

The labours of the early days of the week that were spent at Troas are not related to us, but concerning the last day we have a narrative which enters into details with all the minuteness of one of the Gospel histories. It was the evening which succeeded the Jewish Sabbath. On the Sunday morning the vessel was about to sail. The Christians of Troas were gathered together at this solemn time to celebrate that feast of love which the last commandment of Christ has enjoined on all His followers. . . . Many lamps were burning in the room where the congregation was assembled. The place was hot and crowded. Paul, with the feeling strongly impressed on his mind that the next day was the day of his departure, and that souls might be lost by delay, was continuing in earnest discourse, and prolonging it even till midnight, when an occurrence suddenly took place which filled the assembly with alarm, though it was afterward converted into an occasion of joy and thanksgiving. . . .

The act of holy communion was combined, as was usual in the apostolic age, with a common meal; and Paul now took some refreshment after the protracted labour of the evening, and then continued his conversation until the dawning of the day. It was now time for the congregation to separate. The ship was about to sail, and the companions of Paul's journey took their departure to go on board. It was arranged, however, that the apostle himself should join the vessel at Assos, which was only about twenty miles distant by the direct route, while the voyage round Cape Lactrin was nearly twice as far. . . There may have been other reasons why he lingered at Troas after his companions, but the desire for solitude was doubtless one reason among others. The discomfort of a crowded ship is unfavourable for devotion, and prayer and meditation are necessary for maintaining the religious life even of an apostle. The Saviour to whose service he was devoted had often prayed in solitude on the mountain, and crossed the brook Kedron to kneel under the olives of Gethsemane. And strength and peace were sorely sought and obtained by the apostle from the Redeemer, as he pursued his lonely road that Sunday afternoon in spring among the oak woods and the streams of Ida.

I might mention the fact that there

615

is a record of many meetings on the Sabbath, but will content myself with giving some references. Acts xiii. 14, 42, 44; xvii. 2; xviii. 4. These speak of Paul's preaching "every Sabbath," and that not only to Jews, but the Gentiles as well. And moreover we are told that it was Paul's manner to do so. What a grand thing it would be for the Sunday cause if something like that could be found about the first day of the week.

But we make no argument for the Sabbath from the fact that there were many meetings held by the disciples on that day. The Sabbath rests on the commandment of Jehovah, and nothing can add to that. It is worthy of note, however, that in every case the Holy Spirit, by whose inspiration the book of Acts was written, calls the day on which the Jews were accustomed to assemble, "the Sabbath." The fact that the Holy Spirit calls it the Sabbath, is sufficient evidence that it is the Sabbath.

CHRIST'S EXAMPLE

Of more importance than anything else is the example of our Lord. He left us an example, that we should follow in His steps. 1 Peter ii. 21. "He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself also so to walk, even as He walked." 1 John ii. 6. Now what do we read of Him? "He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up; and as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up for to read." Luke iv. 16. The Spirit of the Lord was upon Him also. Like John, He was "in the Spirit on the Lord's day."

Still further we read His words, "I have kept My Father's commandments, and abide in His love." John xv. 10. And again He says of the law, "I came not to destroy, but to fulfil." Matt. v. 17. How did He fulfil it?-Just as He said, by keeping it, the fourth commandment included.

Now there is not the slightest question in the mind of anyone that the day which Christ kept when He was on earth as a man, was the seventh day of the week, and that He never kept any other day. Then if we walk as He walked, we shall also keep the same day.

"SAVED BY HIS LIFE"

This is not a matter to be lightly passed over. The Apostle Paul wrote that being reconciled to God, "we shall be saved by His life." Rom. v. 10. There is no other means by which we can be saved, for there is no righteousness in our own lives. It is by His obedience alone that we can be made righteous. Rom. v. 19. But His obedience included obedience to the fourth commandment, which requires the observance of the seventh day. Therefore we must submit to let Him live that same obedience in us. It will not do to say that it was as a Jew that Christ kept the seventh day. The only life that He lived on this earth in the flesh was as a Jew.

The fact that it was before His resurrection does not affect the case, because all the record that we have of His life was before the resurrection. We are to be saved by His life, and Jesus Christ is "the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever." Heb. xiii. 8. His life before the crucifixion was as perfect as any other part of His life. It is recorded for our example. Who dare say that anybody is wrong for doing just as Christ did when on earth? and who dare say that anybody is right in doing what He did not do?

A QUESTION OF THE GOSPEL

This is not a mere controversy concerning days, but is a question as to the proper understanding and acceptance of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whatever has to do with the life of Christ, has to do with the Gospel. It is not through indifference to the Gospel, nor to the glory of the cross of Christ, nor to the power and glory of His resurrection that we plead for the observance of the Sabbath of the fourth commandment. Quite the contrary. The Gospel of Christ is the power of God unto salvation unto everyone that believeth. With the heart man believeth unto righteousness. The law of God is righteousness, and the work of the Gospel is to save men from sin to the obedience of the law of God. God sent His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, "that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us." Rom. viii. 3, 4.

THE CROSS AND CREATION

The Gospel is the preaching of the cross, for Paul says that he was sent to preach the Gospel, but not with human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect. Then he adds, "for the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved, it is the power of God." 1 Cor. i. 17, 18. It is therefore the Gospel, for the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation. Rom. i. 16.

Ever since creation, the power of God is seen in the things that are made. Rom. i. 20. The power of God is creative power. The evidence of His greatness, and of His superiority to other gods, is that He is Creator. "For all the gods of the nations are idols; but the Lord made the heavens." Ps. xcvi. 5. "The Lord is the true God, He is the living God, and an everlasting King; . . . The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth, even they shall perish from the earth, and from under these heavens. He hath made the earth by His power, He hath established the world by His wisdom, and hath stretched out the heavens by His direction." Jer. x. 10-12.

We have redemption through the blood of Christ, because in Him were all things created, and in him all things consists. Col. i. 14-17. All things were created in Christ, because in Him is life. John i. 14-17. All things were created in Christ, because in Him is life. John i. 1-4. We have redemption in Him, through His blood, because the blood is the life (Lev. xvii. 11-14), and we are saved by His life. It was by the power of His life that He created all things. Note therefore these points:-

1. Christ, the Word, is God. John i. 1.

2. The power of Christ is the power to create. His power is seen in the things that He has made.

3. The power of Christ is the power of an endless life.

4. The cross of Christ is the power of God, because it represents the life of Christ, which was poured out upon it.

5. Therefore the power of the cross of Christ is creative power. So that in keeping the Sabbath, the

616

memorial of creation, we are celebrating redemption, which we have through Christ's blood.

6. That the power of the cross is creative power, is shown by the two following texts: "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature; all things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. And all things are of God." 2 Cor. v. 17, 18. "For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained, that we should walk in them." Eph. ii. 10.

THE CROSS AND THE SABBATH

Since the power of the cross is the power of creation, it is evident that the memorial of creation is the sign also of the power of the Redeemer. For Christ redeems by His power as Creator. But it is the seventh day, and not the first, that is given as the memorial of creation. And it is the seventh-day Sabbath of which God says that it is the sign of salvation. Thus, "I gave them My Sabbaths to be a sign between Me and the, that they might know that I am the Lord that sanctify them." Eze. xx. 12. It is in Christ that we have sanctification. 1 Cor. i. 30. The Sabbath makes us know His power as Sanctifier, because it is His day, the day which celebrates His creative power by which He redeems and sanctifies. Many people have proved the fact that the keeping of the Sabbath is the bearing of the cross. But since it is the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ that they find in it, they can glory in it. It brings blessing to them.

CHRIST AND THE LAW

These are the words of Christ, through the Holy Spirit, "Then said I, Lo, I come; in the volume of the book it is written of Me; I delight to do Thy will, O My God; yea, Thy law is within My heart." Ps. xl. 7, 8. Out of the heart are the issues of life. Prov. iv. 23. Therefore the life that proceeds from Jesus Christ, by which we are saved, is the perfection of the law.

Christ kept the law just as it was given from Sinai. It was in His heart, and was His very life. When He hung upon the cross, His heart was pierced by the Spirit of the Roman soldier, and therefrom flowed blood and water. In that stream His life flowed out for us and all mankind. But we remember that His life was the law. Thus we learn that the cross of Christ is for the purpose of conveying to us the righteousness of the law.

BLENDING DAYS TOGETHER

You say, "We have the creation Sabbath and the Christian Sabbath beautifully blended in that glorious resurrection day." The Bible nowhere warrants any such distinction as the creation Sabbath and the Christian Sabbath, but I pass that to notice the idea of the two days blending. It is really wonderful how elastic the first day of the week is. It is the first day of the week, and is professedly kept in honour of the resurrection of Christ on that day. Then when we quote the fourth commandment, which says, "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God," you exclaim, Oh, the first day of the week is the seventh day, easily enough. And at the same time it is the eighth! Why not have it the second, third, fourth, etc., as well?

SUNDAY AND THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT

Do you mean seriously to say that the keeping of Sunday is an act of obedience to the fourth commandment? Can you keep a commandment to observe the seventh day by observing the first? If so, why will not the rule work the other way as well? Thus, the law of the State forbids labour on Sunday, the first day of the week. Would you admit that I am obeying that law by resting on the seventh day, and working on Sunday? Would the Government listen for a moment to any such plea? You must answer, No, in both instances. If human laws were allowed to be juggled with in that way, there would be an end of all law. Why will you deal with the law of God as you would not dream of dealing with the law of men?

I notice that you agree with Dr. Scott that the observance of Sunday was "slowly and gradually introduced, by example rather than by express precept." Yet you say that the observance of the first day is in obedience to the fourth commandment. Now which position do you mean to hold to? If Sunday keeping fulfils the fourth commandment, then it came in by express precept. But if there is no express precept for Sunday observance, then it is in opposition to the law of God.

If Sunday observance is required by the fourth commandment, then it must have been required from the beginning. For a law cannot mean anything different after the lapse of years than it did at first, unless its words are changed. But the words of the fourth commandment have not been changed, and we have the authority of God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, to the effect that it did mean from the beginning the seventh day, in distinction from the first day of the week. Therefore it means the same to-day. Until within 300 years, nobody ever thought of defending Sunday observance by the fourth commandment.

HUMAN LAW AGAINST DIVINE LAW

As to the second proposition, Should the Lord's day be the subject of legal enactments? there is really no need of any argument. It is only when men suppose that Sunday is the Lord's day, that they think it necessary to make laws establishing or "protecting" it. The reason is, that since the Lord Himself has given no precept commanding Sunday observance, which you admit, they have no other way of upholding it but by human laws. But as soon as they see that the seventh day is the Lord's day, they are relieved of all anxiety concerning the day, because it would be the height of presumption for man to add a law to that of Jehovah.

With this I will close. I have given this much space to the question because it is important. If it were a matter to be settled arbitrarily, then a few words would have been sufficient. But it can only be settled by the word of God and therefore the attention of the people must be called to that word, so that they can determine their duty for themselves, without depending upon theologians. When men realise that the law of the Lord is of more importance than any human law, then the issue will be clear. When they know that they cannot lightly juggle with its words, calling the first the seventh, then they will see that the question whether Sunday or the seventh day of the week shall be observed, is simply the question of whether the commandments of God shall be obeyed or rejected.

"The Middle Ages Upon Us" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

It is a common idea that the superstitions of the Middle Ages could never have flourished in an age of enlightenment and general knowledge like the present. It is true that ignorance was the parent of the medi?val superstitions, but it was ignorance of God. The advancement of general knowledge in this century is no barrier to superstition where there is ignorance of the Gospel.

This is shown by the rapid increase of superstitious practices in our own day. The shrines of "saints" were never more patronised, and the demand for relics and all the kindred mummery seems to increase from year to year. In France Lourdes draws its thousands, and in Britain St. Winifrede's Well, in Flintshire, has done the same this summer. Across the water, in Canada, the worship of the shrine of St. Anne has been as grossly idolatrous as anything in the centre of Africa. A writer who is often contributed to our columns describes it as follows:-

Should Paul come forth from his grave and visit the shrine of "Good

617

St. Anne of Beaupre," near the city of Quebec, Canada, his spirit would again be stirred within him as "he saw the city wholly given to idolatry." He would not see the "temple of the great goddess Diana," but the temple of the "valiant," "invincible," "holy," "blessed," "glorious St. Anne," the "Mother of the Queen of Angels," "Mother of the Mother of God." Instead of hearing Demetrius and his fellow-craftsmen shouting for "the space of two hours," "Great is Diana of the Ephesians," he would find the people saying day and night, "O good, O glorious, O pious, O merciful, O incomparable Mother Anne." Instead of beholding the people prostrate before the shrine of the "goddess Diana," he would see them kneeling before a gilded statue of "St. Anne," imploringly saying, "Grant, O Good St. Anne, that henceforth I may show myself more worthy of thee, so that, one day, I may be united to thee in heaven." He would see the people crowding the marts of the church buying, not the "Holy Scriptures, which," as Paul wrote to Timothy, "are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus," but memorial beads, rings, and chains, medals, books, and images of "Good St. Anne," with which, through faith in St. Anne, they hoped for protection from the ills of this life, and "eternal glory through her intercession."

All this idolatry is practised by the church claiming to be Christian, to be "the only true church," the "spouse of Christ," the "holy Catholic Church." When the servant of God raises his voice against such apostasies, as of old, its votaries are "full of wrath," "the whole city is filled with confusion," and, as in the case of the Baptist mission at Quebec on August 7, the servant is stoned and the house of worship wrecked by a Roman Catholic mob.

"The Commerce of Solomon" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

Solomon formed a trading partnership with Hiram, king of Tyre, of Phoenicia, and they did a business which would not be called small even in these days, when steamships are on every sea.

The Phoenicians were the great seafaring people of ancient times, and their ships brought wealth to Tyre from far distant lands. They were skilled in the manufacture of all kinds of goods, getting materials from one country and making it up into articles to be sold by their merchants in another. They provided the fir and cedar trees for the great temple which Solomon built in Jerusalem, and also sent the skilled workmen to do the finest of the work in wood and metal.

We are told that Solomon made a navy of ships in Ezion-geber, on the shore of the Red Sea. This was a good port from which to send ships to Arabia, India, and all countries round the Indian Ocean. "And Hiram sent in the navy his servants, shipmen that had knowledge of the sea, with the servants of Solomon. And they came to Ophir, and fetched from thence gold, four hundred and twenty talents, and brought it to King Solomon." 1 Kings ix. 27, 28. In our money this would make over four million pounds sterling.

Then Solomon joined with Hiram of Tyre in trading with the West. He "had at sea a navy of Tharshish with the navy of Hiram." This was on the Mediterranean Sea; and "once in three years came the navy of Tharshish, bringing "gold, and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks." They doubtless

622

got gold and silver from the mines of Spain and Northern Africa, and they found on the African coast the elephants tusks of ivory, and the apes and peacocks. They went out through the Straits of Gibraltar into the Atlantic, and traded up and down the west coast of Africa, and in later centuries even rounded the Cape and sailed up the East coast. We know also that the Phoenician fleets came as far as England, and from the tin and lead mines of Cornwall and the Scilly Isles they got much-needed metals which they could exchange very profitably with countries where gold was a drug in the market. "Gold for brass," the rate of exchange in some places.

"Now the weight of gold that came to Solomon in one year was six hundred threescore and six talents of gold, beside that he had of the merchantmen, and of the traffic of the spice merchants, and of all the kings of Arabia." The amount of gold named is over six and a half million pounds.

"So King Solomon exceeded all the kings of the earth for riches and for wisdom." It was for the latter that he was most famous. "And all the earth sought to Solomon, to hear his wisdom, which God had put into his heart." God prospered him to show him how much he depended upon Him for everything; but like so many whom God helps, he began to be proud of his might, and departed from the right way in his later years. All the riches and glory that the earth could pour into his treasury could not make up for the loss of purity and righteousness, and so it was that Christ said of the lily of the field, that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.

"Tobacco, Alcohol, and Microbes" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

Because alcohol and tobacco kill insects and some germs, some users of these drugs have thought they would find them a safeguard against the microbes of disease. However, the fact that nicotine, or tobacco, will kill insects as quickly as it does, is hardly a reason why we should inhale it. The best safeguard in the midst of disease is a healthy body, and neither alcohol nor tobacco have elements capable of assisting in the building up of some tissue or the making of good blood. And further, according to the findings of investigators, tobacco predisposes to tuberculosis instead of destroying the germs of the disease.

"M. Tusseau recently reported (Lyon Med.) three cases of tuberculosis of the tonsils, in all three of which the patients have been addicted to the very free use of both alcohol and tobacco. The reporter expressed the opinion that the free use of both alcohol and tobacco is a predisposing cause of a tuberculosis infection of the tonsils. In one case in which the disease was cured, by thorough cauterisation of the tonsils, the patient, an innkeeper, remained well for some little time, but on resuming his bad habits was again attacked by tuberculosis, and died of the disease, which became general.

"In still another case the local disease was cured, but the patient, a soldier, continued his bad habits, and a few months later died from a return of the malady. These observations afford the best possible evidence against the theory that tobacco is in any way advantageous as a germicide. Of all the various pathogenic microbes which attack the body, those of tuberculosis are perhaps the most easily destroyed, yet the antiseptic quality of tobacco, even when used to a great excess, as in the cases reported by M. Tusseau, has no influence whatever in preventing the development in the mouth, but actually encourages the growth by producing an irritated and inflamed condition of the tonsils."-Bacteriological Review.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

-A Widow Re-marriage Association has been formed in India.

-The first cargo of live cattle from Australia has reached England.

-It is reported from Vienna that Russia is sending a squadron to Korea.

-The Lucania has lowered the record by crossing the Atlantic in 5 days 8 hours 38 minutes.

-The Victorian Government has sustained a crushing defeat as the result of the general election.

-It is said that the Queen reads all letters ad-dressed to her, including the anonymous ones, which average five a day.

-Incendiary fires in Sicily are very frequent, and the populace is thoroughly alarmed. They attribute them to the Anarchists.

-A number of lives were lost in New York City by the burning of a mattress factory. Five bodies were taken from the ruins soon after the fire had ceased.

-A specialist, after extensive investigation, states that the marriage of cousins is more likely to produce deaf-mutism than even the inter-marriage of deaf-mutes.

-The Czar is reported to be seriously ill, as the result of worry and overwork. He is said to be suffering from an affection of the brain, complicated with an ailment of the kidneys.

-Herr Dowe's famous military invention has in several instances been outdone by his numerous competitors. The latest is a breastplate of chrome-steel, invented by Captain Boynton, and weighing only 6lbs. This successfully resisted the impact of the bullet when tested at Sheffield.

-There is a proposal to establish a school near London for the training and discipline of the in-subordinate sons of the well-to-do, on the model of an institution which has been a success in France.

-A Norwegian newspaper gives an account "from several completely trustworthy men" of the appearance of a sea serpent "at least 180ft, long," near the fishing village of Ervikon, Hammerfest.

-The value of land in England seems to he seriously on the decline. Recently a freehold and tithe-free farm in the Fen district sold for about ?7 an acre, and an estate in Berke realised only ?6 an acre, the growing timber biting included.

-A telegram from Warsaw announces the collapse of a three storied naptha warehouse near the town of Minsk. A number of men lost their lives, and up to the present thirteen dead bodies have been recovered. Many other persons received severe injuries.

-The arrival of a now community of nuns in Edinburgh is reported. The Sisters of Charity are to take charge of certain schools and to visit the poor. The Sisterhood was founded by St. Vincent of Paul in 1634, at Paris, and now possesses 1,000 convents and over 10,000 sisters throughout the world.

-The situation in Madagascar is exceedingly strained, according to the news brought by the mail to Marseilles. The Hovas are said to be preparing for war, and evince strong feeling against France. The French colony regard war as the only solution of the difficulties created by the disorderly state of the island.

-Severe forest fires have occurred in Greece. Several large woods, including one of the famous fir-trees of Cephalonia, have been destroyed. Twenty houses were burned at Moles, near Thermopyl?, and serious fires have also occurred at Aulis and Kophissia. The weather is now cooler after many weeks of intense heat.

-Two disasters are reported from the Pir?us, Greece. The boiler of a flour mill burst, and the chief engineer and three other men were struck by fragments of metal and killed on the spot, while many others were fearfully injured and scalded, several of whom have since died. A fire broke out at the Pir?us at midnight, Sept. 18, and several shops and private houses were burned to the ground. The damage is estimated at 300,000f.

-Mr. Wellman, who nearly perished with the expedition in the Arctic regions, has left London for America. It has been a dreadful year in the Polar regions. The hardships experienced by Lieutenant Peary's party surpass all previous records, the sledge-doge being frozen to death. Peary remains in Greenland, and will resume his explorations next year. The progress of the Jackson-Harmsworth expedition was also impeded by the ice.

-During the last recorded month the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children investigated 1,671 complaints of neglect, ill-treatment, exposure, and other wrongs, 1,521 of which were found to be true, involving 2,077 offenders and affecting the welfare of 3,899 children. In 1,124 cases warnings were given; in 175 cases prosecutions were necessitated owing to the gross nature of the cruelty (convicted 170, discharged five); and 222 were dealt with in other ways.

-The annual wheat Drop estimates issued by the Hungarian Minister of Agriculture shows the world's production of wheat to be 87,278,000 hectolitres. The countries dependent upon others for part supplies require 12,849,000 hectolitres, while those having a surplus production can spare 15,659,000 hectolitres. Great Britain's supply is estimated at 21,500, and the deficit at 60,000 hectolitres. France's supply at 125,000 hectolitres, and deficit at 7,000 hectolitres. Russia's at 128,000 with a surplus of 50,000, and Hungary's at 53,260 with a surplus of 16,000 hectolitres.

-The Japanese and Chinese land and naval forces came into collision Sept. 15, the land forces at Ping Yang, and the naval forces off the mouth of the Yalu river, and the result was a great victory for the Japanese. At Ping Yang the Chinese lost almost their entire army of 20,000 men, most of whom were taken prisoners, giving Japan ruff control of Korea. The naval battle is described as a very desperate and sanguinary fight, resulting in great damage to both fleets, the victory being claimed by both aides. The worst damage was probably sustained by the Chinese, who lost five vessels of their fleet.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

Society is always exacting-in certain well-understood particulars. Max O'Rell, the Frenchman who has made such extensive observations amongst English-speaking peoples, says in his latest book on colonial society and ways that in Australia "an ill-cut coat will close more doors to you than a doubtful reputation."

"All the earth sought to Solomon, to hear his wisdom, which God had put in his heart." It is this wisdom that is in the heart that is valuable. The wisdom of the world is of the head and not of the heart, and it is foolishness. Paul tells us that in the last days men were to be "heady," "high-minded." The wisdom that comes from above makes men hearty not heady.

In Russia duelling has been taken under the wing of the Greek Church. The Czar has promulgated a law making it obligatory upon officers of the army to fight not only when they fancy they have been insulted, but whenever others think they have. Yet in Russia the law punishes men for worshipping God contrary to the customs of the Church.

The habits and customs of the East change so little that the traveller in lands of the Book is constantly meeting scenes which seem to him familiar. In one of the reviews Mr. Burt describes a marriage procession in Southern Arabia, just such an one as we are familiar with from the parable in Matt. xxv. And recent excavations in Upper Egypt have brought to light some wood carvings of the time of the Pharaohs, showing that the dress of soldiers has remained the same. "The Mahdi's warriors," says the Echo, "save in the matter of firearms, are clad and equipped like those of the pyramid builders."

"There are countless households where the reading of novels is the one resource against the dulness of life," says Mr. Zangwill in one of the magazines. And, just as with a taste for alcoholic drinks, the novel reader must have the stimulant increased as the dulness of his real life is increased by the unreal and artificial. Hence the tendency of the modern novel. The one who lives by every word of God does not find life a dull existence, and living by the life of the word does not develop a taste for the false and fictitious.

It is a great mistake to look upon a life of self-denial as a life of sorrow. This is what leads so many to look upon the Christian life as a hard and gloomy one. It is not self that makes one happy. The most unhappy men are generally the most selfish. But that life is happiest which is most full of love. These are facts which all observing persons must admit. And therefore self-denial cannot lead to unhappiness. In the truly Christian life self is forgotten; and when self is forgotten, its sorrow and gloom are forgotten with it.

Westminster Chapel, in the City, has the reputation of being a very difficult place to fill. It is, however, a good omen that the new pastor, Mr. Hurndall, considers the devices so frequently resorted to by depleted congregations as useless. He tells an interviewer that he has "more faith in prayer-meetings than in entertainments. His experience at the Eastend was that entertainments were fatal to the highest kind of success; and that in the proportion in which such were well attended the numbers and spiritual fervour at the Gospel service or prayer-meeting declined."

The Japanese proclamation of war states that the Mikado enters the contest, "fully assured of heavenly aid." The natural man invariably makes a god like unto himself, and so the Japanese think that Deity sides with them in their hatred of the Chinese. And the Chinese call upon Heaven to aid them to root the pestilent Japanese from their lairs. It is so with other nations. On the anniversary of the battle of Sedan the German papers this month quoted from the Psalms, intimating that they did not trust in chariots and horsemen, and so won the day at Sedan. Men take it for granted that God shares in their hatreds and passions, that He is such an one as themselves. Thus it was that the gods of the heathen were but deifications of their own passions. Men must either worship God or self, and every day they make choice whom they will serve.

"Seeing God's Goodness" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

Seeing God's Goodness.-The Psalmist says, "Truly God is good to Israel, even to such as are of a clean heart." Ps. lxxiii. 1. God is good to all, and "His tender mercies are over all His works;" but those who are clean of heart see and recognise His goodness. "Israel" does not mean a class of people whom God has distinguished from all others by being good to them, but simply those who, by having clean hearts, have recognised and acknowledged the goodness of the Lord bestowed upon all. Only the pure in heart can see God, and only they who see Him can know Him. We see God now with the eye of faith, and faith is that which purifies the heart. Acts xv. 9. As soon as we believe what God has said, we shall know for ourselves that God is good, not only to the world in general, but to us.

"Temporal Power" The Present Truth 10, 39.

E. J. Waggoner

Temporal Power.-Jesus Christ refused to be made a temporal King. His Kingdom is not of this world. But apparently the subjects of the Papacy are willing to go to almost any length in their effort to restore the Pope's temporal power. A writer in the Tablet, referring to the resolutions passed by Catholic Congresses every year, urges that these are useless until public opinion in Italy is changed, or until the Catholics of France, Spain, and Austria are ready to do more than pass resolutions.

Not until the Catholics of these three states, or even of one of them, acquire the supremacy over the anti-Christian portion of their fellow-subjects and hold in their hands the destinies of their country, can they invite the 200 million of Catholics, in the rest of the world to aid them by furnishing money and volunteers for the undertaking which should be carried out in the name of the whole Catholic community.

This is the real spirit of the Papacy, the encyclicals on peace and good-will amongst men notwithstanding.

October 4, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

"I sought the Lord, and He heard me, and delivered me from all my fears." Ps. xxxiv. 4. There is nothing more terrible than fear. "Fear hath torment." 1 John iv. 18. It makes no difference if there is no actual danger, the fear of an imaginary evil is as real as the fear of a known peril. But out of all fear the Lord delivers them that trust Him. "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear."

"He that despiseth his neighbour sinneth." Prov. xix. 21. This makes no exception. We are not merely forbidden to despise those who are honourable, but we must not despise anybody. It is natural enough not to despise those who are noble; the grace of God only can keep us from despising those who are mean. But many who seem to us to be utterly unworthy may be God's chosen ones, and so in despising anybody we run the risk of bringing upon ourselves the judgment recorded in Matt. xviii. 6.

The rule of Paganism is, Do good, in order that you may be good; the rule of Christianity is, Be good, in order that you may do good. Here are two principles, and between them there is a world of difference. The first means, righteousness attained by works; a good stream flowing from a corrupt fountain-the natural heart. The second means, good works attained by righteousness; a good stream flowing from a pure fountain-the heart regenerated by faith. Every religion that operates by the former principle is pagan, whether professedly so or not.

"Nothing Impossible" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

Nothing Impossible.-The story of the flood is now very largely discredited even by many who profess to be Christians. Though they may admit that there was a flood, they do not believe that it covered the whole earth, as the Bible says. They think it impossible. Let us see what that unbelief really involves. How much of the earth's surface is now covered with water?-About three-fourths. Who made the sea?-The Bible says, "The sea is His, and He made it." Ps. xcv. 5. Well now, it is a very simple problem. Couldn't He who has covered three-fourths of the earth's surface with water, have very easily covered the other one-fourth with water also? The question answers itself, and shows us that disbelief in the flood, as described in the Bible, means disbelief in God as the Creator and Upholder of the earth.

"Greatness" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

Greatness.-The greatest men that have lived are those whom God has made great; and God makes men great by simply revealing in them His own greatness. But those in whom He most fully reveals Himself are not those who strive most eagerly to display their own powers, but those in whom self appears the least. There is no greater place for any man than the place he is in when he has fully yielded himself to the Lord. If we would be as great as Moses, we must be, like him, the meekest of all persons on the earth; or if we would be as great as Paul, who was not a whit behind the very chiefest of the apostles, we must be able to say with him, "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." The very first step toward this greatness is the realisation of the truth, "I am nothing;" and succeeding steps consist in learning the greatness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.

"Reasoning with God" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

It is a very common thing for men to reason with God. Though He does not stand personally and visibly before them and talk with them, they have His spoken word, to which many feel free to make objections, or excuse themselves from performing its requirements. It is just the same as if they stood face to face with the Creator and presumed to enter into an argument with Him.

This is not the kind of reasoning that the Lord desires. He has said, "Come now, and let us reason together," but He does not ask us to tell Him anything that He does not know, or attempt to prove Him to be in the wrong. To do that would be to unseat Him from His throne. But He says, "Put Me in remembrance, let us plead together." Isa. xliii. 26. He wishes men to remind Him of His promises; not because He has forgotten them, but because He longs for an opportunity to fulfil them. He pleads

626

with men to comply with the conditions upon which His promises are made, in order that by fulfilling them He may demonstrate to men His power and love toward them.

If they will do this, He will remember instantly the things that He has sworn to perform. He holds out to them the greatest of inducements by saying, "Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; and though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." Isa. i. 18. To reason properly with the Lord is simply to give Him an opportunity of doing for us this wonderful work. The result will be most convincing, as regards all the points that can possibly be at issue.

"God's Garden" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

In the beginning, when the work of creation had been finished, "the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man whom He had formed. And out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food." Gen. ii. 8, 9. The Lord still has a garden upon the earth, though Eden has long since been removed. Not the trees nor the shrubs nor the flowers were the most essential things in the garden, but the man and woman whom He created. The purpose of God was centred in these, and not in the beautiful things which surrounded them. That purpose He has been steadily carrying out since time began. He has had a spiritual garden, in which Adam and Eve were the first plants, and which has spread out over the whole world, as the physical garden which was removed was doubtless designed to do.

In this garden grow both wheat and tears; for the devil has sowed tares which have sprung up and developed more abundantly than the wheat. But the Saviour has said, "Every plant which My heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up." Matt. xv. 13. And when that rooting up has taken place, the physical garden will be restored and cover the whole earth, and thus the full purpose of God will be carried out.

But while in this present state the tares grow largely in excess of the wheat, there is still abundant opportunity for the latter to attain a luxurious growth. It is "rooted and grounded in love" (Eph. iii. 17), and so has an abundance of the richest soil; for the Psalmist says, "The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord" (Ps. xxxiii. 5), and, "The earth, O Lord, is full of Thy mercy." Ps. cxix. 64. And he also testifies that "the righteous shall flourish like the palm tree; he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon." Ps. xcii. 12. He is "like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf shall not whither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper." Ps. i. 3.

This garden is also full of most beautiful flowers, which are the promises of God. Not all the tares that are growing around us can hide these from our view, or shut us out from their fragrance. God has poured out His Spirit upon all flesh, and its work is "to appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He might be glorified." Isa. lxi. 1-3. If we will but let the Lord plant us in His garden, we shall find this world still a beautiful place in which to live.

"Studies in Romans. The Surety of the Promise. Rom. iv. 16-25" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

In our last lesson we learned what Abraham found, and how he found it. At the same time we learned what God has promised us as well as Abraham, if we believe His word. God has promised to every man who believes Him nothing less than the freedom of the world. This is not an arbitrary thing. God has not said that if we will believe certain statements and dogmas, He will in return give us an everlasting inheritance. The inheritance is one of righteousness; and since faith means the reception of the life of Christ into the heart, together with God's righteousness, it is evident that there is no other way in which the inheritance can be received. This is further made clear by a statement in the last lesson, which was not noted, namely, that

"The Law Worketh Wrath."-Therefore whoever thinks to get righteousness by the law is putting his trust in that which will destroy him. God has promised a grant of land to every one who will accept it on His conditions, namely, that he shall also accept the righteousness which goes with it, because righteousness is the characteristic of the land. Righteousness is to "dwell" in it. But this righteousness can be found only in the life of God, which is manifested in Christ. Now the man who thinks that he himself can get righteousness out of the law is in reality trying to substitute his own righteousness for God's righteousness. In other words, he is trying to get the land by fraud. Therefore when he comes in the court to prove his claim to the land, it appears that there is a criminal charge against him; and he finds "wrath" instead of blessing. "Where no law is, there is no transgression;" but there is law everywhere, and therefore transgression. All have sinned, so that the inheritance can not be by the law.

"Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace; to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all (as it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations), before Him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were. Who against hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be. And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb; he staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; and being fully persuaded, that what He had promised, He was able also to perform. And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; but for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on Him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification." Rom. iv. 16-25.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What have we already found the inheritance to be?

"The world."

And how is it to be obtained?

"Through the righteousness of faith."

If it were of works, what would be the result?

"Faith is made void, and the promise made of none effect."

Why?

"Because the law worketh wrath."

To what end?

"To the end the promise might be sure to all the seed."

627

Of whom is Abraham the father?

"The father of us all."

Before whom?

"Before Him whom he believed, even God."

According to what scripture?

"As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations."

How could God say to Abraham before he had any child, "I have made thee a father of many nations"?

He "quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things that be not as though they were."

How did Abraham receive the promise of God?

"He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief."

In what was he strong?

"He was strong in faith, giving glory of God."

Of what was he persuaded?

"Fully persuaded that what He had promised He was able to perform."

What was the result?

"Therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness."

For whose sake was this written?

"For us also."

Why for our sakes?

"To whom it shall be imputed?

That which was imputed to Abraham, namely, righteousness.

On what condition will it be imputed to us also?

"If we believe on Him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead."

Why was He delivered to death?

He "was delivered for our offences."

For what purpose was He raised again?

He "was raised again for our justification."

Sure to All.-Since the inheritance is through the righteousness of faith, it is equally sure to all the seed, and equally within the reach of all. Faith gives all an equal chance, because faith is just as easy for one person as for another. God has dealt to every man a measure of faith, and to all the same measure, for the measure of grace is the measure of faith, and "unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ." Eph. iv. 7. Christ is given without reserve to every man. Heb. ii. 9. Therefore, as the same measure of faith and grace is given to all men, all have an equal opportunity to gain the inheritance.

Jesus Is the Surety.-Faith makes the promise sure to all the seed, because it has Christ alone for its object, and He is the surety of the promises of God. 2 Cor. i. 20. We read also of the oath of God, by which Jesus was made high priest, that "by so much was Jesus made a surety of a better testament," or covenant. Heb. vii. 22. Now Jesus was not given for a certain class, but for all without distinction. "God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." John iii. 16. Jesus by the grace of God tasted death for every man. Heb. ii. 9. He says, "Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out." John vi. 37. Christ dwells in the heart by faith. Eph. iii. 17. Therefore, since Christ is the surety of the promise, it must be sure to every one who believes.

The Oath.-It may seem to some a little far-fetched to say that the oath by which Jesus was made priest is the surety of the promise to Abraham. But a little consideration will enable any one to see that it can be no other way. In the sixth chapter of Hebrews we read that "when God made promise to Abraham, because He could swear by no greater, He sware by Himself, saying, Surely blessing I will bless thee. . . . God, willing more abundantly to show unto the heirs of promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath; that by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us; which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which entereth into that within the vail, whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made a high priest forever after the order of Melchisedec."

For Our Sakes.-Why did God confirm His promise to Abraham by an oath? That we might have a strong consolation. It was not for Abraham's sake, because Abraham believed fully without the oath. His faith was shown to be perfect before the oath was given. It was altogether for our sakes. When does that oath give us strong consolation? When we flee for refuge to Christ as priest in the most holy place. Within the veil He ministers as high priest; and it is the oath of God that gives us courage to believe that His priesthood will save us. Then our consolation comes from Christ's priesthood, and so from the oath which made Him priest. Therefore the oath of God to Abraham was identical with the oath that made Christ high priest. This shows most plainly that the promise of God to Abraham is as wide as the Gospel of Christ. And so our text, speaking of the righteousness that was imputed to Abraham, says, "Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; but for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on Him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead."

Power of God's Word.-God "calleth those things which be not as though they were." Sometimes men do the same thing, but we soon lose confidence in them. When men speak of things that are not as though they were, there is only one proper name for it. It is a lie. But God calls those things that be not as though they were, and it is the truth. What makes the difference? Simply this: Man's word has no power to make a thing exist when it does not exist. He may say that it does, but that does not make it so. But when God names a thing, the very thing itself is in the word that names it. He speaks, and it is. It was by this power of God that Abraham was made the father of many nations, even of us, if we believe that Jesus died and rose again.

Quickening the Dead.-It is by the power of God's word which can speak of those things that be not as though they were and have it true, that the dead are raised. His word makes them live. It was Abraham's faith in the resurrection of the dead that made him the father of many nations. God's oath to Abraham was on the occasion of his offering Isaac. Gen. xxii. 15-18. And "by faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac; and he that had received the promises offered up his only-begotten son, of whom it was said, that in Isaac shall thy seed be called; accounting that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead." Heb. xi. 17-19.

Righteousness and Resurrection.-The righteousness which was imputed to Abraham will be imputed to us also if we believe on Him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead. Therefore it follows that righteousness was imputed to Abraham because of his faith in the resurrection of the dead, which

628

comes only through Jesus. Acts iv. 2. That was what the apostles preached the promises to the fathers. The power by which a man is made righteous is the power of the resurrection. See Phil. iii. 9-11. This power of the resurrection, which works righteousness in a man, is the surety of the final resurrection to immortality at the last day by which he enters upon his inheritance.

Not Weakened in Faith.-Some versions of Romans iv. 19 give the idea, "Without being weakened in faith, he considered his own body now as good as dead." That is to say, after God had made the promise to him, a full consciousness of his weakness and of all the difficulties and seeming impossibilities in the way did not have any effect in weakening his faith. Nothing is impossible with God, and there are no difficulties for Him. Whenever a person is inclined to doubt the possibility of his salvation, let him stop and consider that God made the world by His word, and that He raises the dead, and that it is by that same power that God will save him if he is willing. To doubt God's promise to deliver us from all evil is to doubt the fact that He created all things by His word, and that He is able to raise the dead.

"Receiving Reproof" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

Receiving Reproof.-In the Bible we read much about the danger of scorning and rejecting reproof. "He that hateth reproof shall die." Prov. xv. 10. "He that refuseth instruction [or correction] despiseth his own soul." Verse 32. We naturally think that we are doing exceedingly well to receive patiently reproofs that we know we deserve; but we feel that we have a right to reject reproofs that seem to us uncalled for. This is thought to be only the manifestation of a proper spirit of self-respect. But when we do so, we are likely to deprive ourselves of much necessary and wholesome warning; for we are most commonly blind to our own failings, so that we usually think reproof unnecessary. The wise man is he who receives all reproof with meekness. The reproof that we think least deserved may really be the most needed. By accepting all reproof without gainsaying, we run no risk of losing valuable instruction.

If perchance a reproof should be undeserved, then we ought to be able to endure it the better. A man was bitterly complaining that he had been accused of gross misconduct, of which he was entirely innocent. He thought that a man had a right to feel indignant when accused falsely. "Well," said one to him, "would you feel better if the charges were true?" This put the matter in a different light, and made him more contented. We do well to remember Matt. v. 11, 12.

"Which Day Is the Lord's Day?" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

The article that appeared in these columns several weeks ago, concerning the Lord's day and the petition to Lord Rosebery, has attracted still further notice. Before the letter from Mr. Hill, and the reply to him, were printed, an article appeared in The English Churchman from Mr. James Girdlestone, who kindly called our attention to the fact that he had written in reply to our article, and asked us to show where he was wrong, or else to admit that we were in error. Although the most of his letter has been covered by the article in last week's paper, we reprint the whole of it as it appeared in the Churchman, that there may be no appearance of omitting any point in the Sunday argument. Here is the letter:-

THE LORD'S DAY

SIR,-Somebody has sent me a paper on this subject in a journal called THE PRESENT TRUTH (Vol. 10, No. 34). I agree with the writer when he lays down the broad foundation: "All that may be known of the Lord is found in the Bible, and therefore all that may be known of the Lord's Day must be found there" (p. 583). Subject to Rom. i. 20; that is true. I agree also with him when he says, "The Sabbath of the Lord God is God's own memorial, and it is a memorial in behalf of the labouring men, too. It is the badge and the surety of the rest, and perfect liberty, which He gives. It is more than simply twenty-four hours of cessation from toil-it is the renewal of life" (p. 535). He also aptly quotes Ex. xx. 8-10, and been Isa. lviii. 13-14. I next deal with some of the points where I do not agree with this writer.

1. Referring to Rev. i. 10 He says that "The Lord's Day" is an expression that occurs here alone (p. 533). That is true. But he proceeds to argue that because in Ex. xx. "the seventh day of the week, commonly called Saturday, is the Sabbath of the Lord, consequently the seventh day of the week is the Lord's Day" (p. 535). That statement appears to me to be erroneous. The Fourth Commandment does not say "the seventh day of the week." It speak of working for six days and resting on "the seventh day." There was the difference. If the Divine commandment had been, "Work the first six days of the week, and rest the seventh day of the week," I should say we must return to the usage of the Jews, and rest on the seventh day of the week, commonly called Saturday, and work on the first day of the week, commonly called Sunday. The letter of the Divine law is silent as to "the day of the week." The letter of the law leaves that point, the day of the week, a matter of liberty. The spirit of the Divine law of rest for the worker is equally observed, whether it is the first day of the week or the seventh day of the week, on which the worker takes rest.

2. The writer lays stress on the fact that "The same John who wrote the book of Revelation also wrote the fourth gospel, wherein he twice mentions the day called Sunday, and each time he names it simply as 'the first day of the week.' Of course this is only negative; still it is a significant fact that nowhere in the Bible is the day called Sunday given any other title than its numerical designation, 'the first day of the week'" (p. 538). That begs the question, which is whether "The Lord's Day" in Rev. i. 10 is the seventh or the first day of the week. On this subject we are not instructed by any express statement in the Bible. Permit me to carry my answer a stage further. The Bible nowhere speaks of "the seventh day of the week." But "the first day of the week" is referred to in the Bible, several times, and under circumstances that support an inference that "the Lord's Day" mentioned in Rev. i. 10 is "the first day of the week." That is the day of the week when the Lord Jesus rose from the dead. The victory was won.

3. The writer says, "Sunday is one of the six days in which the Lord says we should labour" (p. 584). I have shown under head 1 that this statement is unfounded.

4. The writer points to Luke xxiii. 54, 56; xxiv. 1 to show that "the preparation" preceded, and "the first day of the week" followed, "the Sabbath." That is so. But no one doubts that the Jews rested on the seventh day of the week, or that we rest on the first day of the week. I have already shown that we are at liberty to act as we do.

There are other points on which I differ from this writer. I have answered only those that appear to me to be directly material to a sound interpretation of the Scriptures in regard to a point about which people often are unnecessarily perplexed. JAMES GIRDLESTONE.

Sept. 3.

ONLY AN INFERENCE

First of all, let us notice the ground on which the observance of Sunday as the Lord's day rests. In the paragraph numbered (2) Mr. Girdlestone says: "The first day of the week is referred to several times, and under circumstances that support an inference that 'the Lord's day mentioned in Rev. i. 10 is the first day of the week." The only ground for Sunday observance, therefore, is inference.

Later on we shall repeat some of the direct statements of Scripture which show that the seventh day of the week, and that alone, is called the Lord's day. But for the present, let as proceed

629

as though there were no such direct statements. Allow that one may infer from certain texts in the Bible that the first day of the week is the Lord's day; what then? Does that settle anything definitely?-Certainly not. Everything is vague and indefinite. Because some persons infer a certain thing from certain words, that is no proof that everybody must make the same inference. If it is only inference, then anybody is at liberty to draw his own. Nobody can be charged with sin for not agreeing with somebody else's inference.

The statement that the Sunday Lord's day rests on inference, is an admission that there is no authority to bind anybody to its observance. This being the case, what shall be said of any human laws directed to the enforcement of the observance of the first day of the week as the Lord's day? Is it not evident that such a thing is going beyond the Lord? So far as the enforcement of Sunday observance by law is concerned, the question might rest here. For since God in His word has not said that the first day of the week is the Lord's day, and has given no commandment whatever for its observance, it is clear that for men to make such laws is to set themselves above God. It is to place themselves in the position of the "man of sin" (2 Thess. i. 3-8), and to merit his doom.

THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT

But it is claimed that authority for Sunday observance is found in the fourth commandment. It is claimed that since the commandment says only "the seventh day," it may apply to the first day of the week as well as to the seventh. Suppose that for the moment we allow this to be true; what then?-Why, again we are met with the fact that for men to make laws enforcing Sunday observance, is not only to go beyond the Lord, but to go against Him. For if in His commandment He has left men at perfect liberty to rest on whichever day they may choose, then for men to seek to compel others to rest on some certain day is to transgress His commandment. Let this one fact be clearly noted, namely, that no man can by any interpretation of the Bible construct an argument for Sunday observance that will not demonstrate the wickedness of all human laws on the subject.

Mr. Girdlestone is a Protestant. But if he believes that the fourth commandment is indefinite, and does not specify which particular day of the week is to be observed, then one of two positions he must take. He must either (1) admit that there is no necessity for the observance of any particular day, and that the men who might keep Friday or Monday, as well as the men who keep Saturday and Sunday, are all alike strictly obeying the fourth commandment; or (2) he must admit the necessity for a Pope, who shall decide between them. For if men ought to keep one and the same day, and the Lord has left it open as to which day it shall be, then there must be some person higher in authority and power and wisdom than all other men, who shall take the Lord's place, and do what the Lord left undone. This is what the Papacy has presumed to do with the fourth commandment. Let those follow him who will; but "as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord."

"THE SEVENTH DAY"

The commandment says that "the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." "The seventh day." Mark that it is definite. It does not say "a seventh day," but "the seventh day." Say what you please about a seventh part of time, the fact remains that the words of the commandment indicate a definitely recurring seventh day.

The question then arises, "The seventh day of what?" Is it the seventh day of the year? Does the commandment require the observance of only the seventh day in the year? Evidently not, because it says, "Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God."

The same thing may be said about a month, or about one's life. It cannot mean that we should rest simply on the seventh day of the month, nor the seventh day of our lives, for that would be nonsense.

Of what then is the Sabbath the seventh day? Read the commandment again. "Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work." Ah, it brings to view a cycle of seven days: six days of labour, and one day of rest; six days of labour and one day of rest, and so on. Well, did anybody ever hear of any such cycle of days? Oh, yes, every child knows that seven days make one week. The week is a definite portion of time, consisting of just seven days. It is the only period of time in which one could work six days and rest the seventh, and continue the practice. Then it is the seventh day of the week that the commandment declares to be the Sabbath-the Lord's day.

SIXTH DAY AND SEVENTH DAY

But this matter may be settled still more definitely. What has gone before is simply preliminary. Mr. Girdlestone, as a lawyer, will admit that the fourth commandment can never mean anything different from what it did when first given, without a change being made in the words. No change has been made in the words, for they stand the same in every Bible. Now let us see if there is any ground for the inference that the fourth commandment has left it indefinite as to whether or not we shall keep the seventh day of the week.

In the sixteenth chapter of Exodus, we have the account of the giving of the manna, a little more than a month before the commandments were spoken from Sinai. I will quote a few verses, and will ask the reader to read the entire chapter.

"Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no. And it shall come to pass, that on the sixth day they shall prepare that which they bring in; and it shall be twice as much as they gather daily. " "Gather of it every man according to his eating, an omer for every man, according to the number of your persons; take ye every man for them which are in his tents. And the children of Israel did so, and gathered, some more, some less. And when they did mete it with an omer, he that gathered much had nothing over, and he that gathered little had no lack; they gathered every man according to his eating. And Moses said, Let no man leave of it till the morning. Notwithstanding they hearkened not unto Moses; but some of them left of it until the morning, and it bred worms, and stank: and Moses was wroth with them. And they gathered it every morning, every man according to his eating; and when the sun waxed hot, it melted. And it came to pass, that on the sixth day they gathered twice as much bread, two omers for one man; . . . and they laid it up till the morning, as Moses bade: and it did not stink, neither was there any worm therein. And Moses said, Eat that to-day; for to-day is a Sabbath unto the Lord; to-day ye shall not find it in the field. Six days ye shall gather it; but on the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, in it there shall be none." Ex. xvi. 4, 5, 16-26.

Now let us try on the indefinite seventh-day theory. Let it be noted that in this record we have the expressions, "the sixth day," and "the seventh day." The word week is not mentioned. We have a perfect parallel to the fourth commandment. Moreover, this is an illustration of the fourth commandment, for the whole transaction

630

was to prove them, to see whether or not they would walk in the law of the Lord. In verse 26 we have the same form of words as in the fourth commandment: "Six days ye shall gather it; but on the seventh day, which is the Sabbath, in it there shall be none."

We are now to proceed on the supposition that "the seventh day does not mean the seventh day of the week, but simply one-seventh part of time." Very well, then it is evident that "the sixth day" does not mean the sixth day of the week, but simply one-sixth part of time. If this interpretation works in one case it must in the other.

In order that the reader may get the matter clearly it in mind, we herewith append a portion of the calendar. It is for the whole month of July and the first part of August of the present year.

Sun. M. T. W. Th. Fr. Sab.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7*

8 9 10 11 12 13 14*

15 16 17 18 19 20 21*

22 23 24+ 25 26 27 28-

29 30 31

1 2 3 4*

5 6 7 8 9 10 11

It will be noticed that every seventh day is marked with a star, but every "sixth" day, not of the week, but simply the sixth day after five is marked with a cross.

Now let us place ourselves back in the wilderness, and go out to gather manna for our daily food. For the first week we get along very well. Our theory works beautifully. We gather a double portion on "the sixth day," and are well supplied for the Sabbath.

We will not place ourselves among those who went out on the seventh day to gather, although our theory would really make us do it. But on the first day of the week we begin again to gather manna. We find no difficulty on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. But Thursday is our "sixth day," because "the sixth day" means the sixth day after five. So on Thursday we go out and gather twice as much as on other days, and lay it up for the morning, when, lo, we have a mass of corruption. It did not keep. And yet the Lord told us that if we gather twice as much on the sixth day as on other days, it would not spoil. What can be the matter? Is it possible that the word of the Lord has failed? Not at all; we have simply been trifling with it.

Let us go through our calendar on this basis. We will not be thrown off our theory by one rebuff, but will carry it through. "The sixth day" does not mean the sixth day of the week, but simply one-sixth part of time. Now since it is only on the sixth day that we are to gather a double portion of manna, and our sixth day does not come on Friday any more for six weeks, we must not gather a double portion on that day. So when the next Sabbath comes we shall have to fast, and so on every Sabbath for six weeks. And once a week we shall be subject to the mortification of finding our food decayed.

But now we come to the close of the sixth week. We have doggedly stuck to our theory that "the seventh day" means the seventh portion of time, and that "the sixth day" means the sixth part of time. On the sixth day we must gather a double quantity, and on the seventh day we must gather none. But lo, this week, our "sixth" and the "seventh" day are one and the same day; and we are under the necessity of gathering a double portion on this day, and at the same time we are forbidden to go out to look for any, and are assured that if we do we shall find none. Surely every one will agree that if we do not give up our absurd theory now we deserve to starve.

Let it be noted that we should fare even worse if we did not start out right. In this case we have begun with the first day of the week, so that the seventh day falls regularly on the seventh day of the week, just as the Lord indicated. But if we should carry our theory so far as to begin at some other time, then we should have the case much more involved.

But it is useless to carry the matter further. Perhaps it may seem a waste of space to dwell so long on such a supposition. But if it shall result in showing our readers the absurdity of the theory that "the seventh day" of the commandment means any seventh part of time that men may choose, and that it does mean the seventh day of the week, it will not have been lost time and space.

A few weeks after the manna began to fall, the Lord spoke the ten commandments from Sinai. The fourth commandment meant the same thing then that it does now; neither more nor less. If it now means that we are at liberty to choose any day of the week that we please, as the Sabbath, and that the commandment does not limit us to the seventh day of the week, surely it meant the same thing then. And in that case we should have the Lord making it an impossibility for people to keep His law, even in the thing wherein He was proving them to see if they would keep it! Why was there not someone in the camp of Israel wise enough to quote the words of the Lord against Him, in justification of his course in seeking to keep a double portion on some other day than the sixth day of the week, and to gather manna on the Sabbath? The fall of the manna not proves beyond all possible cavil that "the seventh day" of the fourth commandment means the seventh day of the week, and nothing else.

SABBATH AND FIRST DAY

Our friend has evidently missed the point of the reference to Luke xxiii. 54-56; xxiv. 1. He sees that "the preparation" preceded, and "the first day of the week" followed, "the Sabbath." He says, "That is so. But no one doubts that the Jews rested on the seventh day of the week, or that we rest on the first day of the week."

But do you not see that this admission overthrows your theory that the commandment is indefinite? The Jews kept the seventh day of the week. Very well. But the last verse of the twenty-third chapter of Luke says that "they rested on the Sabbath day according to the commandment." That was why I quoted that text. It shows that resting on the seventh day of the week is the only way in which the Sabbath of the fourth commandment can be kept.

The Sabbath, according to the commandment, is the day before the first day of the week. And we have just shown that God Himself most rigidly fixed the day of the Sabbath to the seventh day of the week, so that in keeping it the Jews were obeying Him. But, by the same token, it follows that those who say, "No one doubts that the Jews rested on the seventh day of the week, or that we rest on the first day of the week," thereby convict themselves of not keeping the fourth commandment.

Is the first day of the week a working day?-Most certainly, and my friend must admit this whether he agrees with me about the definiteness of the fourth commandment or not. For if that commandment be indefinite, allowing everybody to choose for himself which day he will keep in obedience to it, then the first day must be a working day for everybody who chooses to keep some other day; and

631

nobody can tax him with doing wrong in working on it. But if, as is the case, the seventh day of the week, and that only, is enjoined by the commandment, then of course the first day of the week is one of "the six working days" (Eze. xlvii. 1), just the same as Monday and Tuesday.

POSITIVE TESTIMONY, NOT INFERENCE

"Finally, my brethren, rejoice in the Lord. To write the same things to you, to me indeed is not grievous, but for you is safe." With this authority for repetition, we again give a brief summary of proof that the seventh day of the week is the Lord's day.

And first, it is sufficient to recall the evidence that the Sabbath of the fourth commandment is none other than the seventh day of the week. "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." He claims it as His day. To claim any other day as the Lord's day is to ignore or contradict the commandment of the Lord.

Second the Lord, through His holy prophet, whose lips were touched with the coal from God's altar, said, "If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on My holy day," etc. Here He expressly calls the Sabbath His own day. The Sabbath therefore is the Lord's day. But the Sabbath here spoken of was the Sabbath which the Jews kept, for Isaiah was writing to Jews; and Mr. Girdlestone himself says that "no one doubts that the Jews rested on the seventh day of the week." Of course not. Therefore he must admit that God Himself expressly calls the seventh day of the week the Lord's day. Let this suffice for the present on this point.

THE HOLY SPIRIT'S TESTIMONY

"All Scripture is given by inspiration of God." Many times in the New Testament the day which the Jews observed is called "the Sabbath." That day was, without controversy, not the seventh day of the week. The question is, Shall we use the language of the Holy Spirit, or not? If not, then we have no guide at all. If we do not still call the seventh day of the week, and no other, the Sabbath, then what are we going to do with the four Gospels and the Acts? Shall we say that they were not inspired of the Holy Spirit? Or shall we say that the Holy Spirit was mistaken, and that we are not to follow His guidance?

The Holy Spirit has given us the origin of the weekly cycle, and designates the days, "the first day," "the second day," and so on to "the seventh day." The days of creation are sufficiently designated by being numbered, but the day that celebrates creation complete-the day that was blessed and made holy-is honoured by having a name. The name of the seventh day is "Sabbath." By the naming of the seventh day it is distinguished from all other days, and by numbering the others without naming them the fact that the Sabbath is a definitely recurring day is made prominent. The Holy Spirit in the New Testament speaks the same as the Holy Spirit in Genesis. And when God spake the fourth commandment, in that very command He referred to the work which originated and established the weekly cycle, and said "the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord."

This is not a matter to be treated lightly. It does not involve the fourth commandment alone, but the whole of the Gospels, yes, of the New Testament. For if we cannot stand by this point, we have no assurance that anything is right. The question then is, Shall we keep the commandment of God just as it reads, or shall we modify it to suit ourselves? Shall we follow the language of the New Testament, or shall we claim that it is only a human production? "Choose ye this day whom ye will serve."

We have some other matter that would come in very aptly in this connection, but will postpone it till another week.

"The Life in the Seed" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

The old question as to whether seeds will grow after hundreds of years was discussed recently in an evening paper. One reply to the question, "Will 'mummy' wheat grow?" is given as follows:-

"Lord Winchilsea seems to have decided the oft-mooted question as to whether the corn found in the Egyptian tombs really possesses the germ of life. A few months ago Lord Sheffield, on his return from Egypt, gave Lord Winshilsea a handful of wheat which he had himself taken from the sarcophagus containing a mummy. One hundred of these grains were carefully planted under a glass frame. The result was awaited with interest by those who knew of the experiment; but, after some weeks, the seeds were discovered to have rotted away."

The vitality of the seed, however, could not be judged by one trial, in which the grains were from the same place and possibly subject to conditions which might destroy the germ. In reply to this report a correspondent of the paper, the Echo, wrote:-

"Some few years ago a friend who

635

was at the opening of a mummy at the London University-dated 2,000 years B.C.-obtained two peas, which he gave me, and I sowed, getting from them a yield of about a hundred. From this seed I have sown successively for years with good results. They differ from other peas-growing in clusters on very thin stalks-to the height of eight to ten feet, thus rendering them unfit for field culture, but they are very prolific. This year I have sown them between beans, to keep them off the ground. They have a very pretty flower-like sweet peas-are large, but not good eating, and boil with a thick skin the colour of broad beans."

All we know of the life of the seed is that God gives it life. After all the study of plants and the interesting knowledge that has been gained by observers, the greatest of botanical scientists freely confess that they have not got beyond the parable of the seed and the kingdom, in which it was stated that the seed springs and grows up-"he knoweth not how."

"Paper" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

Great changes have been made in the methods of making and using paper since the ancient days when the bulrush papyrus was pounded and pressed into parchment. Besides the common use of paper, it is now being used for maing a multitude of things, from a water pail to a carriage wheel. And it is made from as great a variety of materials. Thus we are told that in the United States there are over 2,000 patents relating to the manufacture of paper.

"Some of the patents provide for the making of paper from the leaves of trees; from hop plants, bean stalks, pea vines; from the trunks and stalks, of Indian corn and every variety of grain; from moss, hay, and more than 100 kinds of grasses; from straw and cocoanut fibre; from fresh water weeds and sea weeds; from sawdust, shavings, and asbestos."

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

-The latest bicycle record in England is 258 miles in 12 hours.

-Twenty school children were killed in Naples by the collapse of the roof of a school building.

-Every animal kept by man, excepting the cat, is taxed in Austria, and now it is proposed to tax cats.

-It has even decided that house rates can be collected only for the time a house is actually occupied.

-It is estimated that in London alone nearly one million pawn tickets are issued every week for sums under 10s.

-A terrible cyclone swept several States of America, causing 100 deaths and wholesale destruction of property.

-The Victorian Government has resigned, and the leader of the Opposition, the Hon. George Turner, has been called upon to form a new Cabinet.

-The Salvation Army is to have a "self-denial week," the date being Oct. 20-28. At other times, we may infer, self will have a fair amount of recognition.

-The output of wine in Cape Colony has fallen by 2,000,000 gallons, or one-third, during the last four years, partly In consequence of the ravages of phylloxera.

-France is to send a military expedition to Madagascar, which will consist of 7,300 men. There are already eight French cruisers and gun-boats in Madagascar waters.

-The Kaffirs in the neighbourhood of Lorenzo Marques, in Portuguese South Africa, are in rebellion against the Portuguese authorities. It is feared that other tribes will join them.

-Excavations in Upper Egypt brought to light a set of wooden statuettes of soldiers, showing the costumes of the troops of the Pharaohs, which are said to be identical with that of the Soudanese of to-day.

-The Hungarian House of Magnates has taken action in favour of granting freedom to all classes in matters pertaining to religious worship. This step comes as a sequence of the enactment of the civil marriage law.

-It is stated that the Admiralty have on foot a large scheme for the maintenance of trained crews for the armed cruisers on which subsidies are now paid. The whole proposition includes the manning of no less than twenty-six vessels.

-A private telegram received at Berlin, from Warsaw, states that a large number of persons have been arrested there on the charge of belonging to a secret society. Among those apprehended are literary men, chemists, students, and compositors.

-Good samples of fen wheat sold recently at 16s. 8d. per quarter, the lowest price on record, and other lots, which last year would have fetched 25s., did not realise more than 17s. This is lies than a halfpenny a pound. Farmers any this means a loss of ?1 for every acre of wheat grown.

-Later reports of the naval battle between the Chinese and Japanese fleets leave no doubt that the advantage meted with the Japanese. The damaged Chinese warships are not expected to be ready for at least two months, and the Japanese have in the meantime practical control of the seas.

-Mail advices received at San Francisco from Japan state that is destructive storm has occurred there, laying waste the districts of Okita and Twate. Fifteen thousand houses are reported to have been levelled with the ground. Great havoc has been wrought amongst the shipping, and 800 persons perished.

-China having demonstrated her weakness in the war with Japan, the question of the partition of the country by the powers of Europe has already been raised, and is boldly advocated by the Novosti, a leading journal of Russia. The Novosti proposes a joint occupation of China by Russia, England, and France.

-Placed end to end in a continuous line, the streets of London would extend from the Mansion House across the entire Continent of Europe and beyond the Ural Mountains into Asia. The number of inhabitants exceeds the population of Paris, Berlin, Vienna, and Rome put together. And yet London is one of the healthiest cities in the world.

-The question of the jus exclusionis, or right of the sovereigns of Franco, Austria, and Spain to object to the election of any cardinal as Pope, has been revived in the Hungarian delegation to the approaching papal conclave, and has excited much indignation at the Vatican. The Pope, it is stated, will do his utmost to prevent any revival of this, ancient prerogative.

-Korean soldiers are an odd-looking military force. Their uniform consists of blue trousers and blouse, with red facings, sandals, and broad-brimmed hats. Caps were first tried, but so derogatory to their wearers did they seem (a Korean being ranked as a man by his hat) that violent opposition was raised, and a compromise on hats two feet in diameter was made.

-Professor Behring, of Halle, the discoverer of blood serum as a cure for diphtheria, in a paper read at a recent meeting of German naturalists, said that although for the present the serum is absolutely efficient only in the case of diphtheria and tetanus, it is but a question of time when it will be successfully used also for cholera, pneumonia, typhus, and probably also for consumption.

-The rainfall in London this year has been inches above the average, and the mean temperature 2 degrees below the average,-an exact reversal of the conditions of last year. Notwithstanding this some sections of the country are suffering from scarcity of water, and at Leicester, it is said, unless there is a heavy rainfall within two weeks, not a drop of water will remain in the reservoirs. Boring operations are going on night and day, and the outlook is very serious.

-Dr. Viquerat of Geneva, after a long study of tuberculosis has reached some extraordinary results. Twenty-seven tuberculous patients of the second or third degree have undergone his treatment (sub-cutaneous injection of the serum of asses), and twenty-five, who had been given up by their physicians as lost, are to-day entirely cured. An authoritative report gives the names and addresses of twenty-five patients treated. As a result of this success a philanthropic Genevan has founded in Geneva the Viquerat Institute for the treatment of persons whose case is looked upon as hopeless.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

The Bishops of Hungary have decided to bring a bill into the legislature "prohibiting conversion to Judaism." This is like some of the old laws demanding that the people must believe certain doctrines, and must not believe others-as though human laws could really control the action of the mind.

The claim that Ritualism in the Church of England prevents people from going over to Romanism, by supplying them at home with the Catholic doctrines and practices, is paralleled by the case of the man who, in order to keep his sons from public-houses, opened a bar in his own house, with a full supply of liquors, to which they had free access.

The twenty-eighth annual report of Dr. Barnardo's Homes is an interesting one. The number of orphan and waif children dealt with during the past year was larger than any year preceding, reaching a total of 13,418. Notwithstanding the general depression which has affected the finances of many religious and philanthropic societies the income of the Homes shows an increase.

The prophet Joel, in the third chapter, is speaking of "the day of the Lord," and the gathering of the mighty ones of the earth to the battle of the last day. "Let the heathen be wakened," "Prepare war, wake up the mighty men," he says. Who does not think at once of the great nations of Asia who are just awakening out of the sleep of centuries, and learning the arts of war, and awakening to the knowledge that they may be counted among the great powers, and have a hand in the struggle for possessions and superiority?

The Lord commanded the widow of Sarepta to sustain Elijah, although she had but a handful of meal; but from the Lord's comment in the fourth of Luke we learn that this was only the Lord's way of sustaining the widow and her household, and blessing her with salvation. It is always so with God's commandments. They are not grievous; and instead of being given to bring us into distress, as the widow might have reasoned had she been faithless, they are designed to be the means of bringing great blessings to us.

"The life was manifested," said John, "and we have seen it." But we read also that the life of God, and His Divine power and Godhead are manifested in the things that He is made, and may be clearly seen by all, so that all are without excuse if they do not accept the life. There were many who saw Christ in the flesh, but few saw the life. All the world is daily seeing the things that God has made, and all are living by the life He gives them, the breath of life that He sends moment by moment; and yet how few now see the life that is manifested in all this.

"The Spiritualistic Revival" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

The Spiritualistic Revival.-As the prophetic Scriptures repeatedly referred to the revival of the old practices of witchcraft, or spirit communication in the last days, we may expect to see Spiritualism, already world-wide, increasing its operations and commanding more attention every year. Those who are deceived by it already congratulate one another on the rapid progress it is making. Last week a conversazione of the London Spiritualistic Alliance was held at St. James' Hall, at which Professor Barret, Dean of the Faculty in the Irish Royal College of Science, gave an address. A report says:-

The Professor concluded by remarking that he believed they were on the eve of a very great change in public opinion with regard to Spiritualism, and that change had been signalised by one of the most distinguished statesmen of the day-viz., the Right Hon. A. J. Balfour-in his presidential address to the Psyschical Research Society recently when he remarked that the time was coming when the scientific thought of this country would be aroused to further investigations, which it was their bounden duty to undertake.

"Virtuous Cant" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

Virtuous Cant.-A Russian official journal calls upon Great Britain, France, and Russia to divide China between them. It declares it to be unworthy of Europe to tolerate further the barbarities of the Chinese, "the massacre of missionaries," etc. Yet not one of the missionary societies operating in China could withdraw one missionary from China and send him to Russia to engage in similar work. And in Russia it would not be the occasional opposition of the superstitious and prejudiced common people, but the strong arm of the law, the determined purpose of the Russian authorities to enforce the customs and usages of the Greek Church and prevent the preaching of the pure Gospel. What a difference it makes where the persecution is! And in other countries that we might name there are many people who abhor Russia for trying to force its subjects to conform to forms and ceremonies in which they have no faith, who themselves follow Russia's principles exactly in their effort to compel the observance of institutions which they think all should honour.

"But a Beginning" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

But a Beginning.-Last week the Christian truly said:-

The Reformation itself was an imperfect work-only a beginning-and retained many of the deadly seeds of Romanism; and, further, that where the Reformation was victorious it sometimes caused reaction by pressing its successes too far. Into many cases its alliance with princes and rulers was its weakness and downfall. The truth is safest in the keeping of loving hearts, however humble.

This truth needs constant emphasising, especially now when the tendency, even among those whom our contemporary represents, is to invoke the aid of civil power to advance the cause of religion. The Reformation began with the cry, "The Bible and the Bible only," and it will not be ended until that is the cry of every child of the kingdom of grace, and every tradition received from human authority is cast aside.

"A Geographical Question" The Present Truth 10, 40.

E. J. Waggoner

A Geographical Question.-The Archbishop of Dublin has long been proposing to consecrate as Bishop the leader of some Spanish congregations who have broken away from the Roman Church. He has at last done so in the face of the opposition of the Anglican Episcopate, the majority of the English Church considering it rank heresy for these congregations to separate from the Catholic Church in Spain. On the Continent the true church is apparently supposed to be Rome, but crossing the Channel to England it becomes the Anglican Church. The Church Times calls the Spanish Reformers-as they have been named-"a new schismatical communion," and threathens the Archbishop of Dublin with certain condemnation when the Lambeth Synod meets. The Spanish churches are very Ritualistic, and it is urged in their favour that they have reformed very little in the matter of altars, and lights, and Roman Catholic ritual generally, but they have nominally denied the authority of Rome.

October 11, 1894

"Getting the Light" The Present Truth 10, 41.

E. J. Waggoner

"Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." "The opening of Thy words giveth light." Ps. cxix. 105, 130.

This is not a mere figure of speech, but an actual fact. Light does come from the word of God, because it is a light. "By the word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of His mouth." Ps. xxxiii. 6. God said, "Let there be light; and there was light." Gen. i. 3. As soon as His word went into the darkness, light came forth, even the light by which we are able to walk and work.

This being the case, it is no wonder that the words of the Lord gives mental and spiritual light. There is light in every word of God, because light is life, and we are to live by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.

Yet the experience of every one that regards the word of the Lord is that more light seems to come in from some portions of it than from others. Some parts seem to have no light at all. If we will think a moment, we shall find the reason for this. It is from the portions with which we are very familiar, that the most light seems to come. It is those passages which we have read many times, which seem like old acquaintances, and which we can recall without the book, from which the light streams so brightly. It is from these that new light ever and anon breaks forth.

This should show us that the reason why we do not get light from other passages of Scripture, is that we have not studied them so as to become familiar with them. It is true that there are many which seem to give their light very clearly on first reading; yet even these reveal much more the more they are studied. But there are others so obscure that a first glance does not reveal any light.

When we look to the sky there are certain heavenly bodies that give us much light. But there are many others so far distant that no perceptible light comes to us from them. There are stars so far distant that they cannot be discerned even by the most powerful telescope. And yet this earth does receive a measure of light from them. One may ask how we know this, if they cannot be seen even through the telescope. Their existence is revealed by photography.

But we must not suppose that their photograph is taken by any "snap shot." Even the long, tedious sitting that was required by the old-style Daguerreotype would be insufficient to leave the slightest trace upon the plate. The astronomer must direct his instrument to a certain portion of the heavens, and keep it steady there, having a bright star as his guide. For many hours must it remain in one position, until the light from those distant suns accumulates upon the plate, and reveals their presence. Then a multitude of tiny spots of light shows that in the infinite depths of space there is light for the one who has but the patience to wait for it.

That is the way that the astronomer studies the heavens. He patiently looks into their depths, until the light is revealed to him. Even so should we study the Bible. We do not study the Bible by talking about it, but by looking at it. The heavens were made by the word of the Lord, even the word which by the Gospel is preached unto us: and therefore the infinite depth of the heavens is but an illustration of the infinite depths of God's word. "O Lord, how great are Thy works! and Thy thoughts are very deep." Ps. cxii. 5. Let the mind be open to the impress of the Holy Spirit, and continued meditation upon the word itself will reveal duties that are not dreamed of by the careless reader.

"'Made Sin'" The Present Truth 10, 41.

E. J. Waggoner

We gain some faint idea of the infinite sacrifice which Christ made for us when we consider that God "hath made Him to be sin for us who knew no sin." Eph. v. 21. To realise its meaning fully would require that we fully comprehend the Divine nature of Christ and the nature of sin. Between the two there is an infinite gulf. The one is as utterly unlike the other as it possibly can be. Christ was infinitely pure: sin was infinitely loathsome and impure. Yet Christ was made sin for us. The serpent which Moses lifted up in the wilderness was a faithful representation of Christ upon the cross, not only because it hung upon the wood, but because it was a serpent, representing sin.

Christ consented to be made the very thing that was most loathsome to Him and to His Father; to become that which was strictly unlike His Father as anything could be; and to be separated from His Father as far as sin is separated from Him, which

642

is as far as the east is from the west. No wonder the Saviour, as He felt this awful gulf of separation yawning between them, prayed that the cup might pass from Him. But He drank the cup and endured the cross that we, who were made sinners by Adam's fall, "might be made the righteousness of God in Him." "We then, as workers together with Him, beseech you that ye receive not the grace of God in vain."

"Life in the Word" The Present Truth 10, 41.

E. J. Waggoner

One great truth which men need at this day to learn is that there is life in the word of God. This was the lesson that the Lord endeavoured to teach His people of old whom He delivered from Egypt, while they were in the wilderness where those things usually necessary to sustain life could not be had; but they had not faith enough to learn it.

It is stated that the Lord fed them with manna in the desert that they might "know that man does not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord." Deut. viii. 3. It required faith for them, under such circumstances, to know that they were daily receiving all that they needed to perfectly sustain their lives. The appearances were against it, and they had more faith in the appearances than they did in God. They became dissatisfied with the manna, and gave expression to their feelings by weeping and murmuring. They said, "Who shall give us flesh to eat? We remember the fish which we did eat in Egypt freely; the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic. But now our soul is dried away; there is nothing at all beside this manna, before our eyes." Num. xi. 5, 6. Their language intimated that they were on the road to starvation.

But what was the truth of the matter? The context shows. The Lord sent quails upon the camp, and "the people stood up all that day and all that night, and all the next day, and they gathered the quails." Verse 32. They had an abundance of strength and life, or they could not have done this. They were without all those things which had sustained their life in Egypt; yet they lived, and their physical powers were unimpaired.

"The word of God is living, and active." Heb. iv. 12, R.V. This is no figure of speech, but a simple statement of the fact which the Israelites proved in the wilderness when the Lord fed them on His word. The word of the Lord is power. And the commandment of the Lord is not given us to be a test of our power, but a measure of His power. The Saviour, speaking of His sacrifice and laying down His life, said, "No man taketh it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of My Father." John x. 18. He might have said, This power have I received of My Father; it would have meant the same. And we, since we have received commandments from God, which command the fullest and highest perfection, need not look upon them with despair, wondering how we are to attain to the Divine standard, but say in faith, This power have I received of My Father.

"Studies in Romans. 'Saved by His Life.' Rom. v. 1-10" The Present Truth 10, 41.

E. J. Waggoner

We have now passed through the first four chapters of Romans. A very brief review may therefore be taken, so that we may preserve the chain of thought.

Chapter one gives us a brief statement of what the Gospel is, and tells us where it may be learned, and the condition of men who reject it.

The second chapter shows that not alone those who have lost the knowledge of the true God, but all men are in condemnation. All men are partakers of the same sinful nature. Disobedience to the law of God is heathenism, no matter what profession the disobedient one may make. Righteousness, the circumcision of the heart, comes only by the Spirit of God. And there is no circumcision except that of the heart.

The third chapter sums up the argument that all men, whether called Jews or Gentiles, whether so-called heathen or professed Christians, are to be judged by the same law, and that all are alike guilty. The law is universal in its jurisdiction, and as it condemns all, none can get righteousness by it, although it is the statement of the righteousness of God. But God has promised righteousness to men, therefore they must get it aside from the works of the law, namely, in Christ. In His blood there is redemption for Jew and Gentile alike. A man is made a doer of the law by faith alone, without the deeds of the law. This is the mystery of the Gospel. It is Christ in men, the hope of glory, and God in Christ working His own righteousness.

The fourth chapter has taken up the case of Abraham as an illustration of righteousness by faith. He was made righteousness by his faith in the promise of God, and God gave him a seal of that righteousness. But the promise of God to Abraham was that he should have a son, and that he should be the father of all the nations of the earth, and that he and the numerous posterity that should come to him through the promise, should have the earth for an everlasting possession. The promise of the son through whom all this should be fulfilled, was made after it was humanly impossible for him to have a son, yet he was not weakened in faith. See Rom. iv. 19. So "through faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged Him faithful who had promised." Heb. xi. 11. Isaac was the child of promise, born of the Spirit, through faith. See Gal. iv. 23, 28, 29. The faith which was imputed to Abraham for righteousness, namely, faith in the death and resurrection of Christ, will bring us the same righteousness, and make us heirs with him of the same promise.

The fourth chapter is really a parenthetical illustration, so that the fifth begins where the third closes. We therefore proceed with the subject of

RIGHTEOUSNESS BY FAITH

644

"Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also; knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope; and hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us. For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life." Rom. v. 1-10.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What have the preceding chapters set before us?

Justification by faith.

Being justified by faith, what do we have?

"We have peace."

What peace do we have?

"We have peace with God."

Through whom do we have peace?

"Through our Lord Jesus Christ."

What else do we have through Him?

"We have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand."

What do we therefore do?

"Rejoice in hope of the glory of God."

What else?

"And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also."

Why do we glory in tribulations?

"Knowing that tribulation worketh patience."

What does patience work?

"And patience experience."

What comes with experience?

"And experience hope."

And what does hope not do?

"Hope maketh not ashamed."

What therefore must hope do?

It must give boldness.

How does it give this boldness?

"Because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts."

How is the love of God shed abroad in our hearts?

"By the Holy Ghost which is given unto us."

What evidence have we that God will give us all these blessings?

"For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly."

For whom did Christ die?

"Christ died for the ungodly."

In what condition were those for whom Christ died?

"Without strength."

What is the greatest love known to man?

"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." John xv. 13. Compare with Rom. v. 7.

But what is the love of God for us?

"But God commendeth His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."

When did Christ die for us?

"While we were yet sinners."

Since we were sinners, in what relation did we stand to God?

"Alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works." Col. i. 21. "The carnal mind is enmity against God." Rom. viii. 7.

What did Christ do for us when we were enemies?

"Died for us."

What does the death of Christ do for us?

"When we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son."

If when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, of what may we be much more sure?

"Much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life."

Faith Works Real Righteousness.-The first verse of the fifth chapter begins with "therefore." "Therefore being justified by faith," etc. The word "therefore" indicates that what follows is a natural conclusion of what goes before. What has gone before? The story of what Abraham gained by faith. He gained righteousness by faith, but it was by faith in the promise that he should have a son. That son was the child of faith. But the same faith that resulted in the birth of Isaac, also brought righteousness to Abraham. And the same will also be imputed to us, if we have the same faith. Therefore, we are taught that the righteousness of faith is as real as was the son that was born to Abraham through faith. Righteousness by faith is not a myth.

Peace.-What is peace? Most people have the idea that it is a sort of ecstatic feeling. They think that peace with God means an indescribable heavenly feeling; and so they always look for that imaginary feeling as evidence that they are accepted with God. But peace with God means the same thing that it means with men: it means simply the absence of war. As sinners we are enemies of God. He is not our enemy, but we are his enemies. He is not fighting against us, but we are fighting against Him. How then may we have peace with Him? Simply by ceasing to fight, and laying down our arms. We may have peace whenever we are ready to stop fighting.

"Peace with God."-Note that when we have peace with God we are not simply at peace with Him, but we have His peace. This peace has been left on the earth for men; for the Lord has said, "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you." John xiv. 27. He has given it to us. It is ours, therefore, already. It has always been ours. The only trouble has been that we have not believed it. As soon as we believe the words of Christ, then we have in very deed the peace which He has given. And it is peace with God, because we find the peace in Christ, and Christ dwells in the bosom of the Father. John i. 18.

Peace and Righteousness.-"Great peace have they which love Thy law." Ps. cxix. 165. "O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea." Isa. xlviii. 18. Righteousness is peace, because our warfare against God was our sins that we cherished. God's life is righteousness, and He is the God of peace. Since the enmity is the carnal mind and its wicked works, peace must be the opposite, namely, righteousness. So it is simply the statement of an obvious fact, that being justified by faith we have peace with God. The righteousness that we have by faith carries peace with it. The two things can not be separated.

Peace and Feeling.-The question is asked, "Can one have peace with God and not have a feeling of peace?" What says the Scripture? "Being justified by faith, we have peace with God." What brings the peace? The faith. But faith is not feeling. If it were necessarily the case that there must be a certain feeling with peace, then if we did not have that feeling we should know that we were not justified; and then justification would be a matter of feeling, and not of faith. The verses which follow show us that we may have peace in tribulation as well as when everything goes smoothly.

Glory in Tribulations.-This does not mean that we are to seek for martyrdom, as some in the early centuries did. But it means, as it says, that in the midst of tribulations our peace and joy continue the same. This must necessarily be the case with peace that comes by faith. Peace that depends on feeling will depart as soon as we begin to feel tribulation. But nothing can make any difference with the peace that comes by faith. "These things I have spoken unto you, that in Me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation; but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." John xvi. 33.

Tribulation Worketh Patience.-What is patience? It is endurance of suffering. The root of the word "patience" means suffering. We see this in the fact that one who is ill is called "a patient." That is, he is a sufferer. People often excuse their petulance by saying that they have so much to endure. They think that they would be patient if they did not have to suffer so much. No, they would not be. There can be no patience where there is no suffering. Trouble does not destroy patience, but develops it. When trouble seems to destroy one's patience, it is simply showing the fact that the person had no patience.

When Does It Work?-The statement is that tribulation worketh patience. Yet there are many who become more and more irritable the more trouble they have. It does not work patience with them. Why not?-Simply because they are not in the condition that the apostle is describing. It is only those who are justified by faith that tribulation works patience. Nothing but faith in God can keep one perfectly patient under all circumstances.

Will It Always Work?-Will tribulation always work patience in those who believe the Lord?-Yes, invariably. "Well," says one, "I am sure that anybody would be impatient if he had as much to trouble him as I have." Question: Would Christ become impatient if He had the things to endure that you have? Did He not have as much to endure, and more? You must admit that He did. Was He impatient? "He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth." Isa. liii. 7. Then if He were in your place, He would be patient. Why, then, do you not let Him be in your place? Faith brings Christ into the heart, so that He is identified with us, and therefore He bears the burdens. "Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and He shall sustain thee; He shall never suffer the righteous to be moved." Ps. lv. 22.

"All Patience."-There is no limit to the patience that comes by faith in Christ. This is the inspired prayer: "That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness." Col. i. 10, 11. That is, we may be so strengthened by the glorious power by which Christ endured suffering, that we may have all patience even though suffering long, and may rejoice in the midst of it.

Patience Works Experience.-In what does it work experience? It works experience in the peace of God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Many people confuse Christian experience with Christian profession. They speak of having had so many years of "Christian experience," when it may be that they have never really experienced the blessedness of the life of Christ. They have made a profession of religion; but real experience means the actual proving of the power of the life of Christ. When one has that experience, it is not a difficult matter for him to tell something of his experience when occasion calls for it.

"Not Ashamed."-Hope makes not ashamed. Why? Because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts. "And now, little children, abide in Him; that, when He shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before Him at His coming." 1 John ii. 28. "Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of Judgment; because as He is, so are we in this world." 1 John iv. 17. There can not possibly be a more trying day than the day of Judgment. Therefore it is certain that those who will then not be ashamed or afraid, will have boldness now. And he who has boldness with God ought certainly not to be afraid of man.

"The Love of God."-The reason why hope makes not ashamed is that the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. Note that it does not say love for God, but the love of God. What is the love of God? "This is the love of God, that we keep His commandments." 1 John v. 3. The Holy Ghost, then, puts into our hearts obedience to the law of God; and it is that which gives us boldness in the day of Judgment, and at all other times. It is sin that makes men afraid. When sin is taken away, then fear is gone. "The wicked flee when no man pursueth; but the righteous are bold as a lion." Prov. xxviii. 1.

"Christ Died for the Ungodly."-"This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners." 1 Tim. i. 15. "This man receiveth sinners." Luke xv. 2. Strange that people will allow a sense of their sinfulness to keep them away from the Lord, when Christ came for the one purpose of receiving and saving them. He is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by Him (Heb. vii. 25); and He says that those who come to Him He will in no wise cast out John vi. 37.

"Without Strength."-It was when we were yet without strength, that Christ died for the ungodly. Of course; because He died for the purpose that we might be strengthened with might by the Spirit. If He waited for us to gain some strength before giving Himself for us, then we should be lost. When were we without strength? Just now; and even now Jesus Christ is set forth evidently crucified among us. Gal. iii. 1. "Surely, shall one say, in the Lord have I righteousness and strength." Isa. xlv. 24.

Righteous and Good.-"For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die." Our English translation does not indicate the difference between the two words used here. The righteous man is the just man, the man who is careful to give every one his due. The good man is the benevolent man, the one who has done us many favours, and who does for us more than we could justly claim. Now, no matter how just a man may be, his integrity of character would scarcely lead one to die for him. Yet it is possible that for a man of great kindness some would even dare to die.

The Greatest Love.-That is the highest measure of love among men. One may lay down his life for his friends, "but God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners," and therefore enemies, "Christ died for us."

"For the love of God is broader
Than the measure of man's mind;
And the heart of the Eternal
Is most wonderfully kind."

"Reconciled by His Death."-God is not our enemy, but we are or have been enemies to Him. Therefore He does not need to be reconciled to us, but we need reconciliation to Him. And He Himself, in the kindness of His heart, makes the reconciliation.

645

We "are made nigh by the blood of Christ." Eph. ii. 13. How so? Because it was sin that separated us from Him, and made us enemies; and "the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin." 1 John i. 7. Being cleansed from sin, we must necessarily be reconciled to God.

The Gift of Life.-"The life of the flesh is in the blood." "For it is the life of all flesh." Lev. vii. 11, 14. In that Christ shed His blood for us, He gave His life for us. But inasmuch as the blood is applied to us, to cleanse us from all sin, He gives His life to us. In the death of Christ therefore, if we are crucified with Him, we receive His life as a substitute for our sinful life, which He takes upon Himself. Our sins are remitted through faith in His blood, not as an arbitrary act, but because by faith we exchange lives with Him, and the life which we get in exchange has no sin. Our sinful life is swallowed up in His boundless life, because He has life so abundantly that He can die because of our transgressions, and still live again to give life to us.

"Saved by His Life."-Christ did not go through the pangs of death for nothing, nor did He give His life to us for the purpose of taking it away again. When He gives us His life, He designs that we shall keep it forever. How do we get it? By faith. How do we keep it? By the same faith. "As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him." Col. ii. 6. His life can never end, but we may lose it by unbelief. Let it be remembered that we have not this life in ourselves, but "this life is in His Son." "He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." 1 John v. 11, 12. We keep the everlasting life by keeping Christ. Now it is a very simple proposition that if we have been reconciled to God by the death of Christ, if His life has been given to us for the remission of our sins, then we shall much more be saved by that life since He has risen from the dead. People sometimes say that they can believe that God forgives their sins, but they find it difficult to believe that He can keep them from sin. Well, if there is any difference, the latter is the easier of the two; for the forgiveness of sins requires the death of Christ, while the saving from sins requires only His continued life.

By What Life?-By the life of Christ, and He has but one. He is "the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever." Heb. xiii. 8. It is by His present life that we are saved, that is, by His life in us from day to day. But the life which He now lives is the very same life that He lived in Judea eighteen hundred years ago. He took again the same life that He laid down. Think what was in the life of Christ, as we have the record in the New Testament, and we shall know what ought to be in our lives now. If we allow Him to dwell in us, He will live just as He did then. If there is something in our lives that was not then in His, we may be sure that He is not living it in us now.

"The Source of Authority" The Present Truth 10, 41.

E. J. Waggoner

The readers of PRESENT TRUTH cannot have failed to notice the prominent place that the Sabbath question has occupied in the last few numbers. Its prominence is not due to any efforts of ours, but is that which it demands for itself, and which it rightly has. It will be remembered that the recent discussion of the matter was brought about through the efforts of "The Lord's Day Rest Association" to secure the better observance of Sunday, which was called the Lord's day.

We have no sympathy with any human laws concerning the Lord's day, because we are sure that the Lord is fully able to care for His own day; and because it is the height of assumption for feeble subjects of the King of kings to take the reins of His Government into their own hands; but if any such laws were to be made, it would be only reasonable to first be sure which day is the Lord's day. Unfortunately those who are so concerned about the Lord's day, seem never to have thought of this phase of the question. Or, at least, they have not thought that there could be any question about the matter.

That we are not at all forcing the Sabbath question, will appear to everybody who reads the religious papers. In every one of them there are frequent articles treating of the importance of the better observance of the Sabbath. Quite recently the English Churchman had an editorial on the subject, from which we take the following two paragraphs:-

The Sabbath was instituted by God when He ceased the work of creation. It was appointed for man in his pure, unfallen state, and though Adam afterwards rebelled, the institution was never abrogated. God knew that one day's rest was good for man's body and soul; and as He sanctified the Sabbath, how can men dare to desecrate it?

When the Israelites were commanded to remember to keep the seventh day holy, there was a special reference to the creation, as it was but the re-enactment of its earlier institution. They were to remember it, as a thing which was ordained long ago. "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy." It was hallowed and blessed by God. It is therefore of universal obligation. So long as men exist, the law of the early Sabbath will remain. By His sovereign authority, He instituted it, and no man on earth has a right to set it aside. Man's proper rest is in God.

This is very good. It would be better, however, to say that the giving of the commandments from Sinai was the repetition of the first law than to say it was the re-enactment of it; because God is never under the necessity of re-enacting His laws. "They stand fast for ever and ever." He often has to repeat them for man's benefit, but one enactment is sufficient for ever. But the point which is stated very plainly is that the Sabbath commandment is precisely the same now that it was when given in Eden, and repeated from Sinai.

Farther on the Churchman's article says:-

A blessing attends the proper observance of the Sabbath. In England the Bible and the Sabbath have been great blessings; but now, men are tampering with God's word, and encouraging the idolatrous system of Rome. The true Christians will neither give up the Sabbath nor the Bible.

This also is good. We cannot be to watchful against the encroachments of Rome. Where Rome comes in, there the Bible goes out. Romanism means the exaltation of the human above the Divine. It means either the total extirpation of the Bible, or else, what is the same thing in effect, the substitution of man's ideas for its simple statements. The English Churchman is very active in its opposition to the growth of Romanism and the Church of England, and in this it does well.

Among the leaders in that branch of the Church of England which delights in the name "Catholic," and which is really Roman in everything except the acknowledgement of Leo XIII. as Pope, Canon Knox-Little is one of the first. In arguing for the Roman Catholic plan of fasting communion, he thus illustrates the Roman treatment of the Bible:-

And first, my dear Dean, I turn to the Scriptural aspect of the question. I do not think this is the point in the present controversy, as I have already said. The point is loyalty to the Church of England, whether Scripturally she is right or wrong.-Sacerdotalism, p. 68.

Farther on He gives an illustration of how little he regards the authority of God's word, in a way that seems to

646

us to be unfortunate for those members of the Church of England who call themselves "Protestant," against whom the Canon is arguing. He says:-

Well, as to certain specific statements of Scripture which are said to forbid the teaching of fasting communion. What are they? The primary argument of opponents is that our Lord instituted the Blessed Sacrament "after supper." It is difficult to believe that fairly instructed persons who use this argument are in earnest, and sincerely believe what they say. It would be just as sensible to argue that you are a "sacerdotalist" for observing the Lord's day, instead of observing the Jewish Saturday. It is certain that our Lord when on earth did observe Saturday, and did not observe Sunday; but no one, as far as I know, has ever been called a "sacerdotalist" for departing from His undoubted habit of "resting the seventh day."-p. 75.

Still further:-

Their efforts strictly to adhere to our Lord's example to the letter, in spite of the usage of the Church, implies that they know better what our Lord desired than His Church. If they are consistent, as I have said, they must keep Saturday, not Sunday, as the day of rest.

But the English Churchman, as the special organ of Protestantism in the Church of England, will not have it that the church is above the Bible. And herein it is right. On the opposite page from that which has the article on the Sabbath, from which we have quoted above, we read in an argument concerning the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England:-

Now the VIIIth of those Articles shows that the Creeds of the Church bind only because "proved by warrant of Holy Scripture;" the XXth limits the authority of the Church by Scripture; the XIXth shows that the Church is fallible; and the VIth limits all necessary truth to what is "read in Scripture, or may be proved thereby," ignoring altogether the opinions of "Fathers" or "Grandfathers," except so far as they may be able to justify themselves by that touchstone.

With all these quotations let us read once more from the Churchman's Sabbath article. It says:-

The change of day from the seventh to the first day of the week does not alter the obligation of its observance. It is equally God's command with the first day or the seventh.

The Protestant reader must ask the Churchman for its authority. The Bible nowhere speaks of any change in the day of the Sabbath, and the commandment reads the same to-day that it always did. This is admitted. What we are waiting to have explained is how a commandment which says the seventh day can be obeyed by keeping a different day altogether.

Let us take a simple illustration. We will suppose in order to make some necessary repairs, the city authorities have ordered all traffic across London Bridge suspended, and have posted a notice to that effect. This notice is properly regarded. As soon as the repairs have been made, it becomes necessary to close Blackfriar's Bridge for the same purpose. Accordingly the same notice as before is posted, and the traveller reads that all persons are forbidden to cross London Bridge. A simple-minded man sees the notice, and proceeds on his way across Blackfriar's Bridge, when a policeman stops him, and asks why he does not regard the order. "What order?" is his surprised inquiry. "Why the order not to cross this bridge," says the policeman. "But I did not see any such order," replies the man. "There it is," says the policeman, pointing to the notice. "But that says London Bridge," says the man, more surprised than before. "Oh, that makes no difference," replies the policeman, "it means Blackfriar's Bridge as well as London Bridge. The change of bridge makes no difference with the order, and you must go back."

Such a case is really not supposable. If such a thing really should occur, every paper would most unmercifully gibe the men who were so foolish as to suppose that an order against crossing London Bridge would serve equally well to prevent the crossing of Blackfriar's Bridge. Yet this is what wise Doctors of Divinity do with the law of God. Truly, as the English Churchman says, "Men treat God as they would be ashamed to treat one another."

How will the Churchman, and those who hold with it, justify themselves for their treatment of the Sabbath of the Lord? They justly refuse certain practices of Rome because they are contrary to the life of our Lord, and the Bible. But Canon Knox-Little has given them a point which no one has seen fit to try to answer. If Romanism is shown in the substitution of one human practice for that of Christ, why is it not shown in the substitution of a day which He did not keep, for the one which He did keep? And if men persist in keeping the substitute day, how can they say that they do not put the authority of "the church" above that of Christ Himself?

Has it never occurred to those who argue against the abrogation of the Sabbath, or rather, the course of men who act as though it were abrogated, that men have just as much right to ignore the commandment altogether, or to abrogate it, as they have to change it in any particular? The Protestants of England have a hard battle before them with Rome, but they must learn that they will be defeated as long as they occupy Romish ground. Indeed, they are defeated before the battle begins. Let them insist that the Bible is above all human authority, and then let them be consistent with this when they come to the fourth commandment. If they swerve in this particular, they are gone. But all Protestants know of a surety that the change of the Sabbath is that upon which Rome bases her claim to supreme authority, and that the final struggle between true Christianity and the Papacy will be over the Sabbath question. This is the question of the day. Shall we take the Bible as the supreme and sole authority, or shall we accept human dogmas and practices instead?

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 41.

E. J. Waggoner

-Many women who are not cyclists now walk about the streets of Paris in knickerbockers.

-A serious convent scandal has been discovered in Naples, and the Lady Superior is under arrest.

-Cholera has broken out in Constantinople, and several deaths from the disease have already occurred.

-Nearly 200 non-commissioned German officers have been arrested on suspicion of being guilty of political intrigues.

-Eight Anarchists have been arrested at Marseilles in connection with a supposed plot to blow up the Italian Consulate there.

-An Anarchist attempt was made upon the life of Senor Iglesias, President of the Costa Rican Republic. The would-be assassin fired five shots without effect.

-The Mahdi is stated to have killed many Egyptian prisoners, and to be fortifying Omdurman and Khartoum in view of an expected attack by Italians or British.

-The zebra, which was regarded as untameable, has been made to go in harness. A pair of zebras have recently been driven in this way in the streets of London.

-Mexico and Guatemala are having trouble with each other over the international boundary line, the Mexican Government alleging that Guatemalans are committing depredations in her territory.

-The elections to the Japanese House of Representatives have lately been held, the result being the choosing of 109 members of the Government party, 149 of the Opposition, and 39 Independent member.

-The New York World publishes a despatch from Caracas stating that a waterspout occurred near Valencia, Venezuela, on Sept. 28, by which 1.50 persons were killed and serious damage was done to crops.

-Great storms have been raging in the tropical seas of the Western hemisphere. Half the town of San Domingo has been destroyed by a cyclone, and a large steamer, a sailing ship, and a schooner have been sighted aground on the coast of Florida.

-Although the electric light is gradually coming into use, according to the latest estimate about twelve million tone of coal are consumed per annum for gas-making in the United Kingdom, over a quarter of that amount being consumed in London.

-The Vatican is in communication with France, which has a protectorate over Catholic missions In China, in order that it may intervene with other European Powers in favour of the missionaries, who have sent to the Propaganda very alarming reports.

-On Oct. 2 the city of Wichita, Kansas, was seriously damaged by a tornado, and on the following day the city of Little Rock, Arkansas, was visited by a similar disaster, which partially wrecked the State penitentiary. Property was damaged to the extent of $500,000.

-The members of an Italian criminal association known as the Male, Vita wore sentenced at Lucent, sixty-eight of them being condemned to terms of imprisonment varying from five to ten years, while fourteen were acquitted. The objects of the society were robbery and rapine.

-Cardinal Monescillo, the Primate of Spain, has issued a pastoral letter declaring the recent consecration of a Protestant Bishop of Madrid to be contrary to the Spanish Constitution. He describes the ceremony of consecration as a violent transition from toleration to freedom of worship.

-Extraordinary scenes continue to take place daily at "St. Winifride's Well," Holywell, the Welsh Lourdes. Crowds of halt, blind and lame, after leaving the water, crawl to the statue of the saint, and there, all dripping and shivering with cold, they pray for her miraculous aid. Many "miraculous cures" are reported.

-The Dutch are doing a good deal of fighting in the East Indies, and have recently met with several reverses. They have captured four forts at Mataram after a most determined resistance on the part of the Balinese, who lost heavily. One of the forts was immediately occupied and strengthened. On the Dutch side one officer and eleven men were killed, while four officers and forty-five men were wounded.

-Frequent reports are received from Odessa of the arrest of young men, chiefly Poles, suspected of complicity with their compatriots in Poland. There can be no doubt that there is an alarming unrest and dissatisfaction among the young Poles of Russia and Germany, and although no particulars in any way reliable have yet transpired, it is generally believed there that the young Poles arrested in Odessa and in various parts of Russian Poland are members of one and the same revolutionary organisation.

-A leading physician at Buenos Ayres was in the habit of inviting two or three guests to dinner. A short time later one or more of them would die, When in all twenty guests had thus plied the physician was arrested, but no trace of poison could be found in the bodies. It then transpired, from a statement by the cook, that the physician had been giving his guests cholera, germs in their drink, presumably to test the effects of microbes upon human beings. The physician killed himself in his cell by means of a drop of poison placed in a capsule, which he had hidden away in a hollow tooth before his arrest.

-The Chinese have evacuated Korea and retreated hastily southward, pillaging and burning the villages on their way. The Japanese are advancing and are landing troops by their fleets at various points. Disorder and anarchy reign at Pekin, and it said that the Emperor has made all preparations for flight to some inland stronghold in the event of a Japanese victory on Chinese soil. As his government is unpopular, this would, it is said, precipitate a revolution. Meanwhile the Chinese are displaying more and more hatred toward all foreigners, and the situation has become so alarming for the latter that steps are being taken to send the European women and children to Shanghai, which is considered the safest place for them now in China.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 41.

E. J. Waggoner

If the children of the Board Schools could comprehend the wordy and somewhat bitter controversy over the religious question they would doubtless form novel conclusions as to the principles of the Christian religion. The controversy well illustrates the absurdity of making religion a branch of politics.

It is said that some years ago, at the close of a visit to Denmark, the Czar bade good-bye to his nieces, the daughters of the Prince and Princess of Wales, saying "Good-bye my dears; you are going back to your happy English home, and I to my Russian prison." The prison life has at last, apparently, worn out even the superb constitution of the Czar.

With the pending removal by death of the occupant of the Russian throne, who is known to exert a strong influence for peace in European politics, and the prospective overthrow of the Chinese government and breaking up of the empire, either by the arms of Japan or by internal revolution, with all the great powers of the world standing ready to assert their claims and defend their "rights" in the matter, the outlook for a continuance of European tranquillity is more alarming than it has been for years in the past.

The prosecutions under the Sunday law in Switzerland, which we have reported, and which are now pending in the courts, are not without good results in awakening a livelier interest in the question of religious liberty. The Swiss correspondent of Evangelical Christendom, the organ of the Evangelical Alliance writes in the October number:-

Professor G. Godet publishes in the Journal Religioux an article in favour of religious liberty for the "Sabbatistes." They have been punished once with a fine, and another since with a fine and three weeks' imprisonment for having printed books on a Sunday. As at Bale all the beershops, theatres, and ball-rooms are open on a Sunday it is evident that it is hatred against a religious sect that is the reason why the Sabbatarians are persecuted.

The Baptist having commended the editor of the Bristol Mercury for reporting Sunday's sermons in Monday's paper, a correspondent very appropriately called attention to the fact that Monday's paper is the one requiring Sunday work in its preparation. This is apparently overlooked by those who would forcibly suppress the Sunday paper in the interests of the Sunday. Replying to the correspondent the editor of the Mercury writes to the Baptist:-

So far as my reading goes, the Sabbath is Saturday, and that evening our compositors have absolutely free and to themselves.

Thus the Sabbath question is being agitated here and there. A correspondent of the Church Review (Anglican) names various Catholic feast days, and asks, "Why is Sunday popularly exalted over (say) the Ascension of our Lord, or the Assumption of our Lady? "Why Sunday," he asks, "more than any other holy day of obligation?" This is what the Church of Rome says also; for it boasts that there is no more authority for Sunday than for any other feast days of the Church of Rome.

People who live sumptuously, eating richly seasoned foods, and drinking stimulating beverages, frequently go for a season to some watering place and take the waters and adopt the simple fare recommended, deriving great benefit. If they would live more simply at home, and drink hot and cold water, nature's beverage for mankind, they would doubtless derive the same benefits throughout the year. The appetite that has been whipped and driven by artificially concocted stimulants until it is jaded out does not know what good living is.

Mgr. Satolli has been interviewed by a representative of the Public Ledger, Philadelphia, U.S.A., in reference to a report that the papal delegate would return to Rome at the end of the present year. He said: "I cannot tell whether I shall return to Rome at the end of the present year or not. But, whether I go or remain, the Apostolic Delegation at Washington is a permanent institution. If I should be recalled, another would be appointed in my place." Rome has her hand upon the throat of the western republic, and is determined not to remove it.

"Alive for Evermore" The Present Truth 10, 41.

E. J. Waggoner

Alive for Evermore.-The Catholic doctrine of the real presence does not suggest a living Saviour to the worshipper. The Bishop of Laval argues for the infallibility of the Pope by urging that in the sacrament the presence of Christ is dumb, but in the person of the Pope the presence is a living one. The Catholic perversion of the Gospel leaves a dead Christ to the world, and every man must save himself. This is the heart of the whole system. But Jesus Christ sends the message to all, "I am He that liveth, and was dead; and, behold I am alive for ever more." To the believer the promise, "I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world," brings a real presence and a living one.

"Better than the Lord" The Present Truth 10, 41.

E. J. Waggoner

Better than the Lord.-Unbelief always makes out that men are better than the Lord. Some doubting soul says he is willing to come to the Lord, but he does not believe the Lord is willing to accept him and take away his sin. That is only one way of saying that self is better than God. The Roman Catholic way of saying the same thing is plainer and more direct. Thus the Bishop of Clifton says:-

Many of you know by your own experience that prayers which have been addressed directly to God have remained unanswered, while when you have invoked the intercession of the Blessed Virgin they have been speedily granted.

Unbelief is all of one religion, and ever since the beginning it has exalted the human above the Divine.

"The Fear of God" The Present Truth 10, 41.

E. J. Waggoner

The Fear of God.-What the fear of God is was shown in the life of Abraham, when he endured the great test on Mount Moriah. When the angel had arrested the patriarch's hand as it was about to give the fatal blow, the Divine messenger said, "Now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from Me." Gen. xxii. 12. The obedience of Abraham did not come from that fear which is inspired by tyrants. How he regarded the Lord is shown in his wonderful conversation with Him on the day before the destruction of Sodom, when he appealed to God's righteousness and mercy. Abraham had placed God first in his affections when he took Isaac to Mount Moriah, and when He is first in our affections, and only then, can we be truly said to possess the fear of God.

October 18, 1894

"Studies in Romans. The Free Gift. Rom. v. 12-19" The Present Truth 10, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

In the portion of the fifth chapter that we have already studied, we learned of the wonderful love of God, so great that He gave Himself for His enemies, in order that they might be reconciled to Him; and that, as in the death of Christ we receive the life of God, and are thereby one with Him, so by the continuation of that life in us we are saved from sin. Without any further review, we may proceed with the following verses, which present

A SERIES OF CONTRASTS

"Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned; for until the law sin was in the world; but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of Him that was to come. But not as the offence, so also is the free gift; for if through the offence, so also is the free gift; for if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many. And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift; for the judgment was by one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offences unto justification. For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ. Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous." Rom. v. 12-19.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

How did sin enter into the world?

"By one man sin entered into the world?"

What did sin bring with it?

"And death by sin."

Upon how many did sentence of death pass?

"And so death passed upon all men."

Why?

"For that all have sinned."

What then was the fruit of that first offence?

"By the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation."

But what else comes just as extensively?

"The free gift came upon all men unto justification of life."

By what means did it come?

"By the righteousness of one."

How only does righteousness come?

"By the obedience of one."

Joy in God.-The eleventh verse should have been included in last week's lesson, as the thought is the same as in the preceding verses. By the same life by which we receive the reconciliation and salvation, "we also joy in God." Christ's life is a joyous life. When David had fallen, he prayed, "Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation; and uphold me with Thy free Spirit." Ps. li. 12. The brightness of the heavens, the beauty of the infinite variety of flowers with which God clothes the earth, and the glad songs of the birds, all indicate that God delights in joy and beauty. Brightness and song are but the natural expressions of his life. "Let them also that love Thy name be joyful in Thee." Ps. v. 11.

There is probably no passage in Romans more difficult to understand than verses 12-19. The reason is that there is so long a parenthesis in the midst of the main statement, and there is so much repetition of the same form of expression.

658

There is really no greatly involved argument. In this study we shall not attempt to deal with every particular, but will note the main thought running through the whole, so that the reader can read and study it more satisfactorily for himself.

First Principles.-It will be seen from verse twelve that the apostle goes back to the very beginning. "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." There can never be any presentation of the Gospel, if these facts are ignored. The story of the fall of man must be as literally true as the story of the cross; for the latter depends entirely upon the former.

Death by Sin.-Death came by sin, because sin is death. Sin, when it is full grown, bringeth forth death. See James i. 15. "To be carnally minded is death." Rom. viii. 6. "The sting of death is sin." 1 Cor. xv. 56. There could be no death if there were no sin. Sin carries death in its bosom. So it was not an arbitrary act on the part of God that death came upon men because of sin. It could not possibly be otherwise.

Righteousness and Life.-"To be spiritually minded is life and peace." Rom. viii. 6. "There is none good but one, that is, God." Matt. xix. 17. He is goodness itself. Goodness is His life. Righteousness is simply God's way. Therefore righteousness is life. It is not merely a conception of what is right, but it is the right thing itself. Righteousness is active. As sin and death are inseparable, so are righteousness and life. "See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil." Deut. xxx. 15.

Death Passed upon All Men.-Note the justice here. Death passed upon all men, "for that all have sinned." "The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son; the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him." Eze. xviii. 20. And this is also a necessary consequence of the fact that sin contains death in it, and that death can not come in any other way than by sin. Death cannot come upon a man because of the sin of another. It must come because of his own sin; for if a man has not sinned, there is nothing to bring death upon him. But since all have sinned, therefore of necessity death passed upon all.

The Conclusion.-It will be noticed that the twelfth verse begins a proposition that is not completed. Verses 13-17 are parenthetical; we must pass on to the eighteenth verse to find the conclusion. But as the mind would naturally lose the first part of the statement on account of the long parenthesis, the apostle repeats the substance of it, so that we may perceive the force of the conclusion. So the first part of verse 18 is parallel to verse 12. "As by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men to condemnation." The conclusion is, "even so by the righteousness of One the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life."

The Reign of Death.-"Death reigned from Adam to Moses." That does not imply that death did not reign just as much afterwards. But the point is that Moses stands for the giving of the law; "for the law was given by Moses." John i. 17. Now since death reigns through sin, and sin is not imputed when there is no law, it is evident from the statement that "death reigned from Adam to Moses," that the law was in the world just as much before Sinai as it was afterwards. "The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law." 1 Cor. xv. 56. There can be no sin imputed when there is no law; but wherever there is sin, there death reigns.

Adam a Figure.-"Death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of Him that was to come." How is Adam a figure of Him that was to come, namely, Christ? Just as the following verses indicate, that is, Adam was a figure of Christ in that his action involved many besides himself. It is evident that Adam could not give his descendants any higher nature than he had himself, so Adam's sin made it inevitable that all his descendants should be born with sinful natures. Sentence of death, however, does not pass on them for that, but because they have sinned.

A Figure by Contrast.-Adam is a figure of Christ, but only by contrast. "Not as the offence, so also is the free gift." Through the offence of one many are dead; but through the righteousness of One, many receive life. "The judgment was by one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offences unto justification. For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by One, Jesus Christ." There is contrast all the way through. Everything that came through Adam's fall is undone in Christ; or, better still, all that was lost in Adam is restored in Christ.

"Much More."-This might be taken as the key-note of this chapter. Not only is everything that is lost in Adam restored in Christ, but "much more." "If, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son; much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life." And there is no chance of finding fault with the inevitable fact that we are inheritors of a sinful nature through Adam. We can not complain that we are unjustly dealt with. It is true that we are not to blame for having a sinful nature, and the Lord recognises the fact. So He provides that just as in Adam we were made partakers of a sinful nature, even so in Christ we shall be made partakers of the divine nature. But "much more." "For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ." That is, the life of which we are made partakers in Christ is much stronger for righteousness than the life which we received from Adam is for unrighteousness. God does not do things by halves. He gives "abundance of grace."

The Condemnation.-"Death passed upon all men;" or, as stated later, "judgment came upon all men to condemnation." "The wages of sin is death." Rom. vi. 23. All have sinned, and, therefore, all are in condemnation. There has not a man lived on earth over whom death has not reigned, nor will there be until the end of the world. Enoch and Elijah, as well as those who shall be translated when the Lord comes, are no exceptions. There are no exceptions, for the scripture

659

says that "death passed upon all men." For the reign of death is simply the reign of sin. "Elias was a man of like passions with us." Enoch was righteous only by faith; his nature was as sinful as that of any other man. So that death reigned over them as well as over any others. For be it remembered that this present going into the grave, which we so often see, is not the punishment of sin. It is simply the evidence of our mortality. Good and bad alike die. This is not the condemnation, because men die rejoicing in the Lord, and even singing songs of triumph.

"Justification of Life."-"By the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life." There is no exception here. As the condemnation came upon all, so the justification comes upon all. Christ has tasted death for every man. He has given Himself for all. Nay, he has given Himself to every man. The free gift has come upon all. The fact that it is a free gift is evidence that there is no exception. If it came upon only those who have some special qualification, then it would not be a free gift. It is a fact, therefore, plainly stated in the Bible, that the gift of righteousness and life in Christ has come to every man on earth. There is not the slightest reason why every man that has ever lived should not be saved unto eternal life, except that they would not have it. So many spurn the gift offered so freely.

"The Obedience of One."-By the obedience of one shall many be made righteous. Men are not saved through their own obedience, but through the obedience of Christ. Here is where the sceptic cavils, and says that it is not just that one man's obedience should be counted as another's. But the man who rejects the counsel of the Lord does not know anything about justice, and is not qualified to speak in the case. The Bible does not teach us that God calls us righteous simply because Jesus of Nazareth was righteous eighteen hundred years ago. It says that by his obedience we are made righteous. Notice that it is present, actual righteousness. The trouble with those who object to the righteousness of Christ being imputed to believers is that they do not take into consideration the fact that Jesus lives. He is alive today, as much as when he was in Judea. "He ever liveth," and he is "the same yesterday and to-day, and forever." His life is as perfectly in harmony with the law now as it was then. And he lives in the hearts of those who believe on him. Therefore it is Christ's present obedience in believers that makes them righteous. They can of themselves do nothing, and so God in His love does it in them. Here is the whole story: "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Gal. ii. 20.

Why Not All?-The text says that "by the obedience of One shall many be made righteous." Some one may ask, "Why are not all made righteous by the obedience of One?" The reason is that they do not wish to be. If men were counted righteous simply because one was righteous eighteen hundred years ago, then all would have to be righteous by the same obedience. There would be no justice in counting righteousness to one and not to all, if it were in that way. But we have seen that it is not so. People are not simply counted righteous, but actually made righteous, by the obedience of Christ, who is as righteous as He ever was, and who lives today in those who yield to Him. His ability to live in any human being is shown in the fact that He took human flesh eighteen hundred years ago. What God did in the person of the carpenter of Nazareth, He is willing and anxious to do for every man that now lives. The free gift comes upon all, but all will not accept it, and therefore all are not made righteous by it. Nevertheless, many will be made righteous by His obedience. Who will be one of the many?

"The Coming Kingdom" The Present Truth 10, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

Our earth has not seen the last one of the great kingdoms which are to be established upon it. The God of heaven is to set up a kingdom, and we are living in the time when this stupendous event is to take place. Whatever absurd and extravagant theories may be floating about in the religious world upon this subject, there can be no doubt whatever that the Lord is to set up a kingdom here, and that we have reached the days in which this mighty act is to be done. We have but to turn to the prophecy and read the statement. We find it in the second chapter of the Book of Daniel. There are many prophecies which relate to this event, but none would speak more directly of the setting up of the kingdom, or which afford less ground for fanciful speculation.

This prophecy was given in a dream to Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, the greatest of the monarchs who ruled over the Babylonian empire. He did not understand the dream, and it troubled him; nor were the astrologers and soothsayers of Babylon able to tell the dream, or what it meant. But God revealed both to the prophet Daniel, and he was brought before the king and interpreted the dream. In his dream the king saw, as we are told (verse 31), a great image, likeness of a man, having a head of gold, breast and arms of silver, belly and thighs of brass, legs of iron, and feet part of iron and part of clay. As he beheld the image he saw a stone "cut out of the mountain without hands, which smote the image upon his feet," breaking them in pieces, upon which they were immediately swept away like chaff, while the stone "became a great mountain and filled the whole earth."

In his interpretation Daniel told the king that the image represented the kingdoms of the world from his own day down to the end of time. Four of these kingdoms, including that of Nebuchadnezzar, were to be universal. Nebuchadnezzar was at that time, as the prophet declared (verse 38), king over all the earth. The first kingdom represented by the image was his own. The prophet said to him, "Thou art this head of gold."

"After thee," said Daniel, "shall arise another kingdom inferior to thee, and another third kingdom of brass, which shall bear rule over all the earth." The kingdom which succeeded that of Babylonia was the Medo-Persian kingdom. When Belshazzar, the last Babylonian king, was slain on the night after his impious feast, "Darius the Median took the kingdom." Dan. v. 30, 31. He was not long afterward succeeded by Cyrus, king of Persia, who operated with Darius in the capture of Babylon. The Medo-Persian empire embraced all the territory of the Babylonian kingdom, and continued until it was overthrown by Alexander the Great. In the eighth of Daniel this empire is symbolised by a ram with two horns (verses 3, 4), which represented "

661

the kings of Media and Persia" (verse 20). In the vision of this chapter the prophet saw the ram overthrown by a goat which came with great swiftness against him, and had a great horn between his eyes. The goat, we are told (verse 21), was "the king of Grecia," the horn representing the first king, which was Alexander. Grecia, therefore, was the "third kingdom of brass," which should bear rule over all the earth, as the prophet said to Nebuchadnezzar. It became universal in the days of Alexander, who is reported to have wept because there were no more worlds to conquer.

The next great universal empire, the fourth kingdom, which was to be "strong as iron," was the kingdom of Rome, which rose to supremacy about the year 160 B.C. Of the strength and universality of this empire nothing need be said. It continued for centuries, until internal corruption finally sapped its strength, and the vast territory over which it ruled became broken up into smaller kingdoms, represented by the ten toes of the image. Of them the prophet says, "And whereas thou sawest the feet and toes, part of potters' clay and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, for as much as thou sawest the iron mixed with miry clay. And as the toes of the feet were part of iron and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong and partly broken." Verses 41, 42. This truthfully represents the condition which followed the division of the empire, and which we see illustrated in the remnants of those kingdoms as they exist to-day. Some of the divisions became strong, and some weak. Some of them have to-day the strength of iron, and some the weakness of clay. A glance at the nations now occupying the territory of the ancient Roman empire is sufficient to show this fact.

Nor will they mix together. The prophet said of them, "And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they shall make themselves with the seed of men; but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay." Verse 43. The fragments cannot be united again into one mass; the nations cannot be blended into one people. All the efforts that have been made to do this have failed. Napoleon conquered several nations and made great changes in the map of Europe, but his empire speedily fell to pieces. He did as much as could be done by arms to unite the nations, but he fell far short of attaining universal supremacy, and those which he bound together by force possessed no cohesion, but fell apart as soon as the bands were removed. Nor has anything more been accomplished by the mingling of the seed of men. Although the heads of the nations of Europe are nearly all allied with each other by marriage, no blending of kingdoms results therefrom. Whatever unions are formed from sentiment, no visible effect is produced in the sterner realm of business interests, but each nation pursues its own policy, guarding and extending its "rights" as jealously as if no alliances existed. The spirit of the times, seen in even the smaller countries of Europe, is that of national independence. The tendency is toward disintegration rather than reunion. Thus the prophecy is fulfilled.

And now comes the important part of the prophecy for us. "In the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever. Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter; and the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure." Verses 44, 45. This language is plain, and needs no interpretation. The four great universal kingdoms of the image were literal earthly kingdoms. The divisions were literal earthly kingdoms. And when the "stone cut out of the mountain without hands" shall smite the feet of the image, all these literal earthly kingdoms will be broken and swept away and the stone will take their place. The kingdom of God will be set up, a literal, visible kingdom, filling the whole earth. Then the promise to Abraham, "that he should be the heir of the world" (Rom. iv. 13), will be fulfilled to him and to his seed. Then "the meek shall inherit the earth, and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace." Ps. xxxvii. 11.

There has been, from the very first, a throne of grace and a kingdom of grace, of which fallen man becomes subject by conversion. Of this kingdom the Saviour spoke when He said, "The kingdom of God cometh not with observation, . . . for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you." Luke xvii. 20, 21. This kingdom has been gathering in its subjects during all the ages in which earthly governments have existed among men; but this work is not to go on for ever. This earth is not always to be the abode of sinners, a place of misery and wickedness, a plague-spot on God's universe. The work of God for sinners will be finished, the day of the Lord come (2 Peter iii. 10), in which the judgments of Jehovah will fall upon the finally impenitent. The hour will be reached which was foreseen and foretold by the Apostle John: "And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever" (Rev. xi. 15), and when will be fulfilled also the words of Ps. ii. 8, 9, "Ask of Me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession. Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel." All this will be incident to the setting up of a visible kingdom, in power and glory, by the God of heaven; a kingdom which shall break in pieces and consume all earthly kingdoms, as the prophet declared

662

(Dan. ii. 44), and shall stand for ever.

We are now far advanced in "the days of these kings," when the God of heaven is to set up His kingdom. Are we looking forward to this great and solemn event? Shall we turn our eyes away from the plain words of the prophecy, as from a mystic or an idle tale? The prophet declared, "The dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure." These are God's words, addressed to us. He revealed these things to king Nebuchadnezzar; but how much greater and more solemn is their import to us, who live down in the consummation of his prophetic dream. The things written aforetime are "written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come." 1 Cor. x. 11.

God gives men ample opportunity to know the truth, but He does not force them to believe it. Signs of the great approaching day have been displayed upon both earth and sky, and every force of nature has been summoned to give its warning testimony of the end of all things at hand. The earth itself "mourneth and languisheth." It has waxed old like a garment; it has become threadbare in many places, like a man enfeebled by age, it can no longer retain a calm and steady control of the forces within it, and the once gentle rain becomes a deluge, and the sunshine a burning drouth. Cyclone and fire cover large districts with death and ruin. The judgments of God are in the land, and will become terrible teachers of His righteousness.

Sacred history reveals the fact that in all ages the Divine judgments have fallen suddenly and unexpectedly. Even the greatest of them have taken the world by surprise, and it will be even so in our day. Hear the words of Christ: "But as the days of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be." Matt. xxv. 37-39. They "knew not until the flood came." Why did they not know? Had not Noah preached it to them for a hundred and twenty years? Yes; but they did not believe him; and the same unbelief blinds the eyes of men to-day. Notwithstanding the plain prophecy which we have here examined, and many others which might be cited from God's word, the vast majority of mankind will not know of the coming destruction of earthly things, when the stone cut out without hands shall smite the image upon the feet, and earthly kingdoms, with all that pertains to them, shall be swept away. And they will be ignorant of this simply because they will not heed the plain words which our merciful God has sent to warn and save them. "The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up." 2 Peter iii. 10.

"But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day; we are not of the night, nor of darkness. Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. . . . . For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Thess. v. 4-9. Solemn and forcible is the admonition left by our Saviour upon this point: "Take ye heed, watch and pray; for ye know not when the time is. . . . . Watch ye therefore; for ye know not when the master of the house cometh, at even, or at midnight, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning; lest coming suddenly he find you sleeping." Mark xiii. 33-36. What excuse can be rendered at the final day by those to whom God shall have spoken in vain?

"Attaining Moral Perfection" The Present Truth 10, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

A Spanish duke, it is reported, has committed suicide because he was not able to attain moral perfection. This is an example of human nature doing the best it can. There is not a man on earth that has not just as good cause for committing suicide as had this duke, and the only reason why the lives of people who are "trying to do the best they can" do not terminate as his did, is that they care less about moral perfection. Human nature is fallen, and cannot rise again to its lost plans by any power or virtue of its own.

Yet there is a way to attain perfection, for He who said, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in Heaven is perfect" (Matt. v. 48), knew that this was utterly beyond the power of man, and so He gave them His own almighty power for its accomplishments. Note the testimony of Paul, who knew this power. "Brethren," he writes to the Philippians, "I count not myself to have apprehended; but this one thing I do; forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." Phil. iii. 13, 14.

Paul valued moral perfection as highly as any man; yet, though he did not consider himself perfect, he was not in despair over the fact, but full of hope and courage. And thus it is with those who seek perfection by the Christian method. With Christ living and working in them, they know that the victory is theirs, for He has already conquered every foe. But without Him, the only recourse is to try to evolve some moral power out of human nature, where there is no power-to bring a clean thing out of the unclean-and afflict the erring body with torturing penalties such as long fastings, pilgrimages, and the various forms of penance, or take the shorter road to the same result which was taken by the duke.

But the language of Paul in this connection is worthy of careful note. He says, "Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended." He had not come to the place where he could pause and survey his own perfection. He did not stop to measure up his attainments and see how far he had advanced, but simply kept pressing forward with eyes fixed upon "the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." He looked steadily upon the glory of God revealed in Jesus (2 Cor. iv. 4-6), and forgot self entirely. Had he not done so,-had he taken his eyes away from Jesus and looked at himself-he would that moment have fallen back toward the place from which he had started. If he had looked at himself and seen himself to be perfect, he would have seen something which was far from that. Notice the testimony of Job: "If I justify myself, my own mouth shall condemn me; if I say, I am perfect, it shall also prove me perverse." Job ix. 20. Looking at self and beholding perfection in self was what started all the trouble in the universe; for that was what Satan did when, as Lucifer, he was an exalted angel in heaven. See Isa. xiv. 12-15; Eze. xxviii. Prov-19. He saw his beauty and brightness and because of this his heart was lifted up (verse 17) and he essayed to set up a government of his own and be equal with God. But his beauty and brightness was not his own,

663

but God's. It was simply God in him that gave him his excellence; and when God withdrew from him and left him to himself, there was left simply-the devil.

We are not, therefore, to look to ascertain whether we are morally perfect, or ever to see any moral perfection anywhere else but in Christ. When we are perfect, is when we are crucified with Christ, and He lives in us. Gal. ii. 20. And then the perfection is not ours, but His; but God, in His love to us, gives us all the credit, and treats us as though it were our own.

"The Best Study of Modern Missions" The Present Truth 10, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

THE STORY OF JOHN G. PATON, by Rev. James Paton. Illustrated. 5s. Hodder & Stoughton, 27 Paternoster Row, London.

The story of the life and labours of John G. Paton among the cannibals of the New Hebrides is the most thrilling in all the history of modern missions; and the story of modern missions is a thrilling and inspiring one. If anybody wants to find books for the youth that will hold their attention and teach lessons of faith in God, let them try the lives of some of these pioneers, and they will find more wonderful experiences than the novelist can draw from his imagination. And the life pictured is a real one, showing that God really lives and works wonders with those who will trust Him.

The Story of John G. Paton has an important lesson for this time especially, when it is too currently believed that the methods of the Book of Acts are out of date; and that, while it is all right to trust the Lord, it is still necessary to have the protection of consuls and gunboats in the work of preaching the Gospel to the heathen. There are many who think Christ's teachings about non-resistance are only figurative language, and that no one could get on who really followed the teaching in these days.

But when Mr. Paton went to Tanna he had only God to care for him. Was that sufficient? How could he have had more? Again and again, when the maddened natives wanted to kill him, and could have done so with perfect impunity, the voice of God was heard as of old, saying, "Touch not Mine anointed, and do My prophets no harm." After a council of natives had decided that the missionary must die the people assembled at his house and-"a man furiously rushed on me with his axe; but a chief snatched a spade with which I had been working, and dexterously defended me from instant death. Life in such circumstances led me to cling very near to the Lord Jesus; I knew not for one brief hour how attack might be made, and yet with my trembling hand clasped in the Hand once nailed on Calvary, and now swaying the sceptre of the universe, calmness and peace and resignation abode in my soul. Next day a wild chief followed me about for four hours with loaded musket, and though often directed toward me, God restrained his hand."

Again a company of men came in the night to shoot him, but they were afraid of a little dog. "Next morning the report went all round the harbour that those who tried to shoot me were 'smitten weak with fear,' and that shooting would not do."

"One day, while toiling away at my house, the war chief and his brother, ad a large party of armed men, surrounded the plot. They all had muskets. They watched me for some time in silence, and then every man leveled a musket straight at my head. Escape was impossible. Speech would only have increased my danger. I prayed to my Lord Jesus, either Himself to protect me or take me home to His glory. I tried to keep working at my task as if no one was near me. In that moment, as never before, the words came to me-'Whatsoever ye shall ask in My name, I will do it;' and I knew that I was safe. Retiring a little from their first position, no word having been spoken, they took up the same attitude somewhat further off, and seemed to be urging one another to fire the first shot. But my dear Lord restrained them once again."

The Sacred men of the tribe had been discomfited by Mr. Paton in a trial of their arts of sorcery, and the leader attempted to kill them.

"Though we got safely home, that old Sacred Man seemed still to hunger after my blood. For weeks thereafter, go where I would, he would suddenly appear on the path behind me, poising in his right hand that same Goliath spear. God only kept it from being thrown."

These are but a few of the incidents in that early experience in the island of Tanna. Day after day the angels of the Lord encamped round about the missionary, and not one of the bloodthirsty savages dared to press the trigger of the leveled musket, or throw the killing stone or spear when they might easily have done so. "It is the sober truth," says Mr. Paton, "and it comes back to me sweetly after twenty years, that I had my nearest and dearest glimpses of the face and smile of my blessed Lord in those dread moments when musket, club, or spear was leveled at my life. Oh, the bliss of living and enduring, as seeing 'Him who is invisible'!"

Need we say that the cannibals of Tanna and other islands long since gave up their ways and are a different people now? We wish that every one might read this story of God's work in the New Hebrides. It is what is needed; for even professing believers are so apt to think the Lord is a long way off, and hesitate to follow Him for fear of danger or distress. As though God could not and does not care for those that put their trust in Him alone, just the same as He did in ancient days. The Lord is constantly doing it, but it is not often that we find in one book so soul-inspiring and encouraging a testimony as Mr. Paton

664

gives in this one. If you have not read it, do not fail to do so if you possibly can, and as you read it, remember that the same Lord can do the same marvellous works for you, whatever may be the work He gives you to do, if you will take the faith that Jesus gives.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

-Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes died from asthma at Boston, Oct. 7, in his eighty-sixth year.

-The military barracks at Granada, Nicaragua, have been blown up, 200 persons being killed.

-A severe typhoon, which caused much damage to the small craft in the harbour, is reported from Hong Kong.

-The St. Petersburg journal Novosti boldly urges Russia to avert future evils by annexing Korea and Manchuria.

-The Bill granting liberty of worship to all denominations in Hungary was defeated in the House of Magnates on the third reading.

-The Czar is in the last stages of Bright's disease, the Ameer of Afghanistan is very ill, and the King of Siam is in the last stages of consumption.

-Advices received from Cuba state that about 200 fatalities were caused by the recent storm in the island. The damage to property is estimated at between 2,000,000 and 3,000,000 dollars.

-During the week ending Oct. 10, sixteen cases of cholera and eight deaths were reported in ten communes throughout Holland. Of these, six cases and one death occurred in Amsterdam.

-A whistling snake has been discovered in Australia. It rushes out from its lair and boldly attacks human beings, uttering the while sounds resembling a whistle. Its sting proves fatal in a bee minutes.

-John Revell, a Michigan miner, was recently thawing some dynamite in his home when it exploded with terrific force. The whole house was blown to atoms, and five persons were killed, three others being fatally injured.

-Terrible storms have raged on the western Atlantic, and great damage has been done along the coast of North America. At Newfoundland over fifty vessels have gone ashore, and thirty fishermen are believed to have perished.

-A chemist in Algiers has invented a process for concentrating wine in tablets. Henceforth, we are told, travellers will be able to carry great intake of wine in small boxes To make the wine, it will only be necessary to add the amount of water which had been allowed to evaporate.

-The war spirit amongst the Kaffes at Delagoa Bay is spreading fast, and all the natives in the Portuguese territory are in arms. Already several whites and a large number of friendly Kaffirs have been massacred at Lorenzo Marques.

-There is talk in Russia of a regency for maintaining the form of government during the illness of the Czar. The latter is said to suffer from great mental depression, which is considered one of the gravest features connected with his malady.

-The Unification of London Commissioners have issued their report, in which they suggest a grand council for the metropolis with local administrative bodies. This means, it is said, the merging of the old city into "Creator London" in the near future.

-Whilst a party of hop-pickers were being driven in a waggon over a level crossing between Canterbury and Chatham, they were run into by a train. The waggon-driver and six women and children were killed, and eight others more or less seriously injured.

-President Cleveland has issued a proclamation declaring that he is satisfied that the members of the Mormon Church are now living in obedience to the laws, and granting a full amnesty and pardon to those convicted of polygamy and suffering deprivation of civil rights.

-The International Arbitration and Peace Association has passed resolutions protesting against the military interference of British subjects in Madagascar, and suggesting to the French Peace Society that the difficulties which have arisen are a fit subject for arbitration.

-The eighty-six Greek army officers who were charged with destroying the Akropolis newspaper office at Athens on account of its military comment, were unanimously acquitted by the court-martial, which even declared them "innocent." Doubtless it will be some thine before a Greek journal ventures again to make criticisms respecting the army.

-Louis Koekoek was a good workman employed in London as a diamond cutter. He had a wife and a young family to whom be was strongly attached. But he was a gambler, and ended by staking his employers jewels in the hope of recovering his losses at baccarat. When he had played and lost everything, including his character, he drank vitriol enough to kill eight people.

-Not only the Bishops but the Roman Catholic laymen have now raised vigorous protests against the "consecration" of Senor Cabrera as Protestant Bishop in Madrid. The question will be raised in the Spanish Senate and Chamber of Deputies by the Ultra-Catholic members. They will be joined by many leading men in the Conservative party, and stormy debates are expected.

-A rare archaeological discovery has been made in the town of Kertch, Russia, from which may interesting relics of the pest have been unearthed. Recently a workman, while digging at the foot of an ancient tumulus, which erections are plentiful in the Crimea, came across the colossal effigy of a lion, carved out of the finest white marble and of the most excellent Greek workmanship. This interesting effigy, which is over 7ft. in length, weighs 70cwt.

-The Duke of Tamanes, the Civil Governor of Madrid, is waging a vigorous warfare in that city against ell gamblers, owing to which he recently received an anonymous letter threatening that a bomb would be exploded in his official residence, unless he relaxed the resent rigorous enforcement of the anti-gambling law. In view of the desperate character of many of the professional gamblers, the fear is entertained that the attempt will be actually made by them.

-Sheng, the Taotai or chief magistrate of Tientsin, and nephew of Li Hung Chang, is disgraced. It appears that he purchased 300,000 obsolete and almost worthless rifles from the Germans, and charged the Government more than four times as much as he gave for them. The viceroy is reported to have ended an interview with his nephew by slapping him in the face, after which the latter retired, no doubt satisfied to be disgraced for a gain of over ?300,000.

-Advices to St. Petersburg from Tiflis, state that the position of the Asiatic Christians is really dreadful. Communication between the towns and villages has been beoken; letters are opened; commerce is at an end. Prices have therefore, risen on all the necessaries of life. What is worse, there is no pnsnbility for those colonists to return to their native land, as the Turkish consuls refuse to sign the passports. Military forces have been sent against the Christian population of Sassoun, the reason given for this course being that the taxes are not forthcoming.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

The correspondent of one of our religious contemporaries are engaged in a discussion, trying to find out if the millennium has already begun.

The Buddhist priests encourage the Japanese to slaughter the Chinese, telling them that the highest felicity awaits those who die with their weapons in their hands.

The religions of the East are missioning in the West. Buddhism has long had a foothold in Europe and America, and now a monthly journal is published in Liverpool in the interests of Mohammedanism.

The grace of giving is one of the Christian graces and privileges. Then why should it be any more needful to devise expedients to get people to give for the Lord's work than to get them to pray or engage in any service of devotion? If one does not give for his love of the Lord, his money is not needed. If he loves the Lord and believes a work is the work of the Lord, he will give money to prosecute it. Then there is no need of the devices borrowed from the world, such as are so commonly resorted to to get people to pay money who do not give because of their love for the work.

Writing from Lausanne, Switzerland, Mr. H. P. Holser, manager of the Seventh-day Adventist publishing house in Basel, whose case has been before the courts for printing on Sunday, says:-

Our case was decided at this place to-day by the Superior Court against us. Two judges were in our favour, and four were not openly against us, but in favour of enforcing the law. A great point made was that of the civil Sunday. As soon as I get the Clerk's report, I will send you an article. We shall probably bring the case before the Federal Assembly which meets in December; but I do not expect that this will hinder the execution of the sentence.

The civil Sunday plea is of course an evasion. It is the same plea that the Church of Rome has always made to excuse religious persecution. It was always the civil power, and not the church that punished "heretics"; and they were punished not for irreligion, it is claimed, but for rejecting customs which society and the State had established.

"The religion of Europe is the worship of Mars," said Sir John Lubbock at the meeting of the Institute of Sociology in Paris. The god of war is worshipped more blindly in Europe than in Asia or Africa. It is an illustration of the gross darkness that follows when the light is turned into darkness.

"Salvation Not in Works" The Present Truth 10, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

Salvation Not in Works.-"Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity." Matt. vii. 22, 23. The uppermost thought in the minds of these is, We and our works. This was the thought they had when they were professedly the zealous servants of Christ, and so completely have they been deceived by it that they even present it as a reason for their admission into the kingdom of heaven, and then, with horror and consternation, they learn that they are cherishing something of no value. Not, We and our works, but Jesus Christ and Him crucified, is the passport that will secure admission there.

"Apostolic Succession" The Present Truth 10, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

Apostolic Succession.-The Scriptures tell us that "without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness." 1 Tim. iii. 16. There has been plenty of controversy, but the controversy has done nothing to solve the mystery. We are reminded of this text by the controversy now raging over the question of "apostolical succession." Having listened to the deliverances of Cardinal Vaughan and Anglican High Churchmen on the subject, it will be refreshing and profitable to look away from the field of controversy and see what is told as concerning it in the word of the Lord. Not that "apostolical succession" is anywhere mentioned in the Bible; for like most of those subjects which have involved Christendom in fierce debate, the question is not raised in Scripture at all. The real question is that of the right and Divine authority of man to preach the Gospel.

Notice Paul's language to the Galatians: "But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed." Gal. i. 8. This shows at once the folly of placing any dependence upon "apostolical succession." The important thing is not the station of a preacher, or the line of "succession" which he may be able to trace back to early times, but the word which he preaches. But people have come to pay little attention to the latter, and are ready to accept as truth almost anything which the Church dignitaries may say, provided only that there be no question as to his rightful place in the "succession."

The Bible tells us who are authorised to give the Gospel invitation. "The Spirit and the Bride say, Come; and let him that heareth say, Come." Rev. xxii. 16. Whosoever hears the gracious invitation may pass it on to his fellow man. It is both his privilege and his duty to do so. But any person, no matter how high or "valid" his station, who preaches any other gospel than that which Paul preached, puts himself under a curse.

"The Stocks Again" The Present Truth 10, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

The Stocks Again.-The old notion that religion may be advanced by force is reviving, and this leads to the enforcement of some of the old laws which many supposed had expired generations ago. Twice within a few months the Sunday law of Charles II. has been set in operation against observers of the seventh-day Sabbath in Australia. The second case has been widely discussed in the Australian press. A correspondent writes of the results of the conviction as follows:-

Of course he would not pay his fine, so was sentenced to the stocks, and the stocks were ordered to be made. After passing the sentence, the police magistrate and members of the bar said that the law was unjust, and advised our people to take steps to have it repealed. Before the stocks were completed, however, the Minister of Justice came to the rescue, as I suppose he did not want the colony disgraced at the present time with the carrying out of the penalty of such a law as that of Charles II. He took the matter in hand, and by investigating the law, he found a technical fault in the case in the amount of the fine imposed, which was two shillings, sixpence; the law says five shillings, or in default levy and distress, or to be acted publicly in the stocks for two hours. He then declared the sentence illegal, and took the matter to the Governor, who signed a requisition to this effect.

October 25, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 43.

E. J. Waggoner

"In everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you." 1 Thess. v. 18.

Very often we hear people say, "I can't see very much that I have to be thankful for;" and doubtless many would thus reply even to the text just quoted. Such seem to misapprehend the scripture. It does not say, "Give thanks for everything that exactly meets your desires," but, "in everything give thanks," making no exceptions for disagreeable things.

The exhortation is put even more strongly in Eph. v. 20. "Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ." Not only are we to be thankful in everything, but for everything.

Nothing comes upon any child of God except what He sends or permits. When Satan was given permission to plague Job, the patriarch accepted it as from the Lord, and said, when moved to complain: "What? shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?" Job ii. 10.

Those afflictions were necessary for Job. They resulted in such a revelation of God to him as he had never before dreamed of. And when He saw God, he saw that He is love. "Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; but the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy." James v. 11. How many people there are who have been ignorant of the depth of tender love which their friends had for them until trouble revealed it. Blessed be the tribulation that reveals to us the infinite tenderness of the Friend who is above all!

We are exhorted, "My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing." James i. 2-4. It appears, therefore, that even temptations are necessary in order that we may have no lack. Shall we not thank the Lord for that which works to supply all our need?

There is nothing more base than ingratitude. What can be more hateful than to complain when receiving good gifts? Yet who has not at some time in his life complained bitterly over some event for which he was afterwards very thankful? If we had known at the time that which we afterwards knew, we should have been patient. Now God gives us information by which we may avoid such mistakes. He tells us that He allows nothing to come to us except that which is good. To be unthankful, therefore, is not to recognise God, and is the first step toward heathenism. See Rom. i. 20-23. Let us therefore in Christ always be thankful for all things.

How minute is God's care for all His creatures! Not a sparrow falls to the ground without His notice, and not one of them is forgotten. Of men, even the very hairs of the head are all numbered. Luke xii. 6, 7. What force this gives to the assurance which Christ gives to His people that in the time of persecution "there shall not an hair of your head perish." Luke xxi. 16-18. But note further: He says that some shall be put to death, but that even then not a hair shall perish. Why?-Because "neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Rom. viii. 38, 39.

"If, through unruffled seas,
Calmly toward heaven we sail,
With grateful hearts, O God, to Thee.
We'll own the favouring gale.

"But should the surges rise,
And rest delay to come;
Blest be the sorrow, kind the storm
Which drives us nearer home."

"Rome Unchanged" The Present Truth 10, 43.

E. J. Waggoner

Has Rome changed? Has she become the friend and advocate of religious freedom? In two of the leading countries of Europe she has lately answered this question. In Hungary, after opposing with all her strength the Civil Marriage Bill, which narrowly escaped extinction at her hands, she fought against and defeated the Religious Liberty Bill,-a mild measure which granted to all denominations freedom in the practice of religious rites. In Spain the consecration of a Protestant bishop of Madrid has called forth protests and denunciations from the Papal Primate of Toledo, and also from the Papal Nuncio, and the whole country is excited. All the Spanish bishops, it is said, have uttered their minds, declaring the act to be "an outrage on the traditional rights of the Spanish Church," and also "a violation of Art. XII. of the Constitution." Meanwhile the head of the Church, Leo XIII., from his seat of power and authority looks quietly on without a word of protest

674

or a syllable spoken in favour of that religious freedom of which the Catholic Church is alleged to be the friend and defender.

No; religious freedom for Protestants is still an "outrage" upon Catholic "rights," and a "violation of the supreme law of the land." Consequently it is in order for the civil authorities in Spain to take the offenders in hand and deal with them as the law prescribes, or as it may be construed by a Catholic judge or jury. The only reason why this will (probably) not be done, is that enlightened public sentiment, both in that country and elsewhere throughout Europe, plays a restraining hand upon such extreme exhibitions of religious bigotry.

Notice, also, that since this "outrageous" act is punishable as a violation of the civil law, such punishment cannot, according to the logic of some who call themselves Protestants, be considered religious persecution, and as conviction and punishment for violations of the civil law was what sent Christians of the Dark Ages to the dungeon, the rack, and the stake, it follows from the same logic that Rome never really persecuted anybody, and that the millions of "martyrs" of that period were not martyrs, but only criminals. This is exactly what Rome claims. In this, as in other respects, she is the same to-day that she was then.

"Christ Our Passover" The Present Truth 10, 43.

E. J. Waggoner

"Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us." 1 Cor. v. 7.

The Israelites were commanded to take a lamb without blemish, and keep it until the fourteenth day of the month, killing it in the evening. "And they shall take of the blood, and strike it on the two side posts and on the upper door post of the houses, wherein they shall eat it." "For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the Lord. And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where ye are: and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I smite the land of Egypt." Ex. xii. 7, 11-13.

There was a destroying angel in the land. Death and destruction were determined from the Lord. So in this day in which we live there is destruction determined upon the whole land, "a consumption, even determined upon the whole earth." Isa. xxviii. 22.

We read in Hebrews that by faith they kept the Passover, and so it is by faith that we must keep it. Christ our Passover is slain for us. It is His blood that averts the destruction that would come upon us. He was slain for their deliverance as well as for ours. There was no virtue in the blood of a lamb, which they sprinkled on the door post; it was simply a token of their faith in the blood of Christ, who was their real Passover, as He is ours. There was no other way than by faith that they could keep the Passover, even as Christ can be received only by faith.

We too have the blood of sprinkling, and the Apostle Paul speaks to us thus positively about it: "But ye are come unto Mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel." Heb. xii. 22-24.

The last part of the verses quoted is very generally taken as figurative language merely. Mount Sion is real, a literal thing; the city of the living God is a real place; the innumerable company of angels are real beings: John saw them surrounding the throne, ready to be despatched on the instant to the uttermost parts of the earth. See Rev. v. 11. God the Judge of all, and Jesus the Mediator,-they are very real beings. Jesus ascended bodily into the heavens, there to appear in the presence of God for us. He is the Mediator between God and men, "the Man Christ Jesus." "And to the blood of sprinkling"-but here it is commonly taken for granted that the apostle is speaking figuratively.

Eighteen hundred years ago or more Christ was crucified outside Jerusalem. He shed His blood. Not only were the nails driven into the hands and feet, shedding His blood, but the spear was thrust into His side, and there came out the blood and the water.

Many have looked a long way into the past to the cross, taking it for granted that because Christ shed His blood there the fact has been counted for us. Of course, too, there has been a touch of the old pagan idea of propitiating the favour of God with blood; the idea that because He was sacrificed, God will take that and be satisfied.

But now, at this time, there are three that bear record, "the Spirit, the water, and the blood." In the verse in Hebrews it is said that we are come to the blood of sprinkling. So in another chapter we are told that we may now have "boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh." Heb. x. 19, 20.

675

It is the blood of Jesus that gives us the boldness to enter in.

The Apostle Peter says of this blood: "Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot." 1 Peter i. 18, 19. The blood that redeems is incorruptible, not subject to decay. Christ entered into the holy place with His own blood, and there appears for us.

Is it a reality, or only a figure of speech, when we speak of the blood as being actually there? We are come to Mount Sion, to Jesus the Mediator, and to the blood of sprinkling. We read again, "If we walk in the light, as He in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin." It is put in the present tense. It is cleansing us from all sin.

What about the flesh of Christ? "He whom God raised up saw no corruption." "Thou wilt not leave My soul in hell: neither wilt Thou suffer Thine Holy One to see corruption." As His flesh saw no corruption, so His blood, that was poured out at the cross, was not left to corruption; it was incorruptible, precious. He appears in the presence of God for us with His own blood, the blood that is ever living and incorruptible.

This helps us to an understanding of Paul's words to the Galatians, "O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you?" In the most vivid sense Jesus Christ is crucified now. We do not have to look back eighteen hundred years to see the cross set up, and the blood flowing from the side of Jesus; but He is crucified. His blood, ever fresh, and incorruptible, is as really and vividly present before the throne as when He suffered outside the gates of old Jerusalem.

And we have come to the blood of sprinkling; it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul, that cleanseth from sin. When the apostle looked into the city, to the place where thousands of angels were assembled before the throne, he saw in the midst of it a Lamb, as it had been slain. We have come to the innumerable company of angels, and to Jesus the Mediator, and to the blood of sprinkling.

The Lamb, as it were slain, was in the midst of the throne. Justice and judgment are the foundation of the throne. The law of God is the basis of it. But in the midst of the throne, identified with it, and with the righteousness of God, the law, is the Lamb slain, the blood of sprinkling. So He is crucified now, a present Saviour. His blood is shed for us now. We come to the cross literally now. We are crucified with Him.

His blood is shed, and it is counted for us, because He identifies Himself with us in our sin. And as we lay hold of Him by faith, He comes into our hearts, and His blood is ever flowing to cleanse the sin. It is in Him that we live and have our being; we receive Him in the light and the air and the food by which He sustains the life, and as He comes within, even while dead in trespasses and sins our faith accepts Him and we are crucified with Him. The blood of Christ it is that makes atonement for the soul, and that blood is ever fresh, incorruptible, and ever liveth. So the same act which makes our sin His as we grasp Him by faith, makes His life ours, and we live. We are crucified with Christ; nevertheless we live.

The knowledge that the cross is set up in every heart, that He is crucified with us and we with Him, makes the crosses and the burdens to be borne, the sins to be trampled under foot, the habits to be given up, which take our very life,-the knowledge, we say, that Christ is now crucified for us, that His blood is shed for us now, and not in fancy

676

but in fact, that we are crucified with Him, makes the very presence of these crosses a joy.

The Apostle John wrote, "If any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and He is the propitiation [sacrifice] for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world." He is now the sacrifice. "Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation to faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God." Rom. iii. 24, 25. For the "passing over of sins," as the Revised Version has it.

God has set Him forth, lifted Him up to be seen, that looking at Him we may have faith in His blood for the passing over of our sins,-for the taking of them away through the forbearance of God. Christ makes peace for us through the blood of His cross. Being reconciled by His death, we know we shall be saved by His life. He receives the death and destruction that come because of sin, and we are passed over. Taking hold by faith the present work of Christ as the Mediator, coming to the blood of sprinkling for the washing away of sins, living now with the Lord at the cross, makes the Christian life such a reality that it is worth living.

"When a Pope Dies" The Present Truth 10, 43.

E. J. Waggoner

In religious and political circles in Italy the next Papal Conclave is being discussed. The Pope and his last Bull fixed the regulations that are to guide the Cardinals in choosing his successor. Even when a Pope is drawing his last breath there are forms and ceremonies to be performed which seem anything but appropriate to a deathbed. A French prelate has recently published a work in which he gives the traditions and the laws governing the papal succession. And describes the elaborate ceremonial of the death chamber.

Around the couch where the moribund Pontiff is battling with death, the Sacred College, or at least as many of the Cardinals as are at Rome, are kneeling. The Sacristan Bishop administers the Viaticum and the Extreme Unction. The Grand Penitentiary gives the Absolution. The Penitential Psalms are then intoned. The Sacristan Bishop pronounces the consecrated formula, the expiring Pontiff, if he has the strength to do so, gives his benediction to the Assembly, and the dirge of the mortuary hymns continues until the end. In order to make official record of the death, the Camerlengo takes up a small silver Hammer, with which he strikes three light blows on the dead man's head, and calls on him by his Christian name.

On the 7th February, 1878, the dead Pope was Pious IX., and, after dealing the three blows with a hammer, the Camerlengo, Cardinal Pecci-the present Pope-called "John! John! John!" and then, turning to the assembly, exclaimed, "The Pope is truly dead!" All present then kneel, and the Camerlengo recites the De profundis. The Master of the Chambers then removes from the dead Pope's finger the "fisherman's ring," and hands it to the Camerlengo-a ceremony that is intended to be the outward signs of the temporary transfer of the authority of the Holy See. At the first plenary meeting of the Sacred College this ring, the seals, and other insignia are broken up. All emblems connected with the late Pope are destroyed. The temporary sovereignty passes to the hands of the Sacred College.

"Studies in Romans. Grace and Truth. Rom. v. 20, 21" The Present Truth 10, 43.

E. J. Waggoner

In studying the two remaining verses of this chapter, it will be sufficient for our present purpose if we remember that the main thought running through the chapter is life and righteousness. Sin is death, and righteousness is life. Death has passed upon all men, because all have sinned, and the gift of righteousness has come to all men in the life of Christ. Sin is not imputed when there is no law, yet sin was imputed to Adam and to all who lived after him, even till the time of the giving of the law, in the days of Moses.

"Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound; that as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." Rom. v. 20, 21.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

Why did the law enter?

"The law entered, that the offence might abound."

What took place when sin abounded?

"Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound."

Where did sin abound?

Wherever the law was; because the law entered that sin might abound, and sin is not imputed when there is no law.

Then when did sin abound?

When "the law entered."

Then when must grace have super-abounded?

At the entering of the law?

Why did God provide that where sin abounded grace might much more abound?

"That as sin have reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord."

How has sin reigned?

"Unto death."

How does grace reign?

"Through righteousness."

Unto what?

"Unto eternal life."

Through whom?

"Through Jesus Christ our Lord."

"The Law Entered."-This statement indicates that there was offence before the particular time spoken of as the "entering" of the law. Taking into consideration verses 13, 14, we have no difficulty in seeing that the giving of the law upon Sinai is the time referred to. "Until the law," the time of Moses, and the entering of the law, evidently refer to the one event.

Sin Abounding.-The law entered that the offence already existing might abound. "But sin is not imputed when there is no law." Therefore we must know that the law was in the world before the time spoken of as the "entering" of the law, that is, before it was spoken from Sinai. This is what we learned from verses 13, 14. It was not possible that the law should actually make any more sin than already existed. It could only emphasise it, that is, more plainly show its true nature. It was, as stated in chapter vii. 13, it was "that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful." There was not one whit more of the law of God in the world after it was spoken from Sinai than there was before; neither was anything that was right before, made sinful by the giving of the law; nor was any act that was sinful before, made more sinful by the giving of the law. But the circumstances under which the law was

677

spoken, tended to show the awfulness of sin, and to impress the hearers with a greater sense of their sinfulness than ever before.

Grace Superabounding.-"Where sin abounded grace did much more abound." It would be well if every person knew this fact. We should hear less talk about being discouraged because we are so sinful. Is the heart full of sin? Know that where sin abounds, there does grace much more abound. This is shown in the fact that Christ, who is full of grace, stands at the door of the heart that is sinfulness itself, and knocks for admission. See Rev. iii. 15-20. "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief." 1 Tim. i. 15. When Wesley sang,

"Plenteous grace with Thee is found,
Grace to cover all my sin,"

he had the authority of Rom. v. 20 for it!

Grace at Sinai.-Since the law entered that the offence might abound, it is evident that at the very time of the entering of the law the offence must have greatly abounded. There never was a time when the awfulness of sin was made to stand out more prominently. "But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound." Therefore it is as plain as the Scripture can make it, that grace was superabounding at the giving of the law from Sinai. It is a mistake, therefore, to suppose that God designed that any should think that righteousness was to be obtained by their own works of obedience. On the contrary, the law was spoken to emphasise the boundless grace of God, in pardoning sin, and in working righteousness in men.

The Law and God's Throne.-We read that "righteousness and judgment are the habitation of His throne." Ps. xcvii. 2. Righteousness dwells in His throne. It is the foundation of it. The law of God is righteousness, even His own righteousness. This is shown by Isa. li. 6, 7, where God speaks of His righteousness, and says, "Hearken unto me, ye that know righteousness, the people in whose heart is My law." That is, only they in whose heart is God's law, know His righteousness. Therefore His law is His righteousness. And the statement that righteousness is the habitation or establishment of His throne, indicates that the law of God is in His throne. He sits upon the throne of righteousness.

Evidence from the Tabernacle.-The tabernacle built by Moses was for a dwelling place for God. "Let them make Me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them." Ex. xxv. 8. In that sanctuary, in the most holy place, was the ark of the testament. This ark is described in Ex. xxv. 10-22. The cover of the ark was called the mercy-seat. Upon this mercy-seat were the two cherubim of gold. Within the ark, under the mercy-seat, were the tables of the law. See Ex. xxv. 16-21; Deut. x. 1-5. Between the cherubim, upon the mercy-seat, and above the tables of the law, was where the glory of God was seen, and where God spoke to the people. Ex. xxv. 22. In 2 Kings xix. 15 and Psalm lxxx. 1. God is addressed as sitting between the cherubim. Therefore we learn that the ark of the testament, with the mercy seat, or the cover, was a representation of the throne of God. As the ten commandments were in the ark in the earthly tabernacle, so the ten commandments are the very foundation of the throne of God in heaven. We may note, in passing, that since the earthly tabernacle was a figure of the true tabernacle in heaven, therefore we are taught that the law as it stands in heaven, in the throne of God, is identical with the law as spoken from Sinai, and written on the tables of stone that were placed in the ark.

God's Throne and Sinai.-We have learned that the law of God is the very basis of His throne. This is no more than might reasonably be expected, since the basis of any government is its law, and the throne simply stands for the law. Mount Sinai, when the law was spoken from it, was the seat of God's law. It represented the awfulness of the law, since no one could touch it without dying. The Lord was there with all His angels. See Deut. xxxiii. 2; Acts vii. 53. Therefore Mount Sinai, at the time of the giving of the law, was designed to represent the throne of God. Indeed, it was for the time the throne of God, the place whence the law goes forth, out of which proceed "lightnings and thunderings and voices" (Rev. iv. 5), and around which stand "ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands" of angels. Here again we learn that the righteousness which is the habitation of the throne of God is the righteousness described by the ten commandments, just as they were spoken from the top of Sinai, as recorded in Ex. xx. 3-17.

The Throne of Grace.-But although the throne of God is the habitation of His law, that law which is death to sinners, yet it is a throne of grace. We are exhorted to "come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need." Heb. iv. 16. Note that we are to come to obtain mercy. Note also that the top of the ark of the testimony, in which were the tables of the law, was called the mercy-seat. It was the place where God appeared to speak to His people, so that the ark of the earthly tabernacle not only represented the throne where God's law is enshrined, but it represented that throne as the throne of grace.

The Law and the Mediator.-We are told that the law was ordained "in the hand of a Mediator." Gal. iii. 19. Who was the Mediator in whose hand the law was ordained? "There is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus; who gave himself a ransom for all." 1 Tim. ii. 5, 6. The law, therefore, was given from Sinai by Christ, who is and always was the manifestation of God to men. He is the Mediator, that is, the One through whom the things of God are brought to men. The righteousness of God is conveyed to men through Jesus Christ. The statement that the law was given in the hand of a Mediator, reminds us that where sin abounded grace did much more abound. The fact that the law was in the hand of a Mediator at Sinai shows us this: (1) That God did not mean that any one should suppose that he must get the righteousness of the law by his own power, but only through Christ. (2) That the Gospel of Christ was displayed at Sinai as well as at Calvary. (3) That the righteousness of God which is revealed in the Gospel of Christ, is the identical righteousness that is described in the law as given from Sinai, without the alteration of a letter. The righteousness which we are to obtain in Christ is none other than that.

The Fountain of Life.-In Psalm xxxvi. 7-9 we read: "How excellent is thy loving-kindness, O God! Therefore the children of men put their trust under

678

the shadow of Thy wings. They shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of Thy house; and Thou shalt make them drink of the river of Thy pleasures. For with Thee is the fountain of life." It is because with God is the fountain of life that He makes those who trust in Him to drink of the river of His pleasure. What is that river?-"And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb." Rev. xxi. 1. Think of it! A river flowing out of the throne of God. He is the fountain of life. The invitation is to every one that is athirst to drink of the water of life freely. Rev. xxii. 17, John iv. 10-14, and vii. 37-39, will help to an understanding of the matter. We take the living water by receiving the Holy Spirit.

Drinking in Righteousness.-The Saviour says, "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness; for they shall be filled." Matt. v. 6. If one is thirsty, how only can he be filled? By drinking. Therefore the Saviour means that we can drink righteousness, if we thirst for it. Remember that God's throne is the seat of righteousness, and that from it flows the river of life, and we shall see the fitness of the assurance that we may drink in righteousness. Since the throne is the seat of righteousness, the river that proceeds from the throne must, so to speak, be charged with the righteousness of the law. Whosoever therefore believes on Christ, and drinks in of His Spirit, must drink in of the righteousness of the law as it is in the throne, or as it was spoken from Sinai.

Drinking at Sinai.-Whoever will read Ex. xvii. 1-6 together with Deut. iv. 10-12 (which shows that Horeb and Sinai are the same), will learn that at the very time when the law was spoken from Sinai, there was a river of water flowing from its base. That river flowed from Christ. 1 Cor. x. 4. Christ, the living Rock, stood upon that rock in the desert, from which the water flowed for the thirst of the people, and He it was from whom it came. With Him is the fountain of life. And so we have the complete likeness of the throne of God in Sinai. It was the embodiment of the law of God, so that no one could approach it without death, and yet they could drink the living water that flowed from it. And in this figure we again see that the righteousness which those who accept Christ's invitation are to drink in, is the righteousness that is described in the ten commandments.

The Heart of Christ.-Through David Christ spoke thus of His coming to this earth: "Then said I, Lo, I come; in the volume of the book it is written of Me, I delight to do Thy will, O my God; yea, Thy law is within My heart." Ps. xl. 7, 8. He said that He had kept His Father's commandments. John xv. 10. So closely did He keep the commandments that He observed the seventh-day Sabbath, which is sometimes stigmatised as "the Jewish Sabbath." Canon Knox-Little says, "It is certain that our Lord when on earth did observe Saturday, and did not observe Sunday." Sacerdotalism, p. 75. This is not true because Canon Knox-Little said it, but it is true because the Bible teaches it. It is so clear a fact that there is no chance for discussion about it. We have never yet heard of any one who had the hardihood to assert that Jesus ever kept any other day than the seventh, the day enjoined in the fourth commandment. The keeping of "the Sabbath day according to the commandment" was part of the righteousness which was in the heart of Christ. And since Christ is the same to-day that He ever was, it is in His heart still.

Eternal Life Through Christ.-"Even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." Christ's life was given for us and to us on the cross. It is by being crucified with Him that we live with Him. Gal. ii. 20; Rom. vi. 8. "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself." 2 Cor. v. 19. In His heart was the law, so that the heart of Christ was really the throne of God. Thus we sing of "Christ enthroned within." When Christ hung upon the cross, "one of the soldiers with a spear pierced His side, and forthwith came there out blood and water." John xix. 34. This was the fountain of life, that freely flows for all. It flowed from the heart of Christ, in which the law of God was enshrined. So we find that Sinai, Calvary, and Mount Sion all present the same thing. Sinai and Calvary are not in opposition, but are united. Both present the same Gospel and the same law. The life which flows for us from Calvary, bears to us the righteousness of the law that was proclaimed from Sinai.

Grace Through Righteousness.-Thus we see how grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life. Eternal life is in Christ, because His life is the life of the self-existent God, who is "from everlasting to everlasting." But the life of God is the law. The grace of God flows to us through the life of Christ, and bears to us the righteousness of it. Thus in Christ we receive the law as it was ordained, namely, to life. To accept the unspeakable gift of God's grace, therefore, is simply to yield ourselves to Him, that Christ may dwell in us, and live in us the righteousness of the law as spoken from Sinai, and treasured in the throne of God. From Christ that living stream still flows, so that, receiving Him, we shall have in us that well of water spring up unto everlasting life.

"A Gloomy Doctrine" The Present Truth 10, 43.

E. J. Waggoner

There is nothing gloomy about the Gospel. That is the "good news" of the "power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth." It is all brightness and glory. 2 Cor. iv. 4. "God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all." 1 John i. 5. Therefore nothing but light can emanate from Him. His word is a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path. Ps. cxix. 105. When any doctrine set forth in that word is said to be gloomy, it simply shows that there are some persons whose spiritual eyesight does not enable them to distinguish light from darkness. They do not stand where they can see God in the light that proceeds from Him.

The Bible declares that the dead "sleep;" that they are unconscious, and "know not anything" (Eccl. ix. 5); that their thoughts have perished (Ps. cxlvi. 3, 4). Theology, on the other hand, declares that they are conscious and exist in heaven as disembodied spirits, having greater power and knowledge than before death. The majority of people choose to believe the latter doctrine, as being a bright and cheerful one, and reject the former as something too gloomy and dark to be entertained by any mind but one that repudiates Christianity. But an examination of the two doctrines in the light of Scripture shows that such a view is entirely superficial.

The teaching of theology upon this

679

point is expressed in these words of the poet Longfellow,-

"There is no death; what seems so in transition,
This life of mortal breath
Is but the suburb of the life Elysian,
Whose portal we call death."
and again in the lines of the familiar hymn,-
"Death is the gate to endless joy."

But Christ Himself said that He was the gate to endless joy, and the portals through which all men must enter into the life beyond. The record is found in the tenth chapter of John. "Then said Jesus unto them [the Pharisees], Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep." "I am the door: by Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture." Verses 7, 9. To those who love the Lord, who see in Him the "One altogether lovely," the perfection of glory and beauty and majesty, the thought that He is the portal to the life beyond, is far brighter than the thought that that portal is death. Death is the "King of terrors;" but Jesus Christ is the Lord of life, the Prince of Peace, the eternal fountain of love and joy. He is the most glorious portal to everlasting life that could possibly be provided or imagined. And no one who loves Him would be glad to believe He had not told the truth.

Theology declares that men go to their reward at death. But while this idea would place some of amidst the joys of Heaven, it would consign the great majority who have died to a very different place; for we read that "wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat; but strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it." Matt. vii. 13, 14. And certainly, between the thought that some of our dead relatives and friends are in torment, and the thought that they are

380

resting, quiet and unconscious, in their graves, there can be no hesitation in choosing.

The popular belief that "there is no death," but only a transition from one state of life to another, contains much that appeals to the natural desires and imaginations of mankind; but it is far surpassed in grandeur by the Bible doctrine of "the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel." 2 Tim. i. 10. This is no figure of speech, but a statement of actual fact. Our Saviour has abolished death, by passing through the grave Himself, and taking away with Him the keys of death. Rev. i. 18. So that to all those who believe in Him, the close of this earthly life is but the beginning of "a sleep," during which they "rest from their labours, and their works do follow them." Rev. xiv. 13.

Nor does the Bible use a figure of speech when it speaks of the death of the saints as a sleep. Sleep and death are two very different things. In the one case there is life, and the other there is no life. In sleep there is a quick awakening to a renewal of the activities of life, but in death there is no awakening.

So it is with those who "sleep in Jesus." 1 Thess. iv. 14. They have life, even that life which God has prepared for those that shall live and dwell with Him, and which has been brought to light in the Gospel. Those who believe on His name have not to wait until death before they can enter the portal of eternal life, as would be necessary were death the gate to that life, but enter in the moment they have faith in Jesus as Redeemer. Jesus said, "I am the resurrection, and the life." John xi. 25.

Christ dwells in the heart of the believer by faith (Eph. iii. 17), and wherever Christ is, there is the resurrection and the fountain of life. "He that believeth on the Son, hath everlasting life." John iii. 33. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death until life." John v. 25. Such an one has already entered the portal to eternal life and happiness, and no power can draw him back, for there is nothing that is able to separate the soul from Him. Rom. vii. 38, 39.

In this doctrine there is no gloom, but the brightness of hope and comfort which sustains the soul in the hour of separation from those whom it loves. It is the doctrine of Jesus Christ as the Lifegiver, without which power He would not be the Saviour of sinners. It exalts Him, and in this all those who love Him will rejoice. It is no misfortune to any person to "sleep in Jesus," any more than to sleep at night during his natural life. On the contrary, we read that "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints" (Ps. cxvi. 15), and that, "blessed are the dead which die in the Lord." Rev. xiv. 13.

While theology may set forth our dead friends as teachers and comforters to us while we remain here, the word of God presents the far more glorious doctrine that our comfort is none other than "the God of all comfort;" that Jesus is Himself our Comforter (John xiv. 18), and that we have "another Comforter," which is the Spirit (v. 16, 17), and that the Spirit is our Teacher, who is able to guide us into all truth. John xvi. 13. Every true Christian must infinitely prefer this comfort and guidance to all others.

Thus the Bible doctrine of eternal life through Christ far outshines the man-made doctrine of life through the portals of the tomb. That, and that alone, is the gloomy doctrine which interposes the tomb between us and the life which we need, which Jesus Christ, through the Gospel, offers freely now to all, and bestows upon all them that believe on Him.

"Don't Force the Truth" The Present Truth 10, 43.

E. J. Waggoner

Condemn no man for not thinking as you think. Let every one enjoy the full and free liberty of thinking for himself. Abhor every approach in any kind or degree, to the spirit of persecution. If you cannot reason or persuade a man into the truth, never attempt to force him into it.

"Children's Page. Moral Backbone in the Young" The Present Truth 10, 43.

E. J. Waggoner

The same courage to do the right which led Patteson when a boy to refuse to join with those who were doing wrong was shown in the work that led to his death. He was in an island group where the natives were angry with the whites, owing to the injustice done them by white traders. Notwithstanding this, Patteson was there to tell the natives of the Lord Jesus, and to show them that white men who loved the Lord were not cruel and dishonest. The danger was that before he could get a chance to convince them of his intentions to do them good, they would attack him. This was the situation on the morning that his party of missionaries approached the island of Nukapu.

Four canoes were seen hovering about the coral reef which surrounded the island. The vessel had to feel her way, so lest the men in the canoes should be perplexed he ordered the boat to be lowered, and when asked to go into one of the native boats he did it to disarm suspicion and was carried off toward the shore. The boat from the schooner could not get over the reef. The bishop was seen to land on the shore, and was then seen alive no more. After a while Mr. Atkin was struck with an arrowhead from the islanders in the canoe, but in spite of suffering and weakness he crossed the reef to seek the bishop. A canoe drifted toward them; the body of a man was seen as if crouching in it. they came up with it and lifted the bundle wrapped in matting into the boat; two words passed, "The body." Then it was lifted up and laid across the skylight. The placid smile was still on the face; there was a palm leaf fastened over the breast, and when the mat was opened there were five wounds.

This is an almost certain indication that his death was vengeance for five of the natives. "Blood for blood" is a sacred law almost of nature wherever Christianity has not prevailed, and a whole tribe is held responsible for one. Five men in Fiji are known to have been stolen from Nukapu, and probably their families believed them to have been killed, and believed themselves to be performing a sacred duty when they dipped their weapons in the blood of the bishop, whom they did not know well enough to understand him to be their protector. The next morning the body of John Coleridge Patteson was committed to the waters of the Pacific, Joseph Atkin reading the burial service even though then recognizing his own doom in a body already stiffened from a poisonous arrow that caused his death.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 43.

E. J. Waggoner

-It is rumoured that the Ameer of Afghanistan is dead.

-The Belgian elections so far have resulted in the complete rout of the Liberal party, with great gains for the Catholics.

-There are rumours that Russia is making a secret advance in the Pamirs, and that a battle has recently been fought by them with Afghan troops.

-A bill has been introduced in the Council at Simla, India, proposing that licenses should be granted for religious processions in India, with a view to securing the proper regulation of such public observances.

-The Spanish Government has taken umbrage at the terms in which the Papal Nuncio has denounced the recent consecration of a Protestant Bishop in Madrid, and has complained to the Vatican on the subject.

-A terrible fire has occurred at Grosny, near Tiflis. A large naphtha spring ignited, and the flames spread in a moment to the neighbouring buildings. Seventeen workmen were engulfed in the sea of fire and perished.

-Private post-cards bearing adhesive penny stamps and private reply post-cards with perm stamps on each half may now be sent abroad. The cards must be of same size and substance as the official post-cards, and must have the words postcards printed on the address side without the Royal arms.

-The Sultan has prohibited dancing and other festivities in Constantinople, plots against the Government having, it is thought, been hatched at these social gatherings.

-At a recent meeting of the London School Board, an application, signed by over 5,000 teachers, asking to be relieved from giving religious instruction, in accorddance with the terms of the religious circular, was submitted.

-The Conservatives in the Norwegian capital have sustained a heavy defeat by the late election, and the three largest towns in Norway-Christiania, Bergen, and Trondjem-have declared themselves in favour of national independence.

-It is reported that Morocco City is in a state of insurrection. Prince Muley, who was sent by the Sultan to arrest a Caid, is hemmed in by insurgents; but it is hoped that the Sheroefian troops will succeed in quelling the rebellion.

-A general strike is threatened in Austria if the motion demanding urgency for the Franchise Bill should be rejected In the Reichsrath. About 10,000 workmen in Vienna, after holding a meeting, came into collision with the police, several on both sides being injured.

-A German doctor has been publishing the results of a long course of visual examination. He finds that only in one case out of fifteen are both eyes in good condition. In seven oases out of every ten, people possess one eye which is stronger than the other.

-In America, a millionaire's infant, having been born out of due time, was being reared in a 'baby's incubator.' This foster mother was a glass case which was kept at a temperature of 100 degrees by hot pipes. The child lived for some months, but is now dead.

-The Sultan has prohibited the Armenian Patriarch from going to Rome to take part in the conference for the reunion of the schismatic and the Roman churches. The Pope telegraphed to the Sultan begging him to alter his decision, but with what success is not stated.

-Two little children, specially treated in Vienna with the anti-diphtheria serum, have died. Experiments at a children's hospital have, how-ever, greatly reduced the mortality from the malady, the deaths being only 10 per cent. The serum is obtained from the horse.

-An attempt at negro-lynching in Ohio, led to a sanguinary encounter between the mob and the militia. The mob attacked the courthouse, and after breaking through one of the doors the militia fired, four men and a woman being killed, three mortally wounded, and twenty injured.

-A father asked a London magistrate if he could send his buy to work and let him attend a night school. He was thirteen and in the second standard. The magistrate replying in the negative, said the boy was not the father's property to the extent of depriving him of his birthright, namely, a good elementary education.

-News from Vienna states that the Czar is conscious that he will probably live only a few days. This information is confirmed from other sources, and is borne out by the fact that the Grand Dukes have been hastily summoned irons St. Petersburg and Paris, and have left for Livadia. The Czar desires to witness the marriage of his son, the Czarewitch, with Princess Alix, and it is understood that the wedding will take place privately at Livadia.

-According to a Shanghai telegram Port Arthur is menaced by Japanese troops, and an attack is believed to be imminent. All foreigners have been peremptorily ordered to leave Pekin. A battle at Wi-ju is said to be imminent. The two armies still face each other on the banks of the Yalu; but Marshal Yamagata is waiting for his heavier artillery and supplies before attacking. The Chinese of all arms are estimated at 25,000. It is affirmed that peace overtures were made to Japan, and were rejected as inadequate.

-The Princess Alix of Hesse has, it is said, in view of her approaching marriage with the Czarewitch, obtained concessions from the Russian "Holy Synod" such as no Princess in a like position has ever before secured. In embracing the Orthodox faith her Royal Highness will not declare her former religion to be accursed, not will she state that her conversion is duo to the conviction that the truth lies not with her own but with the Russian Church. The Synod will content itself with the declaration that the Princess has joined the Greek Church in order to be of one religion with her future husband.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 43.

E. J. Waggoner

The Clericalist party in Belgium has gained a sweeping victory in the recent elections. The party is pledged to work in the interest of the Church of Rome.

Out of 156 speakers at the recent Church Congress at Exeter, only 18, it is said, were "evangelical." It is evident that the Church of the England is rapidly becoming a distinctively Catholic church.

The excise law allows two per cent. of alcohol and so-called temperance drinks, which are sold without license. But some samples of these drinks have recently been analysed by the excise officials, and are found to contain from four to even ten per cent. Beer has only eight per cent. of alcohol.

While so much is being said of school teachers and their work, the Schoolmaster points out that artisans and mechanics are better paid in England than teachers. "Highly equipped certificated masters in hundreds," it says, "toil, even in 1894, for less than thirty pence a day, certificated mistresses for less than twenty."

The literature of an age is a very fair reflection of the quality of social life. If the literature so much talked about is true to life, and that is what is claimed for it, what must we conclude as to the tendency of the times? Dr. Marcus Dods is very far from being what the world calls a "pessimist"-a word which many people are so afraid of that day commonly say black is white-and he said recently:-

Fifty years ago an individual was aware that if he transgressed the bounds of decency marked out by the conversation of well-bred families, he limited his circulation; now there is no surer way of increasing his circulation.

It is true, as anyone can observe from the newspapers and reviews. The novel's most talked about are those which hold up the sensual and foolish, and weave romance about them. And after disporting weakness and dishonour if they but attach a small moral, and properly bring about the punishment of the guilty, many religious reviewers are ready to applaud the moral teaching of the book. Anyone who knows what morality is knows that it is not taught in that way, and one who watches the effect of this class of novels on the popular taste from year to year will not be at a loss to determine the influence of such writers.

The English Church Union, representing the majority of the Church of England, through the President, Lord Halifax, addressed a letter to Cardinal Monescillo, the Spanish primate of the province of Toledo, to express "the profound distress" which they feel at the action of the Archbishop of Dublin in appointing a bishop for the separated Catholics of Spain. Lord Halifax says:-

We, on our own behalf believe it to be right, as members of the Catholic Church, which is the mother of us all, and as members of this Church of England in particular, the solemnly to assure your Eminence, and the Bishops, clergy, and faithful of the ancient and Illustrious Church of Spain, of our repudiation of the encouragement which the action, we deplore, has given to those who have withdrawn themselves from the communion and authority of their unlawful pastors.

The English Church is thus represented as identical with the Roman Catholic Church outside of England.

November 1, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 44.

E. J. Waggoner

"God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son, whom He hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also He made the worlds." Heb. i. 1, 2.

There are many incidental statements in these two verses, but there is only one main fact, and that is that God has spoken. He spoke in time past; He has spoken in these last days. He spoke in time past of the fathers; He has spoken in these last days to us. In time past He spoke by the prophets; in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son.

In many ways and manners has God spoken; but whether in times past, or in these last days; whether by the prophets, or by His Son, it was God who spoke. The voice of God is as clear in the prophets as in the sermon on the mount. It is but one voice. "This is the law and the prophets," said the Saviour. The word spoken through the prophets,-Moses, David, Isaiah, Jeremiah,-is the same as that spoken through Jesus of Nazareth, and has the same authority; and both are the same as that spoken by God's own voice from Sinai.

God has spoken to us. How can we know that He speaks to us?-In just the same way that we should know that anybody else speaks to us, namely, by listening. There is no other way. It is getting quite the custom for people to discuss the Bible, to find out if any part of it is the word of God, and how much. That is, men think that they will learn the voice of God by doing all the talking themselves. They drown His voice with the multitude of their own words. "Be still, and know that I am God," says the Lord.

Every man who will listen, will certainly know that it is the Lord who speaks. And the child may know as well as the man. The people who really listened to the word of God spoken by Jesus of Nazareth, had no difficulty in knowing whose word it was. Those who listened only to criticise, and to find occasion for multiplying their own words, naturally enough did not know that it was the word of God. But those who wished to know God's word, in order that they might do it, knew for a certainty. These words were proved true: "If any man willeth to do His will, He shall know of the teaching, whether it be of God, or whether I speak from Myself." John vii. 17.

There are many people who did not know that the Bible is the word of God. They are not fighting it, but are simply in doubt about the matter. Unfortunately some of these, in their perplexity, go to men for enlightenment, and only have their doubts increased. No man, no matter how well he knows the word of God, can prove to another that it is the word of God. Much less can such a thing be done by one who himself has doubts about the Bible. Only let that doubting one come to the Bible with an open, unprejudiced mind, honestly desirous of knowing the word of God in truth, and he will soon know it for himself, so that he will not ask anybody to prove it for him. Neither will he be troubled by any other person's doubts. He has the demonstration in his own soul. The Bible is its own evidence to him.

One other thing we must notice in this connection, and that is that the text tells us that "in these last days" God has spoken to us by His Son. When Jesus was on earth, eighteen hundred years ago, it was the "last days." The world was even then past its meridian. How much more emphatic, therefore, must the expression be in this time. We are now in the last days, and it therefore becomes us to listen most diligently and reverently to the words of Him that speaketh. "See that ye refused not Him that speaketh."

"Weakness and Strength" The Present Truth 10, 44.

E. J. Waggoner

When men are strong then they are also weak; and they are weak in the very point wherein lies their strength. Were this not so, they would have something of their own wherein to glory. Men are very apt to pride themselves on their "strong points;" but such points are strong only in comparison with other points in their own character which are weaker. Compared with the power of the forces of evil, men have no strength, but can manifest only varying degrees of weakness.

It is upon these "strong points" that men make their greatest moral failures. Peter's strong point was his boldness; but behold him cowering in the judgment hall, afraid to confess his Lord! Solomon was the wisest man on the earth; but what more pitiable exhibition of folly could there be than the king of Israel surrounded by seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines, hearkening to their counsel and leading the people of God into a idolatry! Moses' strong

690

point was his meekness; but we find him at Meribah saying to the multitude, "Hear now, ye rebels; must we bring you water out of this rock?"

Men naturally trust in their "strong" points, and every man is weak when he trusts in himself. We speak about "guarding our weak points;" but our strong points need guarding just as much. Our weak points include our strong ones. We have nothing but weak points. Whatever point it is that we trust in, that point especially is weak. And we are not guarding the weak points unless we are guarding every point. But we must remember that it is not our resolutions, our will, or our vigilance that guards us, but our faith. "The shield of faith" is what quenches the fiery darts of the wicked. Eph. vi. 16. The armour that is prepared for us is not of human manufacture, but is such as God Himself has made in His own wisdom, and endowed with His own strength.

But we need not be discouraged because we find ourselves weak where we had fancied ourselves strong, for our dependence is not self, but God; and depending on Him, we are strong where we are weak. This was the experience of Paul, as he wrote to the Corinthians. 2 Cor. xii. 10. We only need to unite our weakness to God's strength. Then, like the apostle, we can "take pleasure in infirmities, and reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ's sake."

God has to reveal to every man his weakness before He can save him. The devil, on the other hand, leads men to think themselves strong in order that, by trusting in themselves, they may fall and be ruined. When we feel strong, the admonition is, "Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." 1 Cor. x. 12. But when we feel weak, too weak to do anything of ourselves, we are in a position to gain the victory. The danger is that we will not feel weak enough; for men in their weakest moments have strength enough to resist the Holy Spirit and prevent God from working in them. If we are weak enough to yield entirely to the Lord, we then, for those purposes for which we need strength, become as strong as the Lord Himself.

"Studies in Romans. Crucified, Buried, and Raised. Rom. vi. 1-11" The Present Truth 10, 44.

E. J. Waggoner

In beginning the study of the sixth chapter of Romans, it must be remembered that we have but a continuation of the fifth. The subject of that chapter is superabounding grace, and the gift of life and righteousness by grace. As sinners we are enemies of God, but are reconciled, that is, freed from sin, by receiving the righteousness of Christ's life, which has no limit. No matter how greatly the sin may abound, grace does much more abound; "That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." This brings us to a consideration of the particulars of our

UNION WITH CHRIST

"What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein? Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptised into Jesus Christ were baptised into His death? Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection; knowing this, that our old man in crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. For he that is dead is freed from sin. Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him; knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over Him. For in that He died, He died unto sin once; but in that He liveth, He liveth unto God. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord." Rom. vi. 1-11.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

For what purpose did the law enter?

"The law entered, that the offence might abound." Rom. v. 20.

But what do we find when the offence abounds?

"Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound." Verse 21.

"What shall we say then? shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?'

"God forbid." (Not by any means.)

And why not?

"How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein?"

If we have been baptized into Jesus Christ, into what were we baptized?

"So many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death."

What does baptism mean?

"We are buried with Him by baptism into death."

What further?

"That like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life."

If we have been "planted" together in the likeness of His death, what will surely follow?

"We shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection."

What has taken place?

"Our old man is crucified with Him."

Why is the "old man" crucified with Christ?

"That the body of sin might be destroyed."

And what will be the result of that?

"That henceforth we should not serve sin."

From what is he that is dead free?

"He that is dead is freed from sin."

Of what may we be confident if we are dead with Christ?

"That we shall also live with Him."

Why have we this confidence?

"Knowing that Christ been raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over Him."

Why not?

"For in that He died, He died unto sin once."

And what of His life?

"In that He liveth, He liveth unto God."

Therefore since we are dead and raised with Him, what must be the case with us?

"Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead in deed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

An Important Question.-"Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?" The student will doubtless recall a similar question in the third chapter, verses 5, 7, and the answer in verses 6, 8. It is another form of the question, "Shall we do evil, that good may come?" The answer must be apparent to all, "Not by any means," for this is really the force of the words improperly rendered, "God forbid." Although grace superabounds where sin abounds, that is no reason why we should wilfully pile up the sin. That would be most emphatically to receive the grace of God in vain. 2 Cor. vi. 1.

The Reason Why.-"How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?" It is simply an impossibility, and there is really no question

691

as to whether or not we may do it; for it is certain that if we are dead to sin, we can not live in it at the same time. A man can not at the same time be both dead and alive. Now the previous chapter has emphasised the fact that we are reconciled to God by the death of Christ, and are saved by his life. Reconciliation to God means being freed from sin; so that being "saved by His life" means that we have "passed from death unto life." The life of sin that was enmity has been ended in the life of Christ.

"Baptised into Jesus Christ."-Baptism is the symbol of putting on Christ. "For as many of you as have been baptised into Christ have put on Christ." Gal. viii. 27. "For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body; so also is Christ. For by one Spirit are we all baptised into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles." 1 Cor. xii. 12, 13.

Where Christ Touches Us.-It is in death that we come into contact with Christ. He touches us at the lowest possible point. That is what makes our salvation so sure, and so sure for every one without any exception. Sin and sickness are tributary to death. Death is the sum of all the evils possible to man. It is the lowest depth, and it is there that Christ comes in contact with us. We become united to Him in death. As the greater includes the lesser, the fact that Christ humbled Himself even to death proves that there is no ill possible to us that He does not take upon Himself.

Baptised into His Death.-"So many of us as were baptised into Jesus Christ were baptised into His death." And what is it to be baptised into His death?-Verse 10 tells us: "For in that He died, He died unto sin once." He died unto sin, not His own, because He had none; but He "bare our sins in His own body on the tree." 1 Pet. ii. 24. "He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities." Isa. liii. 5. Since in that He died, He died unto sin, it follows that if we are baptised into His death, we also die to sin.

A New Life.-"Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more." "If we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him." It was impossible for the grave to hold Christ. Acts ii. 24. Therefore, just as surely as we are baptised into the death of Christ, so surely shall we be raised from a life of sin to a life of righteousness in Him. "For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection."

Crucifixion.-As Christ was crucified. Therefore, being baptised into His death means that we are crucified with Him. So we read, "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." Gal. ii.20. Crucified, yet living, because crucified with Christ, and yet he lives. Christ said, "Because I live, ye shall live also." John xiv. 19. How can we live a new life? We have no power at all of ourselves; but Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father; and in His prayer to the Father He said, "The glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them." John xvii. 22. Therefore, the power that raised Jesus from the dead is exercised to raise us from the death of sin. If we are willing to allow the old life to be crucified, we may be sure of the new.

"Our Old Man" Crucified.-We shall be in the likeness of His resurrection. If we are crucified with Christ, our sins must also be crucified with Christ, for they are a part of us. Our sins were on Him as He was crucified, so of course our sins are crucified if we are crucified with Him. But here is a difference between us and our sins when crucified. We are crucified in order that we may live again; our sins are crucified in order that they may be destroyed. Christ is not "the minister of sin" (Gal. ii. 17). It was the life of God that raised Him from the dead, and in that life there is no sin.

A Separation.-The reader will notice that the separation from sin is in death. That is because death is in sin. "Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death." James i. 15. Therefore nothing less than death will effect a separation. We could not separate ourselves from sin, because sin was our very life. If it had been possible for us to effect the destruction of sin, it could have been only by the giving up of our lives, and that would have been the end of us. That is why there will be no future for the wicked who die in their sins; their life having been given up, or rather taken from them, they are out of existence. But Christ had the power to lay down His life, and to take it again; and therefore when we lay down our lives in Him, we are raised again by His endless life. Remember that He does not give us our own life back again, but that He gives us His own life. In that life there never was a sin; and so it is that our crucifixion and resurrection with Him is the separation of sin from us. This thought must be borne in mind when we come to study the next chapter.

Living with Him.-"Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him. When shall we live with Him? Why, as soon as buried and risen with Him, of course. Our life with Christ in the world to come is assured to us only by our living with Him now in this world. We are separated from sin, by death with Him, in order that we may be joined to life in Him. The reader is asked to bear this in mind also until we come to the study of the next chapter.

"Buried."-"We are buried with Him by baptism into death." Baptism, therefore, is burial. If people were content to follow the plain reading of the Scriptures, there never would be a question concerning "the mode of baptism." No one from reading the Bible could ever get any other idea than that baptism is immersion. "Buried with Him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with Him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised Him from the dead." Col. ii.12. Baptism represents the death and resurrection of Christ, and by it we show our acceptance of His sacrifice; and the very act is an actual burial, in order to make the lesson the more impressive.

Why the Change?-How is it that there has been a change from Scripture baptism to sprinkling? The answer is very easy. Baptism is a memorial of the resurrection of Christ. But "the church," by which is meant the bishops who loved the praise of men more than the praise of God and who wished to curry favour with the "better class" of the heathen, adopted the pagan sun festival; and in order to appear to justify themselves in so doing, they claimed that the rising sun which was worshipped by the heathen was a

692

symbol of the resurrection of "the Sun of Righteousness," namely, Christ, and that by observing Sunday they were celebrating His resurrection. But they did not need two memorials of the resurrection, and so they dropped the one that the Lord had given. In order, however, not to appear to throw baptism away, they claimed that the heathen sprinkling with "holy water" which they very naturally adopted with the heathen sun festival, was the baptism enjoined in the Scriptures. The people trusted in the "fathers" instead of reading the Bible for themselves, and so it was very easy to make them believe that the Bible was obeyed. It is true that there are some who follow the word in regard to immersion, who also observe Sunday; but the two practices are inconsistent. The word is neglected in one particular in order to provide a memorial for an event which they already celebrate in accordance with the word. We are sorry to learn, what however might naturally be expected, that Scriptural baptism is falling into disuse among those who observe the first day of the week. It must be the case that sooner or later they will wholly give up one or the other.

"Shutting Up Heaven" The Present Truth 10, 44.

E. J. Waggoner

The Catholic Times says of the Roman Catholic system of dealing with new converts, that such "converts are not admitted to baptism, but remain in the condition of 'catechumens' for six months or a year after they express the wish to be Christians," and that "during this time they are not only instructed but made to practise the duties of their new religion, so far as they can be observed by one not yet baptized." This is all very consistent with the idea that the "keys of heaven" have been delivered to the Church of Rome, so that it is at her option that men are shut out of heaven or let into it,-united to or severed from the body of which Christ is the Head. But imagine the Lord inviting and pleading with the sinner to come to Him and thus escape the wrath to come, and then when the sinner does come, holding him off for six months or a year before receiving him! Imagine the hope or comfort we should get from the parable of the prodigal son if a father had left the repentant prodigal wait outside for six months or a year, eating husks with the swine, before taking him in! What would be the fate of the poor would-be Christian who might happen to die during this period of waiting?

And this is not all the doleful prospect; for during this time of waiting to be allowed to become a Christian he must "practise the duties" of his new religion, to prove that as a Christian he would be worthy of confidence! This throws Pharaoh's order for the making of bricks without straw completely into the s. . .; for not only is no power furnished him with which to perform the duties of Christianity, but he cannot possibly get the power himself, however diligent and earnest his efforts to do so. The most he can do is to pretend to be what he is not, and thus make himself a hypocrite. Any person can make a hypocrite; but it requires the power of the Lord to make a Christian.

Happily we are not left to grapple with such a doubtful prospect when we have signified our willingness to become Christians. No such doleful obscurity hangs over the pathway the Lord has marked out for our feet. It is found only in the pathway of salvation by works. The parable of the prodigal son tells us that "when He was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him." Luke xv. 20. That is the Lord's way of receiving sinners when they turn to Him. He does not wait for them to come all the way to Him, but while they are a great way off, He goes to meet them, and receives them graciously. "Why tarriest thou?" is the language of the Spirit to the penitent one; "arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the Lord." Acts xvi. 30-34.

God's plan of salvation does not put an individual on "six months' suspicion" (as it has been appropriately termed) before allowing him to become a full Christian. It doesn't require any proof from an individual to the Lord that He is a proper person for the Lord to accept. In God's plan all persons are on probation from their youth, and all are "accepted in the Beloved." Eph. i. 6. "Behold," says Jesus, "I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it." Rev. iii. 8. That door is the door of the sanctuary above, the abode of our great High Priest, who has entered into heaven, "now to appear in the presence of God for us." Heb. ix. 24. "Being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God." Rom. v. 1, 2. No will but our own can shut us away from the life and the power that is in our Saviour Jesus Christ.

"Which Will You Choose?" The Present Truth 10, 44.

E. J. Waggoner

Some of the present readers of PRESENT TRUTH will remember that some months ago an article, or rather a combination of articles, appeared, with the general title, "The Sin of Witchcraft." The matter was afterwards published in the form of a tract, which we commend to our readers for perusal and distribution. It can be obtained at the office of PRESENT TRUTH, 59, Paternoster Row, E.C.

The little pamphlet has attracted the attention of the editor of a leading Spiritualist paper, called Light, and he has given it an extended notice. The notice is so perfect an illustration of some of the things set forth in the pamphlet, that we quote a few extracts from it. We hope that it may cause serious thought on the part of many.

The reviewer acccepts the definition that "the whole of Spiritualism is summed up in the belief that man has a conscious existence in death-that, in fact, there is no death, because man has life in himself." We call special attention to this statement of what Spiritualism is, because there are thousands of people who think that they disbelieve Spiritualism, who nevertheless heartily believe the above statement.

That such people will sooner or later be obliged to revise their belief, or else openly to accept Spiritualism, is a fact clearly seen by Spiritualists. Our reviewer agrees with the statement of the pamphlet, that "Through the prevalence of the doctrine of the natural immortality of man. . . the churches are being permeated with Spiritualism." He says, "Once grant that the secret of human life is in the immortal spirit, all that we contend for must follow-in time."

"ANCIENT AGNOSTICISM"

All that we are concerned with, in our dealing with the teaching of Spiritualism, is to show that it is in open and positive antagonism to the Bible. With those who reject the

693

Bible we have no controversy. We have no burden to defend the Bible itself; it is its own defender. All that we wish to have made plain is the fact that nobody can believe both the Bible and Spiritualism. Whoever accepts the doctrine of Spiritualism must reject the Bible. They who cling to the Bible as the word of God must renounce Spiritualism from beginning to end.

This is sufficiently proved by the review itself. Some of the texts which teach that at death man really dies, that is, loses feeling, knowledge and thought, such as Ps. cxlvi. 3, 4; cxv. 17; Isa. xxxviii. 18, 19; Eccl. ix. 5, 6; Job xiv. 1, 2, 7-12, 21; James iv. 14, are cited from the pamphlet. Of some of them the application is denied, and of the others the writer says that they are "the expressions of an ancient agnosticism which we surely ought to outgrow, and not to imitate." The only way that Spiritualists can hold their position is by denying the Bible; and recollect that their position is simply this, that men at death enter upon a higher life than before. Our readers may decide for themselves whether they will stick to the Bible, or to the doctrine that the dead are conscious; but they must know that they cannot hold to both.

"A MONSTROUS SUPERFLUITY"

The reviewer has fully comprehended the teaching of the pamphlet, that "the devil's great original falsehood is the teaching of the doctrine of innate or natural immortality," and that in that lie Spiritualism is summed up. Of this he says:-

This may seem monstrous, but the whole pamphlet is built upon it, as we shall see. It may be thought that this is only one man's eccentricity, but we believe that the main thought of the pamphlet is very largely held [not so largely as it ought to be. Ed. P.T.], and that, anyhow, it logically follows from the old doctrine of the general resurrection. At the present moment we are face to face with a huge inconsistency. The truly spiritual thought, that at death we pass into spirit life, in the full possession of more than our present powers, is rapidly taking possession of all the churches: it is in the air, and it is irresistible. And yet it co-exists with the doctrine of the resurrection of the body,-a monstrous superfluity. The crash is not yet; but it must come, and the writer of this pamphlet, with his grim logic, may, and we hope will help it on.

This is the way Spiritualism stands related to the doctrine of the resurrection. Spiritualists consider it "a monstrous superfluity." Now all who read the Bible know that the resurrection is set forth as the hope of the Gospel. The apostle tells us in the fifteenth of 1 Corinthians that if there be no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not raised, and that if Christ be not raised, then there is no hope for any. Spiritualism, therefore, denies the resurrection of Christ, and so the entire Gospel.

Remember that Spiritualism is nothing more than the belief in natural immortality and that the dead have a conscious existence. Now if this were true, then indeed the resurrection would be a superfluity; for if the dead are alive, there is no possibility of a resurrection. We ask our readers to choose between the two things. Which shall it be, the Bible and the resurrection, or the theory that there is no death?

LIFE AND IMMORTALITY

Since Spiritualism is from first to last a denial of the Bible and of the Gospel, it is not at all surprising that its adherents are in the dark as to Gospel truths. The misapprehension in the following paragraph, however, is so common that we quote it in order to point out the truth. Following the paragraph last quoted, the reviewer says:-

But if this writer does not believe in natural immortality, how does he bring immortality in? In some way which we do not understand, he (and he is one of many) believes in immortal life only for those who are "in Christ," whatever that may mean. He plainly says, "None can see life and immortality except those who accept Christ and the Gospel." He does not give any explanation, and we are left to assume that in some subtle way the believer is transformed. From being a mortal creature, he is changed into an immortal one, subject, we presume, to relapses-mortal in 1894, immortal in 1895, and mortal again in 1896.

Will the reader note the following points?

1. Immortality is bestowed at the coming of the Lord and the resurrection of the righteous dead, and then only. "We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality." 1 Cor. xv. 51-53. The believer in Christ is as mortal to-day as any sinner. Immortality is to be "put on," only when the Lord comes to raise the dead. But once possessed, it is never lost.

2. We do not presume to give any explanation of this change. It is "a mystery." To know the fact is sufficient; we could not understand the manner of its accomplishments, if it could be told us, because it is the product of infinite power. When the Lord Jesus Christ comes, He will "change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body, according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue all things unto Himself." Phil. iii. 21.

3. Eternal life and immortality are not identical. Although immortality is not conferred upon any until the resurrection of the just, eternal life is the possession of every believer. "This is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son." 1 John v. 11. "Glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee; as Thou hast given Him power over all flesh He that He should give eternal life to as many as Thou has given Him. And this is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ who Thou hast sent." John xvii. 1-3. The life of Jesus is to be "manifest in our mortal flesh." 2 Cor. iv. 11.

4. This is eternal life which is the possession of the believer in Christ, is simply the power of God working in him "both to will and to do of His good pleasure." Phil. ii. 13. We are saved from sin by "the power of an endless life." This life is not inherent in the believer, but is in Christ, and is the possession of the believer only as his faith brings Christ to dwell in his heart. "He that hath the Son hath the life, and he that hath not the Son of God, hath not the life." 1 John v. 12, R.V.

Here again we are obliged to say that we cannot explain. It is as subtle a mystery as is the way in which the sun and rain give life to plants, or the food that we eat enables us to think and act. But anyone who believes is as conscious of the power of the life as he is that he breathes. We can only say, Taste and see.

ANGELS AND MEN

Another error which so many professed Christians hold in common with professed Spiritualists, is that there is no distinction between men and angels; that angels are simply dead man. Thus the reviewer says:-

What dismal infatuation is it that leads so many people to slam the door in the faces of those who come from the other side, or to see only "devil" when, surely, to say the least of it, a good God would let good angels go where devils are allowed to prowl! Is it possible to believe that God's human race is infested with demoniacal influences only, and that our Creator and Providence permits us to be the fools and victims of a conscious hellish fraud?

The good God does not leave men to the influence of the devil, without the help of good angels. But angels

694

are beings far superior to man. Angels existed before the earth was created, and "shouted for joy" at its creation. Job xxxviii. 7. An angel never was a man, and no man can ever become an angel. The most that is promised to those who gain the world to come, is that they shall be "equal unto the angels," in that they cannot die anymore. Luke xx. 36.

The human race is not "infested with demoniacal influences only," but God has sent to this earth legions of "angels that excel in strength," who are "sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation." Heb. i. 14.

Neither has He left men to be the victims of fraud. "By the word of Thy lips I have kept me from the paths of the destroyer." Ps. xvii. 4. The Lord has not left men to wander in the dark, but has given His word as a light. None will be deceived except those who receive not the love of the truth, that they might be saved thereby. We write for the purpose of calling the attention of those who acknowledge the Bible to be the truth of God, to the light which it gives. The basis of Spiritualism is that man has life and immortality in himself. This is directly opposed to God's word which is the source of light; and therefore those who accept the doctrine of natural immortality, are turning from light to darkness, and inviting deception. And when men turn away from the truth of the Bible, they must necessarily turn away from the morality of the Bible. Which will you choose-the word of God, or the devices of men?

"An Indian Lourdes" The Present Truth 10, 44.

E. J. Waggoner

The close resemblance between Romanism and some of the pagan religions is seen in a great variety of practices. A member of the Telegu mission gives a description of the making of a Hindu shrine, and the use made of it, which reads like a sketch of a Lourdes or a St. Winifride's Well. No one can doubt the sincerity of thousands of the devotees of either religion who patronise these shrines, but the worship can scarcely be said to be much less idolatrous in one case than in the other. No one who believes in Jesus Christ can doubt His power to save men physically now, even as He sustains all physical life every moment; and multitudes of believers know that power of bodily help by experience. But the Roman Catholic shrine, with its theatrical display and merchandise of religious things, exalts the creature above Christ just as this Hindu shrine does. A poor woman had died of the cholera, and was denied a burial in the village, her body being cast out near the jungle, with earth thrown over it.

About three months afterwards, says the writer, a very superstitious man, one of the potters of the village, on returning home one evening, reported that as he was passing the place where the woman had been buried, he heard a voice, as if it were her spirit, saying that if he would clear away the cactus and build her a proper tomb he would be cured of a disease from which he was suffering. As soon as he told his foolish fancy or wilful falsehood, it was believed, and those who heard it told it to others. And the next day they went to the place and began clearing the ground, and brought stones and mortar, and built a tomb over the remains of the woman. And soon people began to flock to the place from all quarters, to be cured of their infirmities and diseases. The blind, the lame, the lepers, those who were supposed to be possessed by evil spirits, and all sorts of ailing ones, came to worship. Most of them could not tell what they worshipped, whether it was the grave or the body or the spirit of the deceased woman, and when questioned they would say they came because others came, and they did as others did.

So rapidly did the superstition spread that within a few weeks thousands were coming, not only sick people, but also their relatives and friends, and multitudes more out of mere curiosity, and all sorts of tramps and adventurers, fortune tellers, jugglers, acrobats, religious beggars, etc. People came hundreds of miles, Hindus of all castes, and Mohammedans, rich people and poor, old and young. Within a month or six weeks from the time the folly commenced, the crowds had increased so that there were ten thousand people there at one time. Shopkeepers set up booths made of mats for the sale of supplies for the worshippers, peddlers of all sorts of trinkets flocked to the place, and side-shows of various kinds were started.

The great majority of the worshippers were women, and the manner of their worship was as follows: They first went to the place where the woman died, under the mango tree, and there each one paid a small fee, equal to about one-third of a penny. The money was received by two men, who sat there for that purpose, and it was placed in safe keeping by the village officials. The promoters of the worship had taken the clothes of the dead woman, or at least what they said were her clothes, and tied them up in a bundle and hung them on the tree under which she died. And they had also the old dirty, ragged palmleaf mat on which she lay when dying. After the worshippers had paid their fee, they first walked round the tree several times with clasped hands and bowed heads, and then devoutly pressed their foreheads against the bundle of clothes and kissed them, and then walked round the old mat and bowed reverently to it, and, coming to the spot where the body of the woman had lain as soon as she was dead, each one took up a pinch of earth from the place and put it in her mouth and swallowed it.

"Keep at It" The Present Truth 10, 44.

E. J. Waggoner

One of the first lessons that we need to learn is to keep doing the little things, to go on learning the simple lessons one by one, until time and patience give us the victory. You may have heard of the old castle that was taken by a single gun.

The attacking force had only one gun, and it seemed hopeless to try to take the castle; but one soldier said: "I will show you how we can take the castle." And he pointed the cannon to one spot and fired, and kept on all day, never moving the cannon. About nightfall there were a few grains of sand knocked off the wall. He did the same the next day and the next. By and by the stones began to come away, and by steadily working his gun for one week, he made a hole in that castle wall big enough for the army to walk through.

"Food and Intemperance" The Present Truth 10, 44.

E. J. Waggoner

A great amount of intemperance in drinking is due to bad cooking, we are told by many who have studied the subject of dietetics and temperance. Highly seasoned and stimulating foods foster the appetite for higher stimulants, and thus at his mother's table many a boy may acquire the craving for alcoholic stimulants. Poorly prepared meals may also drive men to the public-house. "We are convinced," says a writer in the Newcastle Chronicle, "that an indulgence in strong liquors is largely created by the monotonous and uninviting meals provided for the sustenance of the majority of working men. Pork pies, sausage meat, herrings, and other such edibles, prepared hastily and with primitive culinary science by the housewife, or bought (to save trouble) from the pork-shop ready cooked, are certainly calculated to engender a thirst not usually slaked by water. If women were to learn something of cooking and understand how to make the appetising soups and little dishes which promote such happiness among corresponding classes on the Continent, there would be less drinking and drunkenness in this country. Cooking takes time and care, and is not to be done by one who suddenly, in the middle of an interesting exchange of confidences, realises that it is nearly twelve, and that her 'man' will want his dinner. The hasty herring, the badly prepared 'bit of something' is the result, and the result is also indifference to food on the part of the diner, and the subsequent flight to alcohol as a compensation."

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 44.

E. J. Waggoner

-An epidemic of diphtheria is raging at Trieste. All the public schools have been closed.

-A movement is on foot in Birmingham to inaugurate an "Old-Age Pensions League."

-Masked and armed men made an unsuccessful attempt to murder ex-President Harrison.

-Two hundred and sixty persons are reported to have lost their lives in the recent earthquake in Japan.

-Sixteen women, while unloading coke at a wharf in Bilbao, were precipitated into the water and drowned.

-Three barbers were fined at Warrington for shaving customers on the Sunday, "the same not being a work of necessity."

-Terrific thunderstorms with enormous hailstones have done great damage in portions of Austria, Spain and Servia.

-Five negroes were lynched in South Carolina for the supposed murder of a county treasurer. The negroes were tracked by bloodhounds.

-To a correspondent who visited him at Val sin a short time since, Bismarck said: "I shall never enter public life of any kind again. I am out of harness for ever."

-A naphtha spring in America became ignited, seventeen workmen being engulfed in a sea of fire.

-The Paris Exhibition of 1900 is to eclipse all its predecessors. It is to contain at telescope which (it is said) "will enable people to distinguish the inhabitants, if any, of the moon."

-Robbers continue to coolly board trains in America, and make off with the valuables. As the crime is one against inter-state commerce, it will probably be dealt with by a law of Congress.

-A German pianist in London, at a public exhibition, will attempt to play or thirty hours, without once taking his hands from the keys. He purposes playing 400 difficult musical compositions from memory.

-A sensation has been drooled in English naval and government circles by the action of the French cruiser Forfait, which stopped act English ship on the high seas and compelled lion to show her colours.

-On arrival at Southampton the American line steamship Paris reported that she had been in collision, eighty miles off Scilly, with an unknown vessel, which is believed to have sunk with the loss of all hands.

-The deaths to India from wild beasts and snakes are on the increase. In twelve months, exclusive of snake-bites, wild animate, principally tigers, caused the deaths of 2,804 persons, and 90,253 head of cattle.

-An explosion of firedamp occurred early on the morning of the 20th in one of the pits of the Anina collieries in Hungary. Fifteen dead bodies and twenty injured miners have already been brought to the surface.

-A boiler explosion took place on the French cruiser ArÈthuse at Brest, and according to a telegram from that town six were killed and twenty injured. The official account, as telegraphed from Paris, states that four were killed and six injured.

-The Italian Government recently decided to suppress all Socialist Societies in Italy, and on the 22nd inst. put their decision into offset. A manlier of Socialist journals were suppressed. Much excitement prevails attiring the Socialists, but no trouble is anticipated.

-Signor Crispi and his house in Rome are carefully guarded. Twelve detectives, eight policemen in uniform, and two to follow Signor Crispi's carriage when driving out, are under the direction of an inspector, and dedicated to the service of the Prime Minister.

-Several peasants belonging to a village in the province of Viatka, Russia, are suspected of practising pagan rites, and are charged with murdering a man with the object of offering him in sacrifice to their deities. The case will be brought before the authorities for trial.

-During the work of clearing a military magazine at Rio de Janeiro a soldier dropped one of the shells, which in bursting caused the explosion of ten dynamite cartridges. A crowd had collected to view the work, and sixty persons are stated to have been killed on the spot.

-Niagara is already in harness and made to drive mills. It is now proposed to utilise in a similiar way the fall of water from the southern end of Lake Windermere, which is described as equal to 40,000 indicated horse-power, being the best piece of water-power in England.

-Letters from Constantinople represent that city as being, at the present time subjected to a rigorous regime of repression, in obedience to instructions from the Palace, which is a prey to suspicions of all kinds. The censorship over newspapers and publications of all sorts is most severe.

-More than twelve years ago Marguerite Bouyenval, a French lady living in Paris, gave birth to a child, following which, from a sudden fright, hysteria ensued, and then coma, from which, though alive to-day, she has never been roused. She is fed on milk and peptone, and removed once a day from one bed to another.

-The inoculation treatment for diphtheria has keen a great success in Trieste. Dr. Roux, the discoverer of the remedy, cannot supply she serum fast enough. He takes it from horses, several of which he keeps for the purpose. A horse which for three years has been supplying serum, is said to be in excellent health. A useful, lazy career, he says, is thus opened up for lame but healthy horses.

November 8, 1894

"Catholicism Gaining in U.S." The Present Truth 10, 45.

E. J. Waggoner

The Catholic Times, speaking of the diminution of the population of Ireland, which in the last fifty years has been about three and a half millions, almost wholly in the Catholic provinces, consoles itself for this loss to "the church" by the reflection that "this loss of Catholics from Ireland has made the Catholic Church the dominant religious force in the United States, and a power in every colony of the Empire."

American Protestants will not read with pleasure the statement in the Catholic Times that the Catholic Church is "the dominant religious force in the United States;" but it is a fact nevertheless. Its power, however, is not by any means entirely due to Catholic immigration, as the Catholic Times intimates. A large part of it is due to the professed Protestants themselves. In their endeavour to secure the legal enforcement of Sunday observance, they have unconsciously been building up Catholicism, for that is the very soul of Catholic supremacy.

Protestants, both in England and in America, have not been unmindful of the fact that Rome has been gaining ground among them, although they have by no means realised the extent of her growth. They have seen that Rome was seeking to control politics; and so they thought to checkmate her by trying to get control of politics themselves. They have reasoned that if Protestants controlled legislation Catholics could not gain power, not realising that by this means they were only increasing the danger they thought to prevent.

It should be well understood that the early church was just what that which to-day is called Protestantism ought to be. It held the religion of the Bible. We might say that it was Protestant, because it was a protest against Jewish and heathen errors. There was no "Catholic Church." But this "Protestant" Church was not content with its position; it did not wish to wait till the next world for its inheritance, but desired it now. So it sought and gained political power, and thereby became "Catholic." The Catholic Church is nothing else but Protestantism with political power. When Protestants to-day think to beat Catholicism with its own weapons, they will find that it is master of them. Every Protestant appeal to the civil law is but an admission that Catholicism is right. Rome can be successfully opposed only by practices exactly opposite to hers, namely by the practise of the Gospel of Christ, as revealed in His word.

"'A Large Place'" The Present Truth 10, 45.

E. J. Waggoner

In Ps. xviii. 17-19 we read: "He delivered me from my strong enemy, and from them which hated me; for they were too strong for me. They prevented me in the day of my calamity; but the Lord was my stay. He brought me forth also into a large place; He delivered me, because He delighted in me."

Again, in Ps. xxxi. 7, 8, we read, "I will be glad and rejoice in Thy mercy; for Thou hast considered my trouble; Thou hast known my soul in adversities; and hast not shut me up into the hand of the enemy: Thou hast set my feet in a large room."

Once more: "I called upon the Lord in distress; the Lord answered me, and set me in a large place." Ps. cxviii. 5.

What is this "large place" in which the Lord sets those at liberty to call upon Him and put their trust in Him? and how large is it? A few texts of Scripture will tell us.

In the first chapter of the Ephesians the apostle prays by the Spirit that we may be enlightened to "know what is the hope of His calling, and what the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power to us-ward who believe, according to the working of His mighty power to us-ward who believe." Verses 18, 19. In the 10th and 11th verses we are told that it is in Christ that we obtain this inheritance; and in the second chapter (verses 4-10) we learn that we are made partakers of the inheritance in Christ because of the great love wherewith God loved us.

Now read the sum of the whole matter in one of the most wonderful prayers ever uttered: "For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God." Eph. iii. 14-19.

Here we have set before us the "large place," and the size of it. The large place is the love of God which passes knowledge.

"For the love of God is broader
Than the measure of man's mind."

But the size of it? Well, that is a

706

thing that it will take us all eternity to discover. As soon as we are rooted and grounded in love, we may begin to comprehend with all saints what is "the breadth, and length, and depth, and height," so as to know the love of God in Christ for us.

Take your stand wherever you please, and begin the measurement. First, the breadth. Measure both ways from you, as far as there is any breadth. Where will you stop?-There will be no stopping place, for space is as infinite as God Himself. So it must be with the length. The depth and height likewise. There is no limit. The inheritance, and the riches of the glory of it, which belongs to the saints, is the whole universe.

This is all in Christ, in whom we have redemption, "For in Him were all things created, and the heavens and upon the earth, things visible and things invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things have been created through Him and unto Him; and He is before all things, and in Him all things consist." Col. i. 16, 17, R.V. "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?" Rom. viii. 32. "He that overcometh shall inherit all things." But as we are even now to know what is the riches of the glory of the inheritance, which we now obtain in Christ, it is a fact that the large place which God sets us in, so that we may be free, is the boundless universe which His love has prepared for us.

The Psalmist said, "I will walk at liberty; for I seek Thy precepts." Ps. cxix. 45. And here we have before us "the glorious liberty of the sons of God." Here is room in which the mind can expand. Who is it that presumes to say that the religion of Jesus Christ is narrow?

"The Satanic Origin of Spiritualism" The Present Truth 10, 45.

E. J. Waggoner

From the beginning in the garden to the present time Satan has tempted men by appealing to their pride, and holding out to them that great powers and virtues they might develop if they would only turn away from God's plan and allow the good that is in them to manifest itself. The history of the world of sin shows how much there is in man of himself, but the same old falsehood is cherished to-day. The Satanic origin of Spiritualism, and the real principle on which it is founded, is shown by the following from Mr. Hudson Tuttle:-

It takes man by the hand, and instead of telling him that he is a sinful worm of the dust, corrupt from the crown of the head to the sole of his feet, it assures him that he is a nobleman of nature, heir to the Godhead, owning all things, for whom all things exist, and is capable of understanding all.

"Ye shall be as gods," said the serpent, and the lie is still believed and taught.

"Studies in Romans. Instruments of Righteousness. Rom. vi. 12-22" The Present Truth 10, 45.

E. J. Waggoner

Read carefully the first verses of the sixth chapter of Romans, before beginning the study of the remaining verses, in this lesson. A few words are sufficient to summarise them. They treat of death with Christ, and burial and resurrection with Him. In being crucified with Him, we give up our own lives, in order that we may be raised with Him in His new life. We are then to continue to live with Him, since "Christ being raised from the dead, dieth no more." The lesson closed with the exhortation, "Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord." The closing of the previous lesson at verse 11 was purely arbitrary, since there is really no division in the chapter. The present lesson therefore begins with

AN EXHORTATION. ROM. 6. 12-22

"Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin; but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. For sin shall not have dominion over you; for ye are not under the law, but under grace. What then? Shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid. Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness? But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you. Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness. I speak after the manner of men because of the infirmity of your flesh; for as ye have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity; even so now yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness. For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness. What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life. For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

How have we learned that we are to regard ourselves?

"Reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto to sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

If dead to sin but alive unto God, how are we to stand related to sin?

"Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body."

If sin reign in your mortal body what do we do?

"Obey it in the lusts thereof."

What further exhortation is given?

"Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin."

To what are we to yield ourselves?

"Yield yourselves unto God."

In what way?

"As those that are alive from the dead."

And what are our members to be?

"Instruments of righteousness unto God."

If we thus yield ourselves as instruments of righteousness unto God, what will be the result?

"Sin shall not have dominion over you?"

Why will sin not have dominion over us?

"For ye are not under the law, but under grace."

"What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace?"

"God forbid." Not by any means,-far from it.

Whose servants are we?

"To whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are."

What were we formerly, when not under grace?

"The servants of sin."

But what has now been done for us?

"Made free from sin."

How was it that we were made free from sin?

"Ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered unto you."

Being made free from sin, what have we become?

"The servants of righteousness."

How are we now to yield our members servants to righteousness?

"As ye have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity."

When we were the servants of sin from what were we free?

"When ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness."

What is the fruit of those things of which we are or should be ashamed?

"The end of those things is death."

707

But what now that we are made free from sin, and are the servants of God?

"Ye have your fruit unto holiness."

And what is the end?

"The end everlasting life."

What is the wages of sin?

"The wages of sin is death."

And what the gift of God?

"The gift of God is eternal life."

Through whom?

"Through Jesus Christ our Lord."

Reign of Sin.-In the fifth chapter we learned that the reign of sin is the reign of death, because death comes by sin. But we also learned that the gift of life is offered to all, so that whoever has Christ has life. Instead of death reigning over such, they themselves "shall reign in life by One, Jesus Christ." The exhortation, "Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body," is therefore equal to an exhortation to abide in Christ, or to keep his life. We gained the life by faith, and so we are to keep it by faith.

Whose Servants?-That is very easy to answer. "To whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey." If we yield ourselves to sin, then we are the servants of sin, for "whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin." John viii. 34. But if we yield ourselves to righteousness, then we are the servants of righteousness. "No man can serve two masters." Matthew vi. 24. We can not serve both sin and righteousness at the same time. No man can at once be both a sinner and a righteous man. Either sin or righteousness must rule.

Instruments.-We have in this chapter two terms to describe people, namely, servants and instruments. It takes both to illustrate our relation to sin and righteousness. Sin and righteousness are rulers. We are but instruments in their hands. The kind of work a given instrument will do depends entirely upon the one who uses it. For instance, here is a good pen; what kind of work will it do? It will do good work if it is in the hands of a skilful penman, but in the hands of a bungler its work will be poor. Or, in the hands of a good man it will write only what is good; but in the hands of a bad man it will exhibit that which is evil. But man is not a mere tool. No, not by any means. There is this difference between men and ordinary instruments: the latter have no choice as to who shall use them, while the former have full choice as to whom they will serve. They must yield themselves, not once only, but all the time. If they yield to sin, they will commit sin. If they yield to God, to be instruments in His hands, they can do nothing else but good so long as they are yielded to Him.

A Parallel.-In the nineteenth verse we are exhorted to yield ourselves as servants of righteousness just as we have yielded ourselves servants to sin. This being done, we are assured in the following verses that just as surely as the fruit was sin and death when we were yielded to sin, so surely will the fruit be holiness when we yield ourselves servants to righteousness. Yea, even more sure; for "where sin abounded, grace did much more abound; that as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." Righteousness is stronger than sin, even as God is stronger than Satan. God can pluck out of the hands of Satan the soul that cries out for deliverance; but none can pluck God's children out of His hand.

Not Under the Law.-Many people are fond of quoting this expression, thinking that it forever absolves them from any observance of the law of God. Strange to say, this expression is used as a cover only for non-observance of the fourth commandment. Repeat the fourth commandment to a man who objects to keeping the Sabbath of the Lord, the seventh day, and he will say, "We are not under the law." Yet that same man will quote the third commandment to a man whom he hears swearing, or the first and second against the heathen, and will acknowledge the sixth, seventh, and eighth commandments. Thus it appears that men do not really believe that the statement that we are not under the law means that we are at liberty to break it. Let us study the whole verse, and its different parts.

What Is Sin?-"Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law; for sin is the transgression of the law." 1 John iii. 4. "All unrighteousness is sin." 1 John v. 17. This is definite; let us hold it well in our minds.

What Is Righteousness?-Righteousness is the opposite of sin, because "all unrighteousness is sin." But "sin is the transgression of the law." Therefore righteousness is the keeping of the law. So when we are exhorted to yield our members as instruments of righteousness unto God, it is the same as telling us to yield ourselves to obedience to the law.

Dominion of Sin.-Sin has no dominion over those who yield themselves servants to righteousness, or to obedience to the law; because sin is the transgression of the law. Now read the whole of the fourteenth verse: "For sin shall not have dominion over you; for ye are not under the law, but under grace." That is to say, transgression of the law has no place in them who are not under the law. Then those who are not under the law are those who obey the law. Those who break it, are under it. Nothing can be plainer.

Under Grace.-"Ye are not under the law, but under grace." We have seen that those who are not under the law are the ones who are keeping the law. Those therefore who are under the law are the ones who are breaking it, and who are therefore under its condemnation. But "where sin abounded, grace did much more abound." Grace delivers from sin. Distressed by the threatenings of the law which we have broken, we flee for refuge to Christ, who is "full of grace and truth." There we find freedom from sin. In Him we not only find grace to cover all our sin, but we find the righteousness of the law because He is full of truth, and the law is the truth. Ps. cxix. 142. Grace "reigns" through righteousness, or obedience to the law, unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Wages of Sin.-In the second chapter we learned that those who reject the goodness of God are treasuring up to themselves wrath. Now wrath comes only on the children of disobedience. Eph. v. 6. Those who sin are laying up wages for themselves. "The wages of sin is death." Sin has death in it, therefore "sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death." There can be no other end to sin than death, because sin is the absence of righteousness, and righteousness is the life and character of God. Persistent and final choice of sin is therefore choice of complete separation from the life of God, and so from all life, since He is the only source of life. Christ, who is the wisdom of God, says, "All they that hate Me love death." Prov. viii.

708

36. Those who suffer death at last will be only those who have worked for it.

The Gift of God.-But we do not work for eternal life. No works that we could do would make the smallest part of payment towards it. It is the gift of God. True, it comes only through righteousness, but righteousness is a gift. "By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained [prepared] that we should walk in them." Eph. ii. 8-10. "O how great is Thy goodness, which thou hast laid up for them that fear Thee; which Thou hast wrought for them that trust in Thee before the sons of men!" Ps. xxxi. 19. When people sin, God gives them only what they have bargained for. But if any yield themselves as servants of righteousness, He provides the righteousness for them, and gives them eternal life with it, all as a free gift. "The way of the transgressor is hard," but the yoke of Christ is easy, and His burden is light.

"How Do You Know?" The Present Truth 10, 45.

E. J. Waggoner

How do you know that the Bible is the word of God? This is one of the queries put to the Protestant world by Rome. It is one which the reader may profitably put to himself. Doubtless not a few Protestants would find themselves unable to answer it. In a recent lecture in Liverpool a Catholic speaker addressed these questions to Protestants: "How do you know it [the Bible] is the word of God? Who told you it was God's word-your mother, your father, your teacher, your grandfather, your grandmother, the minister of your church?" How many "Protestants" there are who go, if not to their father or grandfather, to their pastor or to some other mortal like themselves, to learn what is the will of the Lord.

We may all know for ourselves that the Bible is the word of the Lord. The Reformers knew it; who told the fact to them? Not Rome; for they did not acknowledge her authority. By that word they were able to discomfit the champions of Rome, and thus they demonstrated to Rome herself the Divine origin of the Scriptures. Had they not known the Bible to be God's word, independently of the authority of Rome, the Reformation would not have been possible. An acknowledgement of Rome's authority in the matter would have barred the way to reform at the outset; for by the same principle which would confer upon Rome authority to declare what is the word of God, she would also be authorised to declare how that word is to be interpreted, and therefore true Protestants do not, as asserted by the aforesaid speaker, receive the Bible "on the authority of the Roman Church." The men who were first known as "Protestants" had entirely renounced the authority of Rome and received the Bible on an infinitely higher authority, before taking the stand which won for them that distinction.

Peter knew the word of God, and by the same means which enabled him to obtain such knowledge, every man may know that word. Peter was a man, mortal and fallible like ourselves. He had no freer or fuller access to the treasures of Divine knowledge than has any fisherman in our land to-day. When many of Christ's disciples "went back and walked no more with Him," because of the things which He spake to them, Peter said in answer to the Saviour's query whether the twelve would also leave Him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life." John vi. 68. How did Peter know that Christ's words were the words of God? It may be said that he knew because it was God who spoke them; but how did he know that Jesus of Nazareth was God? Had any man told him so? No; for we read in Matthew that he had not learned this truth from any human source. "He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am? And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona; for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but My Father which is in heaven." Matt. xvi. 15-17. Neither did flesh and blood reveal to Peter what was the word of God. God in revealing Christ to Peter, revealed to him His word; for Christ was (and is) the Word. John i. 1, 14.

The Saviour did not ask men to believe His words because it was He that spoke them; but to believe on Him because of His words and His works. The latter were the evidences of the former, and not the former of the latter. Peter knew and said that Jesus had the words of eternal life, before he said, "We believe and are sure that Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God." John vi. 71. The word of God is its own evidence; for God is in it, and His word contains His power; and therefore all that God Himself could do to convince a person of the truth, His word can do. And when that word comes to us, if our hearts are open to receive it, we know that it is the word of God. We know it because it "is quick and powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." He to whom flesh and blood alone, whether in the form of a pope or a pastor or any other man, has revealed that the Bible is the word of God, does not know it at all.

"Conferred Not With Flesh" The Present Truth 10, 45.

E. J. Waggoner

The Apostle, writing of his experience when the will of God was first revealed to him, says: "But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by His grace, to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach Him among the heathen, and immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood." But how few there are who, when placed in a similar position, follow his example. For God is pleased to reveal His Son in every person, this being necessary to the salvation of each one, as much so as in the case of Paul. The person in whom Jesus Christ is revealed, is saved, and only by that means can salvation come.

But how many there are who when God speaks to them and makes known His will, that He may reveal His Son in them, do exactly the opposite to that which was done by Paul. Their testimony would be, Immediately I did confer with flesh and blood. Immediately when God by His Spirit had opened to them the Scriptures, and made known to them His will, they conferred with their relatives and friends, or with their minister, to decide what they had better do about it. And these persons told them not to be foolish or fanatical and not to make themselves different from other people, for the Bible isn't to be taken so literally as to require any such thing as that; and they listened to the counsel of flesh and blood, and draw back from the counsel of the Omniscient.

709

"Thus saith the Lord, thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel; I am the Lord thy God, which teacheth thee by the way that thou shouldest go. O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea." "If thou hadst known, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes. . because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation." Isa. xlviii. 17, 18; Luke xix. 42-44. Let not this lament be said over you. The one safe Counsellor in all matters of duty is the Lord Himself.

"The Civil Sunday" The Present Truth 10, 45.

E. J. Waggoner

The report of the Sabbath controversy in Switzerland was received last week so late that we had neither time nor space to make any comments upon it. There are a few features in it to which we now wish to call special attention. They may all be embraced in the above heading.

Throughout Christendom the sentiment quite generally prevails that religious persecution is wrong. This is shown by the fact that even the Roman Catholic Church disclaims ever having carried on any such persecution. It is also shown in the fact that Sunday laws are declared to be purely civil laws, and not in any sense of religious, so that prosecutions for disregarding them may be relieved of the odium of being persecution for conscience' sake.

The reader will, remember that Brother Holser's conviction was justified almost wholly by the civil plea,-religion had nothing to do with the Sunday law or with its execution,-it was solely a social and political affair. Nevertheless some of the judges admitted that religion was at the bottom of it, and that in enacting the Sunday law the voice of "the church" had been obeyed.

Now it makes not a particle of difference upon what grounds Sunday laws are enacted and enforced; in every case it is an act of direct opposition to the authority of God.

God has said to all men, "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy works; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work." Ex. xx. 8-10. This makes the seventh day a sacred day to be devoted wholly to the Lord, and the other six days ordinary working days. Now whenever men, no matter in what capacity they act, nor from what motive, declare that another day,-one of the six working days,-must be regarded as the rest day of the week, they are setting themselves in direct opposition to God. If they say that it is purely a civil regulation, a State affair, then they are simply claiming that the State is above God.

ALL RELIGIOUS LEGISLATION CIVIL

As a matter of fact, there has never been any open persecution except for the violation of civil laws. Why?-Because "the church," as a church, has never of itself had the power to persecute openly. Her dogmas were incorporated into the laws of civil Governments, or her priests were clothed with civil power. Then when those whom "the church" declared heretics were put to death, it was not for their religion, but because they had violated civil laws, and were dangerous to the peace and welfare of the State.

Francis I., of France, was a bitter persecutor of "heretics." Many scaffolds had been set up in Paris, and he had pledged himself to extirpate Lutheranism from his dominions. But when the Protestant princes of Germany, with whom he wished to make an alliance, asked an explanation of his proceedings, "the King was ready with his excuse, and his excuse was that of almost all persecutors of every age. The king had not been burning Lutherans, but executing traitors. If those who had been put to death had imbibed reformed sentiments, it was not for their religion, but for their sedition, that they had been punished."-Wylie.

In like manner one of the judges in the case of Brother Holser said that he "was not convicted because he was an Adventist, but because he had transgressed the Sunday law." But the Sunday law is directly contrary to the Bible, which he, as an Adventist, could not disregard.

KING PHARAOH'S PERSECUTIONS

The people of Israel were the ancient church of God. They went down to Egypt, were there subjected to most bitter persecutions, but purely as a matter of civil policy. The king said unto his people, "Behold, the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we; come on, let us deal wisely with them; lest they multiply, and it come to pass, that, when there falleth out any war, they join also unto our enemies, and fight against us, and so get them up out of the land." Ex. i. 9, 10. All the ill-treatment of the Jews was because it was deemed necessary for the welfare of the nation.

But God regarded it as directed against Himself. So He sent Moses and Aaron to say unto the Pharaoh that then reigned, "Thus saith Jehovah God of Israel, Let My people go." But Pharaoh would not admit that the Lord had anything to do with the case. He replied, "Who is Jehovah, that I should obey His voice to let Israel go? I know not Jehovah, neither will let Israel go."

The Lord therefore proceeded to show Pharaoh who He is. He let him know that no matter what the pretext, whether civil or religious, anything against His people's freedom to exercise to the full their God-given rights was in opposition to Him. Pharaoh had not a race of despised slaves to deal with, but the Lord of heaven and earth. The fact that the ill-treatment of the Jews was a politico-social measure, did not in the least relieve it of the charge of being fighting against God.

CHRIST AND THE CIVIL LAW

It is worthwhile to remember that Jesus of Nazareth was persecuted and put to death solely as a politico-social affair. In the first place, Herod sought to kill Him when He was an infant because the wise men came from the East, inquiring, "Where is He that is born King of the Jews?"

Still later, when the fame of Jesus had spread throughout the country because of the good works that He had done, and the people were turning to Him, "the chief priests and the Pharisees held a council, and said, What do we? for this man doeth many miracles. If we let Him thus alone, all men will believe on Him; and the Romans shall come and take away both our place and nation." John xi. 47, 48.

Then Caiaphas, the high priest, said: "Ye know nothing at all, nor consider that it is expedient for us, that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not."

Finally, when He was arraigned before Pilate, it was on a charge of sedition and insurrection. Pilate found no fault in Him, but the Jews cried out, "If thou let this man go, thou art not C?sar's friend; whosoever maketh himself a king speaketh against C?sar." John xix. 12.

710

Thus it was purely a matter of civil policy throughout. And yet it was solely because of Christ's religious character and teaching that it was done. But "the church," the Jewish people, had no power to put anybody to death, and the Roman Government would pay no attention to their religious prejudices. Accordingly they were obliged to make it appear that Christ's religious teaching and practices tended to subvert the peace and even the very existence of the Government; and on this basis He was put to death. Will anyone say that the crucifixion of Jesus was any the less a heaven-daring crime because He was put to death as a violator of civil order?

Let no one, therefore, think to excuse the persecution of men for keeping the Sabbath instead of Sunday, by saying that Sunday laws are civil, and not religious. Whatever they are called, one fact remains, and that is that they are in direct opposition to the God of heaven and earth.

CONFLICT WITH CIVIL AUTHORITY

The question may be asked, as indeed it has been asked with reference to this special case, "How can you justify your conflict with the Swiss authorities and laws, when these enforce rest on one particular day, Sunday?" And others quote Rom. xiii. 2, "Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation."

Now the answer to this is very simple. It is that we, for in this we identify ourselves with our brethren in Switzerland, have no conflict with the Swiss authorities. It is not a case of Seventh-day Adventists against the Swiss authorities, but of the Swiss authorities against God and His word.

The word of the Lord is a rock. They who build on it are safe. It alone will stand when all things else shall pass away. Jesus, who taught both the law and the prophets, said, "Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of Mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock; and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock." Matt. vii. 24, 25. On the contrary, he who does not obey the word builds upon the sand, and will be lost.

Will anyone say that the man whose house is on the rock, and is a part of the rock itself, has put himself in opposition to the floods and the winds that beat upon the rock? He is on the rock, where he ought to be, and does nothing but stay there. He is not to blame if the floods seek to overthrow the rock on which he rests.

Even so in this case. The law of God says that the seventh day is the Sabbath, and that the other six days of the week are but ordinary working days. On God's word we stand. Now come the Swiss authorities, and the authorities of other nations as well, and seek to destroy that word. Sabbath-keepers have no controversy whatever with them. They simply rest on the word of God against which these authorities are fighting. That is the sum of the matter. Seventh-day Adventists are not breakers of the peace, nor subverters of civil authority. They have no controversy with men nor with Governments. But they do have a message to proclaim, and that is this, "The word of our God shall stand for ever." In proclaiming this they are working in the interest of men and of Governments; because since God's word shall stand for ever, it follows that those nations and peoples that array themselves against it are simply plotting their own destruction; for the impregnable Rock will wear them out. "Be wise now therefore, O ye kings; be instructed, ye judges of the earth."

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 45.

E. J. Waggoner

-The women's suffrage movement is said to be growing fast all over Australasia.

-A new oil well at Baku, on the Caspian Sea, yields a daily supply of 8,200 tons.

-An insurrection has started in Peru. Two British warships have been ordered to the scene of the disturbance.

-A terrible earthquake is reported from Argentina, by which 2,000 persons are said to have been killed, and 20,000 made homeless.

-The butchers of Paris, who deal only in beef and mutton, are becoming alarmed at the extent to which horse flesh, ass flesh, and even mule-flesh is being used as human fool.

-A disastrous collision occurred October 31 between two passenger trains at the station of Redfern, a suburb of Sydney, New South Wales. Six persons were killed and thirty injured.

-A new cannon invented by Colonel Deport has been tested with excellent results. The gun, which does not recoil, fires at the rate of twenty-five shots a minute, and can be worked by three men.

-A Budapest paper reports that a powder mill at Bisztra, in Lower Weissenburg, was totally destroyed by an explosion, October 29. Three workmen were killed on the spot and fourteen were fatally injured.

-An alabaster box of perfume was recently discovered amid the ruins of Pompeii. The pomade was more fragrant even than roses, which it resembled, although it had lain buried for eighteen centuries.

-The Czar succumbed to his malady early in the afternoon of Nov. 1. Much sorrow over the event is felt throughout Europe, and the future, so far as it may be affected by the policy of the new Czar, is regarded with much uncertainty and anxiety.

-A Swazi deputation have arrived in England to protest to the Queen against the annexation of their country by the Transvaal. The deputation numbers six Indunas, who are a fine type of most, one standing six feet three inches in height. They are clad in European dress.

-A heavy rainfall has followed the prolonged drought at Leicester, and the water famine, which lasted a month, is much less acute.

-The population of Germany, according to statistics just issued, is 51,500,000, which is an increase of about 11,500,000 since 1870-and this, too, in spite of the brow and deep stream of emigration which has been flowing out of the Fatherland, mostly towards America.

-A lunatic asylum outside the town of Joenkeeping, Sweden, caught fire October 31, while the wind was blowing a gale. The flames spread with amazing rapidity, and in a very brief space the whole building was ablaze. Only three of the inmates were saved. Fifteen perished.

-Nine other European sovereigns are older than the Czar, who was 49 on his last birthday: the King of Denmark is 76, Queen Victoria 75, King of Sweden 65, Emperor of Austria 64, King of the Belgiums 59, King of Roumania 55, Prince of Montenegro 58, and the Sultan of Turkey and the King of Italy each 50.

-While on a voyage from Sydney to Auckland, on Sunday night, October 25, the Wairarapa, belonging to the Union Steamship Company of New Zealand, was totally wrecked on Great Barrier Island. Amid heartrending scones, no lees than 194 lives were lost, including 111 passengers and the captain of the vessel.

-The Japanese continue to make slow but steady progress in their war with China, the troops of which seem utterly demoralised and incapable of effectual resistance to any disciplined force. Negotiations for peace which have been recently made are said to have utterly failed. A rice famine is threatened in China.

-The Pope claims to view with sincere regret the retirement of Count Caprivi from the lead of Prussian affairs, but hopes that Prince Hohenlohe, the new Chancellor, being a Catholic, will maintain good relations with the Church. As the Chancellor's brother is a Cardinal, the prospects of "good relations" between the Prussian Government and the Papacy are certainly very fair.

-A pilgrimage by proxy is reported from France. A man being ill regarded a pilgrimage as necessary to his recovery. Being unequal to, the fatigue, he selected a young man who, starting with his pocket well filled with his hirer's money, did the regulation shrines, afterwards making a praying tour of the churches of Rome. Before quite completing his round, however, the young man beanie intoxicated and fell into the hands of the police.

-After the great earthquake shocks in Greece last spring a Grand Committee was appointed to make an examination of the Parthenon in order to ascertain what damage the temple had sustained. On careful investigation the committee reported that the monument had been seriously injured, and that there was great risk in allowing it to remain in its present dangerous condition. They recommended, therefore, that immediate steps be taken to strengthen the building. The Arch?ological Society, at a meeting called to consider the question, voted an unlimited credit for the purpose of effecting the necessary repairs.

-A telegram from Lille, France, states that disastrous floods have occurred in the department of the Nord. The country round Lille, Tourcoing, and ArmentiÈres is under water, and the villages on the banks of the Lys and its tributaries, especially the Deule and Marccq, are flooded. Most of the farms are surrounded by water, which in some places has already reached a height of three feet, and they can only be communicated with by means of boats. Numerous factories at Roubaix, Tourcoing, and other planes, says Reuter's correspondent, have been invaded by the floods, and the looms are under water. Work has consequently been suspended, and more than 100,000 hands have been rendered idle.

-A resident of Sydney; New South Wales, ham, invented a submarine torpedo boat capable of sinking to any depth and of travelling under water as quickly as on the surface, without revealing its presence. A working model of the boat was tried recently, in the public baths at Melbourne, in the presence of the Earl of Hopetoun, the Governor, the navel commandant, and a number of naval and military officers The experiments were a complete success, the model rising or sinking stern or bow, turning, reversing, or remaining stationary in obedience to the electric current by which it is worked. The inventor claims that a full-sized boat would be capable of remaining under water for three days.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 45.

E. J. Waggoner

The Bible, in whole or in part, is now going to the world in 400 languages, and at the rate of about two million copies per year.

It is said that a recent article in a New York paper from the noted infidel, Mr. Ingersoll, which advocated the morality of suicide, led directly to a number of suicides.

It is stated that "the personal communications between Alexander III. and Leo. XIII. on the subject of the union of the Eastern religious bodies to the parent church, have been frequent and of a very cordial character."

Speaking of "Reform Sunday," which was devoted to sermons on municipal reform by many churches, the English Churchman pertinently says:-

We consider that there is plenty of room for reform in the "churches," especially when we find music and dancing licenses applied for in connection with mission halls, with power to sell intoxicants. Among these mission-halls are those attached to St. Anne's, Bermondsey, and St. Lukes, Deptford, both in the gifts of Evangelical trustees.

It is pitiful to read some of the plans which are suggested in all earnestness to advance the Protestant cause. The real nature of Protestantism as well as the character of Romanism is little understood by many who talk strongly against Rome. Thus a member of the National Protestant League urges that the fifth of November might be used as the means by which "Protestantism may be once more excited to glowing fervour." He suggests historical processions, tea meetings, and big bonfires. But the mystery of iniquity is a principle and not a name merely, and cannot be opposed by the beating of drums and a big blaze. Another kind of light is necessary to dispel the darkness, first from the individual heart and then to enlighten the darkness of other hearts. When the Apostle Paul saw the beginnings of apostasy he left the charge, "Preach the Word," and the same charge is for us to-day.

Apropos of the fashion of holding special services to attract attention, a contemporary reports the following:-

"Would it not be well to have a London Reform Sunday?" asked Dr. Parker last Thursday morning. "No," he replied very emphatically. "Would it not be well to have special services for the club-footed and men who are blind in one eye? Would it not be something new and nice to show that we were active if we had special Sunday afternoons for confectioners, and special Sunday morning services for cabmen, and special services, beginning at 11:30, for men who are threatened with paralysis? It all means weakness," exclaimed the Doctor. "Let other people use their judgment. I am only answering in my own name. I believe there is still in the old Book and in the old Gospel just what men want." "Would you mind going to a P.S.A.?" queried the Doctor in mocking tone, "or a G.I.G., or, if that does not suit, a J.I.G., or an X.Y.Z.? If I were a working man, I should say: 'If you have any argument to address to me, let me hear it, but I am not going to be smuggled into a meeting like that.' There is such a thing as religious knavery."

Doubtless many people who have read of the Russian persecutions of the Stundists and the Jews have thought of the late Czar as a cruel, vindictive tyrant, a man destitute of all human sympathy. Nothing could be farther from the truth. He was a man of kindly and genial disposition, and a lover of peace, a good husband, and an affectionate parent. Why then such outrageous persecutions?-Simply because Russia is an example of the perfect union of Church and State. The Czar of Russia, whoever he may be, is a part of a great system which knows nothing of human sympathies.

The Czar of Russia is the head of the church and the "Defender of the Faith," by virtue of his position. The late Czar was thoroughly convinced that he was directly commissioned from heaven to maintain the "Orthodox" religion. Therefore in matters of religion he sacrificed his personal feelings to what he considered duty. In any union of Church and State, the best and kindest rulers are usually the most relentless persecutors.

But while the Czar was head of the Church, as of the State, he must needs have advisers. In purely civil matters he might often act on his own judgment, independently of the advice of his ministers; but not so in affairs of religion. In a State church the priests pose as the prophets of God, and what ruler would dare act contrary to the counsel of those who hold the keys of heaven, in matters which concern their special calling?

The fact is, therefore, that the Russian priesthood is a power greater than that of the State. Alexander III. found himself nominally at the head of the Church, but actually an instrument in the hands of scheming, bigoted, and brutal priests, all the evil of whose natures was intensified by the wicked system of which they were a part. And so, no matter how good and well-intentioned the present Czar may be, there is no hope that religious persecution will be any the less.

The Bible requires no apologies, and very often those who set out to explain the imaginary "difficulties" fall into absurd conclusions. Thus in a little pamphlet a well-meaning author meets the denial of the universality of the flood by holding that according to the Bible account the flood need not have covered a very large territory to destroy all the inhabitants of the earth. And he suggests that perhaps only the domestic animals came into the ark as Noah called them to him, the wild animals fleeing and escaping beyond the submerged area. But why did not the wicked also flee with the animals? These weakly attempts to explain away the word of Scripture in order to win the captious critic cannot fail to sow the seeds of scepticism.

"Intemperance and Tea" The Present Truth 10, 45.

E. J. Waggoner

Intemperance and Tea.-At the recent "Conference of Women Workers" in Glasgow, the subject of intemperance among women was discussed. It was claimed that indulgence in alcoholic liquors is secretly increasing among educated women; but Dr. Sophia Jex-Blake, of Edinburgh, said that "in her experience, which included patients from the peeress to the pauper, but was chiefly among the middle classes, for one case in which she had been compelled to beg her patient to desist taking alcohol, she had in ten been obliged to implore her to leave off tea and coffee." Strangely enough, it does not seem to have occurred to anyone that the almost universal use of tea and coffee is the cause of the great increase in the consumption of alcoholic liquors. When the system becomes so accustomed to the weaker stimulant that the desired effect is not produced, the stronger stimulant is inevitably called for.

November 15, 1894

"Fanciful Bible Study" The Present Truth 10, 46.

E. J. Waggoner

Here we have a company of people gathered together, calling themselves a Bible class. A text of Scripture is read, and the leader asks the members what they think of it. "What is your opinion?" and, "Let us hear your mind," he says to one and another. So they go about, each one telling what he thinks the text means, until they either arrive at some common ground, or the leader thinks that it is not profitable to carry the "investigation" any further.

"Studying the Bible," did you say? Certainly not. They imagine that they are, but they are only studying themselves.Their "investigation" is simply an investigation of their own minds, and not of the Bible. They meet and "exchange ideas," as it is called, although it is rare that any real exchange is made, since each usually becomes more fixed in his own opinion; and the Bible is used as a support for their conjectures.

Take another class, where the same class under other circumstances. The Scripture is read, and the leader proceeds to tell what it means. The members of the class may have been asked their opinion, but the leader closes the discussion with an ex cathedra utterance. If he be a man of repute, the class hang on his words, noting them down carefully for future reference, so that they may know what they ought to believe concerning this portion of Scripture. This also is called Bible study, but it is simply the study of a man.

The same disposition is in men to-day that prevailed in the days of the schoolmen. Speaking of the time of Wycliffe, Wiley says:-

Philosophy then lay in guesses rather than in facts. Whatever could be known from having been put before man in the facts of nature or the doctrines of Revelation, was deemed not worth further investigation. It was too humble an occupation, to observe and deduce. In the pride of his genius, man turned away from a field lying at his feet, and plunged boldly into a region where, having no data to guide him and no ground for solid footing, he could learn really nothing. From this region of vague speculation the explorer brought back only the images of his own creating, and, dressing up these fancies as facts, he passed them off as knowledge.

To read the Bible, and to search it carefully to find out just what God has said, is still thought scarcely worthy the name of Bible study. Men look into their own minds, and think that thus there studying God.

This is of the very essence of the Papacy. It is the putting of the human above the Divine. It was thus that manifold errors crept into the Christian church, and it is thus that they are perpetuated, and new ones are devised.

There is in many men an almost insane desire to discover something new and startling; to propound some new and startling theory. They are struck by the sound of certain words in the Bible, and without paying any attention to the connection, they forthwith take their "position," and, if possible, rush into print with a statement of the result of their "study," which is only a demonstration of the fact that they have not studied at all.

"The right of private judgment," against which Roman Catholics declaim so much, is grossly abused. God has given to every man reason, and expects each one to think for himself. If He had designed that the priest or the preacher should do the thinking for the labouring man, He would have given all the brains to the former, and none to the latter. But to every man He has given brains, as an indication that each one is expected to think for himself. But God is still supreme. The fact that no man should be lord of another, does not destroy the fact that God is Lord. The only reason why I should not go to another to learn what God means, is that man's mind is so much less than that of God that he will certainly fail when he tries to interpret the mind of God. The Holy Spirit is the only one who can readily interpret the word of God to men. But when I say that I will not take the opinions of another, but follow my own opinions, I am no better off, for I am a human as well as they. I am simply making myself pope, and saying that my judgment is better than that of any other man.

"God is Judge Himself." The right of private judgment is not a right to set one's self up against God. "Submit yourselves to God." Let God teach you by His own Spirit, through His own word. And let the human teachers work be that of leading his class to the fountain whence he has drunk, that they may drink for themselves. Let God form the judgment, and direct the reason. We are not to put our ideas and construction upon the word, but to meditate upon the word until the light and truth that are in it reveal themselves to us, and mould us.

"The Question of Authority" The Present Truth 10, 46.

E. J. Waggoner

This is one of the questions most frequently raised by an apostate church for the purpose of silencing those in whom she opposes. "By what authority doest thou these things?" The question brings to mind the chief priests and scribes and Pharisees, and their attempts to silence our Saviour and put an end to His work. It is not an honest question, asked for the purpose of obtaining information; but one raised merely to oppose the truth of God. That was the purpose of the Jews, and that has been the purpose of every other apostate church, in raising it. It is the only purpose the question is fitted to serve.

Our Saviour spake "with authority;" that was evident to all who heard Him. Yet He had not received any authority from the chief priests and the others who sat "in Moses' seat." Therefore these chief priest and scribes and Pharisees sought to prove Him an imposter. They took the same course also with Christ's followers, Peter and John. We read that as these disciples taught the people in the temple, "the priests, and the captain of the temple, and the Sadducees, came upon them, . . . and they laid hands on them, and put them in hold until the next day. . . . And it came to pass on the morrow that their rulers, and elders, and scribes, and Annas the high priest, and Caiaphas, and John, and Alexander, and as many as were of the kindred of the high priest, were gathered together at Jerusalem. And when they had set them in the midst, they asked, By what power, or by what name, have ye done this?" Acts iv. 1-7. There was no visible line of succession to which authority had descended to Christ or to His disciples: and therefore they were treated just as teachers of the truth are treated now who are not in the supposed line of "apostolic succession."

To-day this same question is on the lips of the men who speak for the apostate Church of Rome. It has been coming from the same source since the days of the early Reformers. What is the authority of Protestantism? Recently a lecture was delivered in Liverpool by a Catholic prelate, to prove that Protestantism leads to infidelity, and that in spiritual things all Christians were dependent on the authority of the Catholic Church. This is ground upon which Rome feels very confident, as she sees how the principles of true Protestantism have been abandoned by the vast majority of those nominally ranged under its banner, and her own principles adopted, to a large extent, in their place. In the use of her own weapons Rome stands unequalled and fears no opponents who essay to employ them against her. If the appeal is to Church "fathers" and Church councils, Church creeds and decrees, to decide the question, the weight of evidence will be strongly on Rome's side. But the question can be met to-day just as it was by Christ and His disciples, with the same discomfiture to the Pharisees and the priests.

What was the authority of Christ? It was the authority of God; for His Father dwelt in Him and did the works. John xiv. 10. The authority of His disciples was the same. Peter said to the assembly before whom he and John had been called, "If we this day be examined of the good deed done to the impotent man, by what means he is made whole; be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by Him doth this man stand here before you whole."

The work which had been done through Peter and John for the impotent man was the work of the Gospel, and the Gospel is "the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth." Rom. i. 16. He who had done the work was God Himself, and He it was whose credentials they in reality demanded. The Gospel is manifested through an individual only when God dwells in him, and when God dwells in a man, He doeth the works, and the words and works of the Gospel must appear in that man, in spite of every power in the universe.

Has any church the right to say when or with whom God shall fulfil His promises of dwelling in man? Jesus said, "If a man love Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him." John xiv. 23. Can any man or set of men deny to any man the privilege of loving Christ at any time he pleases? If so, then they have the right to deny the authority of any man to speak the Gospel because he did not derive it from the source and by the means which they prescribe.

The word of God is its own authority; and wherever it is spoken there will be manifested "the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth," irrespective of the objections which men may raise over the question of authority. That question need never trouble the Christian, for he has first settled in his mind that he is nothing and can of himself do nothing, and that it is God dwelling in him who does the works. And the words and works of God constitute their own evidence, and as effectual an answer to the prelates who shout, "By what authority?" now, as they did to the like query from the scribes and Pharisees of old.

"Studies in Romans. Union with Christ. Rom. vii. 1-7" The Present Truth 10, 46.

E. J. Waggoner

The seventh chapter of Romans is really all contained in the sixth. He who understands the sixth chapter will have no difficulty with the seventh. Let us therefore, before beginning with the seventh chapter, recall briefly the points brought out in the last few lessons.

In the fifth chapter the principal thing is the gift of life and righteousness. Death comes by sin, and so life comes through righteousness, not our own, but that of Christ.

By Christ's obedience we are made righteous. This is because his life is now given to us, and he lives in us. The obedience of Christ which saves us, is His present obedience in us. And the obedience is to the law.

This union with Christ we get by being crucified with Him. In that death the body of sin is destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin, or, in other words, that we should no more transgress the law. So closely are we identified with sin, it being our very life, that it can not be destroyed without our dying. But in Christ there is no sin, so that while we have a resurrection with him, sin remains dead. So, being raised with Him, we live with Him, a thing that was formerly impossible on account of sin; sin can not dwell with Him.

All this is accomplished by the grace of God, as set forth in the third chapter: "Being justified freely by His

723

grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." By grace are we saved from sin, which is the transgression of the law. Therefore being under grace, we are not under the law, but are freed from its condemnation; for it condemns only those who transgress it. With these points in our minds, we may profitably consider them in

A STRIKING ILLUSTRATION

"Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law), how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth? For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband. So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress; but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man. Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God. For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit and not in the oldness of the letter. What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law; for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet."

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

To whom does the apostle speak in this chapter?

"I speak to them that know the law."

What are such expected to know about the law?

"That the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth."

What illustration of this is given?

"The woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long is he liveth."

If while her husband was alive she should be married to another man what would the law call her?

"An adulteress."

But what if her husband be dead?

"She is no adulteress, though she be married to another man."

Why not?

"She is free from that law."

What personal application is made of this illustration?

"Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law."

By what means?

"By the body of Christ."

For what purpose?

"That ye should be married to another."

To what other?

"Even to Him who is raised from the dead."

To what end?

"That ye should bring forth fruit unto God."

What fruit was brought forth when we were in the flesh?

"Fruit unto death."

What was it that produced this fruit unto death?

"The motions of sins," "did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death."

What gave them that power?

"The law."

But now what has taken place, since we are married to Him that is raised from the dead?

"But now we are delivered from the law."

How is it that we can be married to another, and still be free before the law?

"That being dead wherein we were held."

What is the difference in the service now and then?

"That we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter."

What shall we say then? Is the law sin?

"God forbid." Far from it.

What proves that?

"I had not known sin but by the law."

What special commandment revealed the greatness of sin?

"I had not known sin except the law had said, thou shalt not covet."

The Illustration.-It is a very simple one, and one which every one can understand. The law of God says of man and woman, "They two shall be one flesh." It is adultery for either one to be married to another while the other is living. The law will not sanction such a union. For reasons that will appear later, the illustration cites only the case of a woman leaving her husband. The law unites them. That law holds the woman to the man as long as he lives. If while her husband lives she shall be united to another man, she will find herself under the condemnation of the law. But if her husband dies, she may be united to another, and be perfectly free from any condemnation. The woman is then "free from the law," although the law has not changed in one particular. Least of all has it been abolished; for the same law that bound her to the first husband and which condemned her for uniting with another in his lifetime, now unites her to another and binds her to him as closely as it did to the first. If we hold to this simple illustration, we shall have no difficulty with what follows.

The Application.-As in the illustration there are four subjects, the law, the woman, the first husband, and the second husband so also in the application. We are represented as the woman. This is clear from the statement that we are "married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead," which is Christ. He therefore is the second husband. The first husband is indicated in verse 5: "When we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death." Death is the fruit of sin. The first husband, therefore, was the flesh, or "the body of sin."

"Dead to the Law."-This is the expression that troubles so many. There is nothing troublesome in it, if we but keep in mind the illustration and the nature of the parties to this transaction. Why are we dead to the law? In order that we might be married to another. But how is it that we become dead in order to be married to another? In the illustration it is the first husband that dies before the woman may be married to another. Even so it is here, as we shall see.

"One Flesh."-The law of marriage is that the two parties to it "shall be one flesh." How is it in this case? The first husband is the flesh, the body of sin. Well, we were truly one flesh with that. We were by nature perfectly united to sin. It was our life. It controlled us. Whatever sin devised, that we did. We might have done it unwillingly at times, but we did it nevertheless. Sin reigned in our mortal bodies, so that we obeyed it in the lusts thereof. Whatever sin wished, was law to us. We were one flesh.

Seeking a Divorce.-There comes a time in our experience when we wish to be free from sin. It is when we see something of the beauty of holiness. With some people the desire is only occasional; with others it is more constant. Whether they recognise the fact or not, it is Christ appealing to them to forsake sin, and to be joined to Him, to live with Him. And so they endeavour to effect a separation. But sin will not consent. In spite of all that we can do, it still clings to us. We are "one flesh," and it is a union for life since it is a union of our life to sin. There is no divorce in that marriage.

724

Freedom in Death.-There is no hope of effecting a separation from sin by any ordinary means. No matter how much we may desire to be united to Christ, it can not be done while we are joined to sin; for the law will not sanction such a union, and Christ will not enter into any union that is not lawful. If we could only get sin to die, we should be free, but it will not die. There is only one way for us to be freed from the hateful union, and that is for us to die. If we wish freedom so much that we are willing to be crucified, then it may be done. In death the separation is effected; for it is by the body of Christ that "we" become dead. We are crucified with him. The body of sin is also crucified. But while the body of sin is destroyed, we have a resurrection in Christ. The same thing that frees us from the first husband, unites us to the second.

A New Creature.-Now we see how it is that we are dead to the law. We died in Christ, and were raised in him. But "if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature; old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. And all things are of God." 2 Cor. v. 17, 18. Now we may be united to Christ, and the law will witness to the union, and sanction it. For not only is the first husband dead, but we also died, so that, although alive, we are not the same creature that we were before. "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." Gal. ii. 20. We are one. The same law that formerly declared us to be sinners now binds us to Christ.

A Different Service.-Now that the union with Christ has been effected, we serve in newness of spirit and not in the oldness of the letter. In marriage, the woman is to be subject to the husband. So when we were united to sin, we were in all things subject to sin. For a time it was willing service; but when we saw the Lord, and were drawn to Him, the service became irksome. We tried to keep God's law, but were bound, and could not. But now we are set free. Sin no longer restrains us, and our service is freedom. We gladly render to Christ all the service that the law requires of us. We render this service because of the perfect union between us. His life is ours, since we were raised only by the power of His life. Therefore our obedience is simply his loyalty and faithfulness in us.

Sin by the Law.-The apostle says that when we were in the flesh, "the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death." What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Far from it. The law is righteousness. But it is only by the law that sin is known. "Sin is not imputed when there is no law." "The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law." 1 Cor. xv. 56. "Sin is the transgression of the law." So there can be no sin but by the law. But the law is not sin; for if it were, it would not reprove sin. To convince of sin is the work of the Spirit of God, and not of Satan. He would make us believe that sin is right.

"Thou Shalt Not Covet."-It once seemed very strange that the apostle should have quoted only this one commandment as the one that convicted him of sin. But the reason is plain. It was because this one includes every other. We learn (Col. iii. 5) that covetousness is idolatry. Thus the law ends just where it begins. It is a complete circle, including every duty of every person in the universe. "I had not known lust," or unlawful desire, "except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet." Now lust is the beginning of every sin, for "when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin." James i. 15. And sin is the transgression of the law. But the tenth commandment is that one which forbids lust or unlawful desire. Therefore, if it is perfectly kept, all the others must be. And if it is not kept, no part of the law is kept. So we see that in quoting the tenth commandment as that which convinced him of sin, the apostle really included the whole law.

Living with Him.-Before leaving this portion we must call attention to the force of the eighth verse of chapter vi.: "Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him." We can see how apt this is when we know that it is our death with Christ that frees us from the union with the monster sin, and unites us in marriage to Christ. People get married in order to live together. So we become united to Christ in order that we may live with Him here and in the world to come. If we would live with Him in the world to come, we must live with Him in this world.

"The School Board Controversy" The Present Truth 10, 46.

E. J. Waggoner

BIBLE OR DOGMA?

Some idea of the question involved in the approaching School Board election may be gained from a few statements made by parties concerned. The "Guild of St. Matthew" puts forth a circular which says:-

It is the duty of the Church in each parish and diocese to organise the teaching of the principles or doctrines of the Christian religion for the children: the attempt of a School Board to formulate a Christian religion, watering it down to two or three doctrines and excluding others, and ordering this religion to be taught to baptized and unbaptized children, is Erastian, and most unchurchly. The School Board has received no commission from the Church for this kind of work, and the Church cannot be satisfied with anything less than full, definite teaching.

This is high language and shows that "the Church" proposes to rule.

What the nature of this "full, definite teaching" will be, is shown from the fact that Roman Catholics are making common cause with the Church party. The Church Times refers to what the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of London have said, but adds that "it is impossible to put the whole question in better words than those of Cardinal Vaughan," which are these, "The contest will be between the friends and the opponents of Christianity;" are these, "If Catholics are well assured that the vital interests of Christ are at stake, and that upon their conduct in this crisis may depend the future religion in England, they will not fail to exert themselves strenuously, and to the utmost."

We see therefore that it is really a question of whether or not Roman Catholicism shall prevail.

Unfortunately there is no clear issue between the two parties. It is not a question of whether or not the Bible shall be taught in the schools, but of whose religion, and how much of it, shall be taught. Either party would be satisfied with the true teaching of the Bible, uncoloured by human opinions and traditions. The Church Times again says:-

The progressives and secularists are busy enough, and are not slow to utilise the printing press. A copy of one of the secularised documents before us, now being circulated in Hackney, is dead against religious teaching in Board Schools, but the writer has the candour to admit that the teaching of the Bible without explanation "is no better than the repetition of noisome-rhyme in Latin. Either use the Bible in a common-sense way, or not all."

That there is power in the word itself does not seem to occur to the

725

writers. Such zeal is not zeal for the Bible, but zeal for certain religious dogmas.

The Church of Rome has always talked about Jesus Christ, but where it has had the power it has always persecuted those who really yielded themselves to the life of Jesus and followed in His steps. So too with others who have taken over the principles of Rome without the name. In the early church controversies men fought about their opinions of Jesus Christ, and shed one another's blood in torrents; but they had no idea of really following Christ. They may have thought that they were fighting for His honour, but they were only fighting for their own pride of opinion.

So nowadays it is quite possible for men to engage in bitter controversies about the Holy Scriptures, and all the time fighting only for their own opinions. In this way only can we explain how some on both sides of the Board School controversy which is now raging can talk so loudly about Bible teaching in the schools, while in their own work they have frequently used their influence to destroy confidence in the Scriptures.

Thus the Church Times, which has led in the campaign in behalf of the majority of the Board, in a recent issue answered the query of a doubting correspondent by saying that all scholars know that the record of the creation in Genesis cannot be taken as a statement of facts. The way, then, to teach the Bible is to teach that it is not true, and that it has been left to the evolitionist to discover that God did not create the heavens and earth by the word of His mouth.

But the controversy, as we have stated, is not over Bible teaching; it is merely to decide whose opinions about the Bible shall be taught. The confusion existing in the religious world about the Bible was briefly stated by Dr. Parker in a letter to the Times. After showing how it is contrary to the spirit of Christianity that men should think to enforce its teaching in schools sustained by compulsory rates, he said:-

We cannot shut our eyes to the fact that there is no Bible upon which all Christian parties can agree. One party says that surely the historical parts of the Bible might be read, to which another party replies that the historical parts of the Bible are especially to be avoided because they are ethically incorrect and in many instances glaringly contradictory. One party says read the Bible because of its Divine revelation to the human soul, to which another party replies the one thing that is to be distrusted is the claim on behalf of the supernatural or the ultra-historical. Some say read the life of Jesus, and others say that there is no trustworthy life of Jesus to be obtained. To some the Bible is historical; to others it is ideal.

If there were more pulpits teaching the word as the living and powerful thing that is, able to do actual work in the lives of those who receive it, there would be less political controversy about the radical Bible teaching.

It makes very little difference what name is given to religious teaching that ignores, or contradicts, or attempts to improve upon, the Bible. Call it Catholic or Protestant, the effect is the same. Now since neither party desires that the Bible shall be taught in its purity and simplicity, it is evident that in the end Catholicism will be the gainer whichever way the election turns.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 46.

E. J. Waggoner

-In Russia glass coffins are coming into use.

-The Spanish Cabinet has been reconstructed, with Senor Sagasta as Prime Minister.

-The Chilian ministry is reported to have tendered its resignation to the President.

-The weather in the Atlantic of late is said to have been the worst experienced for over a quarter of a century.

-Queen Victoria is suffering from rheumatism, and is said to be contemplating a trip to Germany next summer to try its mineral waters.

-A persecution has broken out in Korea against the native Christians, as a result of the breaking up of the forces which former held control. It is feared that much bloodshed will be the result.

-The New Czar is 26; the King of Spain is 8; Queen of the Netherlands, 14; King of Servia, is 18; Emperor of China, 23.

-The birth-rate of the United Kingdom for the last quarter was the Iowest on record, the proportion being 28 annually per 1,000 of population.

-Temperance workers are to inaugurate a pledge-signing crusade in 1805, for which a preliminary conference will be hold next month in Exeter Hall.

-There are fifty manufacturers of imitation butter in Germany. A factory in Mannheim produces daily 6,000 pounds from a preparation of cocoanuts.

-The tumulus in Parliament-hill fields, near Hampstead, the supposed burial-place of Boadicea, has boon excavated without yielding any trace of the warrior-queen.

-The Pope has sent an expression of sympathy to the director of the Moniteur de Rome, who was recently expelled from Italy for the expression of treasonable sentiments.

-The French Socialists have determined to wage vigorous war upon President Casiraer-Perier and his supporters, on account of the anti-Socialist policy of the Government.

-The Hova Prime Minister has replied to the French ultimatum by declaring that he will only yield to force. An expedition will accordingly be dispatched by France to subjugate the island.

-Australian stock-raisers have demonstrated their ability to supply the London market with frozen beef and mutton which will compare favourably with American and Canadian competitors.

-The Arctic navigator, Captain Wiggins, is said to be icebound in the Kara Sea. His vessel has been lost, and the Russians are sending out a relief vessel. He was endeavouring to open up a sea-route to Siberia.

-While opinions differ as to the home policy of the new Czar, it is believed in the highest circles that whatever change may take place will be gradual, and that in foreign policy Nicholas II. will follow the example of his father, with a greater leaning towards England and Germany.

-Serious fighting has taken place on the Afghan frontier in connection with the Waziristan-Punjaub delimitation. The British political officer's escort have attacked in the north of the Spin country by the Waziris, who were repulsed with heavy loss. The British force also suffered severely.

-The war in the East continues to go wholly in favour of the Japanese. Port Arthur has been invested and its capture is regarded as certain, together with twelve Chinese ships of war belonging to the Pin-Yang fleet which have been caught in the investment of the place. China meanwhile has addressed a note to the powers of Europe asking their intervention to bring about a peace, but as yet the latter have taken no definite action.

-A young Danish doctor has invented an extraordinary cure for small-pox. He noticed that patients got the deepest and largest marks on the parts of the body that are the most exposed to daylight, viz., the face and hands, and it struck him that if the 'chemical rays,' of the sun-the blue-violet rays-could be subtracted the patients would have a better chance. He treated a number of patients on this theory, with results which seemed to fully confirm his view.

-The American elections have resulted in a complete victory for the Republicans, who, it is expected, will have a majority of thirty over the Democrats in the House of Representatives, in place of the present Democratic majority of ninety-two. The Republicans will also have a majority in the Senate. Tammany, the synonym for corruption in New York, mot with a crushing defeat, not one of its candidates being returned. Mr. Wilson, the author of the Tariff Bill, lost his seat.

-A serious riot is reported from Ruszt, in Hungary, arising out of the objection of the population to the order issued by the authorities that all persons dying from cholera should be buried in a separate cemetery. An excited crowd attacked the gendarmes entrusted with the maintenance of order, and endeavoured to disarm them. A conflict ensued, and the gendarmes were eventually compelled to fire upon the mob. One peasant was killed and many others wounded. Sixty persons were arrested, including twenty women.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 46.

E. J. Waggoner

The administrative authorities of Finland no longer offer any opposition to the work of the Salvation Army, which had added 1,500 to its ranks in the past year.

The pilgrimages to Mecca cause the death of thousands of the pilgrims every year. Travelling amidst filthy surroundings, and drinking of the germ-laden water at the sacred well, about one in ten perish of the cholera. The British Consul at Jeddah estimates the deaths last year during the pilgrimage season at fully 24,000.

The Church of England furnishes by far the largest number of soldiers in the regular army. Returns show 143,129 belonging to the Church of England, 36,878 Roman Catholics, 15,190 Presbyterians, 11,433 Wesleyans, and 1,802 Protestants of other denominations, 2,057 Mohammedans and Hindus.

In Japan, says a missionary correspondent, the contagion of war has infected the Christian bodies, and native pastors are preaching the righteousness of the war with China, and urging the members to be ready to lay down their lives in prosecuting it. It shows how much Japan needs the real Gospel of peace when so many who profess to be following Christ are ready to join their pagan fellows in war, putting country before Christ, the flag before the cross.

A good point which ought to be brought home to all ministers of the Gospel was recently given to the Bishop of Wakefield by a poor miner. The Bishop was on his way to a colliery village where he was to preach, and fell in with a miner, also on his way to meeting, to whom, in the course of conversation, he made known that he was the one who was to preach that day. "Oh, don't preach; just talk to us," said the miner. If there were less preaching at people, and more talking to them, there would be more conversions. As a matter of fact, "preaching," as used in the Bible, is not sermonising, but is simply talking and teaching the word.

In Roman Catholic Italy, where parochial schools have always held sway, fifty-three per cent. of the people, statistics tell us, can neither read nor write. In Roman Catholic Spain, seventy-two and a half, in Roman Catholic Austria forty-five, and in Roman Catholic Mexico ninety-three per cent. can neither read nor write. In Germany only three per cent. of the people are unable to read and write: in Norway and Sweden, three per cent.; in England, ten per cent. The facts speak volumes of the baneful influences of Roman Catholic rule.

The Spiritualist paper, Light, has a very appreciative notice of Mr. Drummond's book, "The Ascent of Man," and gives "full welcome," to his "final conclusion," which is as follows:-

The Ascent of Man and of Society is bound up henceforth with the conflict, the intensification, and the diffusion of the struggle for the Life of Others. This is the further Evolution, the page of history that lies before us, the closing act of the Drama of Man. Kindled by this past, Man may surely say, "I shall arrive." The succession cannot break. The Further Evolution must go on, the Higher Kingdom come.

Light welcomes this as "the very essence of Spiritualism." Of course it is, for Evolution and Spiritualism are but two names for the same thing, namely, the dethronement of God, and the deification of man.

It is a very common saying among those who argue for the total separation of Church and State, that the only thing that civil government has to do with religion is to protect all alike in the practice of their religion. But even this goes too far. Its proper relation to religion is to let it alone. But in so far as any religion is a departure from the Gospel, it must have government protection. Being a human production, it must have human support. But the glory of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is that it derives its support and protection solely from its Author, and asks no protection from human governments. Indeed, it has always flourished best when earthly governments have been in open opposition to it. And have persecuted it; because at such times its professors depend wholly upon their rightful protector-the Lord Jesus Christ. The time of "protection" to the religion of Christ and His followers by civil governments, is the time of carelessness and apostasy.

In trying to find out the reason for the generally small proportion of men at church services, some one has discovered that the fear of spoiling their best hat keeps many away. It has been discussed in the papers, and the churches are urged to provide conveniences for preserving the silk hat from injury, so that many who now stay at home may venture to take their place in the pew. The trials and hardships of the man who really does not want to go to church, but does not like to say it, are truly great in these unheroic days.

Napoleon is reported to have said, "Scratch a Russian and you find a Tartar," and in the light of recent events it appears that the veneer of civilisation is not much thicker over the people of the most advanced nations to-day. How eagerly the barbarians' practice of bull-fighting has been taken up in France! Serious disturbances over large districts have followed the attempts to suppress it, even in its infancy. And this only demonstrates that the soil into which this plant of barbarism was introduced was congenial for its growth. Man is by nature barbarous, wherever he is found; and unless his nature is changed by the grace of God, the polish of civilisation will but constitute a veneer over the savagery that is within.

It is strange that people should make poorer excuses to the Lord than they do to anyone else; yet such is the fact. No one, for instance, ever thinks of offering to man the "any one day in seven" theory, for not observing the first day, or as satisfaction for a law demanding such observance; yet this very same theory is supposed to satisfy God! Is God less particular than men? Let those who would make this excuse to Him pause in their course and ask themselves if they can afford to run the risk.

"Counsel is Mine, and sound wisdom: I am understanding; I have strength."

November 22, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 47.

E. J. Waggoner

"Then drew near unto Him all the publicans and sinners for to hear Him." Luke xv. 1. "And the common people heard Him gladly." Mark xii. 37.

There is no record or intimation that Jesus required some one to go about with Him to explain His words to the people. There is no suggestion that the people needed to have some learned man stand between them and the Lord, to interpret to them His words.

What was the difference between the teaching of Jesus and that of the scribes and doctors of the law? They both used the same Scriptures, and quoted the very same words. When Jesus went into their synagogues, He read the appointed lesson for the day. But the difference was that His teaching was simple, while theirs obscured the sense. The people could understand Him, and could not understand them.

The words that Jesus spoke were the same that the ancient prophets had spoken; for "God, who. . . spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son." Heb. i. 1, 2. They were the same words that the apostle spoke after His ascension; for the word of salvation which "at the first began to be spoken by the Lord," "was confirmed unto us by them that heard Him." Heb. ii. 3. They are the very same words that we find in the Bible to-day.

When the prophets spoke, the people understood them. Their warnings and reproofs were not always heeded, but they were understood. When God sent a prophet with a message to a king or a people, He did not send another man to explain the prophet's message to them. The violent death of the prophet was often the evidence of how well his unwelcome message was understood.

Even so it was with the apostles. When Peter spoke on Pentecost the people "were pricked in their heart," and cried out, "What shall we do?" And "they that gladly received his word were baptized." When Paul "reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come," Felix needed no interpreter to make the words plain. So well did he understand the words that he trembled under them.

In all these cases, an "interpreter" would only have confounded the minds of the hearers. Query: If the people who heard the words of the Lord when they were spoken understood them without the aid of an interpreter, why cannot we? Are the common people now less acute and intelligent than they were then? Is not the confusion of mind that exists concerning the Scriptures due to the fact that there are so many who have set themselves to "tell what they mean," thus leading the people to suppose that they do not mean what they say, and that they cannot be understood by the simple-minded?

"But," we are asked, "Did not Christ and the prophets often use figurative language, in speaking parables?" Yes, they did, but the people understood them nevertheless. If at any time the disciples did not understand the sayings of Christ they went to Him and He made His meaning clear.

That was a sensible thing to do. Why should we not act as wisely? If we wish to know what the Lord means when He speaks, we should go to Him and ask Him. What if we cannot talk with Him face to face? He has left His representative, of whom He has said, "He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you." John xiv. 26.

The Scriptures themselves contain their own explanation. If we wish to know what a parable or a prophecy means, we must find a meaning in the word. No man on earth, be he Pope or peasant, has any authority to attach to them any arbitrary meaning out of his own mind. Whoever presumes to do so, puts himself in the place of God, setting himself forth as God.

"Glorious Preachers" The Present Truth 10, 47.

E. J. Waggoner

"How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace; that bringeth good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation; that saith unto Zion, Thy God reigneth!" Isa. lii. 7.

The tenth chapter of Romans, together with the nineteenth psalm, makes us know who these beautiful preachers are. Let us read, in order that we may be able to recognise them when they come.

We begin with Rom. x. 13, and read to the close of verse 18. We find first that "whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved." But then the questions arise one after the other, "How then shall they call on Him in whom they have

738

not believe? and how shall they believe in Him of the whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher?"

These are very natural questions. Men cannot call upon the Lord if they do not believe in Him, and they surely cannot be expected to believe in Him if they have never heard of Him; and the Lord Himself, in the words first quoted, and which immediately follow, recognises the fact that they cannot hear without a preacher.

The apostle quotes the words from Isaiah to show that a preacher is necessary in order that men may hear the Gospel; "as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the Gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things."

"But they have not all obeyed the Gospel," because they have not all believed it. "Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." But there is no reason why all should not believe and obey the Gospel, because they have heard it. "Have they not heard? Yes verily, their sound went into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world."

What words have gone to the ends of the world?-The words of the Gospel, of course, for that is the subject. Who has proclaimed them?-The preachers who are sent to publish the Gospel of peace, and to bring glad tidings of good things.

Notice the evidence that the apostle gives to prove that all have heard the Gospel. He says, "Their sound went into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world." Who are these creatures whose words have been uttered so widely? The nineteenth psalm gives the answer: "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth His handiwork, day unto night showeth His handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge. There is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard. Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world."

The heavenly bodies, the sun, moon, and stars, are the glorious preachers whose words have made the Gospel known in every land and among people of every language. "How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the Gospel of peace!" Wherever they go, they leave a path of light. And why? Simply because they proclaim only the word of the Lord, the word of power and light.

These preachers have no interpreter. They speak an universal language, and can be understood by all. They proclaim only the power of the word of God, and the message is so simple that all are without excuse if they do not obey it.

The message which they preach is that which should be proclaimed by human preachers. Men are simply to take up the strain and echo the story the heavens are telling. "Let him that heareth say, Come." Not a different message, not the same message with additions, but the very same, for there is but one Gospel. The word of truth is a Gospel of salvation. Eph. i. 13. Therefore let every one, great or small, who would receive praise from the Lord, "Preach the word." Study those model preachers, the heavens, and our Lord Jesus Christ, to learn the power of simplicity.

"Church Reunion" The Present Truth 10, 47.

E. J. Waggoner

While the various Protestant bodies are discussing the problem of Protestant reunion, the Pope is pushing forward a scheme for the reunion of the Eastern churches with the Church of Rome. A conference at which several Eastern Patriarchs were present has been in session at the Vatican for the attainment of this object. The Pope is no doubt willing to receive the Eastern churches again in fellowship on the same terms as those recently offered to Protestants; namely, a full surrender to Rome in the form of an acknowledgment of her supreme authority in spiritual things.

Here is a distinct basis of reunion, and in this respect the Pope and prelates of Rome have an advantage over Protestants, who are without any basis of practical value. There are, in fact, only two ways in which religious reunion is possible, and one of those is held by the Pope, while the other is the one set forth in the word of God, toward which the Protestant masses are becoming more and more sceptical and irreverent.

These are but two great forces represented in the conflict of sin and righteousness, and under one or the other of these all reunion must take place. There must be a surrender to the control of one or the other, for there is a distinct, intelligent personality at the head of each. Christian union (there is no Christian reunion) comes by full individual surrender to God. It is the union of individuals filled with one Spirit,-the Spirit of God. It comes by an acknowledgement of the full and supreme authority of God, which means an acknowledgement of a full and supreme authority of His word.

There has always been Christian union; it is not possible that it should be otherwise. Reunion is a problem only for those outside the Christian ranks.

"Studies in Romans. The Law of Sin. Rom. vii. 9-25" The Present Truth 10, 47.

E. J. Waggoner

In the first seven verses of the seventh chapter of Romans we have had the relation which we by nature sustain to sin, and which by grace we afterwards sustain to Christ, represented under the figure of marriage to a first and second husband. The union with the second husband can not take place while the first husband is living; and in this case the marriage is so perfect, the two parties being literally one flesh and blood, that one can not die without the other; therefore we must needs die with sin, before we can be separated from it. But we die in Christ, and as He lives, although He was dead, we also live with Him. But in His life there is no sin, and so the body of sin is destroyed, while we are raised. Thus in death we are separated from the first husband, sin, and united to the second husband-Christ.

In the verses which follow the apostle has pictured the struggle with the sin that has become distasteful. It is really an enlargement of that which has been presented in the first verses. It is the story of

THE STRUGGLE FOR FREEDOM

"Sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead. For I was alive without the law once; but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died. And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me. Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good. Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful. For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold under sin. For that which I do, I allow not; for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I. If then I do that

739

which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good. Now then it is not more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. For I know that in me, (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing; for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good, I find not. For the good that I would, I do not; but the evil which I would not, that I do. Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. For I delight in the law of God after the inward man; but I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin." Rom. vii. 8-25.

Although this is a long portion of Scripture, it does not need so long treatment as some shorter portions, since there are several repetitions. For instance, the statement in verse 15, is repeated in verses 19 and 20. Verses 17 and 21 are also the same thought, as also verses 18 and 23. The points, however, will doubtless appear much more clearly by the usual

QUESTIONS ON THE TEXT

What does the apostle say that sin wrought in him?

"Sin. . . wrought in me all manner of concupiscence."

How did it do this?

"Taking occasion by the commandment."

What was the condition of sin without the law?

"Without the law sin was dead."

But what was the apostle's condition without the law?

"I was alive without the law."

What change occurred when the commandment came?

"When the commandment came, sin revived, and I died."

What did he find the commandment to be?

"The commandment. . . I found to be unto death."

Yet for what was the commandment designed?

It was "ordained to life."

What did sin do?

"Sin. . . deceived me, . . . and slew me."

How had it the power to do this?

"Sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me."

What was it that deceived and slew him, the law, or sin?

"Sin. . . deceived me, . . . and slew me."

Wherefore what is true of the law?

"The law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good."

Was then that which was good, namely, the law, made death unto him?

No; "but, . . . working death in me by that which is good."

Why was this?

"That it might appear sin;" "that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful."

What do we know of the law?

"We know that the law is spiritual."

But what about ourselves?

"But I am carnal."

And therefore in what condition?

"Sold under sin."

What do we call one who is bought and sold?

A slave.

What is the evidence that the one who is carnal is a slave?

"That which I do I allow not; for what I would, that do I not; and what I hate, that do I."

What is shown by the fact the he does the evil that he hates?

"I consent unto the law, that it is good."

Therefore who is it in reality that does the evil works?

"It is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me."

To what law is such an one subject?

"I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me."

In what does he delight?

"I delight in the law of God."

How does he delight in the law of God?

"After the inward man."

Then why does he not obey it?

"I find another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members."

In what condition is such an one?

"O wretched man that I am!"

What is his distressed cry?

"Who shall deliver me from this body of death?"

Is there any hope of deliverance?

"I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

Sin Personified.-It will be noticed that in this entire chapter sin is represented as a person. It is the first husband to which we are united. But the union has become distasteful, because, having seen Christ and having been drawn to Him by His love, we have seen that we were joined to a monster. The marriage bond has become a galling yoke, and our whole thought is how to get away from the monster to which we are united and which is dragging us down to a certain death. The picture presented in this chapter is one of the most vivid in the whole Bible.

The Strength of Sin.-"The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law." 1 Cor. xv. 56. "Without the law sin was dead." "Sin is not imputed when there is no law." "Where no law is, there is no transgression." So it is that "sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence." Sin is simply the law transgressed, "for sin is the transgression of the law." 1 John iii. 4. Sin has no strength, therefore, except that which it gets from the law. The law is not sin, and yet it binds us to sin, that is, the law witnesses to the sin and will not grant us any escape, simply because it can not bear false witness.

The Law of Life, and the Law of Death.-"The commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death." The law of God is the life of God. "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." Matt. v. 48. His life is the rule for all His creatures. Those in whom the life of God is made perfectly manifest, keep His law. It is very evident therefore that the design of the law is life, since it is life itself. But the opposite of life is death. Therefore when the law is transgressed, it is death to the transgressor.

The Deadly Enemy.-"For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me." It is not the law that is the enemy, but the enemy is sin. Sin does the killing, for "the sting of death is sin." Sin has the poison of death in it. Sin deceived us so that for a time we thought that it was our friend, and we embraced it and delighted in the union. But when the law enlightened us, we found that sin's embrace was the embrace of death.

The Law Cleared.-The law pointed out the fact that sin was killing us. "Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good." We have no more reason to rail at the law than we have to hate the man who tells us that the substance which we are eating, thinking it to be food, is poison. He is our friend. He would not be our friend if he did not show us our danger. The fact that he is not able to heal the illness that the poison already eaten has caused does not make him any the less our friend. He has warned us of our danger, and we can now get

740

help from the physician. And so, after all, the law itself was not death to us, but its office was "that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful."

"The Law Is Spiritual."-"For we know that the law is spiritual." If this fact were more generally recognised, there would be much less religious legislation among so-called Christian nations. People would not try to enforce the commandments of God. Since the law is spiritual, it can be obeyed only by the power of the Spirit of God. "God is Spirit" (John iv. 24); therefore the law is the nature of God. Spiritual is opposed to carnal, or fleshly. Thus it is that the man who is in the flesh can not please God.

A Slave.-"But I am carnal, sold under sin." One who is sold is a slave; and the evidence of the slavery in this instance is very plain. Free men do that which they wish to do. Only slaves do that which they do not wish to do, and are continually prevented from doing what they wish to do. "For that which I do, I allow not; for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I." A more disagreeable position can not be imagined. Life in such a state can be only a burden.

Convicted, but not Converted.-"If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good." The fact that we do not wish to do the sins that we are committing shows that we acknowledge the righteousness of the law which forbids them. But conviction is not conversion, although a very necessary step to that condition. It is not enough to wish to do right. The blessing is pronounced upon those who do His commandments, and not upon those who wish to do them, or who even try to do them. Indeed, if there were no higher position for a professed follower of the Lord than that described in these verses, he would be in a far worse condition than the careless sinner. Both are slaves, only the latter is so hardened that he finds pleasure in his slavery. Now if one must all his life be a slave, it is better for him to be unconscious of his bondage than to be continually fretting over it. But there is something better; therefore it is a blessing that we are convicted of sin, and that our slavery is thereby made as disagreeable as possible.

Two Laws.-"I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. For I delight in the law of God after the inward man; but I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members." Compare this with verse 5. Remember also that all this is written to them that know the law. It is not addressed to the heathen who have not the law, but to those who profess to know God. While knowing the law, we are united in marriage to sin. This sin is in our flesh, since they who are married are one flesh. It is the law that witnesses to the fact that we are sinners, and that will not grant us any escape from it. But we are slaves. Whosoever commits sin is the slave of sin. John viii. 34. Therefore it is that the law that will not let us be anything but what we are, is really holding us in bondage. While we are in that condition, it is not to us a law of liberty.

A Body of Death.-We are joined in marriage to sin. But sin has in it death; for "the sting of death is sin." Sin is that with which death kills us. Therefore the body of sin, to which we are joined when in the flesh, is but a body of death. What a terrible condition! Joined in such close union that we are one flesh with that which is in itself death. A living death! And "the strength of sin is the law." It witnesses to our union, and thus holds us in that bondage of death. If there were no hope of escape, we might curse the law for not allowing us to die in ignorance. But although the law seems to be pitiless, it is nevertheless our best friend. It holds us to a sense of the dreadfulness of our bondage until in anguish we cry out, "O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" We must be delivered, or we perish.

A Deliverer.-The pagan proverb has it that God helps those who help themselves. The truth is that God helps those who can not help themselves: "I was brought low, and He helped me." No one ever cries in vain for help. When the cry goes up for help, the Deliverer is at hand; and so, although sin is working death in us by all the power of the law, we may exclaim, "Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Cor. xv. 57. "There shall come out of Zion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob." Rom. xi. 26. "Unto you first God, having raised up His Son Jesus, sent Him to bless you, in turning away every one of you from his iniquities." Acts iii. 26. "Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift."

A Divided Man.-"So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin." That is, of course, while in the condition described in the preceding verses. In purpose he serves the law of God, but in actual practice he serves the law of sin. As described in another place, "The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary the one to the other; so that ye can not do the things that ye would." Gal. v. 17. It is not a state of actual service to God, because we read in our next chapter that "they that are in the flesh can not please God." It is a state from which one may well pray to be delivered, so that he can serve the Lord not merely with the mind, but with his whole being. "The very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is He that calleth you, who also will do it." 1 Thess. v. 23, 24.

"Days of Peril" The Present Truth 10, 47.

E. J. Waggoner

The address of Dr. Ryle, Bishop of Liverpool, at his recent Diocesan Conference, sounds an alarm which is worth reading. The danger to the believer, in the midst of the perilous times which the apostle said would come in the last days, is in the fact that the spirit of lawlessness and self-seeking which exists in the world is natural to every heart, and can be kept from manifesting itself only by the power of the word of God, effectually working in those that believe. A loose hold on the word of God leads to compromise with the spirit of the times, and the power of godliness is denied. That is why the man who speaks out as Dr. Ryle does in the first part of his address (which we quote) is usually denounced as an alarmist. Dr. Ryle says:-

Some will think me a foolish alarmist and pessimist, and deny that there is any danger. Be it so. The prophets of evil are never popular. Wicked King Ahab said of the faithful my Micaiah, "I hate him, for he doth not prophesy good concerning me, but

741

evil." 1 Kings xxii. 8. None are so blind as those who will not see. Some will think me a gloomy, melancholy man, and charge me with ignoring the immense amount of good that is going on in the country. Be it so. Nothing is easier than to look at only one side of an account, and from that one side to draw a very wrong conclusion. No doubt there is a great amount of good in the land; but side by a side there is even a greater amount of evil. I stand to my point. Whether men will hear me or not, I see that here in England we are living in "perilous times."

(a) The times are perilous in the matter of religion. What are the facts?

Infidelity abounds. Multitudes of people in every part of the country seem to have totally cast off all religion. They go either to church nor chapel, as we know to our sorrow in Liverpool. Many openly sneer at the Bible as an old-fashioned, defective book, and give God no place in their thoughts. Is not this perilous!

Romanism is increasing. Real Popery has revived, and extreme Ritualism is helping it. Some Churchmen are little better than Papists. They scoff at Protestantism and the Reformation. They delight in the very Popish ceremonials which our forefathers deliberately rejected. They avow their belief in the worst and most mischievous Popish doctrines, and boldly preach, teach and defend them. Is not this perilous! . . .

(b) I go one step farther. The times are perilous in a social point of view. What are the facts?

The whole framework of society appears to be falling to pieces. A wave of lawlessness and disobedience to superiors is flowing over the land. Lawlessness in Church and State, lawlessness in the House of Commons, and lawlessness in the streets,-universal lawlessness appears to be the rule of these last days. The foot of the "Lawless One" (2 Thess. ii. 8) is everywhere.

This last sentence points out the root of the evil that has been multiplying its fruit in the earth ever since man fell by disobeying God's law. The Scriptures show plainly that the one great question in the final conflict between truth and error before the coming of the Lord will be loyalty to God and His word. Already we can see the beginning of the fulfilment of the prophet's words, "The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof, because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore hath the curse devoured the earth." Isa. xxiv. 5. So far has the apostasy gone that loyalty to God's law is counted lawlessness by the world. From many pulpits which profess loudly to be evangelical the law of God is openly set aside and counted as of no force. What wonder then is it that lawlessness increases as Dr. Ryle asserts, and as every one can see? But the word of God will endure through it all, and that word has power to keep the one who receives it amidst the perils that have come and are yet coming.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 47.

E. J. Waggoner

-The French Chamber voted 65,000,000 francs for the Madagascar Expedition.

-It is announced that the wedding of the Czar Nicholas will take place Nov. 26.

-Since July, 52 fatal accidents occurred on the Alps, 18 other climbers receiving serious injuries.

-It is said that there were 7,357 murders in the United States and 286 persons lynched in 1891.

-The elections in Hawaii have resulted in favour of the party advocating a union of the islands with the United States.

-As a result of the bye-elections in Newfoundland the Government has been placed in a minority in the House of Assembly.

-A telegram from Calcutta reports that a revolt has broken out against the Rajah of the Tributary State of Nyaghur, in the province of Orissa.

-The P. and O. steamer Caledonia has made a record passage from India, the mails being delivered to London only twelve days after leaving Bombay.

-A British steamer has been fired on by a Liberian gunboat, and twenty-five men were killed. The steamer was unloading cargo in defiance of the revenue laws.

-The first centenary of Gibbon's death is being celebrated by an exhibition in the British Museum, of manuscripts, portraits, and relies of the great historian.

-There have been enormous catchings of herrings off Devon and Cornwall, one boat capturing 15,000 in a night. They were sold at the rate of ten a penny.

-A despatch from La Paz, in Bolivia, states that severe earthquakes have been experienced along the southern coasts of Chili. It is reported that 100 people have been killed.

-A great commotion, similar to that caused by the Jack-the-Ripper outrages in London, has been produced at Denver, U.S.A., by the perpetration of a series of murders, the third victim being a Japanese girl.

-Suggestions have been made in England for the adoption of wooden houses, as country residences, on the Swedish mode. It is claimed that they can be brought from Sweden and put together at half the cost of a very ordinary brick building.

-A terrible explosion of firedamp occurred in the Pluto Colliery at Wiesa, in Saxony. A large number of men were at work at the time, hut the majority escaped with trifling injuries. Twenty men are missing, however, and it is feared that ail of them perished.

-Tortoli, a town in the Island of Sardinia, has been attacked and plundered by about 100 brigands. Two gendarmes were killed and many of the townspeople were wounded in a struggle with the well-armed miscreants. Troops have been sent to the district.

-In consequence of the cold, wet season, and the consequent lack of flowers, the bees in France have been unable to make honey enough to feed themselves, and it will be necessary for bee cultivation to supply their hives with honey or sugar to keep the bees alive.

-Disastrous floods caused by the overflow of a river, have occurred at Limassol, in the island of Cyprus, and a portion of the town has been rendered uninhabitable. Twenty-one persons have lost their lives, and a large number of animals have also perished.

-Various accounts have been received regarding a massacre of Armenians alleged to have occurred in the Samoun district near Moosh, in Asia Minor. It appears that the villages were raided by Bashi Bazouk volunteers, who killed or wounded a very large number of the inhabitants.

-A steamer which is being built in France will, it is said, revolutionise steamboat traveling. The invention consists in rolling a vassal over the water instead of forcing it through as at present. A number of enormous copper cylinders are fixed to the steamer, which revolve on the surface of the water.

-Australian newspapers report extensive cannibalism at Rossel Island, in the Louisiade Archipelago, where a French trader and all his labourers have been killed and eaten by the natives. These islanders are already notorious for having captured and eaten the whole of the crew of a Chinese trader.

-Various rumours that the executioner Deibler is about to retire on a pension and be succeeded by his son has raised a controversy on the subject whether this post ought to be hereditary. M. Paul Masson, an ex-colonial magistrate, has applied for the place.

-Severe floods and gales have been reported from various parts of the kingdom. At Dover there was a south-westerly gale of hurricane force. The barque Leif, of Drammen, went ashore there. Six of her crew were rescued, and three, including the captain, drowned. Part of the promenade pier was carried away.

-Copenhagen has been declared open as a free port, and in accordance with the Free Port Act, the dues of 110 ore per ton, which incoming vessels from abroad had to pay, have been abolished in all Danish ports. The Copenhagen port duos are reduced by one-half, and converted into an impost on merchandise, not applicable, however, to goods in transit.

-For the Lord Mayor's 000 guests, on the occasion of his recent "show," there was provided two barons of beef, 24 turtles,100 gallons of soup 4,000 oysters, 600 lobsters, 200 large soles, 120 turkeys, 200 partridges, 100 pheasants, 300 plovers, 200 capons, 20 hams, 600 cutlets, 200 veal and ham pies, 180 pairs of sweetbreads, 200 calves' feet for jelly, and 1,200 portions of sweets and ices.

-An attempt was made recently by sumo persons unknown to set fire to the military arsenal of the fortress of Brianoon, in the department of the Hautes Alpes. The perpetrators were surprised by an artillery officer on his rounds, but effected their escape in the darkness. Had the attempt been successful a terrible disaster might have ensued, as close to the powder magazine, near which the men were discovered, are the hospital and a number of dwelling houses.

-President Cleveland has, at China's request, communicated with the Japanese Government offering to act as arbitrator, but Japan has not yet made a definite reply. Meanwhile the Japanese continue to advance and disperse the Chinese forces in their front. The Japanese Commander in Chief has informed his Government that he is continuing his march through Manchuria in two directions. A battle had been fought between the right division and a large force of Chinese cavalry, the latter being completely routed.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 47.

E. J. Waggoner

Another such gambling den as exists at Monte Carlo has been established just across the North Sea, at Ostend. The proprietors are to pay ?25,000 to the authorities for the privilege of fleecing the foolish.

A new definition of alcohol has been given by Sir Benjamin Richardson. He calls it "the devil in solution." This is how it comes that the man or woman who gets it into the brain is driven to deeds which only the devil could suggest. "At the last it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder."

Roman correspondents assert that dignitaries of the Church of England are in communication with the Vatican over the question of reunion. To such advances as these from without, doubtless, is due the increased boldness with which Rome has lately been urging her claims to supremacy over all peoples.

It is even asserted that the commission of Anglicans has gone to Rome to confer with the Pope. The Catholic Times says that "if it be true that such a deputation has been appointed to lay before the Pope the views and wishes of a section of the Anglican Church, it may be predicted with certainty that they will be welcomed and received with courtesy, and that any suggestions they may bring forward will be duly weighed and considered." Undoubtedly; Leo-the lion-will not refuse any tempting morsel that is thrown in his way, especially when he has long been seeking to devour it.

The Rome correspondent of the Tablet says that the cause of Joan of Arc is progressing favorably before the college charged with deciding her title to beatification. The only difficulty is the lack of any modern miracle proved to have been wrought through her patronage. But we are told:-

It is thought that the modern enthusiasm will not be unattended by such heavenly signs. My informant states that if it is the Divine will that the beatification should take place they will undoubtedly occur.

Undoubtedly they will.

The Russian Bible Society has been celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversary of the establishment of this work under Imperial action. One favourable thing about Russia in the past has been that the people were allowed to possess the word of God. This fact accounts for the rapid progress of the Stundist movement. But the Stundist not only keeps the Bible in the house, but believes it, and hence he has been persecuted bitterly for years, and now the authorities are beginning to deny to the Protestant the right to have the Scriptures. It has always been considered by a persecuting Church dangerous to leave in the hands of one who believes it.

Along with Stundists and Baptist, many Seventh-day Adventists in Russia had been imprisoned and banished for holding the Bible truth. A communication recently received from one of our Russian brethren in a Southern province says:-

Our situation has not grown any better. They do not allow us to gather any more, therefore each has his own worship in his own house at the beginning of the Sabbath, and then Sabbath morning we meet early, so as to leave the house ere the light. Still they watch us very closely, and they especially seize all the books. One week ago last Sabbath they came and took all the books; only one Bible remained, because it was on the stove, and they did not see it. Last Sabbath we had again our meeting before daydawn. In the afternoon we met out of doors for a consultation. None of us had books, except a brother who had come from one of the villages; he had his Bible, and was at once seized.

Still our work in Russia prospers, and, as ever, the truth is triumphant amidst persecution. Another letter from a leader of one of the Sabbath-keeping churches says:-

Here the storm rages as never before. A member of the clergy was commissioned to visit me to bring me to the Greek Church again, but it turned to the opposite. The Lord directed the priest's mind to the truth. He came very often to me, and as he noticed how we searched in the Bible, and listened to our answers and questions, he became so deeply interested that he declared to us openly that he would lay down his office. As he now really carried out his intention, he has been at once seized, and we have no idea whatever as to where they have taken him. Oh, if you could only see how it boils and seethes here; still on my part I am quiet. I have laid myself wholly on the altar, and I would ask the brethren and sisters to remember us at the throne of Grace, that He might strengthen us and fill us with courage to testify more and more of Him with bold utterance of speech, and sound forth the glad tidings of the near advent of our Saviour.

The Holy Scriptures are our only protection against deception. When man, or angels in the guise of men, come to us with teaching, "To the law and to the testimony; if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." Isa. viii. 20. They may come professing to expound the Scriptures, pretending to tell us what they mean; but still the Scriptures are the test. "It is written," may be replied to every attempt to put a gloss upon the text. The written word will always stand against any professed explanation. "What is written in the law? How readest thou?"

Terrible reports of outrage and wholesale massacre come from Armenia, which may be believed, though the precise cause and responsibility for them are not yet clear. The Turks accuse the Armenians of inciting a revolt, which compelled them to protect the country subject to their depredations; and the Armenians, on the other hand, affirm that Turkish and Kurdish troops made an unprovoked attack upon defenceless people-men, women, and children alike-and slaughtered hundreds with the most fiendish barbarity. However it may be, the situation furnishes a good pretext for Russian intervention in behalf of the Christians, which she may use as she did a similar one years ago, to facilitate her onward march to Constantinople and the Indies. The "unspeakable Turk" cannot much longer maintain a position in Europe.

November 29, 1894

"Praying for Wisdom" The Present Truth 10, 48.

E. J. Waggoner

"If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him." James i. 5.

There is only one condition to this promise, and that is that the one who desires wisdom ask for it in faith. "Let him ask in faith, nothing wavering."

The promise is absolutely unlimited: "If any of you lack wisdom." There are no exceptions. It is open to the child as well as to the man; to the very ignorant as well as to the one who has had great advantages of education.

The kind of wisdom is not specified. It includes everything that may be called wisdom. Everything that is worth knowing, and that is necessary, may be asked for and received under this promise. Some one may say that it means only knowledge of the way of salvation. Take it so if you please; but remember that every act of life has something to do with one's salvation, and that therefore the promise of wisdom must include wisdom for every duty and for all circumstances in life.

We have the record of at least one who proved this promise to the full. The young king Solomon said to the Lord, "I am but a little child; I know not how to go out or to come in. . . . Give therefore Thy servant an understanding heart to judge Thy people, that I may discern between good and bad; for who is able to judge this Thy so great a people?" 1 Kings iii. 7-9.

"And the speech pleased the Lord, that Solomon had asked this thing. And God said unto him, Because thou hast asked this thing, and hast not asked for thyself long life; neither hast asked riches for thyself, nor hast asked the life of thine enemies; but hast asked for thyself understanding to discern judgment; behold, I have done according to thy word: lo, I have given thee a wise and an understanding heart; so that there was none like thee before thee, neither after thee shall any arise like unto thee." Verses 10-12.

That the wisdom given to Solomon in answer to his request was such as is not despised even by the world, may be seen from the following: "And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea shore. And Solomon's wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the east country, and all the wisdom of Egypt. . . . And his fame was in all nations round about. And he spake three thousand proverbs; and his songs were a thousand and five. And he spake of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall; he spake also of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes. And there came of all people to hear the wisdom of Solomon, from all kings of the earth, which had heard of his wisdom." 1 Kings iv. 29-34.

"Well," some one will say, "I have asked the Lord for wisdom, but the wisdom doesn't come; I asked in faith, too, because I believed that the Lord would give it; but I have waited a long time, to no purpose." And you may wait a long time yet to no purpose, if that is your idea of the promise. Let this see where the trouble is.

The word is, "Let him ask in faith, nothing wavering." "But faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." Rom. x. 17. The man whose trust is not according to the word of God, has not faith. There is another very striking text which tells us how we are to ask for wisdom; and it derives additional interest from the fact that it was written by Solomon, whose prayer for wisdom was so richly rewarded. Let us read it.

"My son, if thou wilt receive My words, and hide My commandments with thee; so that thou incline thine ear unto wisdom, and apply thine heart to understanding; yea, if thou criest after knowledge, and liftest up thy voice for understanding; if thou seekest her as silver, and searchest for her as for hid treasures; then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord giveth wisdom; out of his mouth cometh knowledge and understanding. . . . Then shalt thou understand righteousness, and judgment, and equity; yea, every good path." Prov. ii. 1-9.

These are the words of the Lord to Solomon, which he has passed on to us. It is the Lord's answer to Solomon's prayer for wisdom. It tells us how Solomon obtained his great wisdom. That "there is no royal road to learning" was as true in the days of Solomon as it is to-day. We greatly mistake if we suppose that Solomon obtained his great knowledge without any effort. It would have done him no good if he had. He valued wisdom

754

so much that he was willing to search for it as for gold and silver, and the Lord gave it to him. And so the Lord will do for us, if we also have a longing desire to know true wisdom.

Therefore when we wish for wisdom we must ask the Lord for it; "for the Lord giveth wisdom; out of His mouth cometh knowledge and understanding." And we must ask in faith. But since faith cometh by hearing the word of God, we must not ignore the text that we have read from Proverbs. "Nothing wavering." We must not become weary nor discouraged. Keep the mind fixed upon the word of God, as the speculator does upon the stock report. Is not this reasonable? If we ask the Lord for wisdom, do we not thereby indicate that we expect Him to tell us something? Then where should we go except to His word? Try it, and you will find that in Christ even this promise is yea, and amen; because in Him are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

"The Big, Round World" The Present Truth 10, 48.

E. J. Waggoner

We have been informed that some who have read with interest the evidence concerning the Sabbath of the Lord, are wondering how it can be kept in all parts of the world, since the earth is round. This is a very common difficulty that arises in the minds of people who have become convinced that the seventh day is still the Sabbath of the Lord, according to the Bible, but who would fain find an excuse for not keeping it.

We say that it is a difficulty that arises in their minds, for it exists nowhere else. As a matter of fact, nobody has ever found the slightest difficulty in keeping the Sabbath in any part of the world. And, still further, no person ever thought of any difficulty in regard to keeping a definite day, except in connection with the Sabbath of the Lord. People who have sent missionaries to the other side of the world, expecting them to teach the heathen to keep Sunday, and have themselves travelled around the world, observing Sunday strictly, all at once get the idea that a definite day cannot be observed, as soon as the seventh day is mentioned. This inconsistency is enough of itself to convince anybody that there is nothing in the objection. It is a ghost of the imagination.

"But," says one, "the day does not begin everywhere at the same time for the sun sets later and later, the further west you go." That is true, and has always been the case. But the fact that the day begins later in New York than it does in London, is no proof that it cannot be kept in both places. A train from London to Liverpool will reach Leicester much later than it does Bedford; but that is no proof that it is not the same train in both places, nor that a man may not get in it at the former station as well as at the latter.

There are seven days in the week. This is as true in China as in England. Each day is twenty-four hours long; no more and no less. This is also true of every part of the world. "The seventh day is the Sabbath." This also is as true in China as in England. A man who is in China is not in England, and he cannot by any possibility be in both countries at the same time; therefore he is not required to keep the Sabbath in both places at the same time. Wherever he may be, there he will find the Sabbath, and there the Lord expects him to keep it.

"They that sleep, sleep in the night." It is a fact that people in all parts of the world sleep. We never heard the complaint that people could not sleep at night on the other side of the earth, because it is not night there at the same time that it is here. Wherever people live, they sleep in the night when it comes to them, and they sleep in the same nights that people do on the opposite side of the world from them.

If all the rulers in Europe should agree to start a messenger from their respective capitals on a certain Monday evening at six o'clock, no one would think of raising the objection that it could not be done. No one ever thought of suggesting any difficulty in securing the copyright of a book in both England and America on the same day. In fact, all business operations are carried on from the basis of definiteness of time, notwithstanding that the earth is round, and nobody ever gets into trouble on that account. The fact that difficulty is never thought of except in connection with the Sabbath of the Lord, should be sufficient to convince one who stops to think about it that it is merely a flimsy excuse.

God made the earth, it was just as round when He made it, as it has ever been. When He made the earth, He also made man. And He made man "to dwell on all the face of the earth." Acts. vii. 26. God also made the Sabbath; and "the Sabbath was made for man." Mark ii. 27. It was given to Adam, the father of the whole human race. Therefore God designed that it should be kept by the whole human race on the face of the whole earth. And that is sufficient evidence that it can be kept. God does not have commandments that cannot be obeyed.

"All Virtue in Christ" The Present Truth 10, 48.

E. J. Waggoner

That there is no virtue in works the Saviour taught His disciples when He said, "So likewise ye, when ye have done all those things that are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants; we have done that which was our duty to do." Luke xvii. 10.

Our relation to God is not the relation of two independent parties one of whom hires himself to the other, for we are dependent upon God for all that we have, while He is dependent upon on us for nothing. We are His because He created us and redeemed us. We are therefore under obligation to serve Him with our powers of mind and body. This is our duty, and it is all we can do. And therefore, whatever works we may perform, we are not entitled to claim any reward from Him because of them.

No man can put the Lord under any obligations to him, because the Lord, being omnipotent and omniscient, cannot become in any way dependent upon men. It is true that

755

He speaks of man as His hired servants, labouring in His vineyard, and has promised to reward every man according to his works. But this is only a manifestation of God's love and generosity to men, and not the fulfillment of any obligation under which man has placed Him.

For fallen man there is no virtue, no sanctifying power, no merit to which he can claim anything from God, outside of Jesus Christ. And He is "the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever," having just as much merit at one time as another, since He has all merit. Having Him we have His merit and His holiness, and the same at one time as at another, and we can have no more, since that is all that there is. There is no other and no greater worthiness for us than that of Christ. And since He has given Himself freely to us, we have nothing to do to become righteous and worthy but to receive Him into our hearts by faith. This is the very purpose for which Christ suffered and died; and any religion that is built upon the merit of good works and penance, ignores this vital truth which God has at an infinite cost established and revealed to men.

"Testimony of the Centuries. God's Witness to All Nations" The Present Truth 10, 48.

E. J. Waggoner

"This is the purpose that is purposed upon the whole earth; and this is the hand that is stretched out upon all the nations. For the Lord of hosts hath purposed, and who shall disannul it? and His hand is stretched out, and who shall turn it back?" Isa. xiv. 26, 27.

When Paul and Barnabas were trying to persuade the people of Lystra to turn from the vanities of idolatry, they said unto them that although God "suffered all nations to walk in their own ways, nevertheless He left not Himself without witness, in that He did good, and gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness." These are some of the means by which God witnesses of Himself to all nations.

The prophet Isaiah sets forth the absurdity and inexcusableness of idolatry, by simply showing how a god is made. A man plants a tree, which the rain nourishes until it has grown large enough to be used; then he cuts it down, and with part of it he makes a fire, by which he warms himself and cooks his food, and the residue he makes into a god, and falls down to it and worships it, and cries to it, "Deliver me; for thou art my god." Isa. xliv. 14-17. Then the prophet shows where such people fail to use the common sense that belongs with nature itself. Since the rain nourishes the tree from which he makes his god, why does he not worship the power that gives the rain, if he does not know who God is? If he would but do that, he would be walking in the light of common sense, of reason, and of faith, and would soon find God more perfectly. Men who do not do so are without excuse. See Rom. i. 20.

But it is not alone by the giving of rain and fruitful seasons that God has "left not Himself without witness." He has done it by revelation, and through living testimony. When Egypt stood at the head of the world in power, wisdom, and influence, God made manifest in that land His power and His glory in such a way that all the nations heard of it. The Canaanites heard of it, and knew that the God that delivered Israel was the God of Heaven and earth. Josh. ii. 9-11.

The next nation that arose to power and influence in the world was Assyria. And when Assyria had grown corrupt and had gone far away from God, the Lord graciously sent a Hebrew prophet to the people, and called them to repentance. Jonah i. 2, 3. After this, again and again, He bore witness to Assyria that He is God above all, the most notable instance, perhaps, being the slaughter of the host of Sennacherib. Isa. xxxvii.

Babylon next spread her empire over all nations, and to them God left not Himself without witness. He bore witness directly to Nebuchadnezzar, in the dream of the great image, and its interpretation by Daniel, the captive Hebrew. Again in the affair of the three Hebrews and the fiery furnace, God bore witness of Himself to all the power and all the provinces of that mighty empire, by the representatives that were present (Dan. iii. 3), and also by the decree of the king, which followed. Verse 29. Again when Nebuchadnezzar, after being warned of God (Dan. iv. 4-27), was driven out from the presence of men to run wild for seven years, he learned by it that Jehovah rules in the affairs of men, and that He is above all gods; and when he recovered his understanding, he published "unto all people, nations, and languages, that dwell in all the earth," that he "thought it good to show the signs and wonders that the high God" had wrought. Verses 1, 2. Again, when that empire was on the brink of ruin, God, by the handwriting on the wall of the palace, bore a last parting witness to the lascivious king, that he was weighed in the balances and found wanting, and that his kingdom was given to the Medes and Persians. Dan. v. 27, 28.

The power of Media and Persia came after, and through that power, also, God again bore witness of Himself "unto all people, nations, and languages that dwell in all the earth." Daniel, the servant of God, was cast into a den of lions, and came forth unhurt, because God sent His angel and shut the lions' mouth that they should do him no hurt. "Then King Darius wrote unto all people, nations, and languages, that dwell in all the earth," that the God of Daniel "is the living God, and steadfast for ever, and His kingdom that which shall not be destroyed, and His dominion shall be even unto the end." Dan. vi. 25, 26. When Cyrus reigned, he also "made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing, saying,

756

Thus saith Cyrus king of Persia, the Lord God of Heaven hath given me all the kingdoms of the earth; and He hath charged me to build Him house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Who is there among you of all His people? his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and build the house of the Lord God of Israel (He is the God.)"

When Alexander the Great was in the full tide of his career of conquest, he stood at the temple of the Most High in Jerusalem, and heard the witness of God concerning him (Dan. viii. 5-8, 21) read from the Hebrew Scriptures. And through the Greek language, which the career of Alexander was instrumental in spreading throughout all the Eastern world, God chose to give witness of Himself in the salvation wrought for man in the death and resurrection of His own dear Son.

When Rome ruled the world, God not only left not Himself without witness, in the preaching of the Gospel to every nation under heaven, but also by the Apostle Paul He bore witness more than once to the head of the Roman world himself. And from that day to this, God has not left Himself without witness to all nations.

Nor was it only to these great empires and nations that the Lord bore witness of Himself. In Jer. xxvii. 2-11 is the copy of a message from the Lord that was written by the prophet Jeremiah, and was sent "to the king of Edom, and to the king of Moab, and to the king of the Ammonites, and to the king of Tyrus, and to the king of Zidon." The time would fail us to tell of all the testimonies that God bore by Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, and Joel, and Amos, and Obadiah, and Zephaniah, and Zechariah, not only to Assyria, and Babylon, and Egypt, and Medo-Persia, but also to Edom, and Moab, and Ammon, and Tyre, and Zidon, and Syria, and Arabia, and all the nations round about. It is literally true that God has "left not Himself without witness" unto "all nations" in all ages. And when in that great day of the Lord the great trumpet shall be blown, there shall gather before the glorious throne of the Most High God, "a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues," and they will cry "with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb."

Prophecy, the foretelling of the events, is one of the evidences which God has given to show that it is God who has spoken, and that men might believe. "Because I knew that thou art obstinate, and thy neck is an iron sinew, and thy brow brass; I have even from the beginning declared it to thee; before it came to pass I showed it thee; lest thou shouldest say, Mine idol hath done them, and my graven image, and my molten image, hath commanded them." Isa. xlviii. 4, 5. The Lord utters this as a challenge to all who deny His power: "Produce your cause, saith the Lord; bring forth your strong reasons, saith the King of Jacob. Let them bring them forth, and show us what shall happen; let them show the former things, what they be, that we may consider them, and know the latter end of them; or declare us things for to come. Show the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that ye are gods." Isa. xli. 21-23. Thus it is shown that prophecy is an attribute of Deity. "Show the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that ye are gods." From this it is evident that the power to show the things that are to come belongs to God alone, and by the following text is made yet more evident: "Remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done." Isa. xlvi. 9-11.

"Teaching Christianity" The Present Truth 10, 48.

E. J. Waggoner

The only competent teacher of Christianity is the Holy Spirit. One person may be instrumental in leading others to God, but "they shall be all taught of God;" that is, God Himself is the teacher. John vi. 45; 1 Thess. iv. 9. When men essay to teach Christianity, they simply teach man-made creeds, the product of the ideas and conclusions of the human mind. In Christianity we have the mind of Christ. 1 Cor. ii. 16. The Bible is God's revelation of Himself to man, and the Holy Spirit is the Interpreter,-the Guide into all truth. John xvi. 13.

Furthermore, Christianity stands for perfect freedom. It compels no man to do anything against his will. It will not compel anyone to pay taxes to support religious teaching in which he does not believe, or to have his children instructed in dogmas, the truth of which he denies. When anyone is compelled to do this, it is not Christianity which compels him. It is mere denominationalism, and not Christianity, that is served thereby. Christianity asks no help from the State, either financially or otherwise. It is the same cause of God, and His power, His wealth, and His wisdom, are behind it.

"Studies in Romans. Freedom. Rom. viii. 1-9" The Present Truth 10, 48.

E. J. Waggoner

We now come to the conclusion of the whole matter. In the eighth chapter of Romans the epistle reaches its highest point. The seventh has presented to us the deplorable condition of the man who has been awakened by the law to a sense of his condition, bound to sin by cords that can be loosened only by death. It closes with a glimpse of the Lord Jesus Christ as the One who alone can set us free from the body of death.

FREEDOM FROM CONDEMNATION

757

"There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh; that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his." Rom. viii. 1-9.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What is the condition of them that are in Christ?

"There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus."

How do such walk?

"Not after the flesh, but after the Spirit."

From what have we been made free?

"From the law of sin and death."

What has done this?

"The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus."

How did God send His Son?

"In the likeness of sinful flesh."

What for?

"For sin."

What did He thus do?

"Condemned sin in the flesh."

For what purpose?

"That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us."

Why could not the law itself do this?

Because "it was weak through the flesh."

How is it then that it can be done in us through Christ?

Because we "walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit."

What is said of those who are after, or according to, the flesh?

"They that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh."

What of them that are after the Spirit?

"They that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit."

What is the difference between the flesh and the Spirit."

"These are contrary the one to the other." Gal. v. 17.

What is it to be minding the flesh?

"To be carnally minded is death."

And what to be minding the Spirit?

"To be spiritually minded is life and peace."

Why is it that to be carnally minded is death?

"Because the carnal mind is enmity against God."

In what does its enmity consist?

"It is not subject to the law of God."

Cannot the carnal mind be brought into subjection to the law of God?

"Neither indeed can be."

Then what necessarily follows?

"So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God?"

What is the condition of those in whom the Spirit of God dwells?

"Ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be the Spirit of God dwell in you."

What is said of the one who has not this Spirit?

"If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His."

"No Condemnation."-There is no condemnation to them which are in Christ. Why? Because he received the curse of the law, that the blessing might come on us. Nothing can come to us while we are in him, without first passing through him; but in him all curses are turned to blessings, and sin is displaced by righteousness. His endless life triumphs over everything that comes against it. We are made "complete in him."

"Looking unto Jesus."-Some say, "I do not find this Scripture fulfilled in my case, because I find something to condemn me every time I look at myself." To be sure; for the freedom from condemnation is not in ourselves, but in Christ Jesus. We are to look at Him, instead of at ourselves. If we obey His orders, and trust Him, He takes the responsibility of making us clear before the law. There will never be a time when one will not find condemnation in looking at himself. The fall of Satan was due to his looking at himself. The restoration for those whom he has made to fall, is only through looking to Jesus. "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up." John iii. 14. The serpent was lifted up to be looked at. Those who looked were healed. Even so with Christ. In the world to come the servants of the Lord "shall see his face," and they will not be drawn away to themselves. The light of His countenance will be their glory and it is in that same light that they will be brought to that glorious state.

Conviction, Not Condemnation.-The text does not say that those who are in Christ Jesus will never be reproved.

"Do you think He ne'er reproves me?
What a false friend He would be
If He never, never told me
Of the faults that He must see!"

Getting into Christ is only the beginning, not the end, of Christian life. It is the entrance to the school where we are to learn of him. He takes the ungodly man with all his evil habits and forgives all his sins, so that he is counted as though he never had sinned. Then He continues to him His own life, by which he may overcome his evil habits. Association with Christ will more and more reveal to us our failings, just as association with a learned man will make us conscious of our ignorance. As a faithful witness, He tells us of our failings. But it is not to condemn us. We receive sympathy, not condemnation, from Him. It is this sympathy that gives us courage, and enables us to overcome. When the Lord points out a defect in our characters, it is the same as saying to us, "There is something that you are in need of, and I have it for you." When we learn to look at reproof in this way, we shall rejoice in it, instead of being discouraged.

Law of Life in Christ.-The law without Christ is death. The law in Christ is life. His life is the law of God; for out of the heart are the issues of life, and the law was in His heart. The law of sin and death works in our members. But the law of the Spirit of life in Christ gives us freedom from this. Mark that it is the life in Christ that does this. It does not give us freedom from obedience to the law, for we had that before, and that was bondage, and not freedom. What He gives us freedom from is the transgression of the law.

Christ's Work.-This is made very plain in verses 3 and 4. God sent his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, "that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us." "The law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good." There is no fault to be found with it but with us, because we have transgressed it. Christ's work is not to change the law in any particular, but to change us in every particular. It is to put the law into our hearts in perfection, in place of the marred and broken copy.

The Weakness of the Law.-The law is strong enough to condemn, but it is weak, even powerless, with respect to what man needs namely, salvation. It was and is "weak through the flesh." The law is good, and holy, and just, but man has no strength to perform it. Just as an axe may be of good steel, and very sharp, yet unable to cut down a tree because the arm that has hold of it has no strength, so the law of God could not perform itself. It set forth man's duty; it remained for him to do it. But he could not, and therefore Christ came to do it in him. What the law could not do, God did by His Son.

Likeness of Sinful Flesh.-There is a common idea that this means that Christ simulated sinful flesh; that He did not take upon Himself actual sinful flesh, but only what appeared to be such. But the Scriptures do not teach such a thing. "In all things it behoved Him to be made like unto His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people." Heb. ii. 17. He was "born of a woman, born under the law," that He might redeem them that were under the law. Gal. iv. 4, 5, R.V. He took the same flesh that all have who are born of

758

woman. A parallel text to Rom. viii. 3, 4 is found in 2 Cor. v. 21. The former says that Christ was sent in the likeness of sinful flesh, "that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us." The latter says that God "made Him to be sin for us," although He knew no sin, "that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him."

"Compassed with Infirmity."-All the comfort that we can get from Christ lies in the knowledge that He was made in all things as we are. Otherwise we should hesitate to tell Him of our weaknesses and failures. The priest who makes sacrifices for sins must be one "who can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way; for that He Himself also is compassed with infirmity." Heb. v. 2. This applies perfectly to Christ; "for we have not an High Priest which can not be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin." Heb. iv. 15. This is why we may come boldly to the throne of grace for mercy. So perfectly has Christ identified Himself with us, that he even now feels our sufferings.

The Flesh and the Spirit.-"For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit, the things of the Spirit." Note that this depends on the preceding statement, "that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." The things of the Spirit are the commandments of God, because the law is spiritual. The flesh serves the law of sin (see the preceding chapter, and Gal. v. 19-21, where the works of the flesh are described). But Christ came in the same flesh, to show the power of the Spirit over the flesh. "They that are in the flesh can not please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of Christ dwell in you." Now no one will claim that the flesh of a man is any different after his conversion from what it was before. Least of all will the converted man himself say so; for he has continual evidence of its perversity. But if he is really converted, and the Spirit of Christ dwells in him, he is no more in the power of the flesh. Even so Christ came in the same sinful flesh, yet He was without sin, because He was always led by the Spirit.

The Enmity.-"The carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." The flesh never becomes converted. It is enmity against God; and that enmity consists in opposition to His law. Therefore, whoever opposes the law of God is fighting against him. But Christ is our Peace, and He came preaching peace. "You, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in His sight." Col. i. 21, 22. In His own flesh He abolishes the enmity, so that all who are crucified with Him are at peace with God; that is, they are subject to his law, which is in their hearts.

"Life and Peace."-"To be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace." To be spiritually minded is to have a mind controlled by the law of God, "for we know that the law is spiritual." "Great peace have they which love thy law." Ps. cxix. 165. "Being justified [made righteous] by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." The carnal mind is enmity against God. Therefore, to be carnally minded is death. But Christ "hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel." 2 Tim. i. 10. He has abolished death by destroying the power of sin in all who believe in Him; for death has no power except through sin. "The sting of death is sin." 1 Cor. xv. 56. So that even now we may joyfully say, "Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."

"Spiritualism in Korea" The Present Truth 10, 48.

E. J. Waggoner

It is with good authority that the followers of modern Spiritualism count the ancient sorcery and witchcraft as practically identical with the modern phase of spirit manifestations. The religions of heathenism are full of it, and in fact from the most ancient times the idea of communication with the dead has been a root principle in heathen systems of belief.

The Lord warned the children of Israel against observing the enchantments and times of the heathen round about them, or engaging in their rites in behalf of the dead. Lev. xix. 26-28. Notwithstanding this we read in the Psalms that "they joined themselves to Baal-peor, and ate the sacrifices of the dead." Ps. cvi. 28. The heathen profess to hold intercourse with the dead, but the beings with whom they were really in communication, and who personated the dead, were devils, as the apostle says: "But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God; and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils." 1 Cor. x. 20.

A newspaper correspondent, writing of Korea, gives a short account of the demon or spirit worship among the Koreans. He says:-

A good deal of attention in religion is paid to the worship of ancestral spirits, and sacrifices are made to demons who play star roles. One of the spirits is said to take up its abode in an aperture made by nailing two pieces of walnut board together without causing them to meet. This is called an ancestral table, and is often so deified as to have a temple built for its reception. At other times it has a separate room in a house, or again it is carefully laid aside in a quiet nook. A second spirit "goes back" to the ancestors, and the eldest son of the deceased dutifully propitiates the demons by sacrificing for its peace, and a third spirit is in like manner waited upon by this dutiful scion lest by any means the demons should disturb its peace in the grave. He may be so dutiful as to build a hut beside the grave on the mountainside in order to be able to offer morning and evening sacrifice to the demons for the benefit of the spirit remaining in the body. The sacrifices are continued three years in the case of the father and one year for the mother. The son's clothing while performing these rites is of course sea-weed cloth and girdle, and reminds one of the scriptural sack cloth. The meat offering that he brings is the best food that he can afford. It consists usually of boiled rice, raw cabbage and turnips sliced in strong brine, fish, and fruit. The drink offering is native liquor made of wheat, and is highly intoxicating.

The Koreans are an imaginative race. The time between the sacrificial ceremonies is taken up in searching the hills for a propitious site for burial, and the hills themselves become dragons, spirits, and ghosts, to gain whose favour is the desire of every heart, for in that way alone can they hope for earthly prosperity. Praying to the mountain spirits and worshipping every hill-top is the outgrowth of the ancestral reverence. Shrines or spirit trees are at every mountain pass, and travellers bow and make a trivial offering to them.

The choice of a grave in Korea is a much more serious matter than in other countries. In fact, so complicated and mixed are the methods of arriving at a proper conclusion that a large number of people make a special study of it and gain their living as experts in geomancy. If possible, a grave is chosen having two arm-like ridges on either hand, one called the dragon side and the other the tiger. It is a duty of vital importance to the natives to watch after burial and see that no one encroaches on or interferes with these ancestral graves. In fact, if it becomes a choice between feeding and clothing the living and making some outlay for this resting-place for the dead, they will decide in favour of the latter. Should a household meet with repeated disaster, up come their ancestors' bones, which are buried elsewhere to conciliate the spirits.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 48.

E. J. Waggoner

-The future Czarina will be known as Alexandra Feodorovna.

-The Abyssian alphabet consists of no fewer than 208 characters.

-Anton Rubenstein, the eminent pianist and composer, died at Peterhof, near St. Petersburg.

-Conventions have been signed by all the Australian colonies for the direct interchange of money orders with Canada.

-The Rajah of Lombok has surrendered to the Dutch troops in the East Indies, and the war is considered virtually at an end.

-A professional diver dropped 240 feet from the Tower Bridge to win a bet of ?50, and falling into the water feet foremost, was killed.

-It is estimated that if the children attending the London Board Schools were to join hands they would reach from London to Carlisle, a distance of 300 miles.

-The potato crop in Ireland is more diseased than for many years past. It is estimated that the world's potato crop is 376,500,000 bushels short of what it was in 1498.

-After several days' consideration, the Japanese Government has declined to accept President Cleveland's offer of mediation, thinking that China should approach Japan directly on the abject.

-A report has been issued by the San Francisco State Board of Horticulture declaring that shipments of fresh fruits to London are impracticable until cheaper and better transport is obtainable.

-Fines were recently inflicted upon some neon a this country for cruelly driving diseased and worn-out horses sixty miles in order to ship them at Grimsby for the Continent, to be there converted into human food.

-News has reached Tangier that the rebellion in the South of Morocco in favour of Muley Mohammed, who is imprisoned in Morocco City, is at an end, and that the southern capital is again open to trade from the outside.

-A syndicate of prominent Americans has resolved to equip an expedition with the determination of solving the problem of the North Pole before the expiration of the present century. An agent is in England arranging matters.

-An effort is being made to exterminate the sparrows in Hanover. All the farmers in one district are informed that they must bring to the Town House so many dead sparrows within the text six months. The number is determined in each case by the size of the farm.

-Three men are under arrest at Aldershot, charged with being concerned in placing an obstruction on the South Western Railway between Farnborough and Fleet Pond, by which the Bournemouth Express from Waterloo name very near being wrecked.

-Salvador Franch, the Anarchist who threw a bomb which killed many persons in the Licco Theatre, Barcelona, twelve months ago, was publicly garrotted. The culprit, who had pretended to be converted and who had afterwards boasted of his hypocrisy, was callous up to the last.

-A proposal has been made to the French Chamber by the AbbÈ Lamire to diminish the formalities surrounding marriage in France. This will, if carried, be an excellent reform. It is notorious that amongst the humbler classes concubinage is often caused by the harassing legislation which precedes the civil celebration of matrimony.

-In Hungary the Jesuits are doing their utmost to prevent the Emperor Francis Joseph from signing the ecclesiastical bills recently passed by the Government, and an extreme Independent party, headed by Louie Kossouth, is hostile to the Emperor and is conducting an agitation against union with Austria. It is not thought, however, that the Emperor's sanction to the bills will be withheld.

-Among the birthday gifts presented to the Dowager Empress of China upon the occasion of her sixtieth birthday was a Bible in the Chinese language, for which her Majesty very graciously expressed her thanks, at the same time promising to read the holy book. It now transpires that the Emperor recently rent one of the chief officers of his household to the Bible Society's depÙt at Tientsin to purchase a copy of the Scriptures similar to that presented to the Empress.

-Earthquake shocks in Sicily and Calabria have spread alarm throughout Italy. In one village, which was wrecked, over 200 people were killed, 47 of whom were destroyed by the collapse of the church to which they had fled for shelter. Other towns and villages suffered severely, and as the shocks continued the people were all camping out in the open spaces. In all about 400 lives were lost, twice that number being injured. The King of Italy sent 40,000 lire in aid of the sufferers.

-Mr. Nazarek, one of the leaders of the Armenian patriotic movement, who has been interviewed; confirms the reports of outrages committed by Turkish troops upon Armenians in the Sassoun district. The Earl of Kimberley has replied to the Armenian Association in London that the Sultan is being pressed to send at once an impartial Commission of Inquiry. An influential meeting of American citizens was held at Minneapolis to protest against the alleged Turkish outrages, and a resolution was passed calling on President Cleveland to secure the execution of the filet Clause of the Treaty of Berlin.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 48.

E. J. Waggoner

The election of members of the London School Board last week resulted in the return of twenty-nine "Moderates," and twenty-six "Progressives," giving the party which favours the most advanced religious instruction a majority of three on the Board, although the other party polled the largest number of votes in all the constituences.

It is probably too much to hope that the unseemly wrangling and fighting over religious questions will cease. Both sides claim a victory, and so long as men do not agree in religious matters, and so long as there is opportunity to use political and party issues to advance their religious views, there will be religious controversy to embitter political or educational issues. It ought to teach men that the Gospel is not to be advanced by such methods.

Here is part of the account of one Church of England service in London:-

The notice board informed me that "Low Mass" had already been said at 8 and 9 A.M., and that the "High Mass" would be at 11:15. At that hour the choir and clergy took up their positions. The officiating priest in alb, stole, and cope, attended by two other clergymen arrayed in the mass vestments (as deacon and sub-deacon), preceded by a sanctimonious-looking boy carrying a vessel of holy water, proceeded to the altar, and commenced the rite known among Roman Catholics as the "Asperges." This is the ceremony which precedes the High Mass in Roman churches. The priest reciting the prayers as presented in the Sarum Missal, sprinkled the altar, himself, his assistants, the choir (on both sides), and then, with his attendance, marched down and up the church sprinkling the congregation. . . . Then the mass began. The priest recited the Psalm, Confession, and Absolution, etc., with which the Roman Catholic mass always began; then they ascended to the altar, the chief priest kissing it, and afterwards censing it, precisely as is done in the Roman Church.

In connection with all this there was the "mixing of water and wine, washing the priests fingers, elevating the Host and chalice, with bell-ringing, the communion of the priest alone, the interpolation of the Benedictus and Agnus Dei, the ablutions, frequent crossings, prostrations and genuflections, etc."

This is only one instance out of many. We have asked for statistics showing the growth of the Roman Catholic Church in Great Britain; but figures cannot give any true idea of the actual status. In a religious sense these Ritualists would not be counted as Roman Catholics, and yet they are such to all intents and purposes. The only difference is that they do not, openly, at least, acknowledge the Pope of Rome.

But this is not all. As will be surmised from the extracts given, the one who reports that Church of England service has no sympathy with it. He is of the class that glories in the name "Protestant." Now mark the only objections which he offers to those Popish ceremonies. Here are the expressions that he uses: "These unauthorised prayers concluded," etc. "This was followed by some more of unauthorised prayers." "It was twenty minutes to twelve, and we had not been treated to a single authorised prayer." "Suffice it to say that all those ceremonies which the compilers of our Prayer-Book suppressed and forbade, were boldly reintroduced."

This is the most pitiful part of the whole affair. Those who perform the ceremonies that have been described, do so with full consciousness of what they are doing. They know that they are copying Romish methods; they think it a great error that there was ever any division, and they aspire to be known as Catholics. But the majority of those who are opposed to such practices, and who claim to be Protestants, do not know that they really stand on Catholic ground. The objection is not that the things are contrary to the word of God, and idolatrous, but that they are "unauthorised," that is, not authorised by the framers of the Prayer-Book, and by Parliament. The only real difference between the two parties is that one party follows one set of men, and the other party another set of men. The word of God says, "Cease ye from man." It makes no difference whether the authority be derived from a Pope in Rome or from a Parliament in England, both are in essence the Papacy, which consists in following the word of man instead of the word of God.

"Evil Servants" The Present Truth 10, 48.

E. J. Waggoner

Evil Servants.-The "evil servant" of the Lord began to say in his heart, "My Lord delayeth His coming." Matt. xxiv. 38. This was the starting point of a course of backsliding which ended in appointing him a portion with the hypocrites. The same indicated that he had lost his love for his Lord. It is not necessary to limit the application of these words to some particular time in the world's history. Those who love the Lord have always been looking for and desiring His appearing. "For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." Titus ii. 7-13. "The grace of God that bringeth salvation" teaches men to look for the glorious appearing of Jesus Christ. How many men?-"All men"; for it has appeared unto all, and therefore every man who receives this grace will be looking for that glorious appearing. These words penned by Paul were addressed to all who should live after the time of their utterance. There is something wrong with the person who is not to-day looking for that appearing. If he is professedly a servant of the Lord, let him beware lest he be reckoned with the evil servants, and meet the fate of the hypocrites.

"Drawing Near to God" The Present Truth 10, 48.

E. J. Waggoner

Drawing Near to God.-It is sin that separates an individual from God. But the Lord exhorts sinners to draw near to him, and says that when they do this, He also will draw near to them. Jas. iv. 8. Men were not created to live apart from God. It is His purpose that they shall dwell with Him, and He will sooner or later draw near to all. He can draw near to us whatever our condition; but we can draw near to Him only by the removal of the sin that separates us from Him. So it makes all the difference in the world to us whether the drawing near is on our part, or on His alone. If we are separated from Him by sin, it will be a drawing near to judgment (Mal. iii. 5), in which our sins will be consumed and our life with them; for sin is the life of the sinner. But if we have confessed and forsaken our sins, so that they do not stand between us and God, we are like Him, and can see Him as He is and live.

December 6, 1894

"What God Desires" The Present Truth 10, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

What God Desires.-"My son, give Me thine heart." Prov. xxiii. 26. This is what God asks. It is useless to substitute anything for this,-gold, or talents, or other thing of value that we may possess; it will not be acceptable to Him. He has all the gold, all the talents, all the treasure of every kind that He needs, save only our hearts. It is the gift and the treasure of human hearts that is needed in His cause.

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

From South America a missionary sends a description of the Republic of Ecuador, where Rome has its own way, and has made what the late Cardinal described as the model republic. The mystery says:-

Ecuador is yet wholly uninfluenced by direct Gospel agencies. There, those who wish to see the Church of Rome in all its glory can find a view to astonish and startle. This is the great stagnated Republic of South America. Its principal marks are a want of morals, of education, and of progress. Priests and nuns and illegitimate children abound. Bibles cannot pass the custom house of Guayaquil. They are refused, or are confiscated, not as heretical, but as pestiferous books.

The leading nations of the world spent over 150 million pounds annually on their standing armies. Immense as the sum is it is far overtopped by the money that is spent for drink. In Great Britain alone about the same amount is spent for alcoholic drink and tobacco. And every one who looks at the figures will find that the drink is far more deadly than war. There is in fact no comparison, for self-indulgence is ruining and destroying day and night perpetually.

In a contemporary we find the following question, which is one that is often asked:-

Do you know of any book that deals with the facts of Christ's life on earth,-His birth, miracles, resurrection,-suitable for the ordinary reader?

We know of nothing that has been written that can take the place of the Bible. It is the only authentic record. One of the worst signs of the times is a craving for something to take the place of the Bible, and the idea that it is not adapted to the ordinary reader. The four Gospels are very simply written, adapted to the comprehension of a child, and whatever of truth one can learn of Christ must come from them, together with the remainder of the Bible.

"Betraying Christ" The Present Truth 10, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

Judas Iscariot is not the only person among men who has betrayed Christ. The time and circumstances of that final act in the garden of Gethsemane were not the only ones that have invested or may invest a like tragedy. The Saviour needs not to be personally and visibly seized in order to be betrayed. Christ is identified with His followers. To the persecutor of His Church, He said, "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?" His persecution and betrayal are no less real when accomplished in the persons of His disciples.

What was the motive that prompted Judas to this terrible deed? Looking at the elements of the evil that stirred his soul, we see first and foremost the trait of covetousness. "What will ye give me, and I will deliver Him unto you?" A very common trait it was, and is to-day. Yet we are not inclined to feel very deeply over the fact (if so it be) that we are covetous. If we were a thief, or a murderer, or an adulterer, in the eyes of men, or in our own eyes, we might regard ourselves quite differently; but covetousness in the heart, that has not yet assumed the form of a heinous overt act, does not look like anything serious. But beware! that was the very thing that led Judas to betray his Lord. In the light of that act, the nature of coveteousness is correctly seen. It may lead us where it did him. Certainly it will lead us in the same direction.

Judas did not foresee the crucifixion and death of his Master any more than did the other disciples; but this fact did not lessen his guilt or change the character of his sin. The betrayer of Christ does not always see the consequences of his deed. Judas harboured a spite against his Lord, because by Him his covetousness had been rebuked. Out of his covetousness grew the spite, and the betrayal was its fruit. Covetousness is a fertile soil for every evil seed; and every evil seed is within it. No planting is necessary; it springs up and grows of itself, and must be continually cut off or it will bear its baleful fruit.

But cutting off will not cure the evil. That can only be done by a complete removal of covetousness from the heart. So long as that remains, so long shall we have within us the germ of every sin, even such a sin as that of Judas. By allowing this lust to grow and develop until it controls up as it finally did him, we shall be brought where he was brought. By partaking of the spirit that animated him in opposition to the cause of truth and righteousness, we partake also of his sin and condemnation.

770

The assembly of Jews who condemned Stephen were betrayers and murderers of Christ. Acts vii. 52. And as certainly as He is persecuted in the persecution of His followers, as He said to Saul, so certainly is their betrayal and murder the betrayal and murder of Himself. There are some who "crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh and put Him to an open shame." Heb. vi. 6. They are far from imagining themselves in the same position of Judas, but in the day when all eyes will be open to the truth, they will know and confess the fact.

Covetousness throws a softening, palliating mirage around the most glaring sins. It is covetousness that makes the human heart "deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked." It is covetousness that stands out in most marked contrast to the Spirit of Christ. Phil. ii. 5-8. But this spirit, this mind, we may have. We may "let" it be in us, and if we let it in, it will come. And there is our hope and our salvation from covetousness and all the sins to which it leads.

"Of No Reputation" The Present Truth 10, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

The amazing condescension of the Son of God in taking upon Himself the nature of humanity and becoming a babe of flesh and blood, is set forth in the declaration that He "made Himself of no reputation." In heaven His reputation was great, for He was the Son of God, and Creator of all things. But when He came to earth He left all,-His power, His glory, His riches, and His reputation. He began His life again, at the point where each one of thus began ours; and the same path in which He walked, and in which He attained to wisdom and a place at God's right hand, is open to us.

As a child, He grew and "increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man." Luke ii. 52. Each of us had, as a child, the same opportunities. His wisdom was the wisdom contained in God's word, which is open to us; His strength was the strength of God dwelling in Him, which is also our strength by the power of His word abiding in us. When He was raised from the dead, it was not a taking back of what He had relinquished in heaven; but God declared, "Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee." In all points He was identified with us, save that He "knew no sin;" and this identity continues, for He is to-day "the man Christ Jesus." And that He might be identified with us in all things, He took our sins upon Himself, died, and rose again, thus raising man to His own level in the one point where that identity was not complete.

"Studies in Romans. Sons of God. Rom. viii. 9-17" The Present Truth 10, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

The eighth chapter of Romans is full of the glorious things that God has promised to them that love him. Freedom, the Spirit of life in Christ, sons of God, heirs of God and with Christ, glory and victory, are the words that outline the chapter. Our last lesson closed with the ninth verse, but we will include it in the present lesson in order to get the connection better.

"But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you. Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh. For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die; but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our Spirit, that we are the children of God; and if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together." Rom. viii. 9-17.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What have we learned to be impossible for them that are in the flesh?

"They that are in the flesh cannot please God."

Then how can we serve the Lord?

"But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit."

How is it that we are "in the Spirit"?

"If so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you."

What if one has not this Spirit?

"If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His."

But if Christ by His Spirit be in us, then what?

"The body is dead."

Why is the body dead?

"Because of sin."

And the Spirit?

"The Spirit is life because of righteousness."

Of what may we be sure if the Spirit of God dwells in us?

"He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you."

In the first chapter we learned that we are debtors; but to what do we owe nothing?

"We are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh."

For what only can the flesh give us?

"If ye live after the flesh ye shall die."

How shall we live?

"If ye. . . do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live."

How are we to mortify the deeds of the body?

"Through the Spirit."

Who are the sons of God?

"As many as are led by the Spirit of God."

What spirit have we not received from the Lord?

"Ye have not received the Spirit of bondage again to fear."

What Spirit have we received?

"Ye have received the Spirit of adoption."

What does this Spirit enable us to do?

"Whereby we cry, Abba, Father."

To what does the Spirit witness?

"That we are the children of God."

What necessarily follows?

"If children, then heirs."

Whose heirs?

"Heirs of God."

With whom do we have common heirship?

"Joint-heirs with Jesus Christ."

Since we are joint-heirs with Jesus Christ, what shall we enjoy with Him?

"We may be also glorified together."

Under what conditions?

"If so be that we suffer with Him."

Opposing Forces.-The flesh and the Spirit are in opposition. These are always contrary the one to the other. The Spirit never

771

yields to the flesh, and the flesh never gets converted. The flesh will be of the nature of sin until our bodies are changed at the coming of the Lord. The Spirit strives with the sinful man, but he yields to the flesh, and so is the servant of sin. Such a man is not led by the Spirit, although the Spirit has by no means forsaken him. The flesh is just the same in a converted man that it is in a sinner, but the difference is that now it has no power, since the man yields to the Spirit, which controls the flesh. Although the man's flesh is precisely the same that it was before he was converted, he is said to be not "in the flesh," but "in the Spirit," since he through the Spirit mortifies the deeds of the body.

Life in Death.-"And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness." Here we have the two individuals of which the apostle speaks in 2 Cor. iv. 7-16. "For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh." Then he says that "though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." Though our body should fail and be worn out, yet the inward man, Christ Jesus, is ever new. And he is our real life. "Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God." Col. iii. 3. This is why we are not to fear them that can kill only the body, and after that have no more that they can do. Though the body be burned at the stake, wicked men can not touch the eternal life which we have in Christ, who can not be destroyed. No man can take his life from him.

The Surety of the Resurrection.-"But if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you." Jesus said of the water that He gave, which was the Holy Spirit, that it should be in us a well of water springing up unto eternal life. John iv. 14; compare John vii. 37-39. That is, the spiritual life which we now live in the flesh by the Spirit is the surety of the spiritual body to be bestowed at the resurrection when we will have the life of Christ made manifested in immortal bodies.

Not Debtors to the Flesh.-"Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh." We are indeed debtors, but we do not owe anything to the flesh. It has done nothing for us, and can do nothing. All the work that the flesh can do avails nothing, for its works are sin and therefore death. But we are debtors to the Lord Jesus Christ, "who gave Himself for us." Consequently, everything must be yielded to His life. "For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die; but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live."

Sons of God.-Those who yield to the strivings of the Spirit, and continue so to yield, are led by the Spirit; and they are the sons of God. They are taken into the same relation to the Father that the only-begotten Son occupies. "Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God; therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew Him not. Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be; but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is." If we are led by the Spirit of God, we are now just as much the sons of God as we can ever be.

Sons Now.-There is a notion held by some people that no man is born of God until the resurrection. But this is settled by the fact that we are now sons of God. "But," says one, "we are not yet manifested as sons." True, and neither was Christ when He was on earth. There were but very few that knew Him to be the Christ, the Son of the living God. And they knew it only by revelation from God. The world knows us not, because it knew Him not. To say that believers are not sons of God now because there is nothing in their appearance to indicate it, is to bring the same charge against Jesus Christ. But Jesus was just as truly the Son of God when He lay in the manger in Bethlehem, as He is now when sitting at the right hand of God.

The Spirit's Witness.-"The Spirit itself beareth witness with our Spirit, that we are the children of God." How does the Spirit witness? This is answered in Heb. x. 14-17. The apostle says that by one offering He hath perfected them that are sanctified, and then says that the Holy Spirit is a witness to this fact when He says, "This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord; I will put My laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them; and their sins and iniquities will I remember no more." That is to say, the Spirit's witness is the word. We know that we are children of God, because the Spirit assures us of that fact in the Bible. The witness of the Spirit is not a certain ecstatic feeling, but a tangible statement. We are not children of God because we feel that we are, neither do we know that we are sons because of any feeling, but because the Lord tells us so. He who believes has the word abiding in him, and that is how "he that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself." 1 John v. 10.

No Fear.-"For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father." "For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind." 2 Tim. i. 7. "God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgement; because as He is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear; because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love." 1 John iv. 16-18. Christ gave Himself to deliver them who through fear of death were all their life subject to bondage. Heb. ii. 15. He who knows and loves the Lord can not be afraid of Him; and he who is not afraid of the Lord has no need to be afraid of any other person or thing. One of the greatest blessings of the Gospel is the deliverance from fear, whether real or imaginary. "I sought the Lord, and He heard me, and delivered me from all my fears." Ps. xxxiv. 4.

Heirs of God.-What a wonderful inheritance that is! It does not merely say that we are heirs of what God has, but that we are heirs of God himself. Having Him we have everything, as a matter of course; but the blessedness consists in having Him. "The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup." Ps. xvi. 5. This is the fact; it is a thing to be meditated upon rather than talked about.

Joint-heirs With Christ.-If we are sons of God, we stand on the same footing that Jesus Christ does. He Himself said that the Father loves us even as He loves Him. John xvii. 23. This is proved by the fact that His life

772

was given for ours. Therefore the Father has nothing for His only-begotten Son that He has not for us. Not only so, but since we are joint-heirs with Jesus Christ, it follows that He can not enter upon His inheritance before we do. To be sure, He is sitting at the right hand of God. But God in His great love for us "hath quickened us together with Christ, and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places." Eph. ii. 4-6. The glory which Christ has He shares with us. John xvii. 22. It means something to be a joint-heir with Jesus Christ! No wonder the apostle exclaims, "Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God."

Suffering With Him.-"If so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified together." "For in that He Himself hath suffered being tempted, He is able to succour them that are tempted." Heb. ii. 18. Suffering with Christ means, therefore, enduring temptation with Him. The suffering is that which comes in the struggle against sin. Self-inflicted suffering amounts to nothing. It is not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh. Col. ii. 23. Christ did not torture Himself in order to gain the approval of the Father. But when we suffer with Christ, then we are made perfect in Him. The strength by which he resisted the temptations of the enemy is the strength by which we are to overcome. His life in us gains the victory.

The remainder of the verse, concerning being glorified together, may well be left until next week, since it forms the principal part of the verses which follow.

"Testimonies of the Centuries. The Fall of Tyre" The Present Truth 10, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

Although it is interesting to study the great lines of prophecy which show the rise of the successive empires and kingdoms of the world, it is no less interesting to study the prophecies concerning individual nations and particular cities. In all of them God has borne witness of Himself, of His power and His wisdom; but the history of Tyre is remarkable in its fulfilment of prophecy.

Tyre, "whose antiquity is of ancient days" (Isa. xxiii. 7), was founded by a colony from Sidon (verse 12), about twenty-five miles south of the mother city on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. It was "placed in a pleasant place" (Hosea ix. 13), and in the days of Isaiah, 715 B.C., she was "the crowning city," "a mart of nations," and her merchants were princes, and her "traffickers" were "the honourable of the earth." As early as the time of Jehoram, 904-896 B.C., Tyre, in company with the Philistines, invaded the land of Judah and took silver and gold and "goodly pleasant things" and carried them into her temples; "the children also of Judah and the children of Jerusalem" she sold unto the Grecians that she might remove them far from their borders. Joel iii. 4-6; Amos i. 6, 9; 2 Chron. xxi. 16, 17.

The builders of Trye were so accomplished that they are said to "have perfected her beauty." A thousand years before Christ, when Solomon was about to build the temple of God in Jerusalem, he wrote to Hiram, the king of Tyre, saying: "Send me now therefore a man cunning to work in gold, and in silver, and in brass, and in iron, and in purple, and crimson, and blue, and that can skill to grave with the cunning men that are with me in Judah and in Jerusalem, whom David my father did provide. Send me also cedar trees, fir trees, and algum trees, out of Lebanon; for I know that thy servants can skill to cut timber in Lebanon; and, behold, my servants shall be with thy servants, even to prepare me timber in abundance; for the house which I am about to build shall be wonderful great." King Hiram answered: "I have sent a cunning man, endued with understanding, of Huram my father's, the son of a woman of the daughters of Dan, and his father was a man of Tyre, skilful to work in gold, and in silver, in brass, in iron, in stone, and in timber, in purple, in blue, and in fine linen, and in crimson; also to grave any manner of graving, and to find out every device which shall be put to him, with thy cunning men, and with the cunning men of my lord David thy father." 2 Chron. ii. 7-9, 13, 14.

Five hundred and eighty-eight years before Christ, Tyre was so rich that she could afford to make all her ship-boards of fir, and their masts of cedar of Lebanon; their oars of oak of Bashan, and their benches of ivory; their sails of fine linen with broidered work from Egypt, and their coverings of blue and purple from the isles of Elishah. The inhabitants of Zidon and Arvad were her mariners, her own wise men were her pilots, and her army was hired from Persia, Lud, Phut, and Arvad. Her traffic was so great that she enjoyed a continual "world's fair."

Because of the multitude of all kind of riches, and the multitude of the wares of her own making, Tarshish came to trade in her fairs with silver, iron, tin, and lead. Javan, Tubal, and Meshech (Greece, Lybia, and Russia) came with persons of men and vessels of brass. The house of Togarmah (Armenians) came with horses, horsemen, and mules. Dedan (bordering on the Persian Gulf) came with horns of ivory and ebony, and with precious cloths for chariots. Syria came with emeralds, purple and broidered work, and fine linen, and coral, and agates. Damascus came with the wine of Helbon and white wool; Judah and Israel with wheat, and honey, and oil, and balm; Arabia came with lambs, and rams, and goats; Sheba and Raamah (parts of Arabia) came with chief of all spices, and with precious stones and gold; Babylonia and Assyria came with all sorts of things in blue cloths and broidered work, chests of rich apparel bound with cords and made of cedar; and she enriched the kings of the earth with the multitude of her riches and her merchandise. See Eze. xxviii.

And yet for all this, she coveted more. As though this was not enough, she envied Jerusalem the trade that passed through her gates; and when Jerusalem was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, Tyre rejoiced and exultantly exclaimed: "Aha, she is broken that was the gates of the people; she is turned unto me; I shall be replenished, now she is laid waste." Eze. xxvi. 2.

Then it was that Ezekiel uttered the following prophecy concerning Tyre:-

"Therefore thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I am against thee, O Tyrus, and will cause many nations to come up against thee, as the sea causeth his waves to come up. And they shall destroy the walls of Tyrus, and break down her towers; I will also scrape her dust from her, and make her like the top of a rock. It shall be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea; for I have spoken it, saith the Lord God. . . . For thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I will bring upon Tyrus Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, a king of kings, from the north, with horses, and with chariots, and with horsemen, and companies, and much people. He shall slay with the sword thy daughters in the field; and he shall make a fort against thee, and cast a mount against thee, and lift up the buckler against thee. And he shall set engines of war against thy walls, and with his axes he shall break down thy towers. By reason of the abundance of his horses their dust shall cover thee; thy walls shall shake at the noise of the horsemen, and of the wheels, and of the chariots, when he shall enter into thy gates, as men enter into a city wherein is made a breach. With the hoofs of his horses shall he tread down all thy streets; he shall slay thy people by the sword, and thy strong garrisons shall go down to the ground." Eze. xxvi. 3-11.

When this prophecy was spoken Ezekiel was at Babylon, and Nebuchadnezzar had just completed the destruction of Jerusalem, 587 B.C. Soon afterward Nebuchadnezzar invaded Phoenicia, and all the towns hastily submitted, except Tyre, which made such stout resistance that it required

775

of the armies of Nebuchadnezzar a siege of thirteen years, from 585, to take it. The main part of the city was on the mainland, but on an island about half a mile from the mainland, there was the temple of the chief god of the Tyrians, and there was a considerable settlement on the island also. Although the siege lasted so long, and was so persistently pressed that by the continuous wearing of the helmet "every head was made bald," and by the constant working of the battering-rams "every shoulder was peeled," yet the city was finally utterly ruined. And although they at last acknowledged the authority of Nebuchadnezzar, "yet he had no wages, nor his army, for Tyrus, for the service that he had served against it" (Eze. xxix. 18), because the remnant of the people removed with all their valuables to the island. By the work of Nebuchadnezzar there was fulfilled that part of a prophecy which said that they should destroy the walls and break down the towers, and that with the hoofs of their horses they should tread down all her streets; but there were yet two important statements unfulfilled; these were: (1) "I will also scrape her dust from her, and make her life like the top of a rock;" (2) "and they shall lay thy stones and thy timber and thy dust in the midst of the water."

After its destruction by Nebuchadnezzar, the Tyrians rebuilt the city, but they rebuilt it on the island instead of on the mainland, and left the old city lying in its ruins. The new city in the course of time regained much of the glory that had so exalted the old, and one of her principal articles of traffic was fish, for when Nehemiah was rebuilding Jerusalem, 445 B.C., he says: "there dwelt men of Tyre also therein, which brought fish, and all manner of ware, and sold on the Sabbath unto the children of Judah, and in Jerusalem." Neh. xiii. 16. It was built very strong, being "completely surrounded by prodigious walls, the loftiest portion of which on the side fronting the mainland reached a height not less than a hundred and fifty feet." Thus it stood, a mighty city, when, in 332 B.C., Alexander the Great, in his course of conquest, was compelled also to besiege it, or leave behind him a powerful enemy. He determined to take the city, and accordingly began "one of the most remarkable sieges ever recorded," which lasted seven months.

His first move was to build a solid mole two hundred feet broad from the mainland to the city, and, says Grote, "he had stones in abundance" from Old Tyre, for the work. And here was the perfect, literal fulfilment of the prophecy, spoken more than two hundred and fifty years before, that "they shall lay thy stones and thy timber and thy dust in the midst of the water;" for to make that mole the troops of Alexander the Great did literally lay the stones and the timber and the dust of Old Tyre in the midst of the water.

Nor was that all, for the prophecy had also said that they should "scrape her dust from her, and make her like the top of a rock." There was abundance of material there to have made the mole as first designed, only two hundred feet broad, without any very close scraping, if all had gone well. But the channel was exposed to the full blast of the wind, and the work was often broken by the heavy waves. Besides this, as soon as the Tyrians began to see that the enterprise really threatened them, they applied all their power and ingenuity to defeat it by annoying the builders, burning the timbers, and breaking down the mole and scattering the stones in the water.

And when, even against all these hindrances, the mole had been carried almost to the city wall, on a stormy day the Tyrians, pouring out their whole naval force in ships and little boats of all kinds, drove a great fireship loaded with the most combustible materials against the two great protective powers that defended the advancing mole, setting them on fire, while at the same time every Tyrian who could get in a damaging blow at the mole itself did so. They burnt the towers, and drove off the workmen, tore out the woodwork that held the mole together, and the waves being dashed against it, the greater part of the structure was broken to pieces and sank in the sea.

It then became necessary to begin the mole nearly anew, but, nothing daunted, Alexander at once set to work not only to rebuild the mole, but to make it broader and stronger than before. Of course the work that had been destroyed formed good foundation upon which to make the new one both broader and stronger. But every reverse made it necessary to have more stones and especially more dust, and so it came about that in the very nature of the case the builders were compelled to literally "scrape" the dust from Old Tyre, and at the last to leave her "like the top of a rock."

But even yet there was one more word of prophecy unfulfilled. "Thou shalt be a place to spread nets upon," and it is evident that this refers to the city on the island rather than to that on the mainland, for another passage says, "It shall be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea." Eze. xxvi. 14, 5. This was not fulfilled by the capture of the city by Alexander. Although he took the city he did not destroy it, and although Alexander sold many of the people into slavery, yet the place was soon repeopled, and regained much prosperity. Under Roman rule Tyre was a free city till the reign of Augustus, who for seditious conduct deprived her of this liberty.

At that time she is described by

776

Strabo as a city of great wealth, which was chiefly derived from dyeing and selling the Tyrian purple. He also says that the houses consisted of many stories, even of more than the houses at Rome. It is often mentioned in the Gospels, and there was a company of Christians there with whom Paul stayed a week as he made his last journey to Jerusalem. Acts xxi. 3, 4. The number of Christians multiplied till Tyre became the seat of a bishop in the second century. And in the fourth century Jerome called it the noblest and most beautiful city of Phoenicia, and wondered at what seemed to be the non-fulfilment of the prophecy that pronounced its desolation. In the time of the crusades it sustained a long siege, and was taken in 1124, and was made an archbishopric; but from the conquest of Syria by Selim I., A.D. 1516, its decline was rapid, and soon its ruin became complete.

In A.D. 1610-11 it was visited by Sandya, the traveller, who said: "This once famous Tyre is now no other than a heap of ruins; yet they have a reverent aspect, and to instruct the pensive beholder with their exemplary frailty." In 1697 Maundrell visited it and said of it: "On the north side is an old Turkish ungarrisoned castle, besides which you see nothing here but a mere Babel of broken walls, pillars, vaults, etc., there being not so much as one entire house left; its present inhabitants are only a few poor wretches, harbouring themselves in the vaults, and subsisting chiefly upon fishing."

In 1820 Joliffe wrote of it: "Some miserable cabins ranged in irregular lines, dignified with the names of streets, and a few buildings of a rather better description, occupied by the officers of government, composed nearly the whole town." And in 1838 Dr. Robinson spent a Sunday there, and wrote of it thus: "I continued my walk along the shore of the peninsula (formed by the mole of Alexander the Great), part of which is now unoccupied, except as a place to spread nets upon, musing upon the pride and fall of ancient Tyre. Here was the literal isle once covered by her palaces, and surrounded by her fleets; but alas! thy riches and thy fame, thy merchandise, thy mariners, and thy pilots, thy calkers and the occupiers of the merchandise that were in thee-where are they? Tyre has indeed become like the top of a rock. The sole tokens of her ancient splendour-columns of red and grey granite, sometimes forty or fifty together, or marble pillars-lie broken and strewed beneath the waves in the midst of the sea; and the hovels that now nestle upon a portion of her site, present no contradiction of the dread decree, 'Thou shalt be built no more.'" And those who have visited it since "all concur in the account of its general aspect of desolation."

Thus the word uttered by Ezekiel nearly twenty-five hundred years ago, concerning Tyre, has been completely and literally fulfilled. Ezekiel said that they should break down her walls and destroy her pleasant palaces. Fifteen years afterward it was done. Ezekiel said they should lay her stones and her timber and her dust in the midst of the water, and they should scraper dust from her, and make her like the top of a rock. Two hundred and fifty-five years afterward it was done. Although the city was rebuilt in the midst of the sea, Ezekiel said in 587 B.C. that Tyre should be like the top of a rock, and should be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea. That is what she was in A.D. 1697, and that is what she is at the present time, and she shall be built no more. The word spoken by Ezekiel, 587 B.C., is the word of God. Empires perish, nations fall, cities are brought to ruin, the grass withereth, the flower fadeth, but the word of our God shall stand for ever.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

-Russian railways have ladies' smoking cars.

-Japanese children are taught to write with both hands.

-During the last fortnight the north of Italy has been visited by severe earthquakes. Vesuvius has also been showing increased activity.

-The Nihilists have issued a proclamation in Russia, announcing that Nihilism is not dead, and warning the Czar and Government that it has been gathering strength, and means to assert itself.

-The Turkish authorities indignantly deny the first reports of the massacre of Armenians by the Kurds. "The total loss of life," they say, "amounts to but 2,000 persons, and any higher figures are untrue."!

-The natives on the Afghan frontier are said to be rising in revolt against the British outposts. Further troops have been sent forward to aid in meeting the uprising, and the Indian Government are preparing to send a still larger fertile forward if necessary.

-After a stormy two years the Hawaiian Islands have apparently settled down as an established republic. Last month an autographic letter from. Queen Victoria recognised the republic, and it is now declared that the late Hawaiian Queen has no following that can make trouble.

-Professor Petrie, who has been excavating on the shores of the Red Sea, says his investigations show that the early inhabitants of Egypt were a very mixed race. There are marks of invasions by races from Asia Minor or India, and the Egyptians at the time of Moses were, he claims, a cross between the aboriginal Africans and their Asiatic conquerors.

-An Italian priest, Rossignoli, after having been in captivity since the fall of Khartoum, escaped recently from the Dervishes, by the aid of an Arab guide, who piloted him to Assouan. A few other Europeans are still held by the Mandists. The Mandi's forces are preparing an attack upon the Italian position at Kassala. The Dervishes number about 11,000 fighting men.

-To sustain its dignity the Japanese Government refused to see the commissioner sent by the Chinese Viceroy, Li Hung Chang, to discuss terms of peace. The suit for peace must come from the Emperor. The Japanese are said to have refused a proposition that China should pay forty million pounds indemnity. They demand fifty millions sterling, together with an amount to cover all their war expenditure.

-The courts have recently had to consider a number of attempts to wreck various railway trains. In each instance the disaster and loss of life were averted by the obstructions being thrown off by the engine. The trials have shown no special motive for the attempts, but merely bring out the fact that there are men in the world who would sacrifice perhaps scores of lives of people whom they do not know simply out of a desire to do something mean and wicked.

-The French papers are discussing the apparent friendliness which is remarked between Russia and England just now. However, one journal puts the general French verdict as follows "Jealousy finds no place in our feelings towards Russia. We could not be displeased if our friend were to attract Great Britain outside the orbit of the Triple Alliance. But we doubt this sudden tenderness between two countries which do not love one another, which clash in Asia, and whose qualities have nothing in common."

-To signalise his accession to the throne and his marriage, the new Czar has issued proclamation granting amnesties in certain offences, shortening terms of imprisonments, and remitting taxes due to the Crown. At his instigation also it is said that a bill is being prepared for the introduction of elementary public instruction throughout the country. Altogether he has given evidence of a desire to grant reforms. The greatest thing which makes for oppression is the Orthodox Church, which even a liberal Czar cannot, if he would, make other than a bitter persecutor of religious dissenters.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

A vigorous missionary campaign is being carried on in England, and in London especially, by Roman Catholics, as a part of Cardinal Vaughan's plan to win back England to the papal fold. Many able speakers are continually engaged in setting forth Catholic doctrines to mixed audiences of Catholics and Protestants. Concerts and dances, at popular prices, are also among the church's attractions.

It is stated that the Bishop of Worcester has withheld the license of a Birmingham curate, on the ground that the curate has put himself out of the church by been baptized, that is, immersed. The Bishop, of course, calls it re-baptism, since the curate had been sprinkled in infancy. But the significant feature is the Episcopal dictum that a man puts himself out of the church if he presumes to follow the plain letter of the Bible.

The Chairman of the London School Board favours the support of Voluntary Schools, that is, Church of England and Roman Catholic denominational schools, out of the rates. He says that this will very soon become a political question. He said that the commission of churchmen appointed by the Archbishop of Canterbury is at present sitting to consider and formulate proposals, and that "the demand will come from them, as it has from the bishops of the Church of Rome, and that soon."

In view of the efforts which have been made in recent years by the Vatican to draw the Greek Church in relations with Rome, one incident in connection with the Czar's marriage is significant. Reuter says:-

Besides stopping to receive the blessings of the Orthodox clergy at the entrance of the Kazan Cathedral, while on their way to the Anitchkoff Palace yesterday, the Emperor and Empress caused their carriage to halt in front of the Roman Catholic church, where the clergy, who were assembled in full canonicals at the entrance, advanced towards the carriage and blessed the imperial pair.

The less is blessed of the greater, and when the head of the Greek Church theatrically solicits the blessing of the Roman authorities he makes an acknowledgement of which Rome knows how to make use.

Following is from a letter addressed to Cardinal Vaughan by the Cardinal Archbishop of Toledo, Spain. The letter appeared in the Tablet:-

Your Eminence may rely that Spain, though agitated on all sides, will be ever the worthy help of the doctrines and the imitator of its forefathers in offering up prayers, penances, sacrifices, and tears, for the conversion of England to the mother and mistress of all churches, the Holy Roman Church.

The zeal of Spain for the conversion of England was shown in the fitting out of the Armads. There is no doubt but that Rome has always been ready to make sacrifices for the conversion of "heretics." Whenever she was successful in her efforts, the sacrifices were usually in the form of whole burnt offerings.

The school question is destined to bring on such a religio-political fight as has not been known in England for long years. The Roman Catholic Bishop of Middlesbrough in a recent speech intimated that if Catholics did not succeed in securing for their schools a share of the public rates, they would "make a stand and refuse to pay the unjust rates." A correspondent of the Catholic Times, commenting on this utterance, says:-

I venture to express the hope that their Lordships will forthwith see their way to send an ultimatum to Parliament, giving notice that if, after a reasonable interval of stipulated time (say six or twelve months), Catholics are left without some assurance that their claim to the rates will be considered, they will be advised in the various dioceses to refuse to pay the School Board levy, and to throw the onus of the prosecution on the local authorities.

Another priest goes still further, and says, "We Catholics must be ready, if need be, to part with our lives." He says that in the event of their demands not been granted, "resistance to blood and death would be the order of the day."

Not to be behind in the fray, the editor of the Methodist Times writes a stirring article, entitled, "Nonconformists! Close Your Ranks," in which he says:-

And what are we to do? Not to waste our time in useless laments, but to prepare at once, and with all our might, for the next pitched battle. The Church of England has now declared herself the warm friend of Rome and the implacable enemy of Evangelistic Nonconformity. She has made her choices, and we have made ours. She talks about Laud, and we will remember Oliver Cromwell. When the friends of freedom and pure Christianity were united in their earlier encounters with Charles and Laud, Oliver Cromwell did not waste his time in unworthy lamentations, but he quietly organised his ironsides, who ultimately crushed tyranny and clericalism. We, too, must quietly organise.

As between the two there is nothing to choose. While they look to Laud and Cromwell, we must look to Christ, "who, when He was reviled, reviled not again, when He suffered, He threatened not." He is the only example of pure Christianity. "The wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God."

This is the notice which was issued by the Vicar of old St. Pancras, London, and the service described doubtless took place on November 18:-

On the twenty-sixth Sunday after Trinity, with the permission of the Bishop of London, we have arranged to hold the second of a series of Celebrations of the Holy Eucharist, to be offered annually (D.V.) in Solemn Commemoration of the Faithful Dead, whose bodies are lying within our own church or churchyard, or have been buried in any of the other St. Pancras cemeteries.

This is the way the custom of praying to the dead arose in the first centuries. It will be seen that the act is sanctioned by the highest authority, which shows the tendency of the principal part of the Church of England. From copying Rome so closely, it is but a short step to Rome itself.

"The Pope and Sunday" The Present Truth 10, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

THE POPE AND SUNDAY.-As a recent Catholic meeting, presided over by the brother of Cardinal Vaughan, this question was asked:-

In the Bible we find that God set apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers, in the church; but we read nothing about a Pope. Why the silence, if the Papacy is of God?

To this question the priest replied, truly, that it would be an anachronism if the name "pope" were found in the Bible; and then he retorted, "Where do find anything in the Bible about keeping Sunday?"

The questioner subsided; but if he had only been Protestant enough to reply, "We do not find anything about Sunday in the Bible, and therefore we do not keep it," he would not have left the priest in possession of the field. The Papacy and the Sunday are two institutions that go together, and both are unwarranted by the Bible. The Roman Catholics have an unanswerable argument for the Papacy, for those who believe in Sunday observance. But they have no ground at all against those who hold to nothing that is not written in the Bible.

"Basis of Reunion" The Present Truth 10, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

In America, as well as in England, there are beginning to be seen open overtures on the part of professed Protestants for union with Rome, which is of course standing with outstretched arms. In a recent sermon Cardinal Gibbons said:-

Thank God there is a yearning desire for reunion. I myself have received several letters from influential Protestant ministers, expressing the hope of a reunion, and inquiring as to the probable basis of a reconciliation. The conditions of reconciliation are easier than are generally imagined. Of course there can be no compromise on faith or morals. The doctrine and moral code that Christ has left us must remain unchangeable. But the church can modify her discipline to suit the circumstances of the case.

December 13, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 50.

E. J. Waggoner

To be falsely accused is usually felt to be one of the worst calamities that can befall one. It is too grievous to be borne. But there is something far worse, and that is, to be truthfully accused of an evil deed.

When one's motives are misjudged, and he is misunderstood and thought to be guilty of things of which he is innocent, it will help him to be cheerful and composed, if he will call to mind how many times he has been given credit for good intentions and qualities which he did not possess.

When a certain public man was being pilloried in the newspapers for certain irregularities with which he was charged, a friend met him and began to console with him. "Don't say anything," said the other, cheerfully, "they don't know half of it." There are few men who do not know more evil about themselves than anybody has ever thought about them.

"Politicians and Christ" The Present Truth 10, 50.

E. J. Waggoner

Politicians and Christ.-When Pilate learned that Jesus was from Galilee, he sent Him to Herod, the governor of that province, who was then in Jerusalem. Herod amused himself for a while with Jesus, and then sent Him back to Pilate. "And the same day Pilate and Herod were made friends together; for before they were at enmity between themselves." They both knew that Jesus was innocent, yet they were willing to sacrifice Him to their political ambition. This is the treatment that the cause of Christ will receive from worldly men. But none of His followers expect any aid to Christianity from politicians. "The disciple is not above his Master." "If they have called the Master of the house Beelzebub, how much more shall they call them of His household."

"The Gifts of God" The Present Truth 10, 50.

E. J. Waggoner

All from Above.-"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning." James i. 17. To every person the word comes, "Who maketh thee to differ from another? and what hast thou that thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?" 1 Cor. iv. 7. "A man can receive nothing, except it be given him come heaven." John iii. 27. Even the power which earthly rulers have, is granted them from heaven. Jesus said to Pilate, who boasted of his power, "Thou couldst have no power at all against Me, except it were given thee from above." John xix. 11.

"Natural Talents."-It must be evident, therefore, that it is a mistake to speak of some men as having greater natural endowments than others, or for men to take pride in their abilities, as though they themselves originated them. Each one's ability is a gift direct to him from heaven. The keen intellect that is employed in opposition to the truth of God, is a gift from that same God that is opposed. The power to acquire wisdom, is also a gift from God. It is God that gives men power to acquire wealth. Deut. viii. 18. King David recognised this when he made his offerings for the temple. He said, "But who am I, and what is my people, that we should be able to offer so willingly after this sort? for all things come of Thee, and of thine own have we given Thee." 1 Chron. xxix. 14.

Chosen Vessels.-Men often speak of the Lord as looking about, whenever He has any special work to be performed, for some person with the necessary ability to do it. Thus it is said that He found in Luther the qualifications that would make him a leader in the Reformation, and that He chose Paul because he had had the training that would fit him for the work to be done. This is true in a sense, but the very way in which it is stated conceals the real truth, namely, that God Himself had been training those men for the work that He had for them. It was not by accident that God found certain men ready to do certain work. While they were unconscious of any design in their lives, God was fitting them to the work for which He designed them. Paul was a chosen vessel; but he was not chosen because he had the necessary qualifications for the work, but he was chosen for the work, and then taken through the school that would fit him for it. He was chosen from his birth (Gal. i. 15, 16), as were also John the Baptist (Luke i. 13-17), and Jeremiah. Jer. i. 5.

"To Every Man His Work."-"For the Son of man is as a man taking a far journey, who left his house, and gave authority to servants, and to every man his work, and commanded the porter to watch." Mark xiii. 34. Here we learn that God has a work for every one. It is not merely that there is work for every one, but that there is a work for every one. Each person has some specific work laid out for him. It may be a very humble

786

work, but that makes no difference. Not all have the same work, or the same kind of work; very few are chosen to carry on a great work that will attract the attention of the world, yet their work is none the less planned for them by the Lord. And since the Lord's work cannot be complete unless all the parts are finished, it is evident that the least work is not unimportant. And the man who is appointed to a small task, and who does it well, will receive the same commendation from the Master that is received by the one who has a greater amount to do.

Everything Planned.-"Known unto God are all His works from the beginning of the world." Acts xv. 18. The Psalmist said, "O Lord, thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou knowest my downsitting and my uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off. Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways. For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether. Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid Thine hand upon me." There are therefore no accidents in our lives. If we realised this, there would be less complaining. God knows the way that we take. That circumstance that is seemingly the most untoward is designed by God to aid us in our appointed task. Even though the devil lays an obstacle in our way, God will use that as a help. Knowing this, we can rejoice in tribulation. We serve a Master who "worketh all things after the counsel of His own will."

Refusing the Task.-But God compels no one to labour for Him. Allowing us to work for Him is an honour that He bestows upon us; but we may refuse the honour. There are very few who did not make more or less objection. Saul of Tarsus wearied himself in fighting against the design of the Lord. God knew from the beginning what He wished to have him do, and was training him for it, but Saul resisted for a long time, because he had planned something else for himself. He is not the only one that has kicked against the pricks. What a sad thing it is when men persist in refusing to do the work that God has for them, because they do not relish the necessary training, or else wish to have their own way. Not the least among the sorrows of the lost in the day of Judgment, will be the revelation of the honourable position to which God called them, and which they foolishly rejected. Many men who have been mighty to do evil, will see with bitter sorrow that at a certain turning-point in their lives they had just within their grasp a position of trust that would have given them an honoured name throughout eternity. They refused it, because in the blindness of human calculation it seemed to be obscure and mean.

Making "Sacrifices."-From this point of view how contemptible seem all men's boasts of what they have sacrificed for the Lord. Many who have wealth or great mental ability and attainments, and who enter the service of the Lord, are regarded and often regard themselves, as though they had conferred a great favour on the Lord. People act as if they had originated something, and had at great cost fitted themselves for usefulness, and now had enriched the Lord with themselves and their gifts. Let such remember that they have nothing that God did not give them, and that He gave it to them for a purpose. If before we entered the service of the Lord we had certain attainments, or if we have a peculiar aptness for a certain line of work, let us not boast of that, but consider that God gave us that readiness, in order that we might do the work to which He has called us. Instead of boasting, we have rather need to feel ashamed that our childish fretfulness against the training of the Lord has deprived us of much of the ability that we ought to bring to His service.

"What We Need" The Present Truth 10, 50.

E. J. Waggoner

What we need is not prosperity, as we would naturally define it, but the grace of Christ. The Saviour said to Paul, "My grace is sufficient for thee." "Most gladly therefore," says the apostle, "will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, and persecutions, in distresses, for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then am my strong." 2 Cor. xii. 9, 10.

All is prosperity that is accompanied by the grace of Christ. That grace is "exceeding riches." Eph. ii. 7. But while self lives in the heart the true riches cannot be discerned, and men turn aside from them and heap to themselves "treasure" of a different sort. Despising "the riches of His goodness and forbearance and long suffering," they treasure up for themselves "wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God." Rom. ii. 4, 5. The riches of His grace are all that we need, under all circumstances, both in this life and in that to come.

"Ye ask and receive not," writes James, "because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts." If we would receive that which we ask, we must pay the price. We must not shrink from the thorns in the flesh. The flesh must be pierced by something more than thorns, for Christ's flesh was pierced not only by thorns, but by the nails of His cross; and we must be crucified with Him. Whatsoever we shall ask in the name of Christ, we shall receive; but His name means His meekness, His unselfishness, His sacrifice. We cannot ask in His name without partaking of His Spirit. The Lord causes His face to shine upon us only that it may manifest in us the glory of His name.

"Studies in Romans. Glorified Together. Rom. viii. 17-25" The Present Truth 10, 50.

E. J. Waggoner

In the preceding verses of the eighth chapter of Romans we have seen how we are adopted into the family of God as sons, and made joint-heirs with Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit establishes the bond of relationship. It is the "Spirit of adoption," the Spirit proceeding from the Father as the representative of the Son, that proves that we are accepted as brethren of Jesus Christ. Those who are led by the Spirit must be even as Christ was in the world, and are therefore assured of

AN EQUAL SHARE

in the inheritance with Christ. For "the Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God."

"And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified together. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God. For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of Him who hath subjected the same in hope, because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body. For we are saved by hope; but hope that is seen is not hope; for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it." Rom. viii. 17-25.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

To what does the Spirit bear witness?

"That we are the children of God."

If we are children, then what are we?

"If children, then heirs."

Heirs of whom?

"Heirs of God."

With whom do we share this heirship?

"Joint heirs with Christ."

What did Christ inherit on this earth?

"He was oppressed, and He was afflicted." Isa. liii. 7.

Then if we are joint heirs, what must we do?

"Suffer with Him."

What else will also be sure?

"We may be also glorified together."

What may we know of the sufferings of this present time?

They "are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us."

For what does the material creation wait?

"For the manifestation of the sons of God."

To what was the creation made subject?

"To vanity."

How?

"Not willingly, but by reason of Him who hath subjected the same in hope."

What is the hope?

"The creature itself shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption."

Into what will it be delivered?

"Into the glorious liberty of the children of God."

What is the condition of the whole creation at the present time?

"The whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now."

What besides the lower creation is in this condition?

"Ourselves also."

For what do we groan?

"For the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body."

What have we received as a surety that the body will be redeemed?

"The firstfruits of the Spirit."

By what are we saved?

"By hope."

For what do we hope?

"For that we see not."

What does hope lead us to do?

"We with patience wait for it."

Suffering-Christ's life on earth was one of suffering. He was "a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief." He "suffered, being tempted," but His sufferings were not all in the mind alone. He knew physical pain; "Himself took our infirmities, and bare our diseases." Matt. viii. 17. R.V. He suffered hunger in the wilderness; and His works of love were done at the expense of much bodily pain and weariness. The sufferings which He endured at the hands of the rough soldiers in connection with His mock trial, and His crucifixion, were simply a continuation in another form of what He had endured throughout His whole life on earth.

Glory Following Suffering.-In all the prophets, the Spirit of Christ was witnessing and testifying of "the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow." 1 Peter i. 11. When Christ, after His resurrection, talked with the two disciples on the way to Emmaus, he said. "Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into His glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself." Luke xxiv. 26, 27. We know that the first part of those prophecies was fulfilled, and therefore must know that the rest are as sure. As surely as Christ suffered, so surely will the glory follow.

Suffering Together.-Our suffering is to be "with Him." We are not to suffer alone. But we could not suffer eighteen hundred years ago, before we were born. Therefore it follows that Christ still suffers. Otherwise we could not suffer with him. Read what is said of His connection with ancient Israel: "In all their affliction He was afflicted." Isa. lxiii. 9. So in Matthew xxv. 35-40 we learn that Christ suffers or experiences relief whenever His disciples suffer or are relieved. He is the head of the body. Now if when one member suffers all the members suffer with it (1 Cor. xii. 26), how much more must that be true of the Head! So we read of Christ that even now, as high priest, he is "touched with the feeling our infirmities." Heb. iv. 15. A high priest must be one "who can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way; for that He Himself also is compassed with infirmity." Heb. v. 1, 2. So we learn that Christ has never divested Himself of the human nature which He took upon Himself, but that He is still identified with suffering, sinful men. It is a glorious truth, to be recognised and confessed, that "Jesus Christ is come in the flesh." 1 John iv. 2.

Glorified Together.-"If so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified together." Christ does not have anything that is not for us equally with Him. His prayer was, "Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given Me, be with Me where I am." John xvii. 24. And He says, "To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with Me in My throne." Rev. iii. 21. Whatever He has, we have, and we have it when He has it, since we are joint-heirs with Him.

Glory Now.-The above statement may at first sight seem to be untrue. It is the common idea that Christ is glorified long before those who are fellow-heirs with Him. One text is sufficient to settle this matter: "The elders which are among you I exhort, who am also an elder, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed." 1 Pet. v. 1. Peter declared himself to be a partaker of the glory. This was because he believed the saying of Christ, in His prayer for His disciples, "The glory which thou gavest Me I have given them." John xvii. 22. If Christ has glory now, his disciples share it also. Again we have the words of the apostle Peter. Speaking of Christ, he says, "Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see Him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory." 1 Peter i. 8.

Grace and Glory.-The apostle John tells us that although we are now the sons of God the world knows us not, because it knew not Christ. There was nothing in the appearance of Christ on earth to indicate that He was the Son of God. Flesh and blood did not reveal that fact to anybody.

788

To all appearance He was but an ordinary man. Yet all the time He had glory. We read that when He turned the water into wine He "manifested forth His glory." John ii. 11. His glory was manifested in the form of grace. "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us (and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father), full of grace and truth." John i. 14. The grace with which God strengthens His people is "according to the riches of His glory." Eph. iii. 16. Whoever is in Christ is chosen "to the praise of the glory of His grace." Eph. i. 6. Grace is glory, but glory veiled so that mortal eyes may not be dazzled by it.

Glory to be Revealed.-"The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us." The glory is for us to possess now, but it will be revealed only at the coming of Christ. It is then that His glory will be revealed (1 Pet. iv. 13), and then our trials will "be found unto praise and honour and glory." Christ's glory has not yet been revealed, except to the chosen three on the mount of transfiguration. At that time the glory that Christ already possessed was allowed to shine forth. He appeared then as He will appear when he comes. But to the mass of mankind there is no more evidence now that Jesus is the Son of God than there was when he was before Pilate's judgment seat. Those however who see it by faith and who are not ashamed to share His sufferings, also share His hidden glory; and when He shall appear in His glory, "then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father." Matt. xiii. 43. That will be "the manifestation of the sons of God." Then for the first time Christ will be manifested to the world as the Son of God, and those who are His will be manifested with Him.

The Hope of Creation.-The word "creature" in verses 19-21 means the creation; this may be seen from verse 22 where we read of the whole creation as groaning, waiting to be delivered from that to which it has been made subject. When man sinned, the earth was cursed on his account. See Gen. iii. 17. The earth had done no sin, but it was made to share the fall of man, to whom it had been given. A perfect earth was not the dwelling-place for sinful man. But it was made subject to vanity in hope. God made the earth perfect. "He created it not in vain, He formed it to be inhabited." Isa. xlv. 18. And He "worketh all things after the counsel of His own will." Eph. i. 11. Therefore the earth is sure to be glorified as it was in the beginning. "The creation itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God."

Adoption and Redemption.-Both the earth and we are "waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body." The earth waits for it, because it can not be relieved of its curse until we are set forth as sons of God, and therefore lawful heirs. The Holy Spirit is the pledge of this heirship. The Spirit seals us as heirs, "unto the day of redemption." Eph. iv. 30. It is to us a witness that we are children of God, but the witness is not accepted by the world. They know not the children of God. But when that glory which He has given us is revealed, and our bodies are redeemed from destruction and made to shine like His glorious body, then there will be no doubt in the minds of any. Then even Satan himself will be obliged to acknowledge that we are God's children, and therefore rightful heirs of the glorified earth.

Hope and Patience.-Hope, in the Bible sense, means something more than mere desire. It is certainty, because the ground of the Christian's hope is the promise of God, which is backed by his oath. There is nothing that our eyes can see to indicate that we are the sons of God. We can not see our own glory, and that is why we are charged not to seek it here. We can not see Christ, yet we know that he is the Son of God. That is the assurance that we are also sons of God. If there were any uncertainty, then we could not wait with patience. We should be uneasy, and should worry. But, although the natural eye cannot see any indication that we are owned as God's children, faith and hope assure us of it, and so we with patience wait for that which is unseen.

"Testimony of the Centuries. The Burden of Egypt" The Present Truth 10, 50.

E. J. Waggoner

Egypt was one of the very first of nations to attain to power and civilisation. She attained to such a height of power that for ages she was the strongest nation in the world; and to such a height of civilisation that "the wisdom of the Egyptians," was proverbial even among the wisest people in the world. It was a commendable qualification in Moses that he "was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians." And the Scripture, after stating that "God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea-shore," proceeds to give the measure, or at least some sort of an idea, of it, by adding, "And Solomon's wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the East country, and all the wisdom of Egypt." 1 Kings iv. 29, 30.

Egypt was invaded, and, in fact, subdued by Esarhaddon and Asshur-bani-pal, the last of the great kings of Assyria; but she soon recovered strength, and not only assisted Babylonia and Media in the utter destruction of the Assyrian kingdom, but also received as her share all the Assyrian possessions west of the Euphrates, with her stronghold at Carchemish on the Euphrates. 2 Kings xxiii. 29; 2 Chron. xxxv. 20, 21.

In a few years, however, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, took all these possessions, even as far as to the very border of Egypt itself. "And the king of Egypt came not again any more out of his land; for the king of Babylon had taken from the river of Egypt unto the river Euphrates all that pertained to the king of Egypt." 2 Kings xxiv. 27. This was in B.C. 598.

But yet the king of Egypt was "like a young lion in the nations," and "as a whale in the seas," and in 588-586, Ezekiel took up a lamentation for Egypt, and declared that her ruin should come as the ruin of Assyria had gone before. Egypt was given to Nebuchadnezzar by the Lord, for the service which he wrought in the destruction of Tyre, and the spoil of Egypt was the wages of Nebuchadnezzar's army, for their work which they did for the Lord in the ruin of Tyre. Eze. xxix. 18-20. The secret of this was that Egypt had helped Tyre in her resistance.

We have not space to notice all the prophecies concerning Egypt, but the following passage of Scripture is worthy of special notice:-

"Thus saith the Lord God; I will also make the multitude of Egypt to cease by the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon. He and his people with him, the terrible of the nations, shall be brought to destroy the land: and they shall draw their swords against Egypt, and fill the land with the slain. And I will make the rivers dry, and sell the land into the hand of the wicked; and I will make the land waste, and all that is therein, by the hand of strangers; I the Lord have spoken it. Thus saith the Lord God; I will also destroy the idols, and I will cause their images to cease out of Noph; and there shall be no more a prince of the land of Egypt: and I will put a fear in the land of Egypt." Eze. xxx. 10-13.

We have none of the particulars of Nebuchadnezzar's conquest of Egypt. It is known, however, that he did invade it twice, and that he was thoroughly successful, and carried large numbers of the Egyptians captive to

791

Babylon. But aside from this, there are three points in the above quotation which stand forth in such perfect fulfilment that no objection can justly be made by any man, to the faithfulness of the words spoken by the prophet Ezekiel nearly twenty-five hundred years ago. We shall notice them in reverse order, taking the last one first.

1. "There shall be no more a prince of the land of Egypt." Although Egypt was subdued by Esarhaddon and Asshur-bani-pal, by Nebuchadnezzar, and by Cambyses, the Egyptians still ruled within the country itself. But in B.C. 344 Ochus of Persia invaded the land with three hundred and forty-four thousand troops, while the Egyptian king Nectanebo had an army of only one hundred thousand with which to meet him, and twenty thousand of these were Greek mercenaries. The king of Persia was wholly successful. "All Egypt submitted to Ochus, who demolished the walls of the cities, plundered the temples, and after amply rewarding his mercenaries, returned to his own capital with an immense booty." "Nectanebo in despair quitted the country and fled southward to Ethiopia," and from that day till this there has been no native ruler of Egypt. Nectanebo was the last Egyptian king that Egypt ever had.

Thus miserably fell the monarchy of the Pharaohs after an unexampled duration of nearly three thousand years. . . . More than two thousand years have since passed, and though Egypt has from time to time been independent, not one native prince has sat on the throne of the Pharaohs. "There shall be no more a prince of the land of Egypt" (Eze. xxx. 13) was prophesied in the days of Apries [the Pharaoh-hophra of Jer. xliv. 30] as the final state of the land.-Encyclopedia Britannica, art. Egypt.

Beside the princes of the monarchy itself, there were "local princes" throughout Egypt; these continued for about twelve years, to the time when Alexander the Great took possession of Egypt, and then they too disappeared.

With Alexander, the Macedonian dominion began. . . . From this time the Egyptian local princes, who for five centuries, except only during the rule of Psametik and his house, had caused all the divisions of Egypt, disappear from the scene.-Ib.

Thus the word has been literally fulfilled that "there shall be no more a prince of the land of Egypt."

2. "I will also destroy the idols, and I will cause their images to cease." This is a most remarkable prediction, for of all nations that have ever lived on the earth, the Egyptians were the most abundantly idolatrous. Bodies heavenly and bodies earthly, bodies animate and bodies inanimate, real and imaginary, fish, flesh, fowl, and vegetable, all were worshipped as gods in Egypt; and it was literally true that in Egypt it was easier to find a god than a man. "The basis of their religion was Nigritian fetichism, the lowest kind of nature worship. . . . The fetichism included, besides the worship of animals, that of trees, rivers, and hills." The principal god's, such as Phtah, Ra, Shu, Isis, Osiris, etc., numbered up into the hundreds. Of the animals universally sacred, the principal were cows and heifers, apes, ibises, cats, hawks, asps, and dogs. Others, whose worship was more local, were lions, crocodiles, wolves, jackals, shrew-mice, hippopotami, antelopes, ibexes, frogs, goats, vultures, fish, echneumons, and others too numerous to mention.

As numerous as the idols were, and as basic as the idolatry was, the titles have been totally destroyed and the images have ceased utterly.

3. "I will make the land waste, and all that is therein, by the hand of strangers." All history from the conquest of Egypt by Ochus, before mentioned, till this day, bears continuous testimony to the fulfilment of this prophecy. From the day that king

792

Nectanebo fled into Ethiopia till now, strangers have spoiled Egypt of her wealth and drained her of her treasures. When Alexander the Great had defeated Darius at Issus, he was welcomed by Egypt as a deliver. In the final division of Alexander's dominion, Egypt fell to Ptolemy the Macedonian, and he and his successors ruled and rifled it for two hundred and ninety-four years.

It fell next under the dreadful dominion of Rome, whose iron hand held it for six hundred and seventy years, until A.D. 641. Then the Saracens took it and spoiled it for six hundred years. In 1250 the Manalukes seized it, and held it two hundred and sixty-seven years, and "if you consider the whole time that they possessed the kingdom, especially that which was near the end, you will find it filled with wars, battles, injuries, and rapines."-Pacocke. In A.D. 1517 the Turks conquered the Manalukes, and took possession of the whole country, which they still hold. And a hundred years ago, Gibbon, in describing the condition of Egypt under their rule, gave the best statement in existence of the fulfilment of the prophecy. He said:-

A more unjust and absurd constitution cannot be devised, than that which condemns the natives of a country to perpetual servitude, under the arbitrary dominion of strangers and slaves. Yet such has been the state of Egypt above five hundred years. The most illustrious sultans of the Baharite and Borgite dynasties, were themselves promoted from the Tartar and Circassian bands; and the four and twenty boys, or military chiefs, have ever been succeeded, not by their sons, but by their servants. They produce the great character of their liberties, the Treaty of Selim the First with the republic; and the Othman emperor still accepts from Egypt a slight acknowledgement of tribute and subjection.-Decline and Fall, chap. 59, paragraph 20.

And that is exactly as the prophet of God, nearly twenty-five hundred years ago, said it would be.

The statement of these facts has prepared the way for the statement in a few words of the fulfilment of another notable prophecy concerning Egypt. After the scattering of the people by Nebuchadnezzar, the Lord said: "And I will bring again the captivity of Egypt, and will cause them to return into the land of Pathros, into the land of their habitation; and they shall be there a base kingdom. It shall be the basest of the kingdoms; neither shall it exalt itself any more above the nations; for I will diminish them, that they shall no more rule over the nations." Eze. xxix. 14, 15. In view of the fact that that nation has been so sold into the hands of strangers, and so spoiled by them, it is easy to see how, from the wisest of nations, she should become the basest of kingdoms.

There is no more a prince of the land of Egypt; the idols have utterly ceased; the land is wasted by the hand of strangers; Egypt is the basest of the kingdoms; the prophecy is literally fulfilled; and this word which Ezekiel wrote, as he dwelt among the captives by the river of Chebar, nearly twenty-five hundred years ago, is the word of God.

"Believe in the Lord your God, so shall ye be established; believe His prophets, so shall ye prosper."

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 50.

E. J. Waggoner

-The Austrian Reichsrath recently rejected by 148 to 66 votes a motion for the abolition of capital punishment.

-Prosecutions for horrible cruelties to children and barbarous treatment of wives occur daily in various parts of the kingdom.

-The number of persons killed in the recent earthquake shocks in Southern Italy is officially stated to be eighty-six. Besides these about 600 were injured.

-A dynamite explosion occurred at the Hull Waterworks, near Ottawa, Canada, resulting in the death of five men and two boys, and in injuries to at least forty persons.

-A wedding party of twenty persons, while returning home Hungary, were attacked by wolves, thirteen persons being killed and devoured, the others escaping though badly injured.

-The fears of a renewal of hostilities in Samoa seem likely to be realised. The rebels have recently displayed much activity, and have now given notice of their intention to attack Apia.

-The Pope is about to send to the Sultan a copy of the Decisions arrived at by the recent conference of Eastern Patriarchs to assure his Majesty of the friendly feeling of the Vatican. The Pontiff is also preparing two encyclicals for North and South America.

-While urging the enforcement of the new Wild Birds' Protection Act, it is pointed out that fourteen varieties of British birds are now extinct, and twenty-five other varieties are in danger of extinction, owing to the wearing of feather trimmings, and the too free use of the gun.

-The Zemmou and the Demilhassem tribesmen in Morocco have revolted and pillaged Ghab. Communication with Fez is interrupted, all the roads being in the hands of the insurgents. Within three days' time twenty citizens of Fez who had ventured outside the walls of the town were murdered.

-The Anti-Corset League has been holding, in the Queen's Hall, London, what is termed a "fashion without folly" exhibition. A medical man, lecturing in connection with the display of "rational" garments, declared that ninety out of every hundred of the ladies' special ailments were traceable to the use of stays.

-The Manchester Ship Canal does not premise to be a great financial success. The gross receipts for the year are estimated by some observers at less than ?80,000, which is insufficient to pay interest on the first debentures alone. The Corporation has lent five millions, and will probably have to lend a million more at least.

-Twenty refugees from the neighbourhood of Sassoun, in Armenia, who have arrived at Athens, give a terrible account of the Turkish atrocities in that district. An Armenian, writing from Constantinople, also gives particulars, in which he puts the number of victims at 6,000, and says that pregnant women were ripped open by soldiers, and their unborn babes carried upon spears through the streets. A London paper voices the sentiment of the civilised world in the declaration that "The perpetrators of these horrible outrages must be punished, and it is the business of Europe to see that this is done." The days of the Turk in Europe are numbered.

-A proclamation by the new Czar, Nicholas II., granting the people of Finland their ancient rights and liberties, has been received throughout the country with the greatest enthusiasm. When the news was made known that the young Czar intended to maintain the liberties of the Grand Duchy instead of gradually extinguishing them, the people celebrated the event with great rejoicings. The Russian ruler is also liberating, it is said, a large number of political prisoners in Russia, besides which he has telegraphed to the Pope announcing that he has pardoned many of his condemned Polish subjects. The Pope attaches much importance to the conciliatory disposition of the Czar, and has sent the emperor an autograph letter to encourage him in his liberal policy.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 50.

E. J. Waggoner

The Catholic Times says that the most formidable difficulties which stood in the way of England's conversion to Catholicism has been removed.

The Uniat Greek Patriarch of Jerusalem at Antioch, who is making a brief visit to Paris, has expressed himself as firmly believing that the Eastern dissenters will all find their way to communion with Rome in due time.

It is stated by high authority that the petitions for unity, sent to the Pope by prelates and clergy of the Church of England, have greatly affected him. The Pope regards his message to Anglicans as one of the crowning episodes of his pontificate.

War does not settle everything. It doesn't make peace. It has now been ascertained that while all the Korean ministers have professed great gratitude to Japan, they have been secretly sending messengers to various parts of the country to incite the people to rise against the Japanese.

A new treaty has been made between the United States and Japan. By it Japan is to be treated as "standing on the same plane of civilisation as any Christian country." China not having developed so much military skill as its neighbour, must for some time yet be considered a heathen country.

In a letter to the Cardinal-Archbishop of Toledo, Cardinal Vaughan states that multitudes of the most educated and zealous of the Anglican clergy and laity teach nearly the whole cycle of Catholic doctrines, so that only "the office and authority of St. Peter," is needed as the keystone to complete the arch.

The Daily Chronicle's Rome correspondent telegraphs that a cardinal who took a prominent part in the conference of the Eastern Patriarchs, assures him that the Apostolic Constitution for the Eastern churches is the most important act which the Vatican has performed for several centuries. He added that the Pope, being no longer occupied with Eastern matters, designs to give his full attention to religious questions in England.

While all Europe is expressing horror and indignation at the atrocities of the Turks in Armenia, the Pope, having in mind his scheme for re-extending the supremacy of Rome over the Eastern churches, has sent the Sultan an assurance of his friendly regard. The latter, it will be remembered, has authority which might be exercised greatly to the detriment of the papal scheme, hence his goodwill outweighs all else at the Vatican.

What a strange idea some people have of upholding the dignity of Christianity. The editor of a religious paper, himself a Doctor of Divinity, was writing a series of articles describing his travels, and began one of them thus:-

It was a matter of difficulty in former times to enter Damascus unmolested, but no other insult was offered to us than a stone thrown at Mr. L--, one of our party. He chased the urchin till he took refuge in a shop, then dismounting from his horse, he brought the offender out, and in the presence of a crowd of bystanders gave him so sound a thrashing that it was certain that he would not soon throw stones at Christians again.

That is to say, that Mohammedan urchin would understand that if a Christian is insulted he will take summary vengeance. It is in this way that Japan is now proving to the Chinese that she is a "Christian nation." Christ said, "Resist not evil; but whosoever shall smite thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." He is the Author of Christianity, and His words are the only guide for Christians.

The English Churchman rightly says of Roman Catholicism that "the apostate church is well described in the Book of the Revelation as a 'woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and of the martyrs of Jesus.'" But in the same connection it is said that "the kings of the earth have committed fornication" with her, "and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of the wrath of her fornication." This characteristic of the apostate church, namely, that it has connection with the world and its rulers, seems to have been overlooked by the Churchman, because in an article immediately preceding it says, "The real difficulty concerning religious instruction arises from the devices and workings of Ritualism and Romanism. This view of the matter must be kept before the public, and in due time political leaders will take cognizance of it." Why cannot Protestants understand that the church in politics means Romanism, and that the preaching of the pure word of God alone is the only thing that will check its progress? To try to check Romanism by political methods is like tearing down the dykes of Holland in order to keep it from being overflowed with water.

The first sitting of the present German Reichstag was marked by "a scene of tumult almost unequalled in the history of the Imperial Parliament." The President called for a cheer for the Emperor, in which the socialist members refused to join. When censured for remaining seated, one of their number stated, amidst great uproar, that they would never cheer for a man who had told the recruits, when swearing them in, that they must be ready to show their obedience by firing on their fellow-citizens and brothers, if commanded to do so.

A similar thing occurred about the same time in the Belgian Chamber of Deputies. The Royal Civil List was being discussed, when a socialist member rose and read a paper protesting against all royal grants. The president called upon the House to give three cheers for the king, when the socialists responded by crying, "Long live the people! Down with capitalists!" Such scenes indicate the presence of a revolutionary spirit that promises anything but good for rulers in Europe.

Whatever clemency may signalise the accession of Nicholas II. to the Russian throne, it will not be shared by the Stundists. On the contrary, their Juggernaut of persecution moves relentlessly on, the latest step being an official edict prohibiting them from holding prayer-meetings. The tide of religious persecution is rising in all lands, and "all who will live godly in Christ Jesus" will feel its force. Their hope is in the deliverance that will come with His appearing.

December 20, 1894

"Front Page" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

May Christians fight?-Yes, certainly: "fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life." Tim. vi. 12.

May they take human life?-"The Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them." Luke ix. 56. "He that saith he abideth in Him, ought himself also so to walk even as He walked." 1 John ii. 6. "Who, when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He suffered, He threatened not." 1 Peter ii. 23.

With whom, then, are Christians to contend? "For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against wicked spirits in heavenly places." Eph. vi. 12, margin. "Though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh." 2 Cor. x. 3.

With what weapons only may Christians fight? "Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil." Eph. vi. 11. "For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." 2 Cor. x. 4.

"The World Not Converted" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

The World Not Converted.-"If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever." 1 John ii. 15-17. "The friendship of the world is enmity with God." The world and the Gospel of Christ can never have anything in common. The world will pass away, but never be converted. It will never help the cause of Christ along, because it knows Him not. His people are chosen out of the world, so that they are not to be of it, even while living in it.

"'He Saved Others'" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

"He Saved Others."-This was the testimony which the enemies of Christ gave to Him as He hung upon the cross. By that saying they convicted themselves. For He who could save others must have been the Saviour. The Lord had said through His prophet, that His righteous servant should justify many. The persecutors of Jesus acknowledged that He had saved others. But if He had saved others, He could save them. "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners." There is no modification, and no limit. He came to save sinners, whoever, whenever, and wherever they may be. Let no one then be content with admitting that "He saved others." Rather say, He saved me.

"Himself He Cannot Save."-"He saved others; Himself He cannot save." The last statement was as true as the first. He "appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself." "With His stripes we are healed." He could save others only by giving Himself as a sacrifice. "The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many." So of His followers." "He that findeth his life shall lose it; and he that loseth his life for My sake shall find it." "Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus."

"The Day of Visitation" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

Every life has its day of visitation. It is a day when God by His Spirit appeals to us, and we choose, as we must do, whom we will serve. The destiny of no person will be determined otherwise than by his own choice. Every day men are choosing for good or bad, and one choice leads to another in the same direction. Each move takes the individual further, until at last the climax is reached, when a final stand is taken, knowingly and deliberately, from which there will be no retrogression. Then, whether the individual knows it or not, his choice for eternity is made.

The day of visitation comes unheralded, nor does it by any sign proclaim itself an important day in our lives. The consequences with which it is fraught are not discerned. We can gather from it nothing to brace ourselves for any heroic action. Our dependence is simply the principles we have developed, the love of the truth which we have acquired from choices already made. The love of the truth will be our only safety, and not the importance of the issue, for that may not appear. Little did Pontius Pilate, as he gave sentence for the crucifixion of Christ, think of the history he was making for all subsequent time. Yet his foresight was as good as ours. It was the foresight of the wisdom common

802

to men, but which does not penetrate an hour into future. Little do men now foresee that the evil they do in secret will one day be proclaimed on the housetops.

It was when the truth came to Pilate that he made his fatal mistake. So it is when the truth of God comes to people now that they make the decisive choice. Pilate tried to evade the issue, but he could not. He knew that Christ was innocent; that it was for envy he had been seized and brought before him by the Jews; and he endeavoured to shift the responsibility, first upon the Jews themselves, and then upon Herod. But he failed, and his failure is a warning to such as would do likewise. He was forced to make a decision, and in that decision the fear of man outweighed his convictions of right. He feared to lose his position more than he feared to violate his conscience and disregard the right. He had some curiosity about the truth, but not a love of it. He had some curiosity as many have to-day, and all that they have, so far as concerns the choice of righteousness. He did just what all will do who swerve from the right because of the fear of man.

In the day of visitation we are to glorify God; and we are to live so that "the Gentiles," beholding our good works, may also in that day glorify Him. 1 Pet. ii. 11, 12. He is glorified by a life which vindicates the principles of His government; by a decision which justifies Him in His dealings with mankind. Our choice must be in harmony with His law. It must be made in love of the truth. Otherwise it will be Pilate's choice, and we shall see only when too late, the folly which led us to throw aside, with the right, the heritage of righteousness and truth.

"The Pope and the East" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

The Apostolic Constitution, giving effect to the decisions of the recent conference of the Eastern churches, has been issued.

According to Reuter's Rome correspondent, after referring to the history of the Eastern churches and testifying to the dignity imparted to them by the Church of Rome, which is spoken of as the Mistress of the World, the document alludes to the ecclesiastical colleges founded by the Papacy in Rome and in the East, which Leo XIII. proposes to develop on behalf of Orientals. It proclaims the necessity of maintaining intact the rites of the Orientals, because their very divergencies give splendid expression to the oneness of the dogmas of the Catholic religion. The Constitution confirms the measures taken by the Pope Benedict XIV. to preserve the Oriental rites, and sanctions thirteen new regulations, the principal of which provides that any Latin missionary who invites an Oriental to embrace the Latin rites shall ipso facto incur suspension from his functions and loss of his position. The colleges and religious orders shall see that Oriental students are instructed according to their respective rites. No new college is to be established in the East by Latin monks without the authority of the Pope. All Orientals-even those placed beyond the jurisdiction of the patriarchates-shall continue to be instructed according to their rites, and those who may have embraced the Latin rite shall be allowed to revert to the Oriental. Matrimonial cases and questions of conscience shall be referred to the Congregation of the Propaganda. The jurisdiction of the Greek Melchite Patriarch is extended over all the faithful of his rite in the whole Ottoman territory. In conclusion, the Constitution announces that the Pope will establish colleges and churches in the East, and will afford them assistance with the aid of generous Catholics in all countries.

It will be seen that recognition of the Pope is the one essential thing. That being granted, all else will follow as the Pope desires. It is not to be wondered at that the Papacy is exulting in its successes.

"Two Examples" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

The Apostle Paul writes, "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief. Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all longsuffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting." 1 Tim. i. 15, 16.

There is another pattern held up before men, in contrast with this. Peter tells us that God "spared not the old world, but saved Noah the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly; and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrha into ashes condemned them with an overthrow, making them an ensample unto those that after should live ungodly." 2 Pet. ii. 5, 6. The one pattern can be distinctly seen only by those who believe; the other is visible to all persons, whether they believe or not.

The contrast here is not in the dealings of God with men, but in the attitude of men toward God. God displays His mercy and longsuffering toward all. His judgments have never fallen without this. "The longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing." 1 Pet. iii. 20. It waited in the days of Lot, while he "sat in the gate of Sodom." The fate of the wicked city has passed down in the history linked with the wonderful testimony of God's forbearance which appears in His conversation with Abraham, when He declared that for the sake of ten righteous persons only, it should still be spared. So also God "endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction" before sending destruction upon Pharaoh and his host of Egyptians. Rom. ix. 22. The same longsuffering and grace that was manifested in the life of the great apostle was held out to those who perished, but they did not see it. They did not have faith. Paul believed, and they did not believe. That made all the difference in their history.

Saul persecuting and making havoc of the church, and Pharaoh oppressing the chosen people of God, stood in a similar position. The apostle declared that he was the chief of sinners. He had no more claim upon the mercy and grace of God than had Pharaoh or the inhabitants of Sodom. His glorious career as Paul the apostle was the result simply of his faith. He believed on the name of Christ, and was set forth for a pattern to those that should believe thereafter, that all might be encouraged to have faith.

By faith we see not merely condemnation and impending judgment where sin abounds, but grace "much more" abounding. We see God not only as just, but as the justifier of him who believes. We see mercy standing before judgment in all His dealings; we see the bow of the covenant before His throne, and the lightnings and thunders in the background. The patterns He has set before us encourage us to put our trust in Him. Sin, not God, is our enemy; and faith in Him-simple trust-is the victory over every foe.

"Can Animals Think?" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

Even at this day we see the question asked in a high-class religious newspaper, "Can animals think?" This leads us to expect that philosophers will soon be propounding the question, "Can animals eat?"

"Testimony of the Centuries. The Sure Word" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

"We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts." 2 Pet. i. 19.

The present age is called night. Paul says, "The night is far spent, the day is at hand; let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light." Rom. xiii. 12. And this he says in view of the fact previously stated, that it is high time to wake out of sleep, because our salvation is near. The dawning of the day, and the rising of the day-star, refer to the coming of Christ, who is "the bright and Morning Star." Rev. xxii. 16.

At Christ's first advent He Christ's first advent He was made an offering for sin, and He "bare our sins in His own body on the tree;" but when He comes the second time, He comes "without sin unto salvation" to them that look for Him. Heb. ix. 28. Concerning this coming there is less knowledge among men than of the first; yet it brings the consummation of the Gospel and of this earth's history. Therefore, since that event is of such overwhelming importance, how true the words that we "do well" to "take heed" to the sure word of prophecy. In the midst of the darkness of sin which covers the earth, our only light is that which shines from God's word.

THE COMING OF THE LORD

The third chapter of the second epistle of Peter contains some positive evidence concerning the sure word of prophecy which points out the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The chapter opens with the statement that the epistle was written for the purpose of stirring up the brethren to take heed to "the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets." There is special reason for this admonition, because just before the end the darkness will be more intense, as the Apostle says, "Evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived." 2 Tim. iii. 13. And these evil men will scoff, saying (following the Revised Version), "Where is the promise of His coming? for from the day that the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation."

That this is a falsehood, and that they ought to know better if they do not, Peter declares in the next two verses, saying, "For this they wilfully forget, that there were heavens from of old, and an earth compacted out of water and amidst water, by the word of God; by which means the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished."

The plain statement is that the earth in its chaotic state was simply a watery mass, as indicated by Gen. i. 2: "And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters." When God gathered the waters together into one place, and made the dry land appear, He evidently stored large quantities of water in the interior of the earth. This is indicated in the second commandment by the phrase, "the water under the earth," and in other scriptures. In the flood which destroyed the earth in the days of Noah, the waters in the interior of the earth united with the rain from the heavens, as the record says: "The same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened." Gen. vii. 11. "By which means the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished." The idea of the words of Peter is that the very elements from which the earth was formed was made to contribute to its destruction.

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT

Having disproved that all things continue as they were since the beginning of the creation, the apostle draws a parallel thus: "But the heavens that now are, and the earth, by the same word have been stored up for [or, as more properly given in the marginal rendering, with] fire, being reserved against the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men."

Now the comparison is at once apparent. By the word of God, the earth in the beginning was formed from the watery mass which God had spoken into existence. Part of this water was stored up in the earth, and by the word of God was afterward caused to overflow the earth and contribute to its destruction. And the same word of God, which performed this, has stored the interior of this present earth with fire, and is keeping it till the day of Judgment, when, as in the case of the waters of the flood, the fire within the earth, uniting with that which comes down from God out of Heaven (Rev. xx. 9), will destroy it. Instead of all things continuing as they were from the beginning of the creation, the earth has within it the elements of its destruction, and it is only the power of God that stays the catastrophe.

Some have fancied that this chapter teaches that the earth will be annihilated at the Judgment-day. This is a mistake. This earth will be destroyed in the same sense that the original earth "perished" by the waters of the earth. It was all broken up, and the face of it was changed, so that the earth after the flood had no resemblance to the earth before the flood. This was the last and greatest curse caused by sin, and completed the desolation of the earth. But the matter which composed the earth was not destroyed.

So by the fires of the last day "the elements shall melt with fervent heat," but they will not be annihilated. From those melted elements, "new heavens and a new earth" will be formed, which will have no more resemblance to this sin-cursed earth than this earth does to Eden, the garden of God.

804

The people that shall dwell in it will all be righteous (Isa. lx. 21), and "the wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing; the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God." Isa. xxxv. 1, 2.

The "sure word of prophecy" tells us again and again that this earth shall be destroyed by fire, and that in that fire shall the ungodly be burned up. Scoffers say that they see no evidence that any such event will ever take place, but the Apostle Peter assures us that the instrument of the earth's destruction is already prepared, and is stored within it. Just as surely as the earth was once destroyed by water, so surely will again be destroyed by fire.

"But these prophecies were spoken hundreds, and some of them thousands, of years ago, and there is no more evidence of their fulfilment now than there was when they were uttered." Thus argues the scoffer; but it is a vain argument, for two reasons. In the first place, all the evidence goes to show that there is now far more prospect of their speedy fulfilment than there was when they were uttered. The truth of the statement that "the earth shall wax old like a garment" may be verified by any close observer. The earth is wearing out.

Take, for example, the land of Palestine. When the children of Israel were in Egypt, that wonderfully fertile country, the Lord promised them a land "flowing with milk and honey," (Ex. iii. 8), a land better than Egypt (Deut. xi. 10, 11), "a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and hills; a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig trees, and pomegranates; a land of oil olive, and honey; a land wherein thou shalt eat bread without scarceness, thou shalt not lack anything in it." Deut. viii. 7-9. Hundreds of years later the prophet Ezekiel called it a land "flowing with milk and honey, which is the glory of all lands" (Eze. xx. 6, 15); our Saviour's parable affords evidence that the land would yield thirty, sixty, and a hundred fold (Matt. xiii. 8); and when God would describe the beauty and richness of the new earth, He said, "The glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon." Isa. xxxv. 2.

But how is it now? A traveller, who has written a good description of Eastern lands, says:-

Of all the lands there are for dismal scenery, I think Palestine must be the prince. The hills are barren, they are dull of colour, they are unpicturesque in shape. The valleys are unsightly deserts fringed with a feeble vegetation, that has an expression about it of being sorrowful and dependent. . . Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes. Over it broods the spell of a curse that has withered its fields and fettered its energies.

And what is true of that country is true in less degree of other countries. The waxing old of the earth is more marked in Palestine, because of its original superior fertility.

But even allowing that there were no visible tokens of the approach of the time when this earth shall as a vesture be folded up and changed, it would still be a vain thing to say that it must be long ere God's sure word can be fulfilled, because of the truth of the following statement:-

"But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." 2 Peter iii. 8.

God "inhabiteth eternity." The flight of time makes no difference with His plans. Compared with His eternity, the entire six thousand years of earth's existence is but a span. Says the Psalmist, "For a thousand years in Thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night." Ps. xc. 4. Therefore the apostle concludes that "the Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count slackness." That which seems to men forgetfulness of the promise, is only a kindly delay to allow dilatory men to secure the promise. In God's reckoning, it is only as the three days' grace which men allow for the payment of a promissory note.

It should not be forgotten that while

805

a thousand years is with the Lord as one day, one day is as a thousand years. This is too often overlooked. While He may take a thousand years for the fulfilment of a promise, and then it will be the same as though performed the next day, He can do in one day the work of a thousand years. Therefore there is no warrant for settling down to carnal ease, thinking that it will necessarily be a long time yet before the work of God on earth can be accomplished. "For He will finish the work, and cut it short in righteousness; because a short work will the Lord make upon the earth." Rom. ix. 26.

"Christmas Thoughts" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

The great church holiday of the year is at hand, and it is most natural that the season should awaken thoughts in regard to an institution so generally observed throughout Christendom. There are few things in which the influence of "the church" is more strikingly manifest than in the general observance of this festival day by so many who do not profess to be Christians. Since reasonable beings desire to know the reason for the things which they are required to do, it seems most natural that first in order we should consider the

ORIGIN OF CHRISTMAS

This is a thing that is very seldom treated of in these days. The commonly-accepted idea is that it is the celebration of the birth of Christ. If it were not that most people are like school boys, glad of any excuse for a holiday, and that the celebration of Christmas in supposed commemoration of the birth of Christ is one of the easiest ways in which a person can make himself believe that he is religious, the day would long since have fallen into oblivion for lack of foundation. For one of the surest things about the 25th of December, commonly called Christmas, is that it is

NOT CHRIST'S BIRTHDAY

Luke gives us the fullest account of the birth of Christ, but neither he nor any other writer of Scripture gives the slightest hint as to when it took place. Much less is there any hint in the Bible that the birthday of Christ was to be observed any more than any other day in the year. We do know that when Jesus was born in Bethlehem "there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night," to whom the angel of the Lord appeared, announcing the birth of the Saviour. But that this was not the 25th of December, nor any other day of that month, is certain from the fact that December is the height of the rainy season in Judea, when neither flocks nor shepherds could have been out in the fields at night. No man who knows anything about sheep would think of leaving them out at night in a cold, winter rain.

Facts like these, however, have never been allowed to stand in the way of the celebration of festival days. The main thing is to have a day; the facts can be manufactured to suit the occasion.

NOT FROM THE BEGINNING

Neander, in his church history of the first three centuries, speaks of the institution of Easter and Whitsuntide, and says that they were the only feasts observed at this period. "The idea of a birthday festival was foreign to the Christians of this period generally." "Besides, it was in truth unknown at what definite time the celebration of the remembrance of Christ's birth should be placed, as nothing definite was ascertained respecting the date of His birth." He might as well have added also that nothing definite is known now, but that custom has been accepted in the place of knowledge.

ITS FIRST APPEARANCE

There is quite general agreement that the first celebration of the festival of Christmas began in the fourth century after Christ. Neander says, "This feast first makes its appearance, as one generally celebrated in the Roman Church, under the Roman Bishop Liberius, after the middle of the fourth century. . . . It was not till later, however, that it spread from the Roman church to Eastern Asia. . . . Chrysostom says expressly, in a discourse pronounced at Antioch in celebration of this festival, on the 25th of December in the year 386, that it had first become known there less than ten years before."-History of the Christian Church, vol. 2, section 3.

Dr. Schaff says:-

We first find it in Rome in the time of Bishop Liberius, who on the 25th of December 360, consecrated Marcella, the sister of St. Ambrose, nun or bride of Christ, and addressed her with these words: "Thou seest what multitudes are come to the birth-festival of thy bridegroom."-History of Christian Church, vol. 2, sec. 77.

The association in which it is first seen is surely no recommendation to it for Protestants. The name Christmas-Christ mass-shows its Roman Catholic origin, and should have been sufficient to condemn it for those who reject the "idolatrous sacrifice of the mass." Let it be remembered that if we could find the clearest evidence from history that the festival of Christmas was observed from the first century, that would not add a feather's weight to its authority. The two essential things would still be lacking, namely, the knowledge of when Christ was born, and a command to observe the day of His birth, even if it were known.

A RELIC OF HEATHENISM

It is a fact too well known to require any lengthy argument here, that it was not very long after the days of the apostles before the church began to court the favour of the world. Indeed, the "mystery of iniquity," which should develop into the "man of sin," was already working in the days of the Apostle Paul. See 2 Thess. ii. 3-8. Mosheim tells us that as early as the second century, that is, within less than a hundred years of the death of Paul, a large part of the "Christian" observances and institutions "had the aspect of heathen mysteries." This being the case, no one need be surprised to read testimony like the following from Dr. Schaff (same section as above), which might be multiplied indefinitely:-

The Christmas festival was probably the transformation or regeneration of a series of kindred festivals-the Saturnalia, Siggilaria, Juvenalia, and Brumalia-which were kept in Rome in the month of December, and commemoration of the golden age of universal freedom and equality, and in honor of the unconquered sun.

THE SATURNALIA

Space allows but a very brief reference to this Pagan festival, just enough to show how closely it has been copied. The Encyclopedia Britannica says of it:-

The great festival of Saturn was celebrated on the 19th, but after C?sar's reform of the calendar, on the 17th of December. . . . In popular usage, the festival lasted seven days. The time was one of general joy and mirth. . . . All classes exchanged gifts, the commonest being wax tapirs and clay dolls. These dolls were especially given to children, and the makers of them held a regular fair at this time.

So we see that in ancient heathen Rome the shops doubtless presented much the same appearance about Christmas time that they do now in England. It is thought, and with reason, that the dolls that were given on the occasion of the festival of Saturn represented the human sacrifices

806

that had formerly been offered to that god.

Dr. Schaff well says, "Had the Christmas festival arisen in the period of the persecution, its derivation from these pagan festivals would be refuted by the then reigning abhorrence of everything heathen." And he adds, "But in the Nicene age this rigid opposition between the church and the world was in a great measure softened by the general conversion of the heathen." The adoption of the festival was, therefore, a mark of the growth of apostasy, and of the patronising of the church. The heathen, whose chief god was the sun, regarded the time when it began to rise higher in the heavens as its birthday; and it was very easy for church people with whom heathen philosophising had taken the place of the word of God, to take advantage of this idea, and make the heathen believe that they were in reality celebrating the birth of Christ, and so bring them into the church in swarms.

CHRISTMAS AT THE REFORMATION

At the time of the Reformation, there was considerable discussion concerning the festivals of the Catholic Church. By some nearly all of them were retained, and by others nearly all rejected. The Presbyterians and Congregationalists, particularly, rejected all the yearly festivals as human institutions. Doubtless the reason why the rejection of them was not permanent was that in the rejection more dependence was placed in Parliament than in the Bible. Neal, in his "History of the Puritans," says:-

Among the ordinances that passed this year (1646) for reformation of the church, none occasioned so much noise and disturbances as that of June 8, for abolishing the observance of saints days, and the three grand festivals, of Christmas, Easter, and Whitsuntide, and other festivals, commonly called holy days, have been heretofore superstitiously used and observed; be it ordained that the said feasts, and other festivals, commonly called holy days, be no longer observed as festivals; any law, statute, custom, constitution, or canon, to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding."-Vol. 3, ch. 8.

AN UNANSWERABLE ARGUMENT

"The king," says Neal, "was highly displeased with this ordinance and while the matter was under debate, he put this query to the Parliament-commissioners at Holmby-house, April 23, 1647," which shows that as long as the king's head remained on his shoulders it was clearer than those of the theological politicians:-

I desire to be resolved of this question, Why the new reformers discharge the keeping of Easter? My reason for this query is, I concede the celebration of this feast was instituted by the same authority which change the Jewish Sabbath into the Lord's day or Sunday, for it will not be found in Scripture where Saturday is discharged to be kept, or turned into Sunday; wherefore it must be the church's authority to change the one and instituted the other; therefore my opinion is, that those who will not keep this feast may as well return to the observance of Saturday, and refuse the weekly Sunday. When anybody can show me that wherein I am in error, I shall not be ashamed to confess and amend it.-Ib.

No one performed this task. Sir James Harrington made a simple denial that the Sabbath was changed by the authority of "the church," and asserted that the change was derived from the authority and example of Christ and the apostles; but he very naturally neglected to give any evidence from the Scriptures, as the king required, since none is to be found.

It is true that the king's point was made concerning Easter, but it applies equally well to Christmas. The reformers were not willing to carry the reformation so far as to return to the Scriptures as the only guide in all matters of religion. They determined to retain the observance of the Sunday; and the retention of that day, which, like Christmas, was a heathen festival day, left the way open for the bringing back of all the other festivals. Thus it is that to-day we see the church festival days coming more and more into recognition by the various Protestant bodies. And thus it will be that within a few years the Roman Catholic Church will have regained all that it lost a few centuries ago. For when people adopt so much as one custom that has no warrant in Scripture, the Catholic Church has a long lever with which to bring them into its fold, into the observance of all its unscriptural customs.

IS IT A GOOD THING?

Some will certainly ask, "But is it not a good thing to observe one day in the year in memory of the birth of Christ?" The reply is, No; it is not a good thing. If it were, it would have been appointed in the Bible. "Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation; so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation." "It is not lawful for the church to ordain anything that is contrary to God's Word written." "Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? Not one." Job xiv. 4. The Christmas festival was originally an unclean heathen festival, and nothing can make it clean. Heathenism can never become Christianity. The power that presumed to transform a heathen festival into a Christian institution, is the very same that claims the ability to transform a common piece of bread into the actual body of Christ.

The setting apart of one day in the year in commemoration of God manifest in the flesh, must and does tend directly against the daily recognition of that fact. The birth of Christ is a mystery which is to be commemorated not by a yearly festival, but by the formation of Christ within as the hope of glory. Nothing can commemorate the event but the event itself. The life of Christ is to be manifest "in our mortal flesh," and "renewed day by day." 2 Cor. iv. 11-16. In the festivals of "the church year," we have the substitution of forms and ceremonies for Christian reality; and it is one of the worst signs of the times, that the increasing observance of those days, adopted directly from heathenism, is looked upon as a proof of the growth of Christianity. There was never a time when a reformation was more imperatively needed in the church than to-day.

CHRISTMAS GIFTS

"What about Christmas gifts? Are they also to be condemned?" That depends. The Lord assures us that "it is more blessed to give than to receive;" but He makes a distinction in giving. "If ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them. And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same. And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive, what thank have ye? for sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again. But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for He is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil." Luke vi. 32-35.

There is not the slightest doubt but that Christmas giving, as generally practised, is productive of only evil. Selfishness and jealousy are fostered by means of it. The child is encouraged to value its parents and friends according to what it can get from them. They are encouraged to think only of self. And this evil is not

807

confined to children. Besides this, the squandering of so much money upon foolish, unnecessary, and even harmful presents, is wicked, when there are so many who are suffering not only for food and clothing, but for the bread of life. This of course applies to gifts at any time; but if it were not for certain holidays when gifts are by custom specially expected, the evil would be far less.

"But when thou makest a feast, call the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind; and thou shalt be blessed; for they cannot recompense thee; for thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just." Luke xiv. 13, 14. The rule for giving, whether to members of one's own family or to others, is to give where there is need, and to give the thing needed. This is the way with the Lord, whose grace supplies the needy, "in time of need."

But if this rule were followed, there would not be a greater display of giving at Christmas than at any other time. "The poor ye have always with you, and whensoever ye will ye may do them good." Mark xiv. 7. It is a thing much to be commended that Christmas is by many, perhaps more than in time past, devoted to gifts that will benefit the needy; but while it is better to give at Christmas time than not to give at all, it is far better to give when there is need, without any reference to the day. As before stated, these annual church festivals tend to minimise the necessity of daily Christian living; and this is doubtless the reason why the Gospel knows nothing of them.

"Studies in Romans. Something Worth Knowing. Rom. viii. 26-28" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

The preceding lessons have shown us that the possession of the Holy Spirit marks our relation to God as sons. It is the pledge of the life and inheritance to come.

"Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities; for we know not what we should pray for as we ought; but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groaning which can not be uttered. And He that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because He maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are called according to His purpose." Rom. viii. 26-28.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

What does the Spirit do for us?

"The Spirit also helpeth our infirmities."

Why is this necessary?

"We know not what we should pray for as we ought."

How therefore does the Spirit help us?

"The Spirit itself maketh intercession for us."

In what way?

"With groanings which cannot be uttered."

What does He who searches the hearts know?

"He that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit."

Who searches the hearts?

"I the Lord search the heart." Jer. xvii. 10.

Why does the Lord know the mind of the Spirit?

"Because He maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God."

What then do we know?

"We know that all things work together for good."

To whom?

"To them that love God."

How are such ones called?

"Called according to His purpose."

"PRAYING IN THE SPIRIT"

"And in like manner the Spirit also helpeth our infirmity; for we know not how to pray as we ought; but the Spirit Himself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered; and He that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because He maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God."

The heart is deceitful above all things, and none can know it except God. Jer. xvii. 9, 10. That in itself is sufficient reason why we do not know what we should pray for. Moreover, we do not know the things that God has to give us; and even if we did, our lips could not describe them, for "eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him. But God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit; for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God." 1 Cor. ii. 9-12.

God desires to give to us "exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think." Eph. iii. 20. Of course a petition for such things can not be put into words. The next clause however says that it is "according to the power that worketh in us;" and the sixteenth verse tells us that the power that works in us is the Spirit. Thus we find the same thing that we read in the eighth of Romans and the second of 1 Corinthians.

"The Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God." Therefore the Spirit knows just what the Lord has for us. The deepest thoughts are too great for language, and so the Spirit makes intercession for us with groanings that can not be uttered. But, although there is no articulate speech "He that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because He maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God." The Lord knows that the Spirit asks for just the things that He has to bestow. He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that whatever is asked according to God's will is granted. 1 John v. 14, 15.

Now note how this statement in regard to prayer fits in with what goes before in the eighth of Romans. God has given us his Spirit to be in us, to lead us, and to direct our lives. The possession of the Spirit of God proves that we are the sons of God. Being sons, we can come to Him to ask for things to supply our need, with all the confidence of a child to a parent. But while we have all confidence, our thoughts are as the earth is below the heaven. Isa. lv. 8, 9. Not only are our thoughts feeble, but our language is still more so. We can not give proper expression even to the little that we do realise. But if we are the sons of God, we have in us his own representative, who helps our infirmity and who is able to take of the things of God to give to us. What wonderful confidence this should give us in praying to God; and especially should it give confidence to those who are particularly infirm in regard to language! It makes no difference if one has a very limited vocabulary, if he stammers, or even if he is dumb; if he prays in the Spirit, he is sure to

808

receive all that he needs, and more than he can ask or think.

With these facts before us, how much more forcible becomes the exhortation of the apostle, "Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints." Eph. vi. 18.

ALL THINGS FOR GOOD

"And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God." Without this knowledge we could not have that confidence in prayer that we ought to have and that is indicated in the preceding verses. Whoever knows the Lord must love Him, for He is love. And the Spirit reveals Him to us. Whoever knows that "God so loved the world, that He gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life," cannot fail to love Him. And then all things work together for good to Him.

Take notice that the text does not say that all things shall work together for good to them that love God, but that they do so work now in this present time. Everything as it comes is good to those who love and trust the Lord. Many people lose the blessing of this assurance by reading it as though it were for the future. They try to be resigned to troubles that come by thinking that by and by some good will come from them; but in that case they do not get the good that God gives them.

Note further that the text does not say that we know how all things work together for good to them that love God. People in trouble often sigh piously and say, "Well, I suppose that it is all for good, but I can't see how." Of course not; and they have no business to see how. It is God that makes them work good, because He alone has the power. Therefore it is not necessary for us to know anything about how it is done. The fact is knowledge enough for us. God can overrule all the plans of the devil, and can make the wrath of man to praise Him. Our part is to believe. There is no trust in the Lord if we must see how He does everything. Those who must be able to see how the Lord works, show that they can not trust Him out of sight, and thus they give Him a bad name to the world.

CALLED OF GOD

God has called everybody to come to Him. "The Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." Rev. xxii. 17. God is no respecter of persons; He desires that all men shall be saved, and so He calls them all.

Not only does He call us, but He draws us. No man can come to Him without being drawn, and so Christ is lifted up to draw all to God. He tasted death for every man (Heb. ii. 9), and through Him all men have access to God. He has destroyed in His own body the enmity, the wall that separates men from God, so that nothing can keep any man from God unless that man builds up again the barrier.

The Lord draws us, but does not employ force. He calls, but does not drive. It remains therefore for us to make our "calling and election sure" by yielding to the influence that God throws round us. He says, "Follow Me," and we must make the calling effectual by following Him.

PURPOSE OF THE CALLING

God calls us "in the grace of Christ." Gal. i. 6. "He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love." Eph. i. 4. Still further, we read that He hath "called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began." 2 Tim. i. 9. In our text in Romans we learned that those who love God are the "called according to His purpose." His purpose is that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love. If we yield to His purpose, He will see that it is carried out.

God designed man for a companion for Himself. But there is no true companionship where there is restraint. Therefore, in order that man might associate with Him on terms of intimacy, He made the will of man as free as His own. God cannot work against His own purpose; and therefore He not only will not, but He can not, force the will of man. All men are as absolutely free to choose as is God Himself; and when they choose to yield to the call of God, His purpose of grace is wrought out in them by the power by which He is able to make all things work together for good.

"Mackay, of Uganda" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

ALEXANDER MACKAY, Missionary Hero of Uganda, Sunday School Union, Ludgate Hill, London. 1s.

It is a notion, unfortunately too prevalent, that young people must have stories that are not true to interest them. And so every holiday season the catalogue of tales full of fighting and impossible adventures is increased by scores and hundreds of volumes.

It is altogether a matter of perverted taste. Any healthy young person, or old either, who has been trained to believe in the seriousness of life finds far more to interest him in a book that is true, than in one in which he knows the writer is telling him things that never happened. But as the boy is started in with tales, and the taste for the unreal is formed, so when he becomes the man he must have the adult novel with its maudlin sentiment, if indeed the mind does not crave the modern novel with a "purpose" which promises to come in shoals as thick as the frogs of Egypt, and as slimy and unclean.

There are no books of more thrilling interest than the stories of missionary

812

life which are issued by many publishers in popular form. Buy the children such books as these, and they will care little for fiction, and they are as interesting to the old as to the young.

The life of the young Scotsman, Mackay, was a stirring one, and closed only about four years ago. As a boy in Aberdeenshire he was industrious in his studies, and especially apt in picking up bits of information about practical things. Being of a mechanical turn of mind, he took up engineering after his school days were over. One of the most interesting lessons of his life is the story of how the Lord is able to use mechanical skill when it is consecrated to His service.

It was his ability to make things that attracted the natives to him after he reached Uganda, in the African lake region, and by his industry he taught the indolent natives lessons which they needed so much to learn.

"All kinds of iron implements were brought to him to repair; and when they saw him burnishing metal until it shone, their astonishment and admiration knew no bounds. Much of this skill they put down to witchcraft; and when he had done anything more than usually surprising, they cried, 'Mackay is truly the great spirit.' But this very belief in his power was sometimes rather awkward. If they asked him to do something beyond his power, and he explained his inability, they would not believe him, but thought it was because he would not."

It was his work to show, that there was nothing supernatural about his skill, and that he was industrious only that he might do good to others. When later he was persecuted and robbed and yet toiled early and late at the hardest kind of labour for the very ones who mistreated him, many saw revealed a higher principle than the selfishness which ruled their own lives.

Mtesa, the king, had invited missionaries to come to his kingdom, but it was evident that his professed interest to learn of Jesus Christ was only to get some advantages from the white men. He was treacherous and deceitful, and jealous of the missionary's influence. Yet gradually a few natives began to gather about Mackay and his companions, who were rejoiced after the years of labour to see real fruit springing up in the hearts of some.

Toward the close of Mtesa's life, Mackay built a house which was a marvel to the people, and which the Arabs tried to make the king believe was to be a fort for the whites. An ox cart made at the same time was another wonder.

"News of Mackay's wonderful cart was carried to the king, and exaggerated descriptions given of its size and powers. Among other things it was said that the cart was uncontrollable, and had killed people. Mtesa sent a chief to inspect it, and to report, To his great delight Mackay drove him past the mission house, and showed him how absurd were the rumours about its dangerousness."

Every fresh triumph by Mackay only increased the jealousy of the Arabs who had the ear of the king, and so while the believers in the Gospel increased and were learning to read the Scriptures which had been translated, the opposition from the king and chiefs increased.

Mtesa died and was followed by his son Mwanga, who soon began to persecute the native believers. This only increased the number who came by stealth to be taught. Large numbers were now seeking to know the way, and soon a reign of terror began. Soldiers were sent to search out the converts, and every day fresh batches of them were burnt. "These black Christians prayed to God in the fire, and met death so fearlessly, and even joyfully, that the executioner said 'he had never killed such brave people before.'"

Soon after this general persecution of natives was begun Mackay thought it best to leave the king's country for a time, and went to the Southern shore of Lake Nyanza to found another station. It was here that he died in 1890, hard at work to the very last.

Uganda has had a troubled history since Mackay left it. Mwanga was deposed by a revolt, and managed to escape to a Roman Catholic mission, where he professed conversion. Getting back to his kingdom later he found the Protestant converts in power, and since then there has been fighting between the so-called, Protestant and Catholic parties, followed by intervention by the British Government to keep peace between the factions. While admiring the zeal and devotion of the early missionaries, and finding inspiration in their life story, it is impossible to escape the conviction that too much reliance was placed on getting kingly favour and on using force to suppress some irregularities, putting, perhaps, into the minds of the later converts the idea of getting power in the government of the kingdom. Persecution advanced the Gospel, and the power of the word was demonstrated amidst pillage and burnings. But the successive wars between the Protestant and Catholic factions show the death of real piety amongst the great majority of the converts, and their very meagre knowledge of the religion which is pure, peaceable, and easy to be entreated, and which suffers long and is kind.

But this shilling book and the others in the same series, are well written records of the lives of men whose work it will do the reader good to know about.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

-Diamonds have been discovered in Tasmania.

-A financial crisis and panic prevails in Newfoundland and trade is almost at it standstill.

-A convention of the American Federation of Labour was opened Dec. 10 at Denver, U.S.A.

-The Russian Army is to be increased next year by the addition of two regiments of field artillery.

-A cyclone broke over the island of Ponta Delgada (Azores) Dec. 8. Two ships were wrecked and several lives lost.

-Sir John Thompson, Premier of Canada, died very suddenly at a lunch in Windsor Castle, Dec. 12. The body will be taken to Canada for interment.

-The Court appointed to inquire into the loss of the New Zealand steamer Wairarapa, which resulted in the loss of 134 lives, find that the wreck was due to the default of the captain.

-Several Catholic Cardinals are reported as saying that the question of the validity of Anglican orders ought to he again examined, and that the Pope alone can express an authoritative opinion on the point.

-The Austrian Official Gazette has announced that the operation of the Anglo-Austrian Copyright Treaty has been extended to India, Newfoundland, Natal, Victoria, Queensland, Western Australia, and New Zealand.

-The Porte is said to be aware of the gravity the Armenian question, and a conference last-g twenty-four hours took place at the Sultan's palace. It is stated in official Russian circles at the Russian Government done not intend to intervene, as it did in the massacres which led to the Russo-Turkish war of 1877.

-The Japanese troops have captured Foochow, Huh was evacuated by the Chinese without firing a shot. It is reported that two Japanese divisions numbering together 25,000 men have tided on the western shores of the Gulf of Peehill with a view to an advance on Pekin.

-Recently a man undertook to drink three pints of rum in a public-house in Dublin within half-an-hour. After swallowing the last pint he collapsed on the floor and died. The coroner's jury returned a verdict of manslaughter against the man who ordered the drink and the man who supplied it.

-Great satisfaction is expressed both in financial and official circles in Russia, as well as by the Press, at the participation of the London market in the new Russian loan. This is regarded as material evidence of the improvement of the political relations between Russia and Great Britain.

-Relations between the Vatican and M. Dupuy, the French Premier, are, it is said, very such strained. The Pope some months ago expressed a desire to establish an ecclesiastical hierarchy in China. France, however, who exercises a Catholic protectorate in the Far East, refused to entertain the idea, with the result mentioned.

-The Emperor of Austria has at last given his consent to the Church Bills, which with much difficulty were passed through the Hungarian louse of Magnates. Dr. Wokerle, the Premier announced the fact in, the Hungarian Reichstag, and was greeted with enthusiastic applause. The liberal victory has caused great rejoicings in Budapest and throughout the Province.

-A tornado struck the town of Forsythe, in Texas, Dec. 12, and wrought a great deal of havoc. The principal church was blown down, and the roof of practically every place of business was torn off, while many dwellings were completely demolished. The loss is estimated at 50,000 dollars. Other cyclones are reported from parts of Georgia, Alabama, and Florida.

-Emperor William, addressing the newly elected President of the German Reichstag, said he regarded the recant Socialist demonstration as an attack upon the Constitution, which it was the intention of the anti-revolutionary Bill to put down. Herr Leibnicht, a Socialist deputy, has caused further excitement by defending the course of the Socialists, and stigmatising the Emperor's speech as "hypocrisy."

-On October 12 last, three African sportsman, of the abortive Freeland movement, together with Mr. Remington, postmaster of Mombassa, and a German missionary, made a midnight attack on the Somalis, under, it is said, a mistaken impression that they were about to attack the German mission station at Ngoa or the English mission station at Golbanti. The Somalis retaliated by ravaging the Tana districts, inhabited by the Gallas and Pokamas, tribes under British protection. They returned, after doing immense damage, with a largo booty of women, children and cattle. The Somalis also attacked the American-Swedish mission station at Kulasa, but were beaten off Now a "punitive expedition" is talked of, and as the Somalis can put several thousand men into the field, much shedding of blood is likely to happen.

-A large district in Southern Russia is suffering from a plague of mice. Extraordinary accounts have been received of the damage done over a district larger than Wales by the ravages of myriads of these tiny rodents. It is said that their nests are so numerous in the fields that ploughing is impossible, the peasants turning away in loathing. In houses and barns, in the village streets, the mice swarm. The rivers and wells even are full of there, either dead or alive, and carp and other fish taught in the rivers have their stomachs laden with mica. So horrible is the plague that peasants in bodies are leaving their cottages, seeking spots where they may be free from these vermin. They are praying for an early and a severe winter to exterminate the mice. The loss to grain and other property already incurred is enormous.

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 51.

E. J. Waggoner

This year, for the first on record, it is said, the car of Juggernaut at Serampore failed to find a sufficient number of devotees to drag it forth on the usual route. Three days the Brahmans tried to persuade the people to draw it out, but they failed.

When a person is dissatisfied with himself, there is good hope that he will accept the One who is "altogether lovely" and "full of grace and truth." To be dissatisfied with one's self, therefore, is an excellent state in which to be.

It is very common for people to feel discouraged when they have a vivid consciousness of their failures. On the contrary, this should be a cause for courage, since it is an evidence that the Lord is holding up for their acceptance that which is better.

The man who recently jumped from the top of the Tower Bridge into the Thames, a distance of 240 feet, and was killed, was a Spiritualist, and was lured to his death by spirits, who had assured him that he would make the dive in safety.

A recent writer says: "A man in society may betray an amazing ignorance of Scripture, and be let off with an indulgent smile; but let him make a false quantity in a quotation from a heathen author, and he will never be forgiven." Which shows that "society" is more heathen than Christian.

The Catholic Times, speaking of the theological commission which the Pope has appointed to investigate the validity of Anglican orders, says that there is no reason to anticipate that the contention of the Anglican controversialists will be upheld, but that the Pope will make every concession possible.

Poland is rejoicing at the prospect that General Gourko, the Governor who has for years oppressed the people, will soon be superseded. The Czar has censured his recent acts of injustice to the Roman Catholics, who have suffered under him in Poland as Protestants suffer where Rome rules with free hand.

One of the principal points in the German Chancellor's speech in the Reichstag, outlining the policy of the Government, was the statement that the chief task of the State now is to act in friendly and intelligent co-operation with the authorities of the Church, and that his energies would be directed towards maintaining peace between Church and State. This means that Papal influence will vastly increase in Germany.

Complaint is made that, although the Duke of York's military school, Cambridge, is a State-supported institution, before admission can be obtained a baptismal certificate must be produced, bearing a Church of England, a Presbyterian, a Wesleyan, or a Roman Catholic stamp, and that all other sects are barred. The barred sects seem to feel aggrieved that they are not considered sufficiently Christian to be permitted to learn the art of killing men.

One of our workers in Turkey reports rather a queer use of the Bible in controversy. He says:-

One of our brethren who was formerly a colporteur for the Bible Society, but was dismissed as soon as he began to keep the Sabbath, learned basket-making, and went to a city near ancient Nicea. Here he was soon arrested, and without any reason given, sent to the capital of the province. Being released on bail after ten days' imprisonment, he returned to continue the business which he had begun, but was immediately re-arrested. The chief of the place took away his Bible, and striking our brother with it said: "Don't you venture to come to this place again; you preach a strange religion." He was sent to the capital a second time, but is now free again.

It is unfortunate that the most of those who seem to stand for freedom of religion from State patronage and control, are not really opposed from principle to union of Church and State. Thus one of the leading Congregationalists in England, recently said in answer to a question as to the standing of Nonconformists as compared with Churchmen:-

Really our civil disabilities now are hardly worth talking about-except that we are outside a great national institution and can take no part in it.

If this "disability" should be removed, the only Nonconformists that would then be left would be the few who believe that connection with civil affairs is the greatest disability that the Gospel can be made to suffer.

The Bible Echo, of Melbourne, Australia, now in its ninth year, is a weekly paper working along the same lines of Bible study as the PRESENT TRUTH. The increasing tendency among the churches in Australia to seek to control politics in the interests of religious legislation has led our brethren there to establish a 82-page quarterly journal, the Australian Sentinel, specially devoted to these issues, showing how contrary to the principles of the Gospel of Christ is the effort to advance His kingdom by any other method than the preaching of the word.

When Jesus died upon the cross, "the earth did quake, and the rocks rent; and the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, and came out of the graves after His resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many." Matt. xxvii. 50-53. It is through death that Jesus destroys him that hath the power of death, that is, the devil. Heb. ii. 14. He did not go into the grave a conquered victim, but a conqueror. In death He gained the victory, as the opening graves testified. Thus it is that even in death itself "we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us." Rom. viii. 37.

Jesus asks, "Why call ye Me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?" Luke vi. 46. If He is Lord, then His word has authority, and must be obeyed. His Lordship must be practically recognised, else it is but mockery to call Him Lord. Now "the Son of man is Lord even of the Sabbath day." Matt. xi. 8. Therefore properly to recognise Christ's Lordship, means to keep the Sabbath,-the day which commemorates creation, of which He is the Head. "My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth." 1 John iii. 18.

December 27, 1894

"The New Year" The Present Truth 10, 52.

E. J. Waggoner

The "New Year" is at hand; and the time by common consent sacred to the formation of new resolutions. In most cases, however, the resolutions of the previous year have the dust brushed off from them, and are made to serve again, being just as good as new on account of never having been used.

There is a difference of opinion as to the value of making resolutions at any time. It is not our promises that save us, but the promises of God. Making good resolutions often tends directly against real improvement, since the resolution is taken as a substitute for action. A man makes a resolution and breaks it, and then when he is confronted with his failure, he makes another, or repeats the former one with new emphasis, and straightway his conscience is at rest. The resolution is accepted as an "indulgence." In saying this we do not in the least discount a fixed choice, nor a firm purpose to cleave to the Lord; but the penitent who makes real progress is the one who comes to the Lord, saying,-

"No preparation can I make,
My best resolves I only break,
Yet save me for Thine own name's sake,
And take me as I am."

Yet allowing the most that might be claimed for good resolutions, the custom of having one special day for making reformation, out of three hundred and sixty-five, is most pernicious. It is often the case that people wait for months till the New Year to "turn over a new leaf." This evil habit is fostered by religious papers and teachers who make so much of the New Year as the fit time for reflecting over the past and making a fresh start. From such talk people get the idea that there's something sacred about New Year's day.

This evil would be avoided if they would remember that the first day of January is no more the beginning of a new year than is the third of March, the 13th of June, the 19th of October, or any other day of any other month in the year. Every day is just one year from three hundred and sixty-five days before, and so every day begins a new year. Whatever is fit and especially appropriate for the first day of a new year, may be attended to at any time. Are you convinced of the error of your ways, and impressed that you ought to reform? Then never think of waiting for the first day of January to come. "Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation."

One word more as to the date of the New Year. It is purely arbitrary, and is not the same in all parts of the world. In England, until the adoption of the Gregorian calendar, in 1752, the legal and ecclesiastical year began at March 25. This was more nearly the original time of beginning the year, as directed by the Lord. The spring of the year is the natural season. To begin a new year in the beginning of winter is as senseless and arbitrary as to begin a new day in the middle of the night. As a matter of convenience in reckoning, and for business purposes, the 1st of January is as good as any other day; but no one should think that any sort of sacredness attaches to it, or that it is any better than any other day for ceasing to do evil and learning to do well.

The false idea concerning the 1st of January, which is due chiefly to the Roman Catholic Church, has led to what are known as "watch night" services by many people. They assemble in a meeting-house on the last day in December, and remain together until after midnight, to "watch the old year out, and the new year in." There would be something irresistibly funny in this performance, even if the first day of the year were sacred by Divine appointment. For since the last day begins at sunset, it is evident that the new year must also begin at sunset, with the day. So that when people watch till midnight to see the new year in, they are like men who watch for a train that has passed eight hours before.

It is stated on good authority that the term "watch night" originated with Wesley, but not with any reference to the New Year. That godly man was accustomed to spend much time in prayer, and would often, with a company of his people, spend the entire night in prayer. Thus they "watched" the night through. Not that they were watching the hours as they passed, but that they were watching with the Lord. The thought came from the Saviour's words to His disciples on the night of His betrayal, "Could ye not watch with Me one hour?" and, "Watch and pray lest ye enter into temptation." If there were more of this sort of watching every day in the year, there would be less superstition concerning one particular day.

"What doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?"

"Instruments of Righteousness" The Present Truth 10, 52.

E. J. Waggoner

All righteousness is from God; for God is the only being able to manifest it. Righteousness is not a finite thing, but infinite; it is perfection in the eye of God, it is doing as well as God can do it; and no one can do that but God Himself. "All unrighteousness is sin," and, "sin is the transgression of law." 1 John v. 17; iii. 4. The law of God is as perfect as God is, and therefore righteousness,-the keeping of the law,-is the manifestation of infinite perfection of life.

The Lord would make us instruments of His righteousness. Therefore the Spirit exhorts us, "Yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God." Rom. vi. 13. When we yield our members thus unto God, He uses them, and manifests His righteousness by making them do His will; for then it is He that worketh in us, "both to will and to do of His good pleasure." Phil. ii. 13.

The law of men, on the other hand, is not righteousness. It may be in the direction of righteousness, and perfectly proper, just, and necessary; but it comes infinitely short of righteousness itself. Why? Because man comes infinitely short of being God. God's ways are as far from our ways, and His thoughts above our thoughts, as the heavens are above the earth. Isa. lv. 9. Righteousness touches the heart; but the law of man touches only the outward life. But an evil thought, hatred, lust, covetousness, etc., is a violation of the law of God. See Matt. v. 21-28.

A human law may (and always should) be an instrument of good, to keep men civil in deportment, to make them respect each other's rights, to preserve outward order and peace. But when it has done this, it has not produced righteousness. It has not touched the heart, producing peace and order there. It is not, like the law of God, "perfect, converting the soul." No individual has any power to convert another individual and make him righteous. Such power pertains to God alone.

Very properly, therefore, is the domain of religion, which pertains to righteousness, separated from the domain of human law; for it is thus separated by the decree of God, which is seen in its very nature, as compared with the nature of things human. The utmost that any man can have to do with the production of righteousness, or of an instrument of the same, is to yield himself unto God. Then he will become the instrument; and God, working through His law-manifesting the power His own life-will produce the righteousness.

"Studies in Romans. The Unspeakable Gift. Rom. viii. 29-32" The Present Truth 10, 52.

E. J. Waggoner

Our study this week is inseparably connected with that of last week. Only lack of space prevented the verses of each being studied together. The student, however, will read very thoughtfully the preceding verses before beginning this present study, thus preserving the connection. We have learned about our relation to God through the Spirit, and of the help which the Spirit gives us in prayer, as well as of the assurance that "all things work together for good to them that love God, to them that are called according to His purpose." The grounds for that assurance are infinitely strengthened in the verses that follow:-

"For whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren. Moreover, whom He did predestinate, them He also called; and whom He called, them He also justified; and whom He justified, them He also glorified. What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?" Rom. viii. 29-32.

QUESTIONING THE TEXT

How may we be sure that all things work together for good to them that love God, who are the called according to His purpose.

"For whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son."

Why did He predestinate them to be conformed to the image of His Son?

"That He might be the firstborn among many brethren."

What is said of those whom He thus predestined?

"Them He also called."

What of those whom He called?

"Them He also justified."

And what of those whom He justified?

"Them He also glorified."

What shall we then say to these things?

"If God be for us, who can be against us?"

What has God done, to show that He is for us?

"Spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all."

What then must necessarily follow?

That He must "with Him also freely give us all things."

FOREKNOWLEDGE AND FOREORDINATION

"For whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren." The word "predestinate" is the same as "foreordain," which is found in the Revised Version. Volumes of speculation have been written about these terms, but a few words are sufficient to set forth the facts. With respect to these, as well as the other attributes of God, it is sufficient for us to know the fact. With the explanation we have nothing to do.

That God knows all things, is plainly set forth in the Scriptures. Not only does He know the things that are past, but He sees the future as well. "Known unto God are all His works from the beginning of the world." Acts 1xv. 18. "O Lord, thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising; thou understandest my thought afar off." Ps. cxxxix. 1, 2. Thus God can tell what people even yet unborn will do and say.

This does not make God responsible for the evil that they do. Some have foolishly thought it necessary to apologise for the Lord and to relieve Him of the charge that if He is omniscient He is responsible for the evil if He does not prevent it, by saying that He could know if He wished, but that He chooses not to know many things. Such a "defence" of God is both foolish and wicked. It assumes that God would be responsible for the evil if He knew it beforehand and did not prevent it, and that in order not to be in a position to prevent it, He deliberately shuts his eyes from it. Thus their "defence" really puts the responsibility for all evil upon God. Not only so, but it limits Him. It makes Him like a man.

God knows all things, not by study and research as man learns the little he knows, but because He is God.

819

He inhabits eternity. Isa. lvii. 15. We cannot understand how this can be any more than we can understand eternity. We must accept the fact and be not only content, but glad, that God is greater than we. All time, past, present, and future, is the same to Him. It is always "now" with God.

The fact that God knew the evil that men would do, even before the foundation of the world, does not make Him responsible for it, any more than the fact that a man can see by means of a telescope what a man is doing ten miles distant makes Him responsible for that other one's actions. God has from the beginning set before people warnings against sin, and has provided them with all the necessary means for avoiding it; but He cannot interfere with man's right and freedom of choice without depriving him of his manhood and making him the same as a stick.

Freedom to do right implies freedom to do wrong. If a man were made so that he could not do wrong, he would have no freedom at all, not even to do right. He would be less than the brutes. There is no virtue in forced obedience, nor would there be any virtue in doing that which is right if it were impossible to do wrong. Moreover, there could be no pleasure or satisfaction in the professed friendship of two persons if one associated with the other just because he could not avoid it. The joy of the Lord in the companionship of his people is that they of their own free-will choose him above all others. And that which is the joy of the Lord is the joy of his people.

The very ones who rail against God for not preventing the ills that He foresees since He is all-powerful, would be the very first to charge Him with cruelty if he did arbitrarily interfere with their freedom and make them do that which they do not choose. Such a course would make everybody unhappy and discontented. The wisest thing for us to do is to stop trying to fathom the ways of the Almighty, and accept the fact that whatever he does is right. "As for God, His way is perfect." Ps. xviii. 30.

WHAT ABOUT PREDESTINATION?

The text shows that "whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren." God's thoughts toward men are thoughts of peace, and not of evil. Jer. xxix. 11. He ordains peace for us. Isa. xxvi. 12. We read nothing about men being foreordained to destruction; the only thing that God has predestinated is that men should be conformed to the image of His Son.

But it is only in Christ that we become conformed to His image. It is in Him that we come "unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." Eph. iv. 13. Therefore it is that men are foreordained or predestinated only in Christ. The whole story is told in the following passage of Scripture:-

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ; according as He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love; having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good-pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved."

Everything is in Christ. We receive all spiritual blessings in Him; we are chosen in Him unto holiness; in Him we are predestinated unto the adoption of children; in Him we are accepted; and in Him we have redemption through His blood. "God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Thess. v. 9.

That is God's purpose and foreordination concerning man. Still further, "whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son." Whom did He foreknow? There can be no limit; He must have foreknown all. If there were any exception, then God would not be infinite in knowledge. If He foreknows one person, then He foreknows every person. There has not been a person born into the world whose birth God did not foreknow. "Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in His sight; but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." Therefore, since every person has been known to God even before the foundation of the world, and those whom He foreknew He predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son, it follows that God has purposed salvation for every soul that has ever come into the world. His love embraces all, without respect of persons.

"Then everybody will be saved, no matter what He does," some one will say. Not by any means. Remember that the purpose of God is in Christ. It is only in Him that we are predestinated. And we are free to choose for ourselves whether we will accept Him or not. Man's will has been forever set free, and God Himself will not presume to interfere with it. He holds sacred the choice and will of each individual. He will not carry out His own purpose contrary to man's will. His will is to give man whatever man decides will best please Him. So he sets before man life and death, good and evil, and tells him to choose which he will have. God knows what is best, and has chosen and prepared that for man. He has gone so far as to fix it beyond all possibility of failure, that man shall have that good thing if he chooses it. But the wonderful kindness and courteousness of the great God is seen in this, that He defers in everything to man's wishes. If man, in his turn, will but defer to God's wishes, there will be the most delightful and loving companionship between them.

CALLED, JUSTIFIED, GLORIFIED

"Moreover, whom He did predestinate, them He also called; and whom He called, them He also justified; and whom He justified, them be also glorified." This is completed action. We need not stumble over it, if we will but remember that everything is in Christ. In Christ we have already been blessed with all spiritual blessings. All men are called to that which God has prepared for them, but none are "the called according to His purpose" unless they have made their calling and election sure by submitting to His will. Such ones are predestinated to be saved. Nothing in the universe can hinder the salvation of any soul that accepts and trusts the Lord Jesus Christ.

And all such are justified. The death of Christ reconciles us to God. "He is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world." 1 John ii. 2. His death has secured pardon and life for all. Nothing can keep them from salvation except their own perverse will. Men must take themselves out of the hand of God, in order to be lost. Much more, then, those who accept the sacrifice, are justified. "God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through

820

Him. For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son; much more being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life."

"And whom He justified, them He also glorified." Have we not read in the prayer of Christ for His disciples, not only for those who were with Him in the garden, but also for all them that should believe on Him through their word and therefore for us, "The glory which Thou gavest me, I have given them"? Peter said that he was a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed. God has left nothing undone. Everything that Christ has we have if we accept Him. All that remains is that it should be revealed. "The earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God." When God asks concerning His people, "What could have been done more to My vineyard, that I have not done in it?" who shall presume to say that there is something that he has overlooked?

ALL THINGS OURS

But we have anticipated the apostle. Hear him: "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? If God be for us, who can be against us? He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?"

How shall He not? That is, How can He avoid giving us all things? In giving Christ for and to us, God could not do otherwise than give us all things, "for in Him were all things created, in the heavens and upon the earth, things visible and things invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things have been created through Him, and unto Him; and He is before all things, and in Him all things consist." Col. i. 16, 17.

"Therefore let no man glory in men. For all things are yours; whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours; and ye are Christ's; and Christ is God's." 1 Cor. iii. 21-23. This, then, answers the question, "Who can be against us?" Everything is for us. "All things are for your sakes." 2 Cor. iv. 15.

A general once telegraphed to the seat of government, "We have met the enemy, and they are ours." This is what every child of God is privileged to say. "Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Cor. xv. 57. "This is the victory that hath overcome the world, even our faith." 1 John v. 4. This is what makes us know that all things work together for good to them that love God. No matter how dark and forbidding the things may seem, if we are in Christ, they are for us, and not against us.

"'His Holiness'" The Present Truth 10, 52.

E. J. Waggoner

The Pope is designated, throughout the religious world, Protestant and Catholic alike, by the adulatory title, "His Holiness." How well the designation befits him may be seen by a reference to the apostle of whom he claims to be the successor. Upon this claim his pretensions to super-human sanctity and authority rests. Peter, as any reader of Scripture knows, was never addressed by such a title as the above. But Peter at one time had the spirit of the Papacy in his heart,-the spirit of self-exaltation. All the disciples had it; for they disputed among themselves which should be the greatest. And that contest, happily abandoned by them, was afterwards revived in the Church and finally settled in favour of the Bishop of Rome. Since that time he-as Pope-has been the "greatest," claiming authority and power superior to all his fellows, and making himself God on earth.

At that time when Peter possessed this spirit, the Saviour addressed him by a peculiar but not a flattering title. Jesus had been telling His disciples "how that He must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day. Then Peter took Him, and began to rebuke Him, saying, Be it far from Thee, Lord; this shall not be unto Thee." Matt. xvi. 21, 22. What prompted Peter to do this? The reason is plain; he wanted his Master to set up a glorious earthly kingdom, where he himself would be given an exalted place. His selfish mind may have pictured a position of splendour and power not unlike that occupied by his pretended successors in the Papacy's palmy days. The idea that Christ was to be put to death rudely dispelled this pleasing vision, and Peter set himself against it, as if by his opposition he might turn the course of the events in another way.

But Jesus "turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind Me, Satan; thou art an offence unto Me; for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men." The pretended successor of Peter, animated by the same spirit, only more fully developed, which Peter then had, has the same claim to the title "His Holiness" that the unconverted disciple had, and no more.

"The Kingdom of Babylon" The Present Truth 10, 52.

E. J. Waggoner

"Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldee's excellency." Isa. xiii. 19.

At the time when the book of Daniel opens, the Jewish nation was subject to the Babylonians, and many of the Jews were in Babylon. A few years before (about 610 B.C.), the king of Egypt had deposed Jehoahaz, king of Judah, and placed Eliakim, whom he named Jehoiakim, on the throne. 2 Chron. xxvi. 2-4. In the third year of his reign (Dan. i. 1) Nebuchadnezzar came to Jerusalem and besieged it. The city was taken, Jehoiakim was bound with fetters, and some of the vessels of the house of God were carried to Babylon. Some of the people, also, among whom were Daniel and his fellows, were carried to Babylon at this time.

Jehoiakim, however, was allowed to remain in Jerusalem, where he reigned eight years longer. He was then succeeded by Jehoiachin, his son, who, after a reign of three months, was taken by Nebuchadnezzar to Babylon. With him were also taken all the royal family, the wealthy people, and artisans, so that only the poorest people of the land were left in Judah. This was about B.C. 599. Nebuchadnezzar then placed Mattaniah on the throne of Judah, and changed his name to Zedekiah. After a few years' reign Zedekiah rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar, who again came to Jerusalem, and in the eleventh year of Zedekiah's reign (about B.C. 538) he succeeded in capturing the city. Zedekiah was carried to Babylon, and with him all the people who had before been left, and the walls and palaces of Jerusalem were burned to the ground. 2 Chron. xxxvi. 11-21. This fulfilled the prophecy of Jeremiah (chap. xvii. 27), and completed the overthrow of the Jewish nation.

It will be well to notice at this point the fulfilment of a prophecy concerning Zedekiah. The prophet Ezekiel, who was then in Babylon, was directed to bring his stuff out of his house, in the day-time, in the presence of the people, and to dig through the wall and carry this stuff through at evening, and cover his face at the same time, so that he should not see the ground. Eze. xii. 3-6. Then he was directed to say to the people of Israel:-

"I am your sign; like as I have done, so shall it be done unto them; they shall remove and go into captivity. And the prince that is among them shall bear upon his shoulder in the twilight, and shall go forth; they shall dig through the wall to carry out thereby; he shall cover his face, that he see not the ground with his eyes. My net also will I spread upon him, and he shall be taken in my snare; and I will bring him to Babylon to the land of the Chaldeans; yet shall he not see it, though he shall die there." Eze. xii. 11-13.

About 589 B.C., Nebuchadnezzar came to Jerusalem and besieged it. For nearly two years the siege was carried on, until "the famine prevailed in the city, and there was no bread for the people of the land. And the city was broken up, and all the men of war fled by night by the way of the gate between two walls, which is by the king's garden; (now the Chaldees were against the city round about); and the king went the way toward the plain. And the army of the Chaldees pursued after the king, and overtook him in the plains of Jericho; and all his army were scattered from him. So they took the king, and brought him up to the king of Babylon to Riblah; and they gave judgment upon him. And they slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and put out the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him with fetters of brass, and carried him to Babylon." 2 Kings xxv. 3-7. Thus was Ezekiel's prophecy literally fulfilled, and Jerusalem was left in ruins.

Among the Jews who were carried to Babylon at the first siege of Jerusalem, was Daniel, who was of the royal line. He and his fellows were chosen to go through a three years' course of study and training, in order that they might be fitted to fill offices of trust in the Babylonian kingdom. They were chosen because of their superior mental abilities; and so rapidly did they improve that at the end of the three years, when they went before Nebuchadnezzar to be examined, "in all matters of wisdom and understanding, that the king inquired of them, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and astrologers that were in all his realm." Dan. i. 20. God had given "knowledge and skill in all learning and wisdom" to these faithful servants of His, "and Daniel had understanding in all visions and dreams."

In the second year of Nebuchadnezzar's reign as sole ruler of Babylon, but the fourth year after he had begun to reign conjointly with his father, he dreamed a dream which troubled him greatly, and the more so because he could not remember what it was. He sent for the magicians, astrologers, and sorcerers, and demanded of them that they should tell him the dream. They replied: "O king, live for ever; tell thy servants the dream, and we will show the interpretation." But Nebuchadnezzar could not tell the dream, any more than they could tell the interpretation without the dream, and after parleying with them for a while, he ordered that all the wise men of Babylon should be destroyed.

Although Daniel was not among those to whom the king had applied for an interpretation of his dream, the command was to destroy all the wise men of Babylon, and so it included him and his companions. It seems that the first intimation Daniel had of the whole affair was when the officers came to take him to the place of execution. He immediately went to the king and asked for a little time, promising that he would tell the dream and the interpretation.

Daniel did not use the respite granted to him in incantations, as the

822

magicians would have done, but went to his house, and, with his three companions, prayed to the God of Heaven. "Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in a night vision. Then Daniel blessed the God of Heaven. Daniel answered and said, Blessed be the name of God for ever and ever; for wisdom and might are His; and He changeth the times and the seasons; He removeth kings, and setteth up kings; He giveth wisdom unto the wise, and knowledge to them that know understanding; He revealeth the deep and secret things; He knoweth what is in the darkness, and the light dwelleth with Him. I thank Thee, and praise Thee, O thou God of my fathers, who hast given me wisdom and might, and hast made known unto me now what we desired of Thee; for Thou hast now made known unto us the king's matter." Dan. ii. 19-23.

In this action of Daniel's we have an example of true faith in God. As soon as the secret was revealed to him in the night vision, he began to praise the Lord. He did not wait to see if the king would recognise what had been revealed to him, as being his dream, but was positive that the Lord had given him just what he asked for. He evidently acted in accordance with the words of the Saviour: "What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them." Mark xi. 24. If this injunction were followed by all those who seek the Lord, how much praise there would be to God for blessings conferred.

It was a trying occasion when Daniel went before the king to make known to him his forgotten dream, and one well calculated to cause a young man to tremble. If he failed, one word from the haughty monarch, who had once been disappointed, and who now believed that all his professedly wise men were knaves, would have cost him his head. But we may be sure that Daniel did not tremble, because he knew that he should not fail. He modestly disclaimed the possession of any natural wisdom more than other men, and said: "The secret which the king hath demanded cannot the wise men, the astrologers, the magicians, the soothsayers, show unto the king; but there is a God in heaven that revealeth secrets, and maketh known to the king Nebuchadnezzar what shall be in the latter days." Dan. ii. 27, 28.

Then without any hesitation he proceeded to tell the dream. Said he:-

"Thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image. This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee; and the form thereof was terrible. This image's head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay. Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces. Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshingfloors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them; and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth." Dan. ii. 31-35.

These verses contain in outline the history of the world from the days of Nebuchadnezzar until the end of time. Immediately after relating the dream, the prophet addressed the king as follows: "Thou, O king, art a king of kings; for the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory. And wheresoever the children of men dwell, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the heaven hath He given into thine hand, and hath made thee ruler over them all. Thou art this head of gold." Verses 37, 38.

[For a brief historical sketch of the kingdom of Babylon, and the glory of Nebuchadnezzar's reign, we shall have to wait until next week.]

"Choosing a Guide" The Present Truth 10, 52.

E. J. Waggoner

Choosing a Guide.-"I say, hold fast by your Prayer Book, and do your duty. . . . That Prayer Book I have been studying all my life, and I study it still. Let it be the guide-book." This was the reply of a venerable Archdeacon of the Church of England, to the question, "What would you have the young clergyman take as his guide?" No wonder that Rome is making such headway in England; for when a human production,

823

no matter how good, is taken as the guide-book, thus displacing the word of God, the Papacy is the inevitable result. "Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed thereto, according to Thy word." "Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against Thee." Ps. cxix. 9, 11.

"Desperately Wicked" The Present Truth 10, 52.

E. J. Waggoner

Quite likely we should be offended and shocked if any of our friends were to tell us that we were desperately wicked persons, or if someone should represent us as such to the public. We know some people who are wicked,-perhaps some of whom we consider desperately wicked; and we have read of such persons in history and in the accounts of crime which fill the columns of the newspapers; and we would not wish to be classed with them. We belong to the "respectable" class of people,-that class who are not just as good as they might be, but who do not do anything very bad. It would certainly be a gross libel to point us out as desperately wicked.

Would it? Let us look up this matter a little. The Lord has said something on the point, and He does not libel people, but tells every one the exact truth. We turn to the book of Jeremiah and read, "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked." Jer. xvii. 9. Whose heart is it? Ah, there are no particular persons specified in the statement; its application is general; it means your heart and mine. Neither does it say the heart may become deceitful and desperately wicked, but is so. There is no getting around it; the Lord says our hearts are deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. No matter about our respectability and standing in society; if the human heart rules within us, we are desperately wicked. And it is only because our hearts are so deceitful that we do not realise the fact. Yes; there is murder there; there is adultery, there is theft, there is blasphemy, there is that dreadful crime which shocked us as we read it in the paper, and which sent a man to the gallows; there is everything of which lawless men are guilty, and which is contrary to the ten commandments. The Lord says so; for He says, "The carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." Rom. viii. 7.

To how much of the law of God is the carnal mind not subject? Can it be subject to part of that law, and not subject to the remaining part? Certainly that could not be. The heart must either be subject to the law in its entirety, or not subject to it; and the carnal heart, as the text declares, "is not subject to the law of God." This carnal nature is the nature we get by birth, and this nature we must retain, no matter what our station and occupation among men, until we allow the Lord to transform our hearts by the power of His grace. And therefore every person in whom this natural, or carnal, heart exists is at enmity with every precept of the Divine law. He is not only at enmity with the command which says, "Thou shalt not covet,"-as very respectable persons can be-but he is also not in harmony with those commands which say, "Thou shalt not kill," and "Thou shalt not commit adultery." He may not feel the enmity stirring him up to commit some shocking deed; but nevertheless, it is there.

Do we know, even the best of us, what is in our hearts? How often do circumstances discover there evils of which we do not dream! Let our natures become suddenly ruffled, and words and deeds spring forth which cause us surprise and shame. Men do not start out in life to become murderers or adulterers or embezzlers. Such ones would be horrified if told at the outset to what the developments of later years would bring them. Their nature was the same as ours: yet the evil deeds were there.

There is no use denying what the Lord tells us. If mere "respectability" could decide the question the devil would have the advantage of us, for he is "transformed into an angel of light" (2 Cor. xi. 14), which power we do not possess. None of us can compete with the devil in point of a good appearance. The Lord sees us just as we are, and the sooner we see ourselves as He sees us, the better. When we become convinced that we are really desperately wicked, we shall see the necessity of getting rid of our inherited natures altogether, instead of trying to make them presentable to God by some efforts at patching up. We shall be ready to accept the new heart and new nature which God gives us on condition of perfect submission to Him, even the nature of Jesus Christ, who dwells in the heart by faith.

We shall see also that the apostle told the truth when he said, "Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest; for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things." Rom. ii. 1. The germs which developed (and so suddenly) into the evil deeds which we condemn in others, are in our own natural hearts, in the enmity which such hearts have to the law of God. When we have the nature of Christ, we shall be on this point as Michael the Archangel, who against Satan himself would not bring a railing accusation. Jude 9. It is for us to choose between a nature that is desperately wicked, and one that is infinitely good.

"News of the Week" The Present Truth 10, 52.

E. J. Waggoner

-The Bulgarian ministry has resigned.

-M. Brisson has been elected President of the French Chamber of Deputies.

-It is reported that a movement is on foot for the entrance of Servia into the Triple Alliance.

-Tamatave, a seaport in Madagascar, has been occupied by the French almost without fighting.

-A telegram from Apia, Samoa, dated Dec. 8, announces the death of Robert Louis Stevenson, the novelist, from apoplexy.

-Dec. 16 an Italian torpedo boat ran aground near Brindisi. The crew were saved, but the boat is considered a total loss.

-A Bill imposing a tax on the unimproved value of land has been passed by the Legislative Assembly of Victoria, after an all-night sitting.

-The Bluefields difficulty which has for some time engaged the attention of England and the United States, is now thought to he practically ended by the action of the Mosquitos, who have formally incorporated their reserve with Nicaragua.

-The front pages of all the Russian journals still appear with mourning borders. They will continue to do so for twelve months from the date of the late Czar's death.

-It is reported that there is increasing excitement amongst the Russian Armenians concerning the outrage in Sassoun, and that frequent encounters take place between the Turkish and Armenian villagers.

-England, France, and Russia have notified the Porte of the appointment of delegates to ac-company the Turkish Commission of Inquiry which will probably hold its sittings at Moosh. Germany and Austria still hold aloof.

-The sudden prorogation of the Italian Parliament has created in Italy a profound and unfavourable impression. Signor Giolitti and another Deputy will be prosecuted for forgery in connection with the Sancta Romana scandals.

-The war in the East still goes on, the fighting being now mainly in Manchuria. The Japanese continue to be uniformly successful. Elaborate preparations are being made for the detente of Pekin, under the supervision of European officers.

-Large match factories at Milan, Turin, Moncaliori, Rimini and Udine, have been closed in consequence of the announcement that a fresh tax would be placed on matches, and thousands of workmen have thus been thrown out of employment.

-A new automatic hanging apparatus has just been, successfully tried in Connecticut, U.S.A., doing away with the disagreeable office of hangman. The clergy however have condemned it on the ground that it makes the criminal his own executioner, which amounts to suicide.

-The application of the Public Prosecutor to take criminal proceedings against Herr Liebkneckt and other Socialist Deputies for not rising to cheer the Emperor was supported in the German Reichstag by the Chancellor Prince Hohenlohe, and after discussion was rejected by 108 votes to 58.

-Berlin newspapers report an extraordinary case of wholesale poisoning at Freiberg, in Saxony. No fewer than 150 persons have been taken seriously ill through eating breakfast rolls obtained from a certain bakery in the town, and a child has already died. The authorities have instituted an inquiry into the matter.

-Reports of rich mineral discoveries in Matabeleland continue. The latest discovery has been made on the banks of the Lebangwe River, a tributary of the Zambesi, where there have been found large copper deposits, indications of diamond-bearing ground, and enormous coal beds. Twenty seams were exposed, varying in thickness from nine inches to four feet.

-From official statements just published in the Sibirski Vesinik, it appears that only 45,000 emigrants from Russia arrived in Siberia during the present year. As the figures of last year were reported at 70,000, and those of 1892 at 60,000. It would seem that emigration to Siberia does not present a rosy prospect to the peasants, oven of the most congested districts of European Russia. Most of the emigrants come from the central provinces of Kursk, Poltava and Chernigor.

-The mercantile marine of France is on the decline. It fell from 9,704,191 tons in 1891 to 8,382,311 tons in 1893, a loss of 13.6 per cent., but if from this be deducted the tonnage of the subsidised lines, whose ships are obliged to come and go without regard to cargo, the diminution is 16.5 per cent. This year the decadence has still continued. Compared with 1891, the loss is 17 per cent. The decrease is principally with respect to European countries and the Mediterranean. In one year more than one-fourth of the tonnage engaged in navigating to these places has passed away from the French flag.

-A despatch from Buenos Ayres, dated Nov. 22, gives the following particulars of a severe earthquake recently experienced in Argentina. "Advices received at San Juau from Inglesias report that earthquake shocks were frequent, and that nothing was left standing, all the buildings being in a mass of ruins. While the shocks lasted, a water of black colour rushed up through cracks in the ground. The Agna Negra mountain, in the vicinity of Cruz de Piedra and San Roque, split right in two from summit to base, and quantities of earth and pebbles were projected into the air. In Cumillengo and Potreres de Tueuman the ground had opened, and volumes of water continued to be thrown up. On the road from Jachal to San Juan there was one large crack it the ground over three miles in length."

"Back Page" The Present Truth 10, 52.

E. J. Waggoner

Fresh outrages are reported from Armenia. A score or more of additional villages have been burned, and the people scattered or murdered.

The gambling season is at its height in Monaco, and Reuter's agency reports that the frequent suicides are causing a painful impression among the visitors and townspeople.

The Catholic Review rejoices at the evidences of the "failure of the Reformation." "First and most striking," it says, "is the fact of the disposition generally manifested among Protestants to take the back track, and even to claim the hitherto obnoxious title of Catholic."

Jesus said, "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." It was not merely as a teacher and healer that Jesus worked, but for many years He laboured as a carpenter. Even in that He was revealing the character of the Father to men. Whoever therefore is ashamed to labour would be ashamed of the company of God the Father and of the Lord Jesus Christ.

The young Czar seems bent on making changes. He proposes doing away with the secret police who, to the number of 1,000, have been guarding the Imperial family. He also contemplates adopting the Gregorian calendar, which would bring the Russian calendar into harmony with the rest of the world. The Russian year now begins twelve days later than our own.

The Stundists, or Russian Baptists, have been declared to be one of the most harmful sects in Russia. A motion to this effect was brought forward in 1873, but the new sect had not been sufficiently watched, and it was not till July 4, 1894, that the report of the Ecclesiastical Department and the Ministry of Internal Affairs received Imperial confirmation. It is declared that the Stundists are undermining the root and foundations of the true "orthodox" faith and of Russian nationalism. The principle grounds for this declaration seem to be the fact that the Stundists reject all church ceremonies and sacraments, and do not believe in war.

The Japanese are probably no vainer than other men, but they excel in the childish simplicity with which they exhibit the national conceit. Count Okuma, the leader of the Progressionist party recently declared that the European powers are in a decline, and their place, said he, "will be taken by our descendants." Bishop Ninde, of Japan, says that such talk reflects the sober sentiments of the great body of intelligent Japanese.

"It is natural enough," says a contemporary, "for every one to demand his own right; but it is Christianity that teaches us to recognise the rights of others." This is true; but Christianity goes further still-it teaches us to yield our own rights, and give them up. The only rights which the Christian is bound to maintain are the Divine rights of the Lord Jesus Christ. He has the right to claim our service in obedience to His word, and these rights the Christian never can yield without yielding up His Lord.

Work is not a curse, but a blessing. Labour was appointed to man in Eden. The only thing connected with labour that came with sin, is weariness. Weariness, not labour, is a part of the curse. So when man is redeemed and restored to the earth made new "they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; they shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them." They "shall enjoy the work of their hands." Amos ix. 13-15; Isa. lxv. 17-22. The inhabitants of the world to come will all be workingmen.

The commandment "Honour thy father and thy mother," is too often thought to be limited to children, and to require simply that they render obedience while their parents are living. But it should be remembered that the commandment says, "honour," and not "obey." It includes obedience, and much more. A man grown may bring dishonour upon his parents. The commandment requires that such a course be pursued as will honour them. A man of integrity and uprightness reflects honour upon his parents. Through him, people who never saw them will respect them. So though a man's parents be dead, and he himself live to be fourscore years old, there is never a moment in his life when the fifth commandment does not apply to him.

Outside of the truth, there is nothing but error. Therefore when people reject the truth, there is no limit to the wickedness they may commit. They have nothing to hold them back. The Jewish priests were the religious leaders of the people, the patterns of virtue; yet when they had rejected Christ,-the Truth,-they persecuted Him to the death. And not content with seeking His life, they sought to kill Lazarus, whom Jesus raised from the dead, in order that they might destroy the evidence of His power. Yet even while applauding the death of the innocent, they doubtless would have indignantly spurned the suggestion that they were murderers. They thought that their course was justified by the needs of their country. Sin has a terribly blinding power.

"Pitched toward Sodom" The Present Truth 10, 52.

E. J. Waggoner

Pitched toward Sodom.-We read that Lot journeyed eastward over the fertile plain of Jordan, and "pitched his tent toward Sodom." Lot was not a wicked man, but he was attracted by the sight of worldly riches. He did not by this confess, as did Abraham, that he was a stranger and a pilgrim on the earth, looking for a better country, that is, an heavenly. And there are many to-day who are taking the same course. Is your time and strength being spent to gain the wealth of earth? Is that the object of your best endeavours? Beware; your tent is pitched toward Sodom, and do not flatter yourself that the history of that bad choice will not be repeated if you persist. For the world, with all that is of it, is reserved by the word of God unto a fate precisely such as that which overtook Sodom and Gomorrah. The only wise choice now, as then, is to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, trusting Him to add unto you all such temporal things as your best good requires.