appearance of intellectual life.

66

"These crudities and extravagances," say they, are not what we come to the house of God for. Empty buckets, forever going into the well and fetching nothing up, do not meet our case. Whatever interest we may have in religious discussions, our time is valuable; nor do we wish to put ourselves too much under the influence of such an intellectual standard, avoiding weak preachers just as we do weak books, lest our own standard of style and thought should be unconsciously lowered." Thus it is that some of the best minds, in search of a high culture, though doubtful respecting the Christian faith, are repelled till they quit the church to go where their minds shall at least get some sort of nutriment. Men thus repelled fall an easy prey to the higher forms of infidelity. They often become leading propagators of religious error. Or if kept from this by some absorbing pursuit, their withdrawal from Christian relations tells against the truth, and serves to point the sneer of the open opposer. We are not to be servile imitators of those who triumphed in a past age. Very likely the style of preaching which prevailed then would be unsuited to the present times. We, How the exwhom Christ is now calling to give the gospel be met.

Leading infi

dels.

igency is to

to men, should serve our own age as the faithful of other days served theirs. We need to be like them chiefly in knowing the habits of mind, the literature, the science, the theology amidst which we live; need to understand the present spirit and tone of all thinking, and catch the enthusiasm of our great forerunners, so as to meet error effectually and wield the truth with power. Therefore, beyond any collateral good which he may seek to accom

plish, the preacher should strive to make men respect him in his sacred office. The overshadowing fact in his ministry should be, not that he is active in the charities and philanthropies of his time, but that he brings home to men's hearts, with an honest strength which they cannot resist, the gospel of the Son of God. This must be his grand business, and no popular demand must hinder him from consecrating to it all his energies. Pastors of churches can show their sympathy with reforms without becoming pack-horses for all the societies which propose to aid or relieve somebody or something. They can show a tender interest in every parishioner, a good will towards the public enterprises of the day, love for their friends, a kind regard for the sick, the sorrowing, the poor of the outlying districts, without becoming ministerial vagabonds. Let some one else do the canvassing for needy colleges and theological schools, for churches unable to pay their debts, and mission societies whose treasuries are empty. It is not reason, said the apostles at the time of Pentecost, that Christ's ministers should leave the word of God, and serve tables. Deacons are appointed to the offices of parochial charity - a fact which must be emphasized, and made to cover as much ground as possible, or what chance can ministers have, in an age of great mental activity, to magnify their calling? They should be free to act upon their own deep conviction that they are nothing while they are not preachers of the gospel. This is the necessity which the Spirit, if he ever called them to their work, laid on them at the beginning. And woe unto them if they preach not the gospel; if they do not so preach it as to make it respected; so as to silence the

gainsayer; so as to hold sturdy thinkers firmly to the truth, giving them no occasion to wander from it, till they shall be convinced that it is the only bread which they can eat and never hunger.

The spirit

of Christ in

bis people

Our main

4. In the fourth place, Christ's followers may do much to prevent the rise and spread of infidelity, by proving to men that their discipleship reliance. is not prompted by selfishness or self-seeking, but is purely a filling up of the blessed ministry to others which Christ began. Let it appear to the unbelieving that we are in nothing their beneficiaries, but in all things their benefactors. Christ said, “I am among you as one that serveth;" and again, “I came not to be ministered unto, but to minister." God reigns over the universe because he is love; it is being the servant of all, as no other can be, that makes him Lord of all. In such royal and godlike service, according to the capacity given us, is the hiding of our strength-the main secret of any ability we may hope for to make the truth mightier than error. "Do good, hoping for nothing again," is the sublime precept, "and ye shall be like your Father in heaven."

Duty of ministers.

As regards the ministry, though we who preach the gospel may live of the gospel, yet we should, like Paul, suffer loss rather than have our glorying made void. We should preach as debtors to all men, and not as those who look for a reward. It should be our boast that we have no hire but souls; that the slight provision which we receive for present needs is not of the nature of pay, so much as an expression of gratitude on the part of those who contribute it; that our entire ministry is a witness to all men that we seek not theirs, but them. If left to

suffer for this world's comforts, it is better to remember Him who had not where to lay his head, the Good Shepherd who gave his life for the sheep, than to be suspected of any mercenary motive. When those who reap our spiritual things do not let us reap their temporal things, it is wiser to rebuke them manfully, or depart out of their city shaking the dust from our feet, if the privation can be no longer endured, than to be all the time breathing a spirit of complaint. That brooding discontent, if indulged, will gradually infect our whole ministry; and then the power and glory of our office will be gone. Rather than sink down into this state of mind, than have the sense of unrequited service grow to be a chronic disease, it would become us, like Christ and the apostles if need be, not to enter on our ministry till we have made provision for our temporal support; to be able to cultivate a farm, deliver lectures, practise some handicraft, or have other means of supplying our few temporal wants, which shall stand us in stead when they that are taught forget to "communicate with" him that teacheth. It becomes the ministers of Christ to avoid, in all possible ways, the imputation that they are hirelings; that their pastorates are simply their "livings;" that they follow their profession, just as all worldly men labor, for the sake of temporal wages. They must compel men to own that their ministry is indeed a discipleship of Him who, though rich, became poor that others through his poverty might be rich; that it is peculiarly and sublimely a labor of love; that this is its distinctive trait, wherein no other calling or pursuit, in all the world, can be compared with it.

But this devotion on the part of those who preach the

gospel is not enough. It may be made weak through the unfaithfulness of the great body of church-members. There have been ministers remarkable for their The whole

church must

spirit of self-sacrifice in every age. Their co-operate. spirit of devotion was shorn of its power, however, because it was seen to be an exception to the general life of the church. Whatever is exceptional, among persons of the same class and profession, is apt to be regarded as abnormal. The average life of the whole body is taken as the index of its real spirit. On this ground it is that infidels ascribe the zeal of such Christians as Henry Martyn, David Brainerd, and Harlan Page, to religious fanaticism. They see in it, not a proof of the transforming power of the gospel, but a sign of mental disorder. On the same ground the martyr-spirit of the apostles is attributed to natural enthusiasm, awakened by the undue excitement of the religious imagination, and the life and death of Christ are said only to prove that he was the greatest of religious enthusiasts. This objection can be. effectually answered only by a spirit of devotion pervading the church. There is a supernatural element in the Christian life, a love of sacrifice and self-denial in doing good,

causes.

which cannot be accounted for by mere natural But this element must appear in the great body of Christians, thus forcing men to see that it is in no case abnormal or exceptional, but a uniform result of faith in Christ Jesus, or the few good works which are done will not lead them to glorify our heavenly Father. There can be no question, reasoning from the nature of the human mind as well as from history, that when the laity and clergy are one in this thing, every mouth of the gainsayers