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SERMON XX.

ANANIAS, AZARIAS, AND MISAEL.

SONG OF THE THREE CHILDREN, 66.

'0 Ananias, Azarias, and Misael, bless ye the Lord: praise Him, and magnify Him for ever.”

THE

HE three companions of the Prophet Daniel, Ananias, Azarias, and Misael, or, as Nebuchadnezzar called them, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, had much cause to bless God, praise Him, and magnify Him for ever. Their history, related in the third chapter of the Prophecies of Daniel, and brought to our minds whenever we sing the Canticle, Benedicite Omnia Opera, shall form our subject to-day.

There is in the minds of some people, when they hear this narrative read, with its quaint and obsolete language, and almost grotesque incidents, a feeling that it is too strange and marvellous to be accepted by an inquiring age as historical fact. It makes a pretty story for a child's picture-book, but it is rather too much to be swallowed by men. The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, referring

to this incident, tells us that it was faith which enabled the Three Children, as they are called, to quench the violence of fire." In our own

times want of faith has had the same result; for it has so effectually quenched the violence of the flames into which Ananias and his companions were cast, as to put them out altogether, and make men believe that they never existed at all. No doubt the miraculous events recorded in the Book of Daniel are different from most of those narrated in Holy Scripture; and it is not to be wondered at that this book should have been less generally received as a genuine part of the Bible than others. But it should be remembered, that if we once admit that the Almighty has upon certain occasions displayed His power in the conduct of human affairs, in a way which we call supernatural or miraculous, it is not for us to dictate in what manner He shall do so. All miracles are strange to our present experience: that some are stranger than others, is no proof that they never occurred. And it should also be remembered, that the circumstances amid which the Prophet Daniel lived prepare us to expect some unusual manifestations of God's power on behalf of His people. It was the time of the Babylonian Captivity, when Israel had sunk to the lowest pitch of degradation and misery, when the vine which God had brought out of Egypt seemed to be perished for ever, when the Temple

of the Lord was defiled by the occupation of the heathen, and Jerusalem had become an heap of stones. At such a time, the nation needed some strong proof that, in spite of their present humiliation, Jehovah was their God for ever and ever. And as at the first Exodus, the fainting spirits of the people, wearied with the greatness of their way in the wilderness, needed to be revived by the cleft rock and the flowing waters and the daily manna-so in this the second and sadder Exodus, the saints saved from the fire, and the prophet unharmed amid the lions, were meant to assure the remnant who had sat down beside the waters of Babylon, that deliverance was still in store for them, that God had not forgotten to be gracious, nor shut up His loving-kindness in displeasure.

But why should we stop to discuss the historical credibility of this chapter of Daniel? After all, it is not with this consideration that we are most concerned; and I for one should be sorry to call anyone hard names who should declare that, after thoughtful and unprejudiced examination, he could not accept the narrative as historical. For if these passages of the Old Testament Scriptures, read in the public Services of the Church, are 'lessons,' not only in the first sense of that word, as things to be read, but also in its secondary sense, as things from which there is something to be learnt, then surely

it is the moral that lies under them that we should endeavour to find and to draw out. The whole history of which we are speaking, true (as I believe) as fact, is, as to its teaching, a parable of things other than itself.

When, therefore, we hear of the tyrant who set up the golden image, and commanded the world to fall down and worship it, to the sound of all kinds of music, we are reminded that Nebuchadnezzar is not the only person by whom, neither is the Plain of Dura the only place in which, such an image has been set up, and such an edict issued. We have, doubtless, each one of us has in his own heart his little private image, which he worships all by himself-his ease or pleasure or vanity or interest: but besides these, there are idols which, like Nebuchadnezzar's image, command the common homage of many kinds and classes-the princes, the governors, the captains, the judges, the treasurers, the counsellors, the sheriffs, and all the rulers of the provinces, with all people, nations, and languages; and in honour of which young and old, high and low, rich and poor, combine to sound their great concert of applause-cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, dulcimer, and all kinds of music. There are many such idols in the world. I will mention as an illustration only one of them, one to which at all times a vast deal of undeserved homage is paid. I mean cleverness and sagacity, disconnected

from moral worth. The worship of intellect as such is doubtless a more elevated and refined idolatry than the worship of Mammon or the worship of Bacchus but still it is an idolatry. Mephistophiles, disguise him how you will, can never be an object which the Christian should reverence. Remember how entirely it is moral qualities, not intellectual, which the Gospel commands us to honour; moral excellence, which it bids us strive to attain. Look, for example, at the precepts given by S. Paul in a single chapter of his Epistle to the Ephesians. 'Putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour' this requires no readiness of wit, for it is a simpler thing to speak the truth than it is to tell a lie. 'Be ye angry, and sin not:' this calls for no clearness of head or perspicuity of judgement. Let him that stole steal no more :' to obey this does not require that a man should be interested in the march of intellect and the

progress of the age. 'Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth' this may be fulfilled at the least as well by the shy and awkward and hesitating and half-educated man, as by the fluent speaker or the eloquent writer or the adroit manager or the clever speculator. Be ye kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another :' here is no need of cool calculation or enlightened views or a liberal education; for the most commonplace father or mother in the cottage, or the dullest