First to the temple door he made his way.

Through the aisles that hushed behind him, Bernol

came.

One moment at the pulpit steps he knelt

In silent prayer, and on his shoulder felt
The angel's hand: "The Master bids thee go
Alone to Spiran's huts, across the snow,

To serve Him there." Then Bernol's hidden face
Went white as death, and for about the space
Of ten slow heart-beats there was no reply;
Till Bernol looked around and whispered,
"Why?"

Within the humble house where Malvin spent
His studious years, on holy things intent,

Sweet stillness reigned; and there the angel found
The saintly sage immersed in thought profound.
"The One of whom thou thinkest bids thee go

Alone to Spiran's huts across the snow,

To serve Him there." With sorrow and surprise

Malvin looked up, reluctance in his eyes.

The broken thought, the strangeness of the call,

The perilous passage of the mountain wall,

The solitary journey, and the length

Of ways unknown, too great for his frail strength, Appalled him. With a doubtful brow

He scanned the doubtful task, and muttered,

"How?"

Now as he went, with fading hope, to seek
The third and last to whom God bade him speak,
Scarce twenty steps away whom should he meet
But Fermor, hurrying cheerful down the street,
With ready heart that faced his work like play,
And joyed to find it greater every day!

The angel stopt him with uplifted hand,

And gave without delay his Lord's command:

"He whom thou servest here would have thee go

Alone to Spiran's huts, across the snow,

To serve Him there." Ere Asmiel breathed again
The eager answer leapt to meet him,

"When?"

The angel's face with inward joy grew bright.
I have found the man who loves Him best.

Not thine, nor mine, to question or reply
When He commands us, asking "how?" or "why?"
He knows the cause; His ways are wise and just;
Who serves the King must serve with perfect trust.

PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY

"The man said, The woman thou gavest me to be with me, she gave me of the tree."

"The woman said, The serpent beguiled me. Gen. 3:12-13.

T

HE Bible is the great book of human

nature. More than any other book it is a book of living documents. There is photographed in the Scriptures every phase of human nature. We may live in a very different age and in a widely divergent civilization, but in the record in this book, that tells how Adam, when he had yielded to temptation and had eaten the forbidden fruit, undertook to shirk the responsibility of his own act by throwing it on his wife we recognize that he acted exactly as men are acting to-day. There are none of us who find him hard to understand. And when we see Eve, conscious of guilt and shamed by her sin, seeking to evade the force of an accusing conscience by laying it on Satan and his beguiling influence, she seems very

much like the women we have seen. When we turn further over into the records and see Pilate, when he has not the moral stamina to stand out against the men who are clamoring for the life of Jesus, bringing a basin of water into the court-room and washing his hands before the multitude, as if by that act he would wash away all of the stains of responsibility for his conduct as governor in connection with the crucifixion of Christ, we recognize him at a glance as one of the politicians with whom we have had to do.

Our theme is one of the greatest that has to do with our human life, our accountability and responsibility for our own conduct.

I

It is well for us to note in the study of this scene that we can not put the responsibility of our sin on God. How natural it seems to be to attempt it. See how Adam suggests this. "The woman, whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat!" You see the suggestion,

St.

"I was all right when I was alone. I kept away from the forbidden fruit and attended to my own business. If you had left me alone, this never would have happened. But you gave me this woman, and this is what comes of it." All this you read between the lines of this suggestion. And, indeed, you may see the same thing suggested in Eve's answer. "The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat." It is as tho she said, "If there had not been a Satan to tempt, I would not have fallen." But this is all folly. James says, "Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God; for God can not be tempted with evil, and he himself tempteth no man; but each man is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lust and enticed. Then the lust, when it hath conceived, beareth sin; and the sin, when it is full-grown, bringeth forth death.' We all know the strange readiness to feel that the situation in which God has placed us, or the disposition He has given to us, is in some way responsible for the wrong we do. But we can not abuse God's gift and then use that as an excuse for breaking His law. God pours forth His gifts upon us