66 ere their sorrow disappears, to join him in a humble approach to their justly offended God. Come, and let us return unto the Lord," says the prophet, "for He hath torn, and He will heal us; He hath smitten, and He will bind us up. After two days He will revive us in the third day He will raise us up, and we shall live in His sight." Nor is this all that Hosea is commissioned to promise. In the most simple, and yet the most beautiful language, he lays down the conditions and encouragements of true godliness. "Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord: His going forth is prepared as the morning." That which the prophet proposed to do for Israel twenty-six centuries ago, his words may also do for us this day. Many of us have been drawn to God by sorrow. Grief has opened a pathway for us when joy failed to win us by her smiles. But the measure of our spiritual knowledge is limited. We have not yet attained; neither are we already perfect. The devout purpose of following on to know the Lord will best be accomplished as we seek to charge our memories with the truths of God. Not simply seeking to apprehend those truths, but seeking to make them the staple of our thoughts. And yet, before we can rightly apprehend them, how much effort is necessary! How reluctant the mind is to address itself to the understanding of spiritual things! How general the habit of making that which should be a reason for gratitude, a ground of querulousness ! "This chapter is so familiar, or this promise so old, or this example so long remembered, as to be trite and commonplace." How general the thought that no practical use can be gained from a fuller acquaintance with the Scriptures, or that enough has been obtained for life and godliness! But unless there be a constant growth in our knowledge of God, of His character, of His purposes, of His warnings, and of His promises; unless especially there be an increase in our acquaintance with the things which are written concerning Jesus, the Son of God, we can no more expect to " grow in grace" than that a man can live on air. One single sentence from the lips of our blessed Lord sums up volumes on this subject "Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His blood, there is no life in you." : But something more is needed than the apprehension and belief of the truth. We must cultivate that holy love which alone will help us to read its mysteries. A devout soul, like the old patriarch's, is often surprised by the nearness of God; but devout feeling is very fickle and very variable. Now we seem bathed in a tenderness of spirit that helps us to interpret, as with the swiftness of an intuition, the pitifulness of God. Now patience has her perfect work wrought in us. Now love burns in our hearts. Now desire for the peace of God seems triumphant. But how often is it the opposite of all this! What dull, cloddish insensibility enchains us! What restlessness, what indifference, what gloom, what foreboding! Christians, if we would grow in grace, we must grow in heart. We must seek out the Saviour daily, hourly, till our hearts glow with the fire of His friendship; till He becomes something more than a memory or a name-a living Presence and a personal God. Our various needs are revealed to us in the wear and tear of ordinary life. Experience opens our hearts. Experience also opens to us the word of God. If we have never been afflicted, we have no right appreciation of the varied consolations of the Gospel. If we have never been tempted, our virtue is a cloistered virtue, and may suddenly disappear, like snow before the beams of the sun. Not that it is better to have been a prodigal and have repented, than never to have left our Father's house; but if in actual trial we have never felt our weakness, we know not that strange wonder of gladness—so deep, so full-of leaning upon the Everlasting arms. Affliction ripens hearts, while it ages heads. Promises, like stars, shine out with increasing brightness in the midnight of the soul. Indeed very much of God's word remains simply unintelligible, until sorrow has opened our eyes, and grief, like darkness, has quickened our sight. Even the character of our Father in heaven is only understood by degrees, and in the proportion in which our experience qualifies us to apprehend Him. Follow on to know the Lord, no matter what gigantic shadows may be flung over your path, or what unforeseen obstacles may oppose. The end is the highest that human mind can attain to, or that human heart can conceive. The eager eyes of the home-sick traveller peer through the mist and darkness which, for the moment, enshroud the land he has traversed many weary miles across the deep to seek. At first he discerns nothing but the dim cloud-like form of the white cliffs of old England resting on the horizon of dancing waters; and a passing vessel obscures even this imperfect prospect. But by-and-by the cloud assumes a tangible form. The outline of the shore next becomes visible; familiar objects appear along the coast; at length the vessel casts anchor in the desired haven, and in full sight of the wished-for shore. Is it not thus with us in our progress to a higher and better life? We see but dimly at first. Present objects impede even this imperfect glimpse of nobler things. But following on, will not faith turn to ecstatic sight, and hope to the fulness of fruition? “Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord.” But the prophet declares something more than the human condition of true godliness. We should standappalled at our task as hopeless if this were all he announced. Let us thank God that it does not appear alone; that in His unspeakable goodness and pity He has remembered that we are dust. Behold, then, how largely our feebleness is undergirded by divine strength. "His going forth is prepared as the morning." His readiness and ability to help us are even thus complete and abundant. Nothing is wanting that we may desire for ourselves; nothing is denied that in our actual warfare we may need. "As the morning." The morning is certain. No one doubts its return. It is a settled law of God. He made the light. He also made the darkness. Day is sure, however thick the present gloom. The stars will fade out, not because they cease to shine, but because a greater light than theirs shall fill the heavens. What certainty there is in this promise! There is no word to qualify it; no clause to suggest hesitation; no secret reserve of meaning to cast over its brightness the shadow of uncertainty. "His going forth is prepared, made ready, established, as the morning.' The Sun of Righteousness always shines in the heavens, however dark and damp the clouds which now enshroud us. But we have turned our backs upon Him, and have travelled westward. And if we thus flee from the light, the night will always be thick about us. Face his rising. Make ready for the first gleaming arrows of light above the hills, whether hills of holy thought or devout aspiration. Go forward. Follow on to know the Lord; and then, as certain as day follows night; as certain as the sunbeams shall yet kiss the chamber wherein through the dreary night the bed-ridden sufferer has longed for the dawn; as certain as the dark waters of the sea shall sparkle in the glory of sunrise beneath the eye of the watcher on the mast-so certainly shall God visit and bless those who devoutly seek Him. "For thus saith the Lord that created the heavens, I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth: I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain. I the Lord speak righteousness, and declare the things that are right." "And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear.' "As the morning." The morning is revealing. The black pall of night hides from us the most familiar objects, or drapes them with a terror all its own. We may stand within the range of richest landscapes, or before the frowning majesty of the boldest hills, or near the home of the dearest friends; but night hides all. When day dawns, how changed the scene! The hoary crest of the mountain reveals a rich covering of verdure and forest; the sombre fields rejoice in their emerald suits; the meadows are spread out before us "prankt with a thousand flowers,' or dappled with white sheep and richly-coloured kine; the homestead of our brother is near, and he himself stands ready to welcome us. It is thus with the Christian in "following on to know the Lord." How the darkness vanishes, as the morning steals upon it and melts it! How the very mountains of difficulty which overhung our path, and threatened our destruction, reveal gigantic stairs by which we may climb nearer to heaven! How common for celestial benedictions to assume the dark disguise of sorrow! How, on a fuller and completer acquaintance, even the frowning commandments prove to be holy, just, and good! How often the pathway which promises nothing but perplexity and sadness, as we advance still further thereon brings us abreast of new friends, new joys, new hopes, new blessedness! The darkness was not in God, but in ourselves. His purposes are full of wisdom, and His temporary withdrawal was but to educate us for Himself. 'Through his tender mercy the dayspring from on high hath visited us, to give light to them that sit in darkness, and in the shadow of death, and to guide our feet in the way of peace." "As the morning." The morning is full of activity. "Man goeth forth unto his labour in the morning." The opening day awakens all things into life. The very trees stir with its early breath, as though an angel winged by them. The dewdrops, hidden on the grass, now glisten like a field of pearls. The woods echo with the song of early birds; and the whole world awakens up to its daily toil. Is there not much that is suggestive here? When God comes prepared as the morning," it is not that Christian men may fold their arms and sleep, but that they may be aroused into new activity. God does not touch the dreamer that He may give a fresh turn to his dreams, but that he may be up and doing. Awake, thou that sleepest! thou that liest softly in the promises, and seekest only for religious cordials. Awake! thou that livest delicately in thy snug nest of material comfort, or social ease, or intellectual pleasure! Awake! there is much work to be done in the vineyard; many straggling young tendrils to train; many dead branches to remove; many rich clusters that will never ripen until thou hast cut among the leaves which now encase them. Awake there is yet much work to be done in the howling waste beyond; ground to be brought under the Gospel plough, and sown with Gospel seed. And here there is work for every Christian man, work from the individual claims of which no money-bribe can free him, nor any ingenious system of substitution liberate. Awake! this is God's voice to the Church of to-day. She is calmly waiting for a harvest to grow whereon she has hitherto bestowed no protracted 'and patient labour, and has scattered with too niggardly a hand but a few grains of heavenly seed. Arise from your sloth, O men of Israel! Arise, and shine! for thy morning light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. "As the morning." The morning is full of promise. The early dawn is an assurance and pledge of a fuller and more perfect day. The first ray of light is a harbinger of other rays, clearer, brighter, and more abundant. The light of the earliest dawn contains in itself the promise of sunny noon. Broad and blissful day never yet failed to follow those first feeble and flickering beams. Day unto day uttereth speech, and each day's speech is a promise. Every returning dawn that promise is renewed. If God has set His bow in the clouds, He has also set His promise in the dawn. "His going forth" to the devout heart is as the morning. Whatever measure of truth we may possess, whatever love we may feel, whatever grace we may enjoy, be it ours to take them as pledges of that which is broader, completer, nobler, " unspeakable, and full of glory." The day dawns slowly in the higher Alps. The snowy crest of the monarch mountain far up in the heavens is first tinged with rosy light, and his glaciers sparkle with prophetic fire. Presently other peaks catch the living flame. And now the light flashes from point to point, till, spreading itself abroad upon the mountains, it chases out the gloom from the deepest and most sheltered valleys. Thus it is with the soul under God's discipline. The mountains of grief, to the heart that waits for God, glow with a living fire; and the deep valleys of sorrow become flooded with celestial glory. And this even on earth, with all its drawbacks and with all its sins. The grave itself is dark no longer, since Christ took His torch within its chambers, and showed it to be but the portal of heaven. But yonder! where there is no death, where there are no tears, where there is no sin; how shall we measure that blissful consummation? Where all good shall be intensified, al beauty permanent, all bliss crowned and glorified ? Yonder! what sunny noons, what cloudless skies, what changeless glory! Yonder! "the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold," "for the Lord God giveth them light, and the Lamb is the light thereof." What fulness of meaning, what power of comfort, what rapture of blessedness, do these gracious words enshrine and ensure! Our feebleness may appal us. Let God's almightiness be our trust. Our ignorance may grow more visible and measurable. Let us come to Him, in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Our deficiencies of heart and life may be painfully apparent as we more closely judge ourselves by our Master's example. Let His love win us over to closer union with Him, even as of old it won the sinful Peter and the penitent Saul, and won them because of its pitifulness and of its power. And God give us hearts to read aright this gladdening promise, to accept it, to trust it, to live by it, to cling to it in all our work. We shall need it, if our hearts are ever to be braced up to a right apprehension of the value of our work, and we ourselves are to attain to a more complete understanding of its possibilities. Never think your own hearts can prosper in godliness without God; or that God's kingdom can be established without its King. His presence alone can give us true willingness to work; His blessing alone can secure success. "Abide with me!" Let this be our earnest and constant desire. Let sermon pass into song, and exhortation into prayer; and let this be the spirit if not the form of our supplications : Leicester, "O thou that changest not, abide with me! Not for a brief glance I beg, a passing word, I need thy presence every passing hour; : What but thy grace can foil the tempter's power? Hold thou the cross before my closing eyes! Shine through the gloom, and point me to the skies! THE FEEDING OF THE FIVE THOUSAND. Ir any man moot the question of Miracles, and urge that, as contrary to the ascertained laws of nature, they are not to be believed, how may we best meet him? Surely by raising a previous question-the question of our Lord's divinity. The Gospels affirm that Jesus of Nazareth was the Immanuel. Once admit Him to have been God with us, God manifest in the flesh, "and it must follow as the night the day'' that "signs and wonders" should gather round His path. Long before He came and dwelt among us, "in the beginning," all things were made by Him, and made in finished beauty and perfection. Looking down on all the works of His hands, He saw that they answered to His thought, that they incarnated His ideals, and pronounced them "very good." But these, His good works, were soon marred. Man's will grew "incorrect to heaven;" the dark shadow of sin fell on his spirit, and spread and darkened over all the excellent works which had been put under his feet. The whole creation was made subject to vanity and imperfection. And how, for what purpose, could the Divine Maker take our flesh and stand with sorrowful compassionate eyes among |