him. So great was the anger of those who were thus around him that they left him for dead, when they got through with him. See his head all swollen up; see the bruises upon his body and his limbs; see the ugly scars and the gaping wounds that he carried. He was hardly brought to life again; and for a long time thereafter you could see him with his injured head and black eye on the corners of the streets, and yet not frightened by any means, but preaching the glorious gospel of his God and master Jesus Christ. He went to Corinth, was not afraid, but preached there for eighteen months; and in all his ministrations; and in all this, he had to rely upon himself. He had no influential committee to meet him on his arrival at the station, and conduct him to a fine hotel, and make all arrangements about his expenses. There was no station in those days; when he did arrive, he came unannounced and on foot. And instead of a splendid hotel to go to, his first care was to go himself, walk around all the streets and find cheap lodgings, in some alley, where he could go after he had left off preaching for the day to made tents, to which trade he had been brought up. And then, after all his preaching, and all his labors, what reward did he receive? Well, there was a sort of a committee, and they said they would pay him off. Did they give him some testimonial and a large sum in money then? What they did do instead of presenting him with, say, a thousand dollars in gold. This committee that I speak of took him down to a cross street and gave him thirty-nine stripes. That is the way they paid him off. That was the way they treated this mighty fighter, a preacher that turned the world upside down.

Talk about Alexander making the World tremble at the tread of his armies! Talk about Napoleon shaking the world to its centre, when the powers knew he had gathered his army round about him! Why these have all passed away; but the words of Paul, of the despised tent-maker, make the world tremble even to this day. He talks about being in peril among robbers. Well, what did the robbers find on him? No money, no jewelry-nothing. What treasures he had, he had placed them above their reach, he had but them in heaven, where thieves do not break through or steal. The robbers got nothing from him, though he was richer than any man is at the present day. Not a man who has lived since Paul is richer than he was. Three times, again he says, he suffered shipwreck; also a day and a night he was in the deep. He had been subjected to perils by water, to perils of robbers, to perils brought about by his own countrymen. Besides these, he experienced perils of the wilderness; perils among false brethren-ah! that must have been the hardest. He was weary, he was in pain; but none of these things meved him. Thank God the apostle was a warrior; and would to God the church had a thousand like him at the present day. Nothing was able to battle him down. Not even the newspaper of the

day, if they had one, pitching into him every day, would have caused him a moment's thought. It might have called him a poor, deluded man, might have said to him, "Oh, you poor fool." For none of these things did he care. He looked above and beyond them. He knew there was a glorious reward awaiting him.

And so the mighty warrior went on to fight for his Master. But at last he had to flee; and to escape, he was let down the walls in a basket. He goes to fight elsewhere. Driven out of one place, he does not despair; and that is the spirit that we want to-day. He was always willing to receive the stripes and the torments, and to suffer everything the world could heap upon him for the cause of Christ. His enemies again gave him thirty-nine stripes. Well, he was used to it. His back had not perhaps got well before he received this punishment. After they got through with him, they cast him and Silas into prison. No sooner had they got in, instead of being frightened at what they had received, they began to worship the God for whom they had suffered. Paul says to Silas: "Come, Silas, let us praise God and have prayers." And they opened their worship by singing, perhaps, the 46th Psalm. After that they had prayers, and called upon God for his protection. And as soon as they had said "Amen," their God responded to their cries of help, and the whole prison shook, and there was a great commotion. Yes, that was a queer place to sing praises in-a prison; and it was just after he had received the stripes. Why, I dare say if Mr. Sankey should have only one stripe upon his naked back, he would not feel much like singing! But this man had received thirty-nine. He was as much at home with his God in prison, as he was out of it. He could praise him as well behind bolts and bars as he could in the synagogue. He knew what his reward would be. He knew that the grave would be his immediate reward; but he had faith in the great hereafter; he had a crown and a reward that would not pass away. Yes, do you think that God would let him suffer like that without rewarding him? If we suffer persecution for Christ's sake, great will be our reward. Paul's sufferings were the cause of the conversion of the Philippian jailor. I suppose he was the first convert in Europe.

Look at him again in Rome. The time had come for his depr ture; Nero had signed the order for his execution, and he is being taken out to be beheaded. Ask him now, at this moment, when death is but a little way off, if he is sorry that he has suffered for the Son of God. Ask him if he would like to recant to save his head. I can imagine how he would look if you should ask him such a question as that. They are going to take him two miles out of the city to the place of execution. He walks with a steady, unfaltering step, He wavers not, nor looks aside. His gaze is fixed upon the reward of his high calling in Christ Jesus. And he writes to his friend

Timothy, "Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown." You could not shake him in his faith. Thank God, at this dread moment, he kept his word with Jesus. He had never preached any false doctrine. He had only preached Christ crucified, and had manfully fought under his banner like a faithful soldier, to this, the end of his life. "Good-by," you can imagine him saying to Timothy; "Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown, and I am going to win it." As he walked through the streets of Rome, I tell you Rome never had such a conqueror. Not all her mighty men of war, nor all her generals and statesmen and orators, had risen to the supreme height that Paul had reached at this moment. He was going to receive a prize that would eclipse all the trophies of war, and wit, and learning. But at last he approaches the fatal spot. He is placed in the position that he had to take; the executioner makes him ready, and at the given signal the blow descends, his head comes off, and his spirit is lifted into the golden chariot, and is borne to the pearly gates of heaven. As he approaches the celestial portals, the battlements of heaven are crowded with the saints that Paul by his preaching had sent before him. Ah! how they welcome him. He is borne on toward the great white throne to receive his reward. The bells of heaven are set a-ringing, and hosannas are chanted by the choir of paradise. He comes near the throne, and he hears the great voice saying: "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." and the saints now gather around him, and greet, and bear witness for him to the Master he had so faithfully served. One would say: "That sermon that you preached to the Galatians wrought a change of heart in me, and I have been chosen to take my place among the elect." Another would say, "That lecture that you delivered at Thessalonica converted me." Another: "Paul, that appeal that you made at Corinth touched my wicked soul; I began to worship the Jesus whom you preached, and here I am among the angels." Oh, what a reward was that. Was it not worth all the cares, troubles. anxieties, sufferings, torments, and death he had gone through? Men murmur at the little crosses they have to endure here; but they forget that if they be faithful the Lord will reward them by-and-by.

One more thought before I close. What is it that occasions so much joy in heaven?. Suppose some great discovery had been made in this country; it would throw the whole nation into excitement. If it should turn out that some great mines had been discovered, whose riches had never been equaled; that it rewarded all those that went to it with an independent fortune in a few months, what intense excitement would be created all through the land! Yet this would not be noticed in heaven. What would, then, create joy in that place? Why, if that little girl down there would only give her heart to Jesus to-day, all heaven would sing and shout. "There is joy," it is written, "over one sinner that repenteth." The idea that

that little boy or girl could cause joy in heaven, and create an excitement there! For every sinner that repents there is joy in heaven. Just look at the 15th chapter of Luke: "When he found the sheep, he called his friends in." I have tried to make out what friends arc there referred to. Were they the angels? No; I don't think they were the angels. I can imagine, and I think the idea is a legitimate one, that these friends are the redeemed ones that knew us, and loved us, and prayed for us on earth. These are the people whose names Christ is writing in the book of life. It might be that an entry would be made that down at the Hippodrome, on March 10, at 4 o'clock in the afternoon, these redeemed ones first turned their hearts to me. Some beloved mother is up there, it may be, and is looking down on her child, and is praying that her child may have a clean heart and seek the Lord. Perhaps some little, loving child is looking over the battlements to see its father or mother here repent and give their souls to God. When I was in the great Exhibition Building in Dublin, I said that perhaps a mother was praying near the Throne for a certain young lady in the audience, and asked her if she would not come to Jesus. A short time afterward 1 received the following letter: "Dear Sir, on Wednesday, when you were speaking of heaven, you said that it might be that at this moment a mother was looking down from paradise and praying for the salvation of her child who is here.' You apparently looked at the spot where my child was seated. My heart said, 'That is my child, and that is her mother.' Tears sprang to my eyes, and I bowed my head and prayed that the Lord would show his way to my darling child. 'Lord, save my child,' I cried. I was then anxious to the close of the meeting. When I reached her she was bathed in tears, and she arose and put her arms around my neck and kissed me; and on the way to the inquiry-room she told me that it had been the same remark about a mother looking down from heaven that had found its way to her heart." I remember that time, when a beautiful young lady was led to the inquiry-room, leaning on the arm of her father. "What can I do to be saved?" she said. And afterward she became a zealous worker for the Lord. The letter was written by her father, who is a clergymen.

Shall these lectures close without one deciding to make heaven his home? Will there be no young man start for heaven to-day-no person, no father, no mother, that will repent and turn to God? I pray that many will accept salvation. Shall we not all pray that he will save every soul in this assembly? Would it be asking too much? Let us who are saved pray that God will rescue every lost soul here; and as we pray let us bow the head and lift up our hearts -and may Christ the God hear us, and hearing save!

LOVE OF GOD.

"And the God of love and peace shall be with you." 11 CORINTHIANS 18: 11.

We have for our subject this evening, "Love." I have often thought I wouldn't have but one text; if I thought I could only make the world believe that God is love, I would only take that text, and go up and down the earth, trying to counteract what Satan has been telling them-that God is not love. He has made the world believe it effectually. It would not take twenty-four hours to make the world come to God, if you can only make them believe God is love. If you can really make a man believe you love him, you have won him; and if I could only make people really believe that God loves them, what a rush we would see for the kingdom of God! Oh, how they would rush in! But man has got a false idea about God, and he will not believe that he is a God of love. It is because he don't know him.

Now, in Paul's farewell letter to the Corinthians, in the 13th chapter, 2d Corinthians, he says: "Finally, brethren, farewell. Be perfect. Be of good comfort. Be of one mind. Live in peace, and the God of love"-he calls him the God of love-"and peace shall be with you." Then John, who was better acquainted with Christ, telling us about the love God has for this perishing world, writes in this epistle, in the evening of his life, these words: "Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God, and every one that loveth is born of God and knoweth God, and he that loveth not, knoweth not God, for God is love." We built a church in Chicago a few years ago, and we were so anxious to make people believe that God is love, that we thought if we could not preach it into their hearts, we would burn it in, and so right over the pulpit we had the words put in gas jets, "God is love," and every night we had it there. A man going along there one night glanced in through the door and saw the text. He was a poor prodigal, and he passed on, and as he walked away, he said to himself, "God is love? No. God is not love. God does not love me. He does not love me, for I am a poor, miserable sinner. If God was love, he would love me. God is not love." Yet there the text was, burning down into his soul. And he went on a little further, and turned around and came back and went into the meeting. He didn't hear what the sermon was, but the text got into his heart, and that is what we want. It is of very little account what men say, if God's word only gets into the heart. And he stayed after meeting was over, and I found him there weeping like a child;