the seventy rulers of the Jews; he was a doctor of divinity, and taught the law. There is not one word of Scripture against him; he was a man that stood out before the whole nation as of pure and spotless character. What does Christ say to him? Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." I can see a scowl on his forehead. He says, "What do you mean by being born again-born from above, born of the Spirit? Now I am old, can I a second time enter my mother's womb, and be born again?" Jesus saith, "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot see the kingdom of God." He didn't take back what He had said, but He repeated it. I can imagine Nicodemus was like tens of thousands of men in London today. The moment you talk to them about regeneration or conversion, there is a scowl on their forehead. They say, "I don't understand it." Of course, the natural man doesn't unders and spiritual things. It is a matter of revelation. A great many men try to investigate and find out God. Suppose you spend a little of your time in asking God to reveal Himself to you.

I heard some time ago of some commercial travellers who went to hear a man preach. They came back to the hotel, and were sitting in the smoking-room talking, and they said the minister did not appeal to their reason, and they would not believe anything they could not reason out. There was an old man sitting there listening, and he said to them, "You say you won't believe anything you can't reason out?" "No, we won't." The old man said, "As I was coming in the train yesterday, I noticed some sheep, and c tile, and swine, and geese, all eating grass. Now, can you tell me by what process that same grass was turned into feathers, hair, bristles, and Wool?" 66 'Well, no, we can't just tell you that." "Do you believe it is a fact?" "Oh, yes, it is a fact." "I thought you said you would not believe anything you could not reason out?" "Well, we can't help believing that; that is a fact we see before our eyes." "Well," said the old man, "I can't help but believe in regeneration, and a man being converted, although I cannot explain how God converted him."

Now, the illustration which Christ used to Nicodemus was the wind. "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, nor whither it goeth." Now, you cannot see the Spirit of God work in this audience; but I hope and pray He may be working now in the hearts of many, convincing them of sin! Do you believe more than ever that you are a sinner? Well, that is the work of the Holy Ghost. The devil never told you you are a sinner; he tries to make you believe that you are good enough. If you believe to-night that you have sinned against God, that is the work of the Holy Ghost. He is here at work. We cannot see Him, but there are a great many who kno He is here. Suppose I should say, "I don't believe in the wind, and that it must be all imagination; I have lived thirty-seven years,

and have never seen the wind. It is folly for men to talk about the wind." I can just imagine that boy there saying, "Why, I know more than that man; I know there is wind, for it blew my hat off this very day into the mud, and I have often felt it blowing in my face." My friends, you have never felt the wind more than I have felt the Spirit of God. You have never seen the effects of the wind more than I have seen the effects of the Spirit of God, and of the working of the Holy Ghost, and there are hundreds of witnesses here who would testify the same thing.

It may be that I am talking now to some poor drunkard here. When he comes into his house his children listen, and hear by the footfall that their father is coming home drunk, and the little things run away and hide from him as if he was some horrid demon. His wife begins to tremble. Many a time has that great, strong arm been brought down on her weak, defenceless body. Many a day has she carried about marks from that man's violence. He ought to be her protector, support, and stay; but he has become her tormentor. His home is like hell upon earth; there is no joy there. There may be one such here to-night who hears the good news that he can be born again, and receive a nature from heaven, and receive the Spirit of God. God can give him power to hurl the infernal cup from him. God will give him grace to trample Satan under his feet, and the drunkard will then become a sober man. Go to that house three months hence, and you find it neat and clean. As you draw near that home you hear singing; not the song of the drunkard, that is gone, all things have become new. He has been born of God, and is singing one of the songs of Zion—

"Rock of Ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in Thee."

Or perhaps he is singing that good old hymn that his mother taught him when he was a little boy

"There is a fountain filled with blood,

Drawn from Immanuel's veins;

And sinners plunged beneath that flood
Lose all their guilty stains."

His children are

That

He has become a child of God, an heir of heaven. climbing up bis knee, and he has his arms round their neck. dark home is now changed into a little Bethel on earth. God dwells there now. Yes, God has done all that, and that is regeneration.

Then some of you may have been saying, "I wish Mr. Moody would tell us how we are to become Christians, for he says that we cannot be Christians by trying to do good and by making new resolutions." Many a time you have been at a meeting like this, and have resolved to turn over a new leaf, and you may now form another good resolution. If you do, you will break it. What are you going

⚫to do? If it is a new birth you are to have, you cannot create life. Can you bring life to the dead? All the wise men in London cannot do it. God alone is the author of life; and if you have the new birth it must be God's work. When the Jubilee Singers were in the North of England, my family went to see them, and my little boy asked why they didn't wash the black off their faces. I told him it was because they were born black. The Ethiopian cannot change his skin, nor the leopard his spots. You cannot save yourself. There is a man dying-can you put new life into him? Or can you raise up a dead body by saying, Young man, arise?" That is the work of God. Your souls are dead in trespasses and sins, and only the Lord Jesus Christ can speak life.

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I imagine some of you will say, "Haven't I anything to do?" Well, you haven't. Salvation has been worked out for you by another. Many go all round the world in search of honour or possessions. Salvation is worth thousands of times more than anything earth can produce; but you don't get it that way. God has but one price for salvation. Do you want to know what it is? It is without money and without price. Rowland Hill said that most auctioneers found they had hard work to get people up to their price, but that he had hard work to get people down to his. "The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life." Who will have it now? I say to you, young man, will you have this gift? Suppose I was going over London Bridge, and saw a poor miserable beggar, bare-footed, coatless, hatless, with no rags hardly to cover his nakedness, and right behind him, only a few yards, there was the Prince of Wales with a bag of gold, and the poor beggar was running away from him as if he was running away from a demon, and the Prince of Wales was hallooing after him, "Oh, beggar, here is a bag of gold!" Why, we should say the beggar had gone mad to be running away from the Frince of Wales with the bag of gold. Sinner, that is your condition. The Prince of Heaven wants to give you eternal life, and you are running away from Him. Then you say, "If it is not by working in earnest, how am I to be saved?" I will tell you; Scripture will tell you that is better. Take the illustration Christ used to Nicodemus; you could not have a better. He took him to the remedy: "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up: that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life." Now, there is the remedy. How am I to be saved? By looking to Christ; just by looking. It's very cheap, isn't it? Very simple, isn't it? Just look away to the Lamb of God now and be saved. What says the great wilderness preacher? "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." You might say the whole plan of salvation is in two words-Giving; Receiving. God gives; I receive.

I remember, after one of our terrible battles-I was in the army, tending soldiers-and I had just laid down one night, past midnight,

to get a little rest, when a man came and told me that a wounded soldier wanted to see me. I went to the dying man. IIe said, "I wish you to help me to die." I said, "I would help you to die if I could. I would take you on my shoulders and carry you into the kingdom of God if I could; but I cannot. I can tell you of One that can." And I told him of Christ being willing to save him; and how Christ left heaven and came into the world to seek and to save that which was lost. I just quoted promise after promise, but all was dark, and it almost seemed as if the shades of eternal death were gathering around his soul. I could not leave him, and at last I thought of this third chapter of John, and I said to him, "Look here, I am going to read to you now a conversation that Christ had with a man that went to Him when he was in your state of mind, and inquired what he was to do to be saved." I just read that conversation to the dying man, and he lay there with his eyes rivetted upon me, and every word seemed to be going home to his heart, which was open to receive the truth. When I came to the verse where it says, "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life." The dying man cried, Stop, sir. Is that there?" "Yes, it is all here." Then he said, "Won't you please read it to me again?" I read it the second time. The dying man brought his hands together, and he said, "Bless God for that. Won't you please read it to me again?" read through the whole chapter, but long before the end of it he had closed his eyes. He seemed to lose all interest in the rest of the chapter, and when I got through it his arms were folded on his breast, he had a sweet smile on his face; remorse and despair had fled away. His lips were quivering, and I leant over him, and heard him faintly whisper from his dying lips, "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of min be lifted up: that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life." He opened his eyes, and fixel his calm, deathly look on me, and he said, "Oh, that is enough; that is all I want; "and in a few hours he pillowed his dying head upon the truth of those two verses, and rode away on one of the Saviour's chariots, and took his seat in the kingdom of God. Oh, sinner, you can be saved now if you will! Look and live. May God help every lost soul here to look on the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.

I

THE FINISHED WORK OF CHRIST.

"He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed." Now, this is true, or it is not true.

D

Christ was either wounded for our transgressions, or else He was a great impostor. Now I cannot think for a moment that there is a man in this ball to-night who thinks that Christ was an impostor; and if He was not, and if He did come into the world, and if He was wounded for our transgressions, if He was bruised for our iniquities, if the chastisement of our peace was laid upon Him, and if with His stripes we are healed, then He ought to have a claim on every individual here, and a right to demand our hearts, our affections, and our lives. I have often thought that if a preacher were just to take this story of the cross, and go up and down the earth and tell it as it occurred, he would need no other sermon. Just draw a picture of the sufferings and the death of Christ, and if that doesn't move our hearts, I don't know what will. If a man can hear or read that story of the cross, and then sit still and fold his arms and say, "I see no beauty in Christ that I should desire Him; He is without form or comeliness to me; He is as a root out of dry ground;" then such a man has got a harder heart than I have. It was His love that broke my heart, and I hope His love will break every heart in this hall tonight. Christ said, "If I be lifted up, I will draw all men unto me." Let us pray to Him to be lifted up to-night, and let us see if we cannot make these words real, and apply them practically to ourselves.

If you turn to the 9th chapter of St. Luke, and read the account of the Transfiguration-Moses and Elias coming back to speak with Christ (and though Matthew and Mark do not tell us what they talked about, Luke did)-you will find they talked about His decease which He should accomplish at Jerusalem. They did not talk about the nineteenth century, and about the inventions of that age--its telegraphs, steamships, and railways; no, one thought only was in their minds the decease which Christ was to accomplish. Why, that was the most important council ever held in this world-Moses, the great law-giver; Elias, who represented Christ and Peter; James and John, who represented this dispensation-all assembled in council on that mountain, talking about a subject which ought to concern every man in this hall-the story of the cross, the decease which Christ should accomplish a Jerusalem.

Now, let us forget that we are living in London in the nineteenth century, and go back nineteen hundred years, and imagine we are citizens of Jerusalem instead of London, and that we are living just at the time when Christ was on earth, and that we are going up to the Temple. And as we pass down the streets, one Thursday afternoon, we see thirteen men coming along. We pause to look at them. They are common looking men, but still there is something so striking about the group that every eye is fixed upon them, every passer-by is looking at them and talking about them. We ask who it is that is making such a stir, and they tell us it is the celebrated Galilean prophet, Jesus of Nazareth, who has been performing such wonderful miracles for the last three years; he had raised a dead man at Bethany,