HIS LOVE TOWARD ALL MEN.

His love toward all men, and his want of all malice, were specially brought out in his singular freedom from the vice of evil-speaking. This was the more noteworthy because "much speaking" was a frequent snare to him. In speaking at inconvenient times and at excessive length, he forgot the counsel of a wiser than himself, that "in the multitude of words there wanted not sin;" although in speaking to God he often remembered the higher warning, “God is in heaven, and thou upon earth: therefore let thy words be few." But as regards "backbiting with the tongue, and taking up a reproach against a neighbour," the commendation might fitly be bestowed on him, "If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man." This perfect "bridling of the tongue" from speaking evil, was the more trying in his case, and its mastery a greater triumph, because he did not limit himself to the rule of saying nothing about your neighbour except when you can speak well of him. Toward his neighbour he bridled his tongue with a perfect control and skill; but he did not muzzle it. Talking about his fellow-men was in mere bulk a very small ingredient of his multitudinous speech. But he delighted in portraying men's characters; not in gossip, not in long discussion, and not in random remarks, but in one or two deep lines of a portrait thoughtfully fashioned in his own mind: as he abridged a subject into its most practical shape, so he condensed a man into an aphoristic sentence. He greatly loved to dwell on the good that was in men, but it was the characteristic good; and he shunned the utterance of any evil, so far as it was mixed with the "leaven of malice." Yet he characterized the man, not as good, and not as bad, but as an individual human being with his own distinctiveness; painting the portrait in vivid hues, but never mingling his colours with any drops of "the poison that is under the tongue."

"The command," he said, "is not 'Thou shalt love thyself as thy neighbour;' but, 'Thy neighbour as thyself.' There is a priority, but a priority among equals. -The Talmud says: He who says, 'Mine is mine, and thine is thine,' is a just man; he who says, 'Mine is mine, and thine is mine,' is a wicked man; but he who says, 'Thine is thine, and mine is thine,' is a good man. -Love seeketh not her own. Some people's minds are made up of extreme suspiciousness. If they hear part of a matter concerning any one, and there be both a clean and a dirty handle to take hold of it by, they are sure to take hold of it by the dirty handle. If you are without love, then the church bell is as good a Christian as you."

Any simple statement of the gospel had a great attraction for him—and the simpler it was he enjoyed it the more-if it was not controversial but the genuine utterance of the heart. The account of redemption from the lips of an African woman, a slave, impressed him deeply: he liked to repeat it in conversation; and on one occasion at a meeting for prayer, he stood up and said without further remark of his own-"I have never heard the gospel better stated than it was put by a poor negress: 'Me die, or He die; He die, me no die.""

THOUGHTS ON PREACHING.

On the preaching of Jonathan Edwards, he said, "His doctrine is all application, and his application all doctrine." But the most graphic of his conversational criticisms on the pulpit, was his comparison of two great preachers, Dr. Chalmers and Dr. Gordon; but his voice and action added a vividness which we cannot transfer by the pen. "They were both one-idead preachers; but I used to compare the one to a showman, and the other to a huntsman. Dr. Chalmers was the showman, and his idea was the showman's box, which he set down before you and said, 'Here's the idea.' Then he took it up in his hands, and turned it, and showed it in every possible way: "This is the top of it, and this is the bottom; this is its front, and this is its back; this is its right side, this is the left; this is the outside, and this is the inside: so there you have the whole idea.' Dr. Gordon was the huntsman, and his idea was the fox which he asked you to help him to catch: 'You cannot see it yet, but we shall search the thicket and make sure to find it. It is somewhere in this cover; let us first beat for it on the right, next let us turn and beat the bushes on the left. It is not in either, let us now beat straight in front. Sniff! sniff! we have got on the scent, we shall soon catch it now, it must be very nearho, there it is at last! look, that is it! the idea:'-and he closed the book just the moment before you had caught it." The same thought has been otherwise expressed, that "the idea was in the sentence after the last."

After the death of Dr. Gordon, to whose clear and earnest teaching of the way of life not a few teachers of others were deeply indebted, Dr. Duncan, in conducting an ordinary service in church, began in a loud voice, and said with a singular majesty and force, "Know ye not that there is a Prince and a great man fallen this day in Israel?" He added no comment; yet more effectually than by a long oration did these few words, as he spoke them, set forth the prince-like grandeur of the dead, and awaken at once admiration for his character and sorrow for Israel's loss.

B

ROM the example of the Master, Paul had acquired the habit, in his teaching, of gliding softly and quickly from a common object of nature to the deep things of grace. In his conversation with the woman of Samaria, for example, Jesus led his scholar, ere she was aware, from the water | of Jacob's well to the water of life. In like manner, the Apostle of the Gentiles was accustomed to make any common topic that arose, the stepping-stone by which he carried his pupils over into the concerns of the kingdom of God.

In this case, the question concerned the testimonials which a.minister or missionary might present when he reached a new sphere. The practice of asking and obtaining certificates seems to have been introduced at a very early period into the Christian Church. Already, in Paul's time, some abuses had crept in along with it. A minister of very moderate gifts, or even of doubtful soundness, might carry in his pocket a voucher signed by some great names. We may gather from this epistle that some very well recommended missionaries had been spoiling Paul's work at Corinth.

Virtually challenged to exhibit his own certificates, he boldly appeals to the profession and the life of those who had been converted through his ministry. He does not need to present letters of recommendation to them when he comes to Corinth, or to request letters of recommendation from them when he goes away: "Ye are our epistle." The work which God had done by him is evidence that God has sent him to work. He will not deign to submit any other proof of his call.

But Paul always reckons himself a small subject. Although compelled sometimes to introduce it, he will not dwell on it. The conception

of the disciples being an epistle to recommend him is no sooner brought in than it is abandoned. He glides instantly into a greater thing. The Christians are an epistle of Christ. Their lives are a letter in which men may learn the Lord. Regarding these living epistles of Christ, consider,

I. The paper, or material, on which the marks are made. Many different substances have been employed in successive ages of the world to receive and retain a written language; but one feature is common to all,-in their natural state they are not fit to be used as writing materials. They must undergo a process of preparation. Even the primitive material of stone must be polished on the surface ere the engraving begin. All the rough places must be made smooth, otherwise the writing would not be legible. The precious stones containing the names of the twelve tribes, and together constituting the high priest's breastplate, were not capable of taking the engraving on when first the Hebrews found them. Much labour was expended ere all the sharp corners were rubbed off, and a glassy polish imparted to the surface. The reeds, and leaves, and skins, too, which were used as writing materials by the ancients, all needed a process of preparation. Therein they are like the living epistles of Jesus Christ, who must be renewed in the spirit of their minds ere they can show forth the Redeemer's likeness in their lives.

But the preparation of modern materials for writing, although it was not before the apostle's mind when he wrote this text, contains, in fact, more points of likeness to the renewing and sanctifying of believers than any of the ancient arts.

Although Paul does not here directly refer to

Filthy

paper-a substance not invented when he wrotethere is a remarkable likeness between the method employed in its manufacture, and that work of the Spirit by which a human life becomes fit to receive and exhibit an epistle of Christ. rags are the raw material of the manufacture. These are with great care and labour broken very small, and washed very clean. They are then cast into a new form, and brought out pure and beautiful, ready to get a new meaning impressed on their smooth, bright breast. Paper from rags is, in an obvious and important sense, a new creature. It has been cleansed from its filthiness. There is now no spot nor wrinkle upon it, nor any such thing.

Such a process of breaking down and building up again takes place every time that a writing material is prepared for receiving an epistle of Christ. You might as well try to write with pen and ink upon the rubbish from which paper is made, as to impress legible evidence for the truth and divinity of the gospel on the life and conversation of one who is still "of the earth, earthy."

The paper manufacturer is not nice in the choice of his materials. He does not reject a torn or a filthy piece as unfit for his purpose. All come alike to him. The clean and glancing cloth from the table of the rich, and filthy rags from a beggar's back, are equally welcome. The clean cannot be serviceable without passing through the manufacturer's process, and the unclean can be made serviceable with it. He throws both into the same machine, puts both through the same process, and brings out both new creatures. The Pharisees were scandalized on observing that publicans and sinners came in streams to Christ, and were all accepted. "This man receiveth sinners," they complained. Yea, receiveth them: sinners are taken in between the wheels, at the commencement of this process; but at the end of it, saints in white clothing are thrown out, fit for the kingdom of heaven. Go ye into the highways and hedges, and as many as ye can find bid to the marriage. Christ does not find any pure on earth; he makes them. Those that stand round the throne in white clothing were gathered from the mire. They were once darkness, though they be now light in the Lord.

Let no man think he can go into heaven be

cause he is good; but neither let any one fear he will be kept out of it because he is evil. Him that cometh, the Lord will in no wise cast out. Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as wool. The blood of Jesus cleanseth us from all sin.

Not on tables of stone, like those on which the law was graven, but on tables of flesh, must the mind and likeness of Christ be written. Give him your heart. Surrender it to him, that he may blot out its stains, and mark it for his own. The Lord hath need of epistles to recommend his grace in this world: Lord, here am I; use me.

II. The writing, or the mind and meaning which is fixed on the prepared page.-It is not Christianity printed in the creed; but Christ written in the heart. When that writing is fixed on the heart, it shines through every opening of the life, and conciliates favour for the Lord.

It is well understood that a person's character may be very well gathered from his letters. These seem to be windows in his breast through which you can read his true character. How eagerly the public read the letters of a great man, if they are printed after his death. People expect to learn better by these than by any other means what the man really was.

As our Lord left no monument of himself in brass or marble, so he left no letters written by his own hand. He did not write his mind on tables of stone or on sheets of parchment. Even Rome, with all her rage for relics, does not pretend to show a specimen of his hand-writing. Yet he has not left himself without a witness. He has left letters behind him which truly reveal his mind: "Ye are epistles of Christ." Disciples, when he desires to let the world know what he is, he points to you. Nay, more, and further, when he would have the Father to behold his glory, he refers him to the saved: "Father, I am glorified in them." It is not only that the world, in point of fact, judges of Christianity by what they see in Christians, but they have authority so to do. The Lord himself consented that they should read him there.

So, Jesus sends a letter to the world-sends many letters-sends a letter to every city, and every street, and every house. A merchant who

A similar place is assigned to the ministry of men in the work of the Spirit. God does not send angels to preach. We learn the gospel from men of flesh and blood like ourselves. Cornelius and his house will be saved; but for that end Peter must go from Joppa to Cæsarea, and there declare the way of life. The Ethiopian treasurer will find the Saviour whom he seeks; but not until Philip is sent from Samaria, a skilful evangelist to guide the earnest but ignorant African. It is thus that the Lord employs parents, teachers, pastors, at the present day, as instruments to break hard hearts and bind up broken ones.

This is the most interesting and honourable employment in which any human being can be engaged. Whether he be a ministering child or a ministering man, the agent who stands between the living and the dead-a channel through which the light of life may run-occupies the most honourable place and discharges the greatest function competent to any creature. Here above me is the depending extremity of the wire whose. upper end is dipped in heaven-dipped there in everlasting love-dipped in God, who is love; and here beneath me, within reach, is a brother "dead in trespasses and sins." I grasp with one hand the conducting rod, and with the other the cold, stiff hand of my brother; then, not from me, but through me, the light of life flows from its eternal fountain into the empty soul. Here is an example of the first resurrection. The living is now an epistle of Christ, written indeed by the Spirit, but yet "ministered by us." Printing nowadays is done by machines which work with a strength and regularity and silence that is enough to strike an onlooker with dismay. Yet even there a watchful human eye and alert human hand is needed to introduce the paper into the proper place. Agents are needed, even under the glorious ministry of the Spirit needed to watch for souls.

V. The readers. They are a great number, and of various kinds. The terms of the text

men." The writing is not sealed, or locked up in a desk, but exposed daily, and all the day, to public view. These living epistles walk about upon the streets, and mingle with the crowds in the market-place. the market-place. Every one may read them at will. Some who look on the letters are enemies, and some are friends. If an alien see Christ truly and clearly represented in a Christian, he may thereby be turned from darkness to light; but if he see falsehood, and anger, and selfishness, and worldliness in one who is called a Christian, he will probably be more hardened in his unbelief. Those who already know and love the truth are glad when they read it clearly written in a neighbour's life; are grieved when they see a false image of the Lord held up before the eyes of men.

Here, however, in justice, I ought to say that many readers fail to see the meaning of the plainest letters. None so blind as those who will not see.

Every one's life is an open letter. Every man, whether he is a Christian or not, is written and is read. Some are epistles of Christ; some are epistles of vanity; some are epistles of covetousness; some are epistles of selfishness; some are epistles of the wicked one. The main features of the father of lies are written largely on the life of some of his followers. The spirit that reigns within is more or less visible in the outward conduct. In some countries the master's name is branded in the flesh of his slave, so that, if the slave should run away, every one should know to whom he belonged. The captive may, indeed, be bought with a price; and then he receives the mark of his new master. Thus, whether we like it or not, people may read in our lives, with a considerable degree of accuracy, whose we are, and whom we serve. The surest way to appear a Christian, in all places, and at all times, is to be one. The surest way to make people, when you go out, take knowledge that you have been with Jesus, is really to be with Jesus.

Considering how defective most readers are, either in will or skill, or both, the living epistles should be written in characters both large and fair. Some manuscripts, though they contain a