the mysterious universe in which our human world is set by the light as it shines in your own time; it may be dim, it may be confused, it certainly is incomplete, but you can see a little, and the little that you see, in God's name, do!

Man is not only a seer, he is a doer. The seer alone is incompetent; the seer and the doer must unite if life is to be sane and strong. Take your strength at its poor best and turn it into a deed, make your vocation utter your twilight visions. Omniscience is desirable, but it is attainable in no least part of any subject; it is desirable, but it is not necessary in order that we should do the duty of the hour and day.

When the civil service examinations began to be held, they were rather awkwardly conducted. On one occasion a candidate for an office, a humble office in the custom-house, was asked if he knew how far distant the sun is from the earth. "No, not exactly," he replied, "but I know that it is far enough away not to interfere with me in the performance of my duties in the customhouse!" The finest surgeon in the world, the ablest navigator, the wisest statesman, the mightiest prophet, each is conscious all the time of the sorest limits to his knowledge; but each can act, and act well, and when a man has done his best in the given circumstances of his life, he has satisfied the law of God and man.

The best way to wait for the coming of the perfect day is to work at the tasks that are set for us in the twilight. All the sciences are but twilight apprehensions of truth; the complete intellectual appreciation of the universe is a postponed satisfaction. The vision of the world as it stood in the mind of Jesus is as yet unattained; the comprehension of his Gospel is nowhere closed, nowhere adequate. The political condition of the nation is a welter of justice and injustice, strength and weakness. The higher opportunities are given to the overwhelming majority of human beings only through grinding toil and mean pain. The higher mind of the race is less than we need; that higher mind is inaccessible to the multitude. Social reform is only an infant crying in the night, education covers but a meagre part of man's need, his requisite outfit for life. Man's inhumanity to man is everywhere in evidence. There is an altruism exacted of the egoist by the nature of things; voluntary altruism is the possession of the few; it is as rare as sainthood. The moral conflict of the earnest portion of the community is with the baser moods; like Paul they have fought with beasts at Ephesus, unlike Paul they have so far failed of victory and are still fighting. Contentment with the wages of virtue, serenity in the heart of trouble, rest in the Lord amid the wreck of things seen and

temporal, a mind above the world, and able with the Platonic philosopher to view all time and all existence, to consider the earthly life a small affair detached from the eternal, and to look upon death with high disdain or with welcome; ability to join Paul in his triumphant lyric, "All things work together for good to them that love God," are still in the sphere of the ideal; they are not present but prophetic attainments.

The question returns, How shall we wait for the greater life? Again the answer comes, Wait at your work, wait in the full and happy exercise of your present power. Wait for the perfect day as men in the Far North wait for the polar sunrise. What is the appearance upon which they look? There is a faint flush in the east one morning; soon it fades and is gone. This flush is succeeded by another a little stronger and lasting a little longer. Still another flush comes, richer in tone, rising higher, promising more. Thus it goes on for many weeks before the great day is born that is to flood their whole world with perpetual light.

While this process is going forward, what is the attitude of these brave peoples? They stand to the task of life as it appears in the twilight. They are able to recognize one another; they see their work; they find their homes; they are in a community of human beings; in all this they

have their duty, and this they accept and do with courage and gladness. Their courage and gladness are all the more spontaneous because they are living in the twilight before dawn.

Here in parable we have the world of the ancient disciples of Jesus whose words are our text ; here in symbol is our own world. The light is dim, but it is becoming less dim; the flush is deeper from decade to decade; it is rising higher, it is spreading wider, it is prophetic of something greater in the coming time. What shall we do in this intensely interesting but sadly incomplete existence? Work in the light that we have. We know the order of the world; we see one another; we can make out our task. We are able to feel God with a greater sureness and to a greater depth; we are gaining in closeness to the spirit of the Lord; we can discern something of the meaning of the noble tragedy in which we live. Here is our treasure; let us hold it fast till the day dawn, the great, splendid, all-illuminating, cloudless day of the Lord.

XXVIII

THE IDEAL EVENING

"Man goeth forth unto his work and to his labor until the evening." PS. CIV, 23.

In these words as in a picture the leading features of man's life in this world are presented. While we look upon this picture it is as if we were beholding the life of man represented upon the canvas of some great master. This is the chief service rendered by the highest works of genius. Human life is in a large way represented in them, and while we give our attention to them the vision of it, sad and yet beautiful, is rising in our hearts. We read the Book of Job and it seems as if we stood where we could behold the sorrow of humanity, the whole terrible and yet divine movement of man's life. We read the great tragedies of Shakespeare, -"Hamlet," 66 Othello," "Lear," and we feel as if the entire human race were upon the stage before us. The everlasting charm of Dante's poem lies here. It is a symbol of the ultimate meaning of man's life, the awful world of self-will and woe, the terrible realm of purification and suffering, the blessed sphere of peace and the beatific vision these ultimate and highest aspects of existence