avail itself.

St. Paul's thoughts doubtless were often with his Master, while he was making his tents. And

those who covet above all things a closer communion with God, will assuredly think no scorn of an occupation which engages the hands rather than the thinking faculty. Doubtless intellectual pursuits are, in the order of things, nobler than a common handicraft. But there is "a spirit," as well as a mind, in man. And if a handicraft gives greater scope for the action of the spirit,-if the husbandman as he digs his field, the lacewoman as she plies her bobbins, the shepherd as he tends his flock, nay, the boy set to keep the birds from the crop, are at least free to feed their spirits the while with the thought of God's power, wisdom, and goodness, they are more than compensated for their intellectual loss by their spiritual gain, and they find consolation and refreshment in place of the weariness of merely mental effort, a weariness thus commented upon, in accents of bitter disappointment, by the wisest of men; "Of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh."

CHAPTER XIX.

SELF-SACRIFICE A TEST OF THE LOVE OF GOD.

“And when He was gone forth into the way, there came one running, and kneeled to Him, and asked Him, Good Master, what shall I do that E may inherit eternal life? And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou Me good? there is none good but One, that is, God. Thou knowest the command= ments, Do not commit adultery, Do not kill, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Defraud not, Honour thy father and mother. And he answered and said unto Him, Master, all these have E observed from my youth. Then Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow Me."-MARK X. 17-21.

UR subject in this little treatise is the pursuit of

OUR

Holiness. Now the spring and motive of all Holiness being the love of God, we have enlarged upon this grand topic in several of the Chapters, and have spoken much of the beauty and blessedness of the Divine character, as having a tendency to attract towards God the hearts of men. But the general complexion of the subject, and the tenour of our remarks upon it, has

made it quite necessary, in bringing our argument to a close, to say one or two words of solemn warning. It is very easy to delude ourselves into the notion that we have the love of God, and are under its influence. It is easy at all times to mistake a sentiment for a principle, a transient feeling for a deeply-rooted affection. And therefore the Holy Scriptures, which aim at implanting and nourishing, not sentiments but principles, while they supply us in the Psalms with aspirations after God, which can only proceed from genuine love, and while they set forth every where the beauty and attractiveness of His character, are careful to furnish practical tests of a very stringent kind, whereby we may try our hearts and ascertain how far they are really under the empire of God's love. One of these tests I shall consider on the present occasion, reserving another for the following Chapter.

The interview of the rich young man with Our Lord is one of those many incidents, which derive importance from being recorded three times in the New Testament. There are few passages of Scripture the teaching of which is more apt to be misunderstood. The key to it is to be found in the circumstances of the young man, and in what transpires of his character. He was "very rich," "had great possessions ;" his circumstances, therefore, gave him no trouble; he never knew what it was to be straitened. He was "young;" and therefore we may assume that he was in health, and had all that bright sanguineness and energy, which

only health can give. He was "a ruler," possibly the president of some synagogue, one therefore for whom his position gave a sort of guarantee that he was a man of virtue and piety. And to a great extent he really was so. He had observed, at least in the letter, the commandments of the second Table; and that his observance of them was, so far as it went, commendable, and had really proceeded from a principle of duty, we may gather from the circumstance that when he mentioned it, Our Lord seems to have smiled on him in approbation; "Then Jesus beholding him loved him." It was not in a Pharisaic spirit of pride that he said, "Master, all these have I observed from my youth." What he desired was that this great Teacher of Divine Truth who had appeared in Israel, should point out to him some arduous attainment of virtue, some one great moral effort, more arduous than the commandments of the second Table (which he does not seem to have understood in their spiritual import), by which he might secure the prize which he professed to covet,-"eternal life."

Now here was a man- fair and promising in many points—(may we not call him a man of great spiritual promise?) whom Our Lord was about to test by the application to his conscience of the first and great commandment in a practical form. For that this is the true significance of Christ's dealing with him cannot be doubted. It is very observable how the only commandments, which are specified to this young man as

the pathway to eternal life, are those of the second Table. Why is this? It is impossible to suppose that Our Lord, in bringing the Law to bear upon his conscience, would omit the commandment which He Himself called the first and great commandment; "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind." Assuredly He does not omit it; but makes it here, as He did on other occasions, the most important point of all. But He begins with the lower and less arduous, before He comes to the higher and more arduous, requirements of the Law, as if He had said to the rich young man; "Tell Me first how you have loved your neighbour, whom you have seen, before I proceed to inquire how you love God, whom you have not seen." The young man's answer virtually is; "I have from my earliest youth fulfilled my duty to my neighbour." "Assuming that you have done so, for argument's sake," Our Lord continues, "how do you stand disposed towards God? Is your heart right with Him? Is it whole with Him, as a heart must be, if it is to be right?" This is the import of Our Lord's words; but He does not put the question thus explicitly. Doubtless, if He had done so, the young man's conscience would have evaded it. The pressing of the love of God in an abstract form gives great room, as I observed at the opening of the Chapter, for self-deception. especially is this the case, when the persons, on whom it is pressed, are free from trouble in their circumstances

And