Bible Commentaries

Chapter70

Prayer

Almighty God, thou art near unto us in Christ Jesus thy Son. We come to thee by him, and, therefore, by the only way. We would come boldly in his name, speaking to thee what is in our hearts, telling thee of our sin, singing to thee of our thankfulness, and asking from thee daily direction and continual sustenance. This is our delight; it is no longer a burden to us, because of the Holy Spirit dwelling in our hearts. He takes of the things of Christ and shows them unto us. Jesus Christ himself thus enlarges upon our wondering vision until he fills all things with his radiant presence. Under the ministry of the Holy Spirit we would live, and would prove that we are under him by our joyfulness, peace, hopefulness, triumph over the world and time, and by all the fruits which they bear who are warmed by the presence of the spirit of fire. We bless thee that we have passed from the baptism of John to the baptism of the Cross. We are no longer in the state of mere repentance which daily begs forgiveness; we enjoy communion with God, fellowship with the Father—yea, we have access into inner sanctuaries, into the Holy of holies, which we have obtained through the Cross of Christ; so that we are no longer children of grief and of fear, carrying burdens many and heavy; but are children of the day and of the light, filled with sacred hope, animated with unutterable joy—yea, glorying in tribulations, also. This is thy miracle wrought in our hearts; we know it to be thine; this is no workmanship of ours; this is the gift of God, having in it the quality of eternal life and the joy of heaven partially begun. We bless thee for all the gifts of the week; for the balmy winds of summer; for the bread of the table; for the sleep which has refreshed us; for the thoughts which have made us men; for the hopes which have proved us to be in Christ Jesus; for all the favours thou hast shown throughout the rising and falling of the days. We stand here today to praise God with a full heart and an open mouth. Verily we are not afraid of our own voices. We would make a joyful noise unto the rock of our salvation. We would speak with holy confidence and emphasis of the preserving, sanctifying, tender care of which we have been the continual subjects. Hear thy people when they sing their psalm. Listen to them when they would whisper in the heart of thy love some tale of pain, of sin, of shame, and answer them with great answers, when, at the Cross of Christ and in the presence of its atoning blood, they ask thee for a double portion of thy Holy Spirit. We remember the sick—those who are at home and those who are in public institutions. We pray that they may be healed and comforted, and that the thought of their weakness may become a new strength. We desire that having seen the side of life which is humiliating, they may now see the side of life which presents itself towards heaven's light and rises towards heaven's rest. Sanctify affliction and pain, sleepless nights, and weary days. Speak comfortably to those who can hear no voice but thine own, and where eyes are closing on earth's dim light may the eyes of the soul be opened on heaven's cloudless morning. Give wisdom to all physicians; give patience and tenderness to all nurses; make thou the bed of the afflicted, and keep thou watch by the side of the helpless. We pray for all mankind; and if specially for the land we love the most, thou thyself hast set that partiality in our hearts. We bless thee for love of home and native land; and we pray that every one now before thee, praying for special places and countries, may be heard and graciously answered. Read thy word to us thyself. May we know that we are only listeners, and may the expression of every life be, "Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth." Let this be a wonderful day in the history of the Church. May thy servants speak with new boldness, and by their ministry may special miracles be done. Amen.

Acts 19:1-12

1. And it came to pass that, while Apollos was at Corinth [ Acts 18:27], Paul having passed through the upper [G. "more inland"; i.e, Lycaonia, the Phrygian district of Galatia, Acts 18:23] country came to Ephesus, and found certain disciples [older term still used for Christians, Acts 11:26].

2. And he said unto them, Did ye receive the Holy Ghost when ye believed? [G. "Holy Ghost" without the article, as in John 7:39; signifying, the gift of the spirit. "Given" is therefore correctly supplied below, as in John 7:39 : "Did ye receive the gift of the Holy Spirit as the consequence of your believing?"] And they said unto him, Nay, we did not so much as hear whether the Holy Ghost was given [ 1 Corinthians 12:13; for a strikingly illustrative modern instance see John Wesley's Alders-gate Street "experience," as narrated by Tyerman].

3. And he said, Into what then were ye baptized? And they said, Into John's baptism.

4. And Paul said, John baptized with the baptism of repentance, saying unto the people that they should believe on him which should come after him, that Acts 10:46, Acts 11:27. Signs and wonders were still necessary to enable their minds to grasp the new conscious fellowship of the Spirit].

7. And they were in all about twelve men [the Spirit saith "about"].

8. And he entered into the synagogue, and spake boldly for the space of three months, reasoning and persuading as to the things concerning the kingdom of God.

9. But when some were hardened and disobedient, speaking evil of the Way [compare with Acts 9:2] before the multitude, he departed from them, and separated the disciples, reasoning daily in the [? rabbinical] school of Tyrannus [as Jews came freely to hear Paul this was probably a "private synagogue," Tyrannus being the Greek name of a Jewish teacher].

10. And this continued for the space of two years; so that all they which dwelt in Asia heard the Word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks.

11. And God wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul:

12. Insomuch that unto the sick were carried away from his body [G. "skin": after use by the Apostle] handkerchiefs or aprons [used by tent-stitchers], and the diseases departed from them, and the evil spirits went out.

Apollos Completed By Paul

PAUL said he would return to Ephesus. In this chapter we find Paul again in that famous city. Something has occurred since he was last there—that event occupied our attention in our last study. An "eloquent man and mighty in the Scriptures," named Apollos, had been exercising his ministry in Ephesus, and some twelve men had answered the persuasion of his matchless eloquence. Paul found them out, and as he looked upon them he was surprised. They did not look happy. There was a severity in the face which excited Paul's anxiety; there was nothing radiant in that little Church. The twelve heads were bowed; the twelve faces were written all over with lines of discipline, subservience, fear, penitence. Paul was a direct speaker. Looking at them, and observing their mode and appearance, he said, "Have ye received the Holy Ghost?" He noticed that something was absent. He said, "This is not a Christian assembly; these twelve men are unhappy; they are not singing men; the spirit of triumph is not in their hearts—what is it that is lacking here?" "Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed?" If you had, your heads would have been erect; your eyes would have been flames of light; a new life would have lifted you up to higher levels of thought and feeling and utterance; what is wanting here is the Holy Ghost. Paul was a penetrative observ. He looked for causes, traced their operation, and judged of them by their effects.

Is there no lesson here for us? Looking upon us today, what would Paul inquire? He would read our faces; he would listen to our voices; he would pay attention to our mode of singing the sacred psalm and of reading the Holy Book, and if he saw happiness in our faces and heard music in our voices, and saw that we were not men who were time-bound and fettered by sense, he would say, "This is none other than the house of God and the gate of heaven, and these are the living miracles of the living Spirit of God." But if he saw us world-bound, if he saw our truant minds running out of the church for the purpose of collecting accounts and alleviating temporal anxieties, and making arrangements for the lower life—if he saw our prayers like birds with bruised wings that could not fly; and if he heard us talking the common speech of time in the common tone of earth, he would say, "What is wanting here is the Holy Ghost—Spirit of fire, Spirit of light, Spirit of love!" There is no mistaking his presence, for there is none like it. "The fruit of the Spirit is... joy."

The twelve men who followed Apollos were like their eloquent leader. We have seen, in the25th verse of the preceding chapter, that Apollos knew only the baptism of John. What he knew he preached. Paul recognized the work that had been done, and did not attempt to undo it, but rather to complete it; and that is what we must study to do in reference to the education of the world. If you come to me knowing only the first four rules of arithmetic I must begin with you where you end; and recognizing the validity of these four rules of arithmetic, I must lead you up into heights on which no tape line can be laid, and gradually so enlarge your vision and increase the inheritance of your soul until you despise with ineffable contempt everything that can be measured by arithmetical figures and standards. I must not begin your education by throwing into contempt the only four rules you do know; my object as a wise prophet must be to lead you on until you yourselves feel that the first four rules of arithmetic are only for infants, and not for princes and kings of heaven. Paul did not attempt to undervalue the work of Apollos—he carried it on to holy consummation. One minister must complete the work which another minister began. The students of Apollos must become the students of Paul. We began by loving eloquence; we end by loving instruction. But do not let the instructive teacher undervalue the eloquent evangelist. They belong to one another. Apollos has the silver trumpet; Chrysostom has the golden mouth. Let such men make their parables, create their metaphors and figures, thunder with strenuous energy of rhetoric, and they will do a good work in the world. By-and-by their students will look out for other teachers, and will pass on from the lower school of eloquence to the higher school of instruction, doctrine, even the theology which is truly theological. So must we have large appreciation of men: so must we put out no little light, but be thankful for its flicker and spark. The young man likes to hear a fluent speaker, one who rushes with unbroken force at a speed incalculable over an area immeasurable. The young man calls it "eloquence." He goes to the church where the Apollos preaches long before the doors are opened, and willingly stands there that he may see this rushing torrent of eloquence, and hear this mighty wind of sacred appeal. I will not condemn him; many of us once belonged exactly to that class. But Time—teaching, drilling, chastening Time—works its wondrous wizardry upon the mind, and without violence, or consciousness of transition, we come to a mental condition which says, "There was more in that one sentence than in the infinite Niagara whose bewildering forces once stupefied our youthful minds." But do not condemn any man. Let him teach what he can. If he is still calling for water to throw upon the faces of the people, or calling for people to plunge into the water, he knows no better—let him do it. Have faith in the revelations which accompany a wise use of time.

If Paul did not discredit the work of Apollos, the disciples of Apollos did not discredit the larger revelation of Paul. The inference Acts 19:13-16

13. But certain also of the strolling [itinerant] Jews, exorcists, took upon them to name over them which had the evil spirits the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, I adjure you by Jesus whom Paul preacheth.

14. And there were seven sons of one Sceva, a Jew, a chief priest [? head of one of the twenty-four courses of the Levitical priesthood], which did this.

15. And the evil spirit answered and said unto them, Jesus I know [recognize], and Paul I know; but who [what sort] are ye?

16. And the man in whom the evil spirit was leaped on them, and mastered both of them, and prevailed against them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded.

Seven Sons of Sceva

IN considering these circumstances we must call to mind what had been done in the city of Ephesus, the capital of Asia. A great spiritual revolution had taken place. Paul had been resident in Ephesus, more or less, for two years. At first he found the twelve disciples of Apollos utterly without Christian knowledge beyond the introductory baptism of John. Under Paul's ministry the Holy Ghost had been poured out, and from that time great interest was felt in the whole subject of spiritual influence. From time immemorial superstition has grown in Ephesus, and to add one superstition to another came quite easy to the sophisticated minds of the Asiatics. Christianity was another department of magic. It seemed to succeed well in the hands of Paul and his colleagues, and it might be worth while to incorporate it with Ephesian mysteries. At all events, the men who had practised exorcism, or the art of casting out, were willing to try it, and the trial is related in this passage.

Even the Jews of Ephesus were tainted by this superstition. As we see from the14th verse "there were seven sons of one Sceva, a Jew, and chief of the priests," which "took upon them to call over them which had evil spirits the name of the Lord Jesus." We must not dismiss the men as impostors. They were deluded, but not necessarily wicked. They wanted to do a good work, and so far we must credit them with a good motive. You and I are most concerned in finding out the modern meaning and present-day force of the narrative. A wonderful testimony—the more wonderful because unconscious—is here borne to the power of Christianity. Such testimony is of high corroborative value. The outsiders had been looking on, wondering how the new magic would act. They said nothing about it, but when occasion served they endeavoured to practise it; and so much to the world's testimony, unconscious or reluctant, to the potent power of Christian action. The Ephesians did not say, "This argument is cumulative, cogent, and unanswerable, therefore we yield our intellectual citadel to the holy siege." They uttered no words, but looking on they saw wonder after wonder, and when the Apostles were not there they tried to conjure according to the apostolic necromancy, as they regarded it. That is being done today. If Paul had failed, the Ephesians never would have tried the new art. When the seven sons of the chief of the priests tried to repeat the processes of Paul they unconsciously certified to the practical influence which Paul had exercised in Ephesus.

The thirteenth verse sums up a large mass of evidence; it is a condensed history of Christian triumph. The Ephesian necromancers and exorcists had seen the most stubborn of the devils dragged out of their heart-caves. For years they had been trying to silence this evil spirit and that, and the evil spirit had mocked them, chattering back in broken speech the boldest words of a timid audacity. But in this instance the most reluctant and stubborn of the spirits had been dispossessed, and the Acts 19:17-20

17. And this became known to all, both Jews and Greeks, that dwelt at Ephesus; and fear fell upon them all. and the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified.

18. Many also of them that [now] had believed [those in whom the "fear" had wrought repentance and faith] came, confessing and declaring their [previous] deeds ["tricks"].

19. And not a few of them that practised curious ["vain"] arts, brought their books together, and burned them in the sight of all: and they counted the price of them, and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver [drachmae, about 1875].

20. So mightily grew the word of the Lord and prevailed.

The Sacrificial Fire

THERE was a kind of religious indignation in the man who was possessed by the evil spirit. He was made stronger than all the seven men who conjured with a Name which they did not know and love in their hearts. Nominal faith is always coming to grief. It has no backbone; it carries only a painted fire; there is no iron bullet in its gun. The devil is always real, and the more real when he pretends to be an angel of light. His cannon is full of iron. Hypocrisy only adds to the reality of devilism. It is not so with Christianity. Christianity is powerless if insincere. If I may so put it, I may say that Christianity when it ceases to be sincere ceases to be Christian. That is the difficulty of the Church. It is the difficulty of keeping up sincerity. Sincerity is sacrifice, and it is difficult to find fire every day for the altar, and to climb upon it and lie down in its hot centre and be burned in the sight of heaven. It is so much easier to do a trick; to read a word—so much easier to say a prayer than to pray. There the enemy has the advantage over us. He has nothing but the meanest work to do. When he mocks he is religious; when he sneers he is at church; when he helps himself he serves the only altar he ever kneels before. It is so different with the followers of him who made the Cross the symbol of discipleship. They are watched at every point. When they fall below the line of passion they fall into criminal Acts 19:21-41

21. Now after these things were ended, Paul purposed in the spirit, when he had passed through Macedonia and Achaia, to go to Jerusalem, saying, After I have been there, I must also see Rome.

22. And having sent into Macedonia two of them that ministered unto him, Timothy and Erastus, he himself stayed in Asia for a while.

23. And about that time there arose no small stir concerning the Way.

24. For a certain man named Demetrius, a silversmith, which made silver shrines of Diana, brought no little business unto the craftsmen;

25. whom he gathered together, with the workmen of like occupation, and said, Sirs, ye know that by this business we have our wealth.

26.. And ye see and hear, that not alone at Ephesus, but almost throughout all Asia, this Paul hath persuaded and turned away much people, saying that they be no gods, which are made with hands:

27. and not only is there danger that this our trade come into disrepute; but also that the temple of the great goddess Diana be made of no account, and that she should even be deposed from her magnificence [better, "that the temple be disesteemed and the splendour of the goddess impaired." Demetrius forsees the injury, but not the destruction of Diana's worship], whom all Asia and the world worshippeth.

28. And when they heard this they were filled with wrath, and cried out, saying, Great is Diana of the Ephesians.

29. And the city was filled with the confusion; and they rushed with one accord into the theatre [ruins of which building, constructed to hold over25 ,000 spectators, still remain], having seized Gaius and Aristarchus [ Acts 20:4; Acts 27:2; Colossians 4:10; Philemon 1:24; Caius of Macedonia is not elsewhere mentioned], men of Macedonia, Paul's companions in travel.

30. And when Paul was minded to enter in unto the people, the disciples suffered him not.

31. And certain also of the [G. "Asiarchs": the ten annually elected presidents of the provincial games and sacrificial rites were thus named. They defrayed the enormous expenses of the games which were held during the whole of May (hence called Artemision), and they retained the honourable title when past the presidency] chief officers of Asia, being his friends, sent unto him, and besought him not to adventure himself into the theatre.

32. Some therefore cried one thing, and some another; for the assembly was in confusion; and the more part knew not wherefore they were come together. [Yet they were unanimous for assembling, Acts 19:29.]

33. And they brought Alexander [ 1 Timothy 1:20 and 2 Timothy 4:14] out of the multitude [or better, some of the multitude instructed Alexander], the Jews putting him forward [compare Acts 19:9]. And Alexander beckoned with the hand [moved his hand up and down], and would have made a defence [G. "apology"] unto the people.

34. But when they perceived that he was a Jew, all with one voice, about the space of two hours, cried out, Great is Diana of the Ephesians.

35. And when the town clerk [an official who wrote, kept, and read publicly, when required, the statutes and judgments of a Greek democracy] had quieted the multitude, he saith, Ye men of Ephesus, what man is there who knoweth not how that the city of the Ephesians is temple-keeper [G. "temple-sweeper." Cf. Psalm 84:10] of the great Diana, and of the image which fell down from Jupiter [must therefore be supposed to have been saved when Herostratus burnt down the old temple on the night when Alexander the Great was born. This image had many breasts, and tapered to its base].

36. Seeing then that these things cannot be gainsaid, ye ought to be quiet, and to do nothing rash.

37. For ye have brought hither these men, which are neither robbers of temples nor blasphemers of our goddess.

38. If therefore Demetrius and the craftsmen that are with him have a matter [a charge] against any man, the courts are open, and there are proconsuls [there would be only one in each province. The meaning is, proconsuls (judges) as well as courts, are provided by the state]; let them accuse one another.

39. But if ye seek anything about other matters [not yet defined by statute], it shall be settled in the regular [legislative] assembly.

40. For indeed we are in danger to be ["run the risk of being"] accused concerning this day's riot, there being no cause for it; and as touching it we shall not be able to give account of this concourse. [The reviser's Greek text is here corrupt. The "not" is obviously a copyist's repetition, and "this day's riot," involves an ungrammatical transposition of the Greek order of words, quite without N. T. precedent. Translate: "For we run the risk of being accused of riot concerning this day, there being no cause whereby we may give an account of this concourse."]

41. And when he had thus spoken, he dismissed the assembly. [" So says Chrysostom, "he quenched their rage, for what kindles easily is easily put out."]

Old Complaints and New Reproaches

THE application of these words to present-day life is a task that might be assigned to a child. The speech of Demetrius is a speech that was made yesterday in every centre of civilization affected by Christian ideas and demands. Demetrius never dies; his word is to be heard in every tongue; he is present in great force in every Church, and present as representing two very special and remarkable phases of life. In the twenty-seventh verse he puts these two phases before us in the most vivid colouring. With the subtlety of selfishness he puts the case with comical adroitness. He knows the value of a little piety. How it flavours the appeals that are made to man's fears and to man's commercial fortunes! See how religious he becomes quite suddenly! If it were a mere matter of trade he would not have troubled himself about it. He could have lifted his noble self above all market-place considerations and reflections, but—"not only this our craft is in danger to be set at nought; but also that the temple of the great goddess Diana should be despised." The second was the thought that afflicted his pious heart! The mere matter of losing a few silverlings in shrines would never have excited him beyond a momentary flutter, but to see the great temple of the great Artemis despised was more than that godly soul could bear. Said I not truly that Demetrius never dies? Was it not a wise word—wise because consistent with facts—that Demetrius is present in great force in every centre of civilization affected by Christian ideas and claims? What was the reality of the case from the first point of view? "A certain man named Demetrius, a silversmith, which made silver shrines for Diana, brought no small gain unto the craftsmen." Trade was injured; "no small gain" was destroyed; the weekly takings had gone down to nothing. If Paul had preached abstract ideas and lived in a painted theology, and clothed himself in clouds "rolled" a thousand miles above the air, Demetrius would have made shrines for him if he had ordered them, but a preacher that comes down upon the earth, walks in the common dust, thunders upon immediate iniquity and visible falsehood, may get himself into trouble. We have escaped all this. Modern preachers are never in trouble; they tell the false dealer that after all if he did not deal in that he would deal in something else. The preachers might preach a whole year upon the evils of intemperance, but if those who deal in strong drink were to find their takings going down very considerably, the preacher would soon hear of the circumstance and find himself involved in no small trouble. That is one reason why a modern institution, known to us all, is often persecuted, opposed, denounced, and vilified. It is not an institution of ideas and propositions, and theological placards, propounding curious problems for curious minds, but an institution that stops people from going in to spend money on bad counters; and Demetrius comes out and shakes his indignant fist in its face. He is quite right. I thank God for it, personally. You may circulate what books you please if you do not interfere with the profitable circulation of corrupt literature—you are quite at liberty to walk upon both sides of the street; but if the literature that is eating out the morality of our young people is interfered with, is arrested in its baleful progress, then you will be caricatured, travestied, spat upon, contemned, laughed at. My brethren, rejoice when such persecution befalls you. It is a sign of true success; your blows are taking effect. Demetrius will not fail to let you know how your work is going on. Do not believe yourselves about it; you see things through painted glass, and report that the orient is white and the day is coming when there is nothing of the kind on the road. Do not take the Christian's word for progress; he means to speak truth; from his own point of view he speaks nothing but truth, he is honest and upright, but he does not know the reality of the case. Demetrius knows it. I want to hear Demetrius when he calls the men of the same craft together and says, "Sirs, ye know that by this craft we have our wealth," and "this our craft is in danger to be set at nought—what shall be done?" Then the war is going well; the fight is at its highest point of agony; press on—another stroke, another rush, and down goes Demetrius, and all his progeny fall into the pit to keep him profitless company. What bad journal have you, as a Christian Church, ever shut up? What place of iniquitous business have you ever bought and washed with disinfecting lime, and within its unholy walls set up the altar of Christ? What property do you buy? Where do you follow and out-bid Demetrius, driving him back, and back, and back? Is he in the thoroughfares of the capital cities of the world, or is he not? We are afraid to build churches too near one another; we study one another's feelings about that. I would God the thoroughfare five miles long had churches on both sides of the street, one after another in great godly rows, phalanxes of moral strength, sanctuaries into which the poor and the weak and the weary might run, with great hospitable doors standing open night and day. Show me the thoroughfare in any great city in the world in which Christian churches have pushed back evil institutions and made them take up their quarters in narrow streets—back, back to the river's edge and into the river, if possible. To see such a city would be to see the beginning of heaven. Christ would almost have to inquire lor his own address if he came back to earth; he would need some one to point out his dwelling-places; they are quite back; they are put up on sufferance; they are watched with suspicion; they are left to decay; and if any adventurous spirit should propose to paint them, clean and repair them, such proposition would be received as a new assault upon the purses of the people. Demetrius will let you know how the work is going on. Do not let us deceive ourselves and trifle with facts. Who dares assail an evil institution, an effete society, and obsolete secretariat and pension? Preach abstract ideas, rewrite "Paradise Lost," add to it "Paradise Regained," publish them both in sumptuous editions, and Demetrius is well content. He never suffered much through blank verse, he rather likes it; it sounds as if there might be something in it, but that something is not a thunderbolt.

The next phase of the case as put by Demetrius is infinitely more humiliating. The temple of the great goddess Diana is in danger of being despised. How shall we name that particular phase of the situation? It is best represented by the words a religious panic. The temple was in danger. That is the language of today. We have set up societies for the purpose of defending Christianity. All those societies represent, with few exceptions, some degree of religious panic. The temple is never in danger—that must be our faith. If it is a temple that can be put in danger, it is a temple made with hands and must go down. Hear the great challenge of the Master: "Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up." What panics we have seen! What godly godless excitement, as if truth could ever be in danger; as if some blind Samson could catch hold of the pillars of heaven and shake down upon us the contents of the sky. What a sky we live under if you think it can be shaken down! Some time ago a number of highly learned and morally and spiritually distinguished men issued a volume entitled, "Essays and Reviews." It was the doom of Christianity! It was the end of the world! Edition after edition was published—for sceptical books enjoy a circulation whilst orthodox books enjoy a slumber. The Church likes to buy heterodox literature; it looks like being "in advance of the times." From what I can understand of the case Christianity has come forward since the day of the publication of "Essays and Reviews," and the smell of fire has not passed upon it. What excitement there was! What panic in religious halls and on religious platforms! and yet Christianity, quiet as light, pure as the living breeze that blows among the snowy tops of the hills, has gone forward on her beneficent career without ever having bought a copy of the volume that some people earnestly thought was to have taken her life. There was no need for panic. Some time ago a bishop, who was born to take an inventory of things, and to reckon them up within the four corners of the multiplication table—a small universe and hard to lie down upon—began to suggest that it was impossible for seven-and-twenty thousand men to stand upon six square inches! What a panic there was! It was the end of the world, this time! "A man," as Mrs. Carlyle well said, "with a little silk apron on had undertaken to find fault with the Pentateuch." She took it wisely; she was in no panic. She looked at the "apron" and despised the arithmetic. So far as I can understand, the Pentateuch seems to be very much where it was. Why these panics? Why these causeless distresses? We want to get at truth and fact and right, and if any man can help us in that direction he is not an enemy but a friend. I would rather teach that the men of true science are all men of a Christian spirit. They may not be so advanced as others; they may be sadly wanting in this or that department of theological culture and knowledge, but wherever I find a man whose supreme purpose is truth and reality, I find, not an enemy, but a fellow-worker. We ought to have a religion that cannot be put in danger. No man can touch my religion. If our religion is an affair of letters, forms, dates, autographs, and incidents of that kind, then I do not wonder that our cabinet is sometimes burglariously entered and certain things filched from it. I do not keep my religion in a museum; my Christianity is not locked up even in an iron safe; my conception of GOD no man can break through, nor steal. You cannot take my Bible from me; if you could prove that the Apostle John wrote the Pentateuch, and that Moses wrote the Apocalypse, and that the Apocalypse should come in the middle of the Bible and not at the end, you have not touched what I hold to be the revelation of God to the human mind and the human heart. Let us leave all such questions to be decided by the very few who are capable of gathering together the evidence, adjusting and distributing it, and founding upon it wise critical conclusions. What we, as the common people, have to be sure about is, that God has not left himself without witness amongst us; that God has sent great messages of law and love and light and life to every one of us; that God's revelations do not depend upon changing grammars, but upon an inward, spiritual consciousness and holy sympathy, whose insight is not intellectual but moral—the purity of heart which sees God. When all the assaults have been concluded there remains the tragedy of human life; when all other books have been published, there remains another publication to come forth—the Book that can speak to conscious sin, to blinded penitence, to broken-hearted, sobbing, supplicating contrition. The Bible speaks to my own heart as no other book speaks; it knows me altogether; it is a mirror which reveals me to myself; it is a voice which calls me out of myself; it is a friend that will quietly sit down beside me seven days, because my grief is very great, will wait until its turn comes, and then will speak in silvery tone, in tender accent, so winningly, so graciously, so lovingly. It hath a history, it hath a Psalm, it hath a song, it hath a tongue, it hath a fire. It proves its own inspiration by its grasp of human life, by its answers to human need.

The town-clerk laid down the principle that ought to guide us. He did not know probably how good a philosophy he was propounding. The town-clerk said, "Seeing then that these things cannot be spoken against, ye ought to be quiet." That is what we say about our Christian teaching. There are some things which cannot be "spoken against" so far as my own experience is concerned. The brevity of life, the certainty of death, the reality of sin, the present hell that burns me, the need of a Saviour who needs no saviour himself—these things cannot be "spoken against"; therefore, those of us who feel them to be true "ought to be quiet."