sign. The truth is far otherwise. The uniformity predicated of the pre-Noahic earth is surely no desirable thing. How much grandeur would be lost to the world if the mountains were levelled, how much fruitfulness also! These undulations play a vast and beneficent part in the economy of nature, in the regulation of winds and rivers, and they have plants and animals all their own which naturalists would be sorry to miss; they almost play as great a part in the story of the race as they do in physical geography, standing forth in history as they stand above the plains; and one of the prime founts of poetry would be sealed if we should behold no more those gigantic ridges with their sunset-nimbus, those pinnacles bathed in purple and gold one hour and the next terrible with cloud and fire, those white tops on which 'pauses the morning star.' Somewhat thus is it with the soul. Our ideal experience must not be a tame uniformity, which really bespeaks the absence of deep life and feeling. The true soul is full of great contending emotions, the upheavals and subsidences caused by the Spirit which worketh in us mightily; and in the exaltations and humiliations of the mind, in the soaring hopes and lowly fears, in the confidence which touches the heights and the apprehensions which reach the depths, lies the perfecting of the soul. Let us not reckon that state most desirable in which we are least moved and exercised, least agitated and perplexed; the more

life the more feeling, the more feeling the more life.

In an experience which contains the full measure and compass of feeling we secure the stability of the soul. The architect builds his lighthouse on a rock, and builds a fabric very much like the rock in solidity and strength; yet it is essential there should be flexibility in the massive masonry, or it would be utterly insecure. The perfect lighthouse is a mighty column rising out of the rock, the very ideal of strength; yet it is a reed shaken with the wind, and because it bends it stands.

It is thus with the

There must be in us

highest and safest characters. strength-strength of mind, of principle, of faith— or it is impossible that we should bear the strain of life. We must have great faith in God, boldness in prayer, and a mighty hope of final conquest and inheritance. And yet with all this there must be that sensitiveness which is ever the sign of sublimest strength. 'Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall.' 'Be not highminded, but fear.' These and similar exhortations are most necessary, and the purest, strongest souls are most responsive to them. And herein is our security. Like the powerful, trembling tower of ocean, his head crowned with light and his feet based on granite, the Christian braves the wildest storms of life. And as the stability of the soul is secured by touching opposite poles of feeling and holding them in their unity, so

likewise is the education of the soul thus secured. In this perpetual play of various emotion and manifold discipline the development and perfecting of the Christian life is secured. The laws of nature are arranged on the principle of antagonistic forces, and out of the constant struggle to maintain them in equilibrium comes all the glorious phenomena of the world. So in the moral life are there what we regard as antagonistic forces, joy and sorrow, fear and comfort, love and awe, and in the constant struggle which ensues to keep the equilibrium the soul's faculties are educated and our highest life perfected. As out of the alternations of fire and frost, sun and shade, drought and vapour, storm and calm, dew and hail, night and day, summer and winter, come the glories of the sky and the treasures of the earth, so out of the chequered experiences of the heart comes matured knowledge, love and righteousness.

IX.

THE OPEN SECRET OF CHARACTER.

'And from thence He arose, and went into the borders of Tyre and Sidon, and entered into an house, and would have no man know it; but He could not be hid.'-MARK Vii. 24.

WE

E have here two somewhat singular facts related concerning the Lord Jesus: He desired to be hid; He could not be hid. We reflect upon these facts and their teaching, inasmuch as they have an immediate bearing upon the experience of all Christ's disciples.

I. Christ desired to be hid; 'He entered into an house, and would have no man know it.' We e are sure this desire was not prompted by fear or shame, that it did not spring from caprice or unworthy policy. Nobler reasons must be sought for this withdrawal. One of these will be found—

1. In the modesty of high goodness. There is a religiousness which clamours for recognition: 'But all their works they do for to be seen of men: they make broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments, and love the uppermost rooms at feasts, and the chief seats in the synagogues, and

greetings in the markets, and to be called of men, Rabbi, Rabbi.' Spurious goodness like this is condemned when named. Far removed from this stagey pietism is the goodness which does not clamour for recognition, but which is grieved if not recognised. A Christian brother is ruffled because he was not nominated to some vacant office; some sister in the Sabbath-school is pained by being passed over when an appointment was made to what is termed, a superior class; and even the Preacher may be grieved because his merit has been ignored, and he was not chosen to fill a more conspicuous sphere. These good people are not to be confounded with the pragmatical Pharisee; they have simply not yet learned to lean altogether on God; theirs is genuine but imperfect goodness. Finally, there is the goodness of Jesus Christ-the highest goodness-and this is rather pained by recognition than by neglect. Christ abhorred parade. He was deaf to applause. He sought not honour from men. Enough for Him the Father's eye; the Father's love; the Father's approbation.

With all her magnificence, how modest is Nature!

'Nature cares not

Although her loveliness should ne'er be seen
By human eyes, nor praised by human tongues.
The cataract exults among the hills,

And wears its crown of rainbows all alone.'

Her intense colours are mixed with severity; in her grandest works is the hiding of power; her most