Analysis of Homily the Fifty-fifth.

"He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He came unto his own, and his own received him not. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God."-John i. 10-12.

SUBJECT:-The Relation of Humanity to Christ.

THESE words give us three distinct classes of men in relation to Christ:

I. THOSE WHO DO NOT KNOW CHRIST. This is stated as an extraordinary fact. Though "in the world, the world knew him not." In the world: (1) in the operations of nature, shining in its light, breathing in its life, and speaking in its voice; (2) in the intuitions of reason, in the notions of causation, the sentiments of order, the propensities to worship, and the forebodings of conscience; (3) in the events of history, in the creations of literature, in the progress of science, in the growth of commerce, and in the advancing steps of civilization; (4) in the special revelations of heaven-appearing as the Promised to Adam, as the Shiloh to Jacob, as the Counsellor to Isaiah, the Desire of nations to Hosea, and the Sun of righteousness to Malachi. And yet the world knew him not. This class comprehends Pagans.

II. THOSE WHO KNOW CHRIST, BUT DO NOT RECEIVE HIM. "He came to his own," &c. This class comprehends all who are mere hearers of the gospel. To know Christ, and to reject him, is to sin against the benevolent designs of God, the moral sentiments of our being-such as justice, gratitude, and reverence—and against the highest interests of human nature.

III. THOSE WHO RECEIVE CHRIST, AND ARE AFFILIATED TO GOD BY HIM. "To them gave he power to become the sons of God." He unites estranged humanity to God by inbreathing his own filial disposition. What a privilege is this!

The Genius of the Gospel.

(Continued from page 132.)

[ABLE expositions of the gospel, describing the manners, customs, and localities alluded to by the inspired writers; also interpreting their words, and harmonizing their formal discrepancies, are happily not wanting amongst us. But the eduction of its widest truths and highest suggestions is still a felt desideratum. To some attempt at the work we devote these pages. We gratefully avail ourselves of all exegetical helps within our reach; but to occupy our limited space with any lengthened archæological, geographic, or philological remark, would be to miss our aim; which is not be make bare the mechanical process of scriptural study, but to reveal its spiritual results.]

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SEVENTH SECTION.-Matt. iv. 12-25.*

The Dawn of the Model Ministry.

JOHN was cast into prison."† "The voice" which rose in the wilderness, rang its piercing tones through the heart of Jerusalem, and all Judea, and all the region round about Jordan, is now hushed in the oppressive silence of a cell; the ministry that was "a burning and shining light" has gone down amidst the dense gloom of a prison. But the world, though it incarcerates virtue, and seeks to quench the light of its great teacher, shall not be left in darkness. John's light has set, but with its last fading beams there mingles the dawn of another and a higher ministry. As the stars of all preliminary dispensations go down with John's imprisonment, the GREAT LIGHT" from which they all derived their lustre arises "upon the people that sat in darkness."

This passage does not follow the preceding in immediate chronological relation, for Christ evidently taught and wrought considerably both between his temptation in the wilderness, and the imprisonment of John, and the events here recorded; nor is there an immediate chronological relation even between

* Mark i. 14-20; Luke iv. 14, &c.

† For a detailed account of John's incarceration, see Matt. xiv. 3—12 ; Mark vi. 17-29; Luke iii. 19, 20.

John iii. 24.

the events which these verses bring together. But, notwithstanding this, they develop truths, in relation to the ministry of the Son of God—the model ministry—which are of universal application, and of vital importance, to all ages.

They teach us three grand truths about Christ's ministry, the practical development of which by the Church is indispensable to the diffusion of Christianity, and the spiritual progress of the world.

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I. THAT ITS ASPECT WAS BOTH SPIRITUAL AND SECULAR. In its spiritual aspect, the narrative suggests that it was enlightening. It tells us that Jesus, according to an old prophecy, came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is upon the sea coast, in the borders of Zabulon and Nephthalim: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, The land of Zabulon, and the land of Nephthalim, by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles; the people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up." Christ was a luminous teacher: the truths he enunciated were all-revealing. They opened up a new world to the eye of the soul; they exposed time in the light of eternity, humanity in the light of God. And the way he presented them was most lucid. It was not in abstruse reasonings, nor incoherent declamation. He did not cloud his audiences with wordy redundancies; he did not perplex them with the dry formalities of logic, or the erudite references of criticism. His words were radiant. His hearers required neither the specular of syntax nor science to see what he meant, for he spoke not so much to the critical, reasoning, or any other faculty, as to the soul. All the subjects he touched stood out in broad daylight to the common eye. Hence "the people

* The Evangelist sees nothing accidental in the choice of this very locality, but, on the contrary, he sees in it the fulfilment of a prophecy of Isaiah (ix. 1, 2). The passage quoted means, that the light of the Messiah would reveal itself in the most brilliant manner, in the most despised localities of Palestine.--Olshausen.

who sat in darkness" when he appeared amongst them, saw a "great light" throwing its beams on those spiritual domains of existence which sin, for ages, had enwrapped in gloom. (2) The narrative suggests further, in relation to the spiritual aspect of Christ's ministry, that it was reformative. "From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." The reformation he sought was not a mere revolution in intellectual ideas, or in external habits. It would require the former as a means, and ensure the latter as a result. It was a thorough change in the presiding disposition of the soul he meant. It is fully expressed in the two words, "Follow me," which he now addressed to those fishermen on the shores of Galilee, who forthwith became his disciples. True reformation of soul consists in following him who is the Divine embodiment, and minister of that disinterested benevolence which is the one sovereign law of all holy mind, and the one necessary condition of all moral order and true joy.

But his ministry had a secular as well as spiritual aspect. He was not merely engaged in preaching to souls, but in "healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people. And his fame went throughout all Syria: and they brought unto him all sick people that were taken with divers diseases and torments, and those which were possessed with devils, and those which were lunatic, and those that had the palsy; and he healed them." What a catalogue of physical woes is this! and yet it is but a specimen of the bodily sufferings which he thus removed at the outset of his public life. Jesus did not overlook the claims and the woes of the body in his endeavours to enlighten and reform the soul. He fed those who were hungry, and healed those who were sick; and thus he "took our infirmities, and bore our sickness."

That the ministry of Christ had this twofold aspect is not only an unquestionable, but a significant, fact. It indicates the method in which his system should ever have been presented to mankind; that it should have been made to appear the

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friend of humanity in all its varied sufferings-the Divine instrumentality to remove all evils, natural and moral, from the world. But how lamentably has the church failed in this matter! It has almost entirely neglected the secular aspect. Attempts to remove political wrongs, and promote measures for the physical well-being of society, have generally been considered as beneath her high calling, and a work too worldly for her holy hands. Had the church exhibited Christianity in the spirit of its Lord-made it appear to men more as a secular benefactor, and less as a theological belligerent, an ascetic devotee, or a sectarian partizan ;-had the world seen it move in the acts of a genial messenger of deep and genuine philanthropy, penetrating the darkest scenes of trial, with a word to cheer and a hand to bless; showing that pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction;" -and less in pompous ceremonies, conflicting creeds, and affected pietisms; I say, had this been the past history of the church, the secularly depressed-the great bulk of the racewould have had their sympathies in warm and living connexion with it, instead of, as now, having their hearts loofed away in antipathy, and setting up a system of "secularism" to oppose and crush it. Moreover, the church has not only so generally neglected the presentation of the secular aspect of Christianity; it has often failed in the spiritual. Has it presented Christianity as Christ did-to enlighten and reform; or to bewilder with party controversies, and to win over to little sects? Has the reformation it has sought been an endeavour to turn men to the one true and living God, or to turn them to its own peculiar dogmas and polities? Let history answer.

II. THAT ITS SYMPATHIES ARE THOROUGH AND PRACTICAL. The verses suggest three thoughts illustrative of the thoroughness of Christ's sympathies :-First. They had respect to man in the lowest condition. The tract of country here described as the scene on which Christ now entered, where he hence