law, giving them such precepts and exhortations to fear God and keep His commandments as a pious parent would naturally do, and perhaps joining with them in singing to God some of the prayers and praises of the Book of Psalms. Whether the Jews had in those days any religious assemblies except those of the Temple is very doubtful. There are some texts* which lead to the conjecture that the people who were within reach may have gone to the colleges of the prophets on the Sabbaths and new moons to join in their psalmody and to hear their preaching; or that the prophets may have held assemblies of the people here and there for the same offices.

But after the return from Babylon it became the custom, in the towns and villages, and wherever a minimum congregation of ten men could be habitually brought together, for the people to meet every Sabbath day for a religious service, which consisted of the reading of the law and the prophets, and an exposition of them, the singing of psalms, and the chanting of prayers. The Temple continued to be the centre, and its services the soul, of the worship of the Church; but the addition of the synagogue services must have tended much to the edification of the people.

The popular idea that because the law included many merely ceremonial observances, and its worship included a minute ritual, therefore the religiousness and the devotion of the ancient Church was of a formal and unspiritual character, is at least greatly exaggerated. The spiritual summary of the law which our Lord has given us (Mark xii. 29), "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and mind and soul and strength, and thy neighbour as thyself," was proverbial among the Jews of His day (Luke x. 27), and it was as old as the law itself, for it is taken from two 1 Sam. ix. 12, x. 5, xix. 20—24; 2 Kings iv. 23.

*

texts in the two Books of the Law-Leviticus xix. 18 and Deuteronomy vi. 5. The practical part of the writings of the prophets from Joel to Malachi are examples of the practical religious teaching which the colleges of the prophets were continually giving, and they are full of passages which show that the necessity of spiritual obedience and spiritual worship were thoroughly understood. The Book of the Psalms, the Prayer Book of the Jewish Church, contains expressions in the sublimest language of the deepest penitence, the strongest faith, the most fervent devotion, the most intimate communion with God, and has supplied words to the devotions of the saints of every succeeding age. Wherever there are religious forms, unspiritual men will tend to empty them of their spirit and content themselves with a religion of forms only; if there were no forms, such men would content themselves without any religion at all. Without forms the most spiritual would find it more difficult to maintain a life of constant faith and holiness.

CHAPTER XXVII.

THE FULNESS OF THE TIME.

"WHEN the fulness of the time was come God sent forth His Son" (Gal. iv. 4). Why the great atonement was not made immediately upon the fall we do not know. That God anticipated it in dealing with fallen man we have already. seen. What constituted "the fulness of the time" we cannot tell. It has already been suggested that the Incarnation of God the Son had other motives and objects than the redemption of the race of man, and it is among those other motives, perhaps, that we should, if we knew the history of the universe, recognise "the fulness of the time."

But though we see no special crisis in the history of the world which seemed to call for the Incarnation at the particular period when it took place, yet a survey of the condition of the world then does enable us dimly to recognise a previous preparation of the world, which seems to lead up to the appearance of Christ at the time when He actually

came.

The human mind in the person of Socrates and Plato had reached as far upward as the human mind could stretch towards the discovery of truth, it had disentangled itself from the errors of the old mythologies, and it had come to believe in one God, Creator and Ruler of the universe; it had expressed its sense of the need of a revelation of His will; it had even given utterance to its longing that God would come among His children and help them. The Greek language and literature had been adopted by the educated

classes all over the civilised world, and these speculations of the philosophers had been pondered by every educated mind.

The Roman empire had organised the nations into one great community, and extended not only the power but the arts and civilisation of the capital to the furthest extremities of the empire; so that there was a greater intercourse among the families of mankind than perhaps at any previous period of history, and the world never before lay so open to the influence of any new ideas which should appeal to their common humanity.

The Jews, so long prone to idolatry, had since the captivity most firmly, through many persecutions at the hands of their powerful neighbours of Syria and of Egypt, maintained their faith in the one true God. In the later ages of their history they had overflowed the boundaries of their own land; and by the time of the Christian era colonies of Jews were settled in every great commercial city of the world, where they maintained their separate nationality, bearing witness to the one true God in the midst of all the idolatries of the world, and looking with earnestness for the coming of the Messiah, whose advent they believed to be close at hand.

The old religions of the world were worn out--the human mind and conscience had outgrown them. Among the educated classes there was a very general disbelief in the old mythologies. The great philosophers had led them up to the very confines of revealed truth; and among those who came in contact with the Jews there were many who were attracted by the sublime theology and the lofty morality of their religion, and adopted more or less their belief. Thus when Paul went forth into the world to preach Christ, his Greek learning and language gave him the ear of the educated world; his

Roman citizenship gave him safe entrance everywhere; in every town was a synagogue of Jews, to whom he first addressed himself, and let fall the seed of the Word in preprepared soil; they believed in God, they looked for the Christ, they expected Him then; what Paul had to say was that Jesus is Christ, and to establish it, out of the Scriptures they believed in, and by the miracle of the resurrection, of which the apostles were the witnesses. And around the synagogue was the fringe of proselytes of the gate, believing in the great general truths of the Old Testament, not prejudiced by Jewish prepossessions and narrowed by Jewish exclusiveness, ready-perhaps even more ready than the Jews-to embrace the new revelation which the Christian apostles brought them. And through these proselytes the Gospel might spread like leaven to their heathen relations, friends, neighbours, till the whole mass of society was leavened.