are to let the arrows of divine truth fly full and strong, and straight to the mark. You must put your life into your work. Soul and body must go together. The vast majority of men appreciate nothing purely intellectual. Only through the stir of the emotions, and the physical energy of the man who addresses them, will they be awakened to attend to the truth he preaches. If you cannot reach them by preaching, then reach them by private and personal influence. Be all things to all men, if by any means you may save Do not be fettered by traditional rules of ministerial conduct, when these bar your access to men's hearts. Devise new methods, set on foot new enterprises. No Fabian policy, in the conduct of this warfare. Not simply to "hold the fort" that is already ours, but to "storm the fort" of the enemy for this are we sent. Christ holds us to this putting forth of practical force, this doing of aggressive work, and here is the field for Christian courage.

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And now all this would be at the hazard of the preacher's own salvation, if there were not a third work of courage. I mean spiritual living. No one but he who has tried it, knows what courage it takes to live a spiritual life above the average standard of the community or the church. You never know the bitter hostility of the world to Christ, until you see households divided, and enmities occasioned, by simple faithfuluess to the Master on the part of some one of his disciples. The church too often is willing to bear the ministrations only of one who will speak kindly of its sins, and not too urgently of its duties. Simply to give to secret prayer the time that is absolutely necessary to nourish one's heart, in this age of predominantly outward activities, requires in the minister a continual struggle. To live so far above his people that this struggle shall have ceased and prayer be his life — this, to the mass of Christians, is unhoped for and almost unheard of sanctity,— and the demand that they should come up to a standard so lofty is an irritating impertinence. To contend against these resisting influences requires that Christ's servant should die daily. Yet without thus contending, how can his ministry be other than a failure? He is to lift men up to a higher life. How can he do this, unless he lives that life himself? Nothing but a high-hearted boldness, a very sublimity of courage, will enable even a minister of the gospel in these days to meet the first and most fundamental demand of his office- the living of a spiritual life.

You know whither these remarks are tending. Christ has made provision for all these sublimities. The passive courage that we term patience, fortitude, endurance; and the active courage which we term independence, force, spirituality, both these are given to us in Him in whom we are complete. There is a boldness which consists of meekness and humility- the boldnessof the man who knows that he has the truth, not his own truth, but God's truth, the truth that the world is dying for, the truth that will stand the test of the last great day; the boldness of the man who, by whatever process, has come to the conviction that God has sent him to proclaim the truth, that a woe is on him if he preach not the gospel, and that eternal woe or eternal blessedness for some who hear him depends upon their acceptance or rejection of the message he brings; the boldness of the man who has implicit confidence in God and in his promises, who believes that God is with him in his preaching, helping him to speak and helping his hearers to

hear, and who therefore declares to men with a solemn rejoicing the whole counsel of God. And this boldness, my brethren, so magnificent in its nature and in its results, the very crown and summit of all gifts of God, this is no dream of a wild imagination, but the rightful possession of every one of us whom Christ has put into his ministry.

Courage, then, in its essence as well as in its etymology, is a matter of the heart - the possession only of him whose heart is one with the heart of Christ. It is not a thing of native endowment alone, nor simply a product of reason and experience. The true courage of the Christian minister has its chief source in that divine Person who has constituted himself the heart of our heart and the life of our life. My brethren, if it were in my power, I would pour out upon you such fullness of grace and strength for the work before you, as should leave you never for a moment conscious of intermittency or lack. What I would do but cannot, Christ can do and will. I point you, to Him as the only and the unfailing source of courage. It is for you now to point others to Him. Do it with such zeal, such determination, such faith, such self-devotion, that over you, when you die, may be said those words which were spoken at John Knox's grave: “Here lies one who never feared the face of man."

1878:

TRUE DOGMATISM.

BRETHREN OF THE GRADUATING CLASS :- The Providence of God that has brought you by varied but converging ways, first to your meeting, as students, and now to your parting, has doubtless been preparing your work for you, as well as you for your work. God's Providence and God's Spirit supplement each other. As each age rises, new men arise to take the lead of it and to turn its activities into Christian channels. The preachers of a past generation give place to the preachers of the modern time, because of the great law that men are influenced most by those who are in sympathy with them. The everlasting gospel is everlasting because of its power of endless adaptation to the conditions of the humanity it is to save. And you, who are sent out to teach an age different in some respects from any that has gone before, must in some respects be different men from God's servants in the past, if you are to succeed in your ministry. "Like people, like priest," is a maxim that has a good meaning as well as a bad. As this is an age of intelligence, rapid thinking, hatred of shams, you can mould it for Christ only by being educated, alert and genuine men.

But it is to another point that I wish to call your special attention. It is an age in which all beliefs that take possession of men's minds, whether in science, literature or philosophy, intensely and dogmatically assert themselves. If you would cope with the age's skepticism and indifference, its pre-occupation and hostility, you must meet this assurance of unbelief with the sublimer assurance of faith; you must believe something with all your heart, and then you must declare it and stand for it, and offer combat to all who come. To this doubting, questioning time, you must present some

thing beyond all doubt or question - the eternal truth of God,— present it with the true dogmatism of an unwavering faith. Then your faith shall be contagious, and those who hear you shall believe and live.

Is there a body of definite truth for which you may thus safely stand? And has this truth laid hold of you, so that you glory in nothing else but the preaching of it? These are the two great questions. I trust your course of instruction and investigation in this Seminary has settled the first one for you. I know that there are many "winds of doctrine" at present blowing; much doubt whether the apostles fully knew whereof they affirmed, and whether even Christ's teaching was not an accommodation to his times. There are many who question whether we can be sure enough what the New Testament teachings are, to warrant us in drawing a hard and fast line anywhere, and saying "This is truth,” and “That is a lie." But just this, John did that Boanerges whose love could brook no slight upon Christ or his truth. And we have failed in our teaching, if we have not awakened within you a new and profound conviction that a magnificent and organic scheme of doctrine is made known in the Scriptures - a scheme of doctrine whose foundations are the nature and decrees of God, whose various parts have fixed and unchangeable relations to each other, and whose structure towers above all human systems and embraces truth with regard to heaven as well as with regard to earth.

One of the Bampton Lecturers, Garbett by name, has pointed out very clearly a distinct inculcation of this principle by one of the apostles. In an age of heresy and conflict Jude exhorts his readers to "contend earnestly for the faith once for all delivered to the saints." Notice how much is implied here. First, he assumes the existence of a definite and well-known body of truth called "the faith." The belief of the church was not something vague and changeable, but it consisted of a clear and organized mass of religious doctrine, distinctly separable from the errors that assailed it, and recognized by all believers as characteristic of the Christian church. Secondly, this body of truth is characterized by completeness and finality; it is not susceptible of addition or diminution; it is the faith "once," or as it should be translated, "once for all, delivered to the saints." Thirdly, there is an authority about it, because it has not originated in human reasonings or in human speculations, but has been given from above; it is "the faith once for all delivered," by God. And fourthly, this faith has been given as a sacred trust to a particular body, namely, the church, that they may keep it and defend it, the faith has been "delivered to the saints." And thus we, as ministers of the church, are trustees, and into our hands this priceless treasure has been put, to ensure not only its safety and purity, but its universal diffusion through the world. What can humble us, what can exalt us, more than this, that we who are "less than the least of all saints," are yet chosen to be "stewards of the mysteries of God," and that "this grace is given us," that we might present "the unsearchable riches of Christ "!

You have the objective faith — the system of divine truth; have you the subjective faith-the confidence and zeal that will lead you to devote your lives to its propagation and defense? This is the last question. I invite you to severe self-scrutiny, while you answer it. There is much to weaken this faith in our day. The skeptical habit is the prevalent habit of the time.

The oldest and most settled beliefs have become open questions. God and conscience, heaven and hell, are all marked with interrogation-points. Dogmatic reviews have given place to critical journals in which doubters and disputants hold prolonged symposia. Laxity of doctrineaye, scorn of doctrine is epidemic. I beg you, stop where you are and go no further toward the work of the ministry, if you are not ready to meet this half-questioning, half-denouncing spirit, with faith in the living Christ and in the absolute truth and saving power of his word. If you have still the idea that Christian doctrine is dead dogma, that it is a human invention instead of a deliverance of God, that it weakens the human intellect instead of nourishing it with its proper food, and fetters the mind instead of expanding it with its vital breath,-in fine, if to contend earnestly for the old faith seems to be dogmatism, in the narrow and mean sense of positiveness where there is no certainty, then turn back, the pulpit is no place for you. But, if you know whom you have believed, if God has revealed his Son in you, if you have indubitable assurance that the Scripture doctrines of sin and salvation are the very truth of God, then go forward, declare the whole counsel of God: whoever may refuse to hear, God's Spirit will make your word a word of power, and you shall both save yourselves and those who hear you.

One year ago this evening the class that preceded yours stood in like manner before me. How well we remember one of the members of that class, the manly but gentle, the noble but modest, Albert J. Lyon. As I think of his tall and graceful form, and then of the thorough scholarship and deep devotion that he showed in his Seminary course, I thank God that I was permitted to instruct him. He gave himself to the work of missions. With all the ardor of his ardent nature, he went across the intervening oceans to Christianize and civilize a mountain tribe in Northern Burmah. God spared his life just long enough to permit him to see in the distance the hills where he had expected to labor, and there, before the first year was over, he was called from work to rest, from labor to reward. How pathetically and impressively his example speaks to us to-night! Out from that new-made grave the other side of the sea there comes a voice, speaking to us of the glory of a Christian service performed under the eye and direction of the great Captain of our salvation, even though that service may only be one of suffering and death. May the Spirit that animated him be yours! If you go and continue in that Spirit, your life will not be in vain, even though that life be short.

In this last address, which marks the termination of three years of intimate spiritual and intellectual fellowship-years in which you have commended yourselves individually and collectively to your instructors as candid and faithful Christian men --I bid you for my last admonition to be true dogmatists; not dealers in negations, nor fanciers in literature, nor liberalists in doctrine; but positive preachers of a positive faith. Listen to no theory of development which would add to or take from the written word; and yet let every sermon that you preach show that the old truth has had a new and living development in your apprehension and experience. "Be not ashamed of the testimony of our Lord." Be satisfied with the breadth of his mercy. Proclaim his terms of salvation. Preach his gospel as the final and the only hope of the sinner. One only life is given you to live. Let the "Woe is me!" sound through it. Let it be said that for you "to live is Christ."

Then, whether your lives be long or short, whether you labor on Christian or on heathen soil, whether your apparent success be great or small, you will be sure of the "honor that comes from God only." There is a day whose splendors will outshine the brightest triumphs of the world. Not for the present time, with its flatteries and its pleasures, let us live, but for that day when one approving word from Christ our Lord will well repay a life-time of suffering for his truth. With hopefulness, but with solemnity also, go to work as ministers or servants of the word,- for by that word you, as well as those to whom you preach, will be judged at the last day.

1879:

GOD'S LEADINGS.

BRETHREN OF THE GRADUATING CLASS :- You have reached the end of a long course of preparatory study. The most of you go now for the first time to be pastors of churches at home, or preachers of the gospel abroad. To all of you, I do not doubt, this breaking with the old, and entrance upon the new, is a time of serious self-examination. You recognize your weakness and unworthiness, and say, "Who is sufficient for these things?" But at this crisis of your lives you feel also the stress of Providence. Another hand has guided you. A thousand converging lines of divine influence find their focus at the spot where you now stand. You perceive that there is no real significance in this hour, unless God has had to do with your past life and will have to do with your future. As you look out upon that future, you see as you never saw before, that you need to be led by God. My last words to you will have this for their subject:- "God's Leadings of His Servants in the Ministry."

There is an external leading of God's Providence, of which the subjects of it are unconscious. He leads the blind by a way that they know not. He ordered your birthplace, your early associations, your later experiences. On some slight influences, such as a casual meeting, the loss of a letter, a shower of rain, a trivial indisposition, the caprice of a friend, you now see that your whole earthly career has been made to depend. What caused you to choose the ministry? A very little thing may have turned your thoughts toward it at the first. As you have gone on in life you have been gathering up the threads of the past and weaving them into a definite pattern. You have begun to see the meaning of incidents in your history which you could not understand years ago. All through David's early life with its varied experiences and wonderful vicissitudes - shepherd-boy, outlaw and monarch, by turns - we see how God was fashioning a heart to sing such songs of sorrow and rejoicing as might be the vehicle of his church's devotions through all coming time. In Luther's obscure origin and literary ambition and monastic struggles, we see how God was preparing a familiar but powerful voice for the great German discontent with Papal corruption of Christianity. God was in the whole complex mass of events that prepared the way for the Jewish kingdom and the Protestant Reformation. But God has been equally in the past influences which have shaped your lives. Evil has been overruled for