XV.]

ST. MATTHEW'S USE OF THE TEXT.

263

pass by all these utterances that we may dwell on some favourite passage like that of which I have been speaking today, or like that in the eleventh chapter which describes the lamb and the lion feeding together, we shall, I fear, lose the full and true meaning of the sentences which we have chosen for our exclusive, certainly not for our exaggerated, admiration. If we adopt the headings which divines or printers have affixed to our chapters, and determine that such and such a paragraph denotes the flourishing state of the Kingdom of Christ, we may extract from them a kind of meaning,—we shall extract the indication of an excellent meaning;—but I am afraid that we shall go away with a very loose notion of this kingdom, of what makes its state weak or flourishing, of the relation in which our own times or our own selves stand to it. Whereas if we had allowed the prophet to teach us how he had acquired his lore respecting a divine king and a divine kingdom, I believe we should understand infinitely better in what way his prophecies relate to after periods in the life of the Church and of the world, and how it has pleased God to educate one and another into the knowledge of Himself.

If you consider the application which St. Matthew makes of the words, "The people which sat in darkness have seen a great light, and to them who sat in the region and shadow of death, light is sprung up," you will find how much the thoughts in Isaiah's mind respecting the divisions of his land and the heathenism of a great part of it, help to explain our Lord's teaching and work, as well as to unfold the mystery of His person. He went into the further coasts of Zebulun and Naphthali, to that Galilee of the Nations of which Isaiah had spoken; so, says St. Matthew, his words were fulfilled. Just as the summons to the Pass

264 THE LIGHT THAT LIGHTENETH EVERY MAN. [Serm.

over taught the outcasts in these regions seven hundred years before, that they were the children of the divine covenant for whom the unseen Ruler of the land cared; so did the appearance of Jesus among them and His words and acts of love break down the barriers which the Pharisee had raised between them and himself, and claim all Galileans and Samaritans, publicans and harlots, for members of a flock which the chief Shepherd loved, and the poorest sheep of which He would go into the wilderness to seek and to fetch home. The voice which spoke to them was mighty because the heart and conscience confessed that it was a divine voice. The light which shined upon the people of Zebulun and Naphthali, half heathen now as in the days of old, was that light which lightens every man who comes into the world. It was the light which Pharisees and Scribes must own if they would not sink into deepest darkness, and which, if they did own it, would show them that every publican and sinner was their brother.

And if we, brethren, would know who Christ is and what he was come into the world to do, we must feel the strifes which rend asunder the Church Universal, our own nation, every family, every man in it, as Isaiah felt those which tore Ephraim from Manasseh and set them both against Judah. We are not to learn-we cannot learn-who He is from books, however precious they may be,-not even from the book which contains the Revelation of Him,-unless we are content that God should reveal Him to us as He did to His chosen servants and teachers. And thus this blessed revelation may come to you. Look round upon Christendom. Look into the darkest, as well as into what are called the brightest, corners of it. See idolatry here;

XV.]

CHRIST THE CENTRE OF UNITY.

265

pride and exclusiveness there. See men disputing, reviling, slandering, on all sides of you, about the faith that has been delivered to them. See while these things are going on among those who boast that they have the doctrine which can renew the world, what utter heathenism, brutality, atheism is reigning among the masses who are sealed with the seal of God's covenant. Do not trust to your own observation of these facts. Take with you the most scoffing infidel you can find to show them to you, to force them upon your notice, to draw his natural inferences from them. Let him point out to you the different plans of comprehension and reconciliation which wise and religious men have devised, and tell you, with infinite ridicule, how they have all come to nought. Let him show you how in fact each of these plans of compromise is really a confederacy among certain sections of the church, for the destruction of some other. Acknowledge the truth of his boast that each school and church is glad of help from statesmen whom they all denounce as oppressors, yes from the most absolute, godless tyrannies, to accomplish their own ends. Nay stop not yet. Go into some smaller circle of persons separating themselves from others and making the establishment of peace and unity among men their watchwords. Mark the jealousies, strifes, heart-burnings among them. Oh yet once more! See them in your own heart; those lusts that war in your members-they cause all the wars and tumults without.

And then ask yourselves whether you can meditate on such a world as this, whether you can explain how society has been possible in it, how families, nations, churches can have existed in it, how there has been order and fellowship amidst so much hatred and anarchy,-unless there were

266 THE DEMAND OF THE HEART SATISFIED. [Serm. XV.

a centre of unity, a divine source of life and regeneration such as Isaiah confessed when he cried "Unto us a Son is given, and the government is on His shoulder, and His name is Wonderful, Counsellor, The Mighty God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace." I know that there is a conscience and reason within us which say, 'Such a One there must be.' And, oh! are we to refuse to believe, because the Bible has said it, because the creeds of Christendom have said it, because myriads of suffering men and women in all corners of the earth have said it, 'Such a One there is'? Do you desire some new king or prophet to arise and tell you a truth which you never heard before? Kings and prophets we shall have if we need them; but they can only repeat the old lesson; they can only say, 'HE is come, and unto Him the gathering of the people shall be.' They can but do what each one of us in his own place and vocation may do now;-proclaim that the great Christian passover is prepared; that men of all habits, opinions, races are invited to sit down at it; that the poor, the halt, the blind will be welcomed by Him who lived with them and died for them; that upon them who sit in darkness and the shadow of death a Light has risen which no powers in earth or hell can quench.

SERMON XVI.

THR PROUD CITY DOOMED.

LINCOLN'S INN, 5TH SUNDAY IN LENT.-MARCH 29, 1852.

ISAIAH, XIII. 1.

The burden of Babylon, which Isaiah the son of Amoz did see.

In the seventeenth chapter of the Second Book of Kings, we find these words. "In the twelfth year of Ahaz king of Judah began Hoshea the son of Elah to reign in Samaria over Israel nine years. And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord; but not as the kings of Israel which were before him. Against him came up Shalmaneser king of Assyria; and Hoshea became his servant and gave him presents. And the king of Assyria found conspiracy in Hoshea. For he had sent messengers to So king of Egypt, and brought no present to the king of Assyria as he had done year by year; therefore the king of Assyria shut him up and bound him in prison. Then the king of Assyria came up throughout all the land, and went up to Samaria, and beseiged it three years. In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria took Samaria, and carried Israel away into Assyria, and placed them in Halah and in Habor by the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the