joyful hope they lived and died. I remember Stephen, the first martyr. I saw his face shine like the face of an angel. I heard him cry, "I see the heavens opened and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God," and he called upon him, praying, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit"; and calmly fell asleep.

It is five years since I first preached the gospel to you in Corinth. Many of those who heard me and believed are gone. They died in the full assurance of faith. They believed the word that Jesus spoke, "In my Father's house are many mansions; . . . I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I come again, and will receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." You committed them to the earth, believing that you laid them in the arms of Jesus. You were comforted in their death by the hope that they had entered into life. But it is all a delusion, if Christ be not risen. They dreamed of heaven, they wake in hell. They have perished every one. They are lost, all lost, forever lost, for they are yet in their sins, and the wrath of God rests upon them through eternity. The gospel is a fable, salvation is a dream, sin and judgment alone are real. Those who fell asleep in Jesus have perished everlastingly. Father, mother, husband, wife, child, friend-they are all lost.

We commit our beloved dead to the earth in the glad hope of a glorious immortality. By the side of the open grave we have seen Jesus standing, and

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have heard from his lips the blessed words on which we rest: "I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth on me, though he die, yet shall he live; and whosoever liveth and believeth on me shall never die." "Thy brother shall rise again." Upon the stone that marks their last resting place we inscribe the words that have brought peace and comfort to our sorrowing hearts: "I know that my Redeemer liveth," "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord," They shall see his face," "For we know that if the earthly house of our tabernacle be dissolved, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." There are many tiny graves in which are laid the bodies of little children. Over them is the inscription, "Suffer the little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for to such belongeth the kingdom of heaven." We have been greatly comforted by these gracious words. But how terribly are we deceived, if Christ be not risen. Then are they falsehoods, every one of them. There is no Redeemer, no heavenly home, no Kingdom of heaven for little children. Let us take mallet and chisel and go from grave to grave, striking out these flattering words letter by letter till not one lying syllable remains.

What shall we inscribe instead? "Death is an eternal sleep?" Terrible as those words may be they fall immeasurably short of the awful reality. As all who slumber there are involved in a common fate, as all are yet in their sins, there is no need of carving upon each separate tombstone the word of doom.

Let us place above the entrance to every cemetery the words that Dante saw inscribed above the gates of hell: "All hope abandon, ye who enter here." "They also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished."

These are the consequences that follow the denial of the resurrection. "Our preaching is vain," "Your faith is vain," "Ye are yet in your sins." "We are found false witnesses of God," "They also that are fallen asleep in Christ have perished." Truly are we then of all men most pitiable, we who have believed a lie and set our hope upon the dead. Life may be a pleasant dream, but death shall shatter our illusions, and set us face to face with the grim realities of judgment.

But hearken to this trumpet peal of exultation: "Now hath Christ been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of them that are asleep." "The Lord is risen," cry the mighty hosts of those on earth who have felt his saving power and rejoice in his constant presence. "The Lord is risen indeed," is the response like the sound of many waters, from the multitude that no man can number, who see his face and bow before his throne in the kingdom above. And every ransomed soul in heaven and on earth replies, "Amen and Amen." Our faith stands not in the wisdom of men but in the power of God. Our hope is fixed upon the living One who was dead, and behold he is alive for evermore. Our sins are blotted out for his name's sake. Our beloved dead are safe. No man shall pluck them out of his hand, the hand

that was nailed to the cross of Calvary for their redemption. He hath opened to all believers the gates of everlasting life. Here and hereafter, now and forever, he is our Saviour and friend. The utmost reach of our faith and hope falls immeasurably short of the truth and the grace that are found in him. He is all that we expect, and infinitely more, able to do for us exceeding abundantly above all we ask or think.

In his rapturous flight Paul has borne us to the skies, beyond the realm of time and sense, to that heavenly home where death is swallowed up in victory. Now he brings us back to earth. We have not yet attained that perfect life. It is reserved for those who are faithful here. Only through fidelity to the tasks of to-day shall we find the way to everlasting life.

"Wherefore, my beloved brethren," seeing we have such a Saviour, such a hope, such a responsibility, "be ye stedfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labor is not vain in the Lord." The path of duty is the path of life.

VIII

THE FOLLY OF SIN

"When he came to himself."

Luke 15:17

The phrase does not indicate that he had been insane, though indeed he was affected with that moral insanity which the Scripture terms folly and sin. It means he came to his senses. We are accustomed to say, when we are out of sorts, I am not myself to-day. If one whom we esteem gives way to bad temper, or falls below our expectation, we say charitably, He is not himself. In these common forms of speech we recognize that a man is himself only when he is at his best. The true self is the better self. This man of the story had been in a manner beside himself. He was lost to reason and conscience. The sensual in him overcame the rational, the brute mastered the man. He gave himself up to lust and appetite. When reason and conscience began to reassert themselves, when the higher nature began to stir within him, it is said that he came to himself. A man is himself only as his life unfolds according to the divine purpose.

Hunger and rags and wretchedness brought him to his senses. Experience is a good teacher, because it wields a vigorous rod. Often it gives a clear head through a sore back, and flogs us to our senses. When in this case the brute was tamed by hunger, the man's better self had a chance to rise.

He had

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