in the homes of Nazareth, Cana, and Bethany. No Christian was ever so "practical" as Jesus Christ. No disciple ever so directly and sympathetically "served his own generation by the will of God" [Acts xiii. 36.] as did the blessed Master. But all the while "His soul dwelt apart" in the Father's presence, and there continually rested and was refreshed, [John iv. 32, 34.] and there found the "meat" in the strength of which He travelled that great pilgrimage by way of the Cross to the Throne. Jesus Christ, our Exemplar as well as our Life, did indeed live behind His work, behind His ministry, behind His ministerial character, in the region of a Filial Communion in which His Father was His all in all for peace and joy, His law of action and His eternal secret of life. And observe, this habitual communion in the midst of active service did not at all supersede in His blessed experience the stated and definite work of worship and petition before and after the busy hours of service. "He was alone, praying"; [John vi. 57.] "He continued all night in prayer to God"; and at last, "He was withdrawn from them about a stone's cast, and kneeled down and prayed." [Luke ix. 18; vi. 12; xxii. 41.]

All this is not only matter for wondering notice, as we read our New Testament. It is example, it is model. The Head is thus showing His members the way, the only way, to maintain a life among men and for men which shall be full of good for them, because itself ever filled with the life and presence of God.

TESTIMONY OF LUCIUS VON MACHTHOLF.

From a leaflet which came long ago into my hands, I quote the experience of a German Christian, eminently successful in spiritual work; a passage which will illustrate and bring home my appeal in this whole matter:—

"When Lucius von Machtholf was asked how he carried on religious intercourse with individuals, he wrote:—'I know no other tactics than first of all to be heartily satisfied with my God, even if He should favour me with no sensible visible blessing in my vocation. Also to remember that preaching and conversation are not so much my work as the outcome of the love and joy of the Holy Ghost in my heart, and, afterwards, on my lips. Further, that I must never depend upon any previous fervour or prayers of mine, but upon God's mercy and Christ's dearly-purchased rights and holy intercession; and cherishing a burning love to Christ and to souls, I must constantly seek for wisdom and gentleness.... Finally, I would guard myself from imagining that I know beforehand what I should say, but go to Christ for every good word I have to speak, even to a child, and submit myself to the Holy Spirit, as the Searcher of hearts, who, knowing the individuals I have to do with, will guide and teach me when, where, and how to speak.

"'Be always following, never going before. It were better to be sick in a tent under a burning sun, and Jesus sitting at the tent door, than to be enchanting a thousand listeners where Jesus was not. Be as a day-labourer only in God's harvest-field, ready to be first among the reapers in the tall corn, or just to sit and sharpen another's sickle. Have an eye to God's honour, and have no honour of your own to have an eye to. Lay it in the dust and leave it there. Never let your inner life get low in your search for the lives of others.'"

I dare to say that this quotation contains no mere "counsels of perfection," but principles which are indispensable for the Minister of Jesus Christ who would be not only reputable, popular, and in the superficial sense of the word successful, but—what his dear Master would have him be for His work. And the blessed spirit it suggests and exemplifies is a thing which cometh not in "but by prayer" and by at least such fasting as takes the shape of a most watchful secret self-discipline. When von Machtholf speaks of "never depending on previous prayers" it is obvious what he means; not that prayer should not precede work, but that nothing should satisfy the worker short of a living and present trust in a living and present Lord. But that trust is the very thing which is developed, and prepared, and matured, in the life of genuine secret intercourse, in which the Lord is dealt with as man dealeth with his friend, and gazed upon and (I may reverently say) studied in His revealed Character, till the disciple does indeed "know whom he has believed," "who He is that he should believe on Him." "My soul shall be satisfied ... when I remember Thee, when I meditate on Thee, in the night watches," [2 Tim. i. 12; John ix. 36; Ps. lxiii. 5, 6.] aye, and in the Morning Watch also.

URGENT PRESENT NEED TO MAINTAIN SECRET DEVOTION.

I know not how to get away from this subject; not only because of its intense connexion with the most blissful experiences of the believing soul, but because of its unspeakably important bearing on the work of the Ministry, the Ministry of our own time and of my reader's own generation. Never was there a period when the cry for enterprize and practical energy was louder; and God knows there is occasion enough for the cry, and for the answering resolve. But never was there a time when the need was greater to distinguish true from false secrets of energy, and to be content with nothing short of the deepest and most divine as our ultimate secret. Do you not well know what I mean? Is there not far and wide in the "Christian world"—I do not speak now of the exterior regions of avowed scepticism or indifference—a tendency to merge the whole idea of religion in that of philanthropic benevolence, and thereby to draw inevitably the idea of philanthropy downward in the end into its least noble manifestations? Is it not a fashionable thing to regard the Christian Ministry, for example, as a useful and ready mechanism with which to work out the social and sanitary amelioration of the lives of the multitude, and so to take him to be the best qualified Clergyman who is, perhaps, the most "muscular" of Christians, or the cleverest at the invention or superintendence of recreations on a large scale, or the quickest student and exponent of the principles or theories of political economy, or possibly of socialistic enterprize? But all this may leave entirely out the very life-blood of what the New Testament means by the Gospel of the grace of God; and in many, many cases it does entirely leave it out.

*"NATURALISM" IN CHRISTIAN WORK.

A conception of "Church work" is widely entertained, and thought to be adequate, out of which is practically dropped all the mystery, and all the mercy; above all, the work and message of the atoning Cross and the dying Lamb; and the need of the sovereign grace of the Holy Ghost to begin and carry out the Regeneration of the soul; and the depth of our Fall; and the offered greatness and splendour of our New Creation; and "that blessed hope, the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." [Tit. ii. 13.] It is just one wave of the great anti-supernatural tide of our time. Christian work is viewed as much as possible as man's work for man in this present world, under the example, doubtless, of the beneficent life of our Lord, but not under the shadow of Calvary, nor in the light of Pentecost, nor in the definite prospect of an immortality of holy glory.

HOW TO COUNTERACT IT.

To counteract this tendency, and to do so in the right way, is one of the very noblest tasks set before the younger Clergy of the English Church in our time. It is for them, under God, in a pre-eminent degree, to find out the secret, and then to live it