night and day before the Eternal Presence.

In the strength of this belief he had lived, and in the awe of this thought he now died. This conviction it was—this sense of a present righteousness, confronting him always—which raised him high above the level of his age; keeping him pure amid the surroundings of a dissolute court; modest and humble in a generation of much pretentious display; high-minded and careless of wealth in a time of gross venality and corruption; firm in the faith amidst a society cankered by scepticism; devout and reverent, where spiritual indifference reigned supreme; candid and thoughtful and temperate, amidst the temptations and the excitements of religious controversy; careful even for the externals of worship, where such care was vilified as the badge of a degrading superstition. Hence that tremendous seriousness which is his special characteristic—that "awful sense of religion," that "sacred horror at men's frivolity," in the language of a living essayist. Hence that transparent sincerity of character, which never fails him. Hence that "meekness of wisdom," which he especially urges his clergy to study, and of which he himself was all unconsciously the brightest example.

And what more seasonable prayer can you offer for him who addresses you now, at this the most momentous crisis of his life, than that he—the latest successor of Butler—may enter upon the duties of his high and responsible office in the same spirit; that the realisation of this great idea, the realisation of this great fact, may be the constant effort of his life; that glimpses of the invisible righteousness, of the invisible grace, of the invisible glory, may be vouchsafed to him; and that the Eternal Presence, thus haunting him night and day, may rebuke, may deter, may guide, may strengthen, may comfort, may illume, may consecrate and subdue the feeble and wayward impulses of his own heart to God's holy will and purpose!

And not for the preacher only, but for the hearers also, let the same prayer ascend to the throne of heaven. In all the manifold trials and all the mean vexations of life, this presence will be your strength and your stay. Whatsoever is truthful, whatsoever is real, whatsoever is abiding in your lives, if there be any antidote to sin, and if there be any anodyne for grief, if there be any consolation, and if there be any grace, you will find it here, and here alone—in the ever-present consciousness that you are living face to face with the Eternal God. Not by fitful gusts of religious passion, not by fervid outbursts of sentimental devotion, not by repetition of approved forms, and not by acquiescence in orthodox beliefs, but by the calm, steady, persistent concentration of the soul on this truth, by the intent fixing of the inward eye on the righteousness and the grace of the Eternal Being before Whom you stand, will you redeem your spirits and sanctify your lives. So will your minds be conformed to His mind. So will your faces reflect the brightness of His face. So will you go from strength to strength, till, life's pilgrimage ended, you appear in the eternal Zion, the celestial city, wherein is "neither sun nor moon, for the glory of God doth lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof."

Let this, then, be the theme of our meditation this morning. Many thoughts will crowd upon our minds and struggle for utterance on a day like this; but we will put them all aside. Not our hopes, not our cares, not our burdens; nothing of joy, nothing of sadness shall interpose now to shut out or obscure the glory of the Presence before Whom we stand.

Not our hopes, though one hope starts up and shapes itself perforce before our eyes. It will be the prayer of many hearts to-day that the inauguration of a new Episcopate may be marked by the creation of a new See; that Northumberland, which in the centuries long past gave to Durham her Bishopric, may receive from Durham her due in return in these latest days; that the Newcastle on the Tyne may take its place with the Old Castle on the Wear, as a spiritual fortress strong in the warfare of God.

Not our cares, though at this season one anxiety will press heavily on the minds of all. The dense cloud, which for weeks past has darkened the social atmosphere of these northern counties, still hangs sullenly overhead. God grant that the rift which already we seem to discern may widen, till the flooding sunlight scatters the darkness, and a lasting harmony is restored to the relations between the employer and the employed.

Not our burdens, though on one at least in this Cathedral the sense of a new responsibility must press to-day with a heavy hand. If indeed this burden had been self-sought or self-imposed, if his thoughts were suffered to dwell on himself and his own incapacity, he might well sink under its crushing weight. But your prayer for him, and his ideal for himself, will shape itself in the words which were spoken to the great Israelite restorer of old, "Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord of Hosts." In this strength only, before you as before him, will the great mountain become a plain.

Therefore we will lay down now our hopes and our fears, our every burden, at the steps of the altar, that, entering disencumbered into the inmost sanctuary, we may fall before the Eternal Presence.

The vision of God is threefold—the vision of Righteousness, the vision of Grace, the vision of Glory.

I. The vision of Righteousness is first in the sequence. Righteousness includes all those attributes which make up the idea of the Supreme Ruler of the universe—perfect justice, perfect truth, perfect purity, perfect moral harmony in all its aspects. Here, then, is the force of Butlers dying words. Ask yourselves, Can it be otherwise than "an awful thing to appear before the Moral Governor of the world"? You have read, perhaps, the written record of some pure and saintly life, and you are overwhelmed with shame as you look inward and contrast your sullied heart and your self-seeking aims with his innocency and cleanness of heart. You are confronted—you, an avowedly religious person—in your business affairs with an upright man of the world; and his straightforward honesty is felt by you as a keen reproach to your disingenuousness and evasion, all the keener because he makes no profession of religion. Yes, you know it; this is the very impress of God's attribute on his soul, though God's name may seldom or never pass his lips. And if these faint rays of the Eternal Light, thus caught and reflected on the blurred mirrors of human hearts and human lives, so sting and pain the organs of your moral vision, what must it not be, then, when you shall stand face to face before the ineffable Righteousness, and see Him in His unclouded glory!

It is a vision indeed of awe, transcending all thought; a vision of awe, but a vision also of purification, of renewal, of energy, of power, of life. Therefore enter into his presence now and cast yourself down before His throne. Therefore dare to ascend into the holy mountain; dare to speak with God amidst the thunders and the lightnings; dare to look upon the face of His righteousness, that, descending from the heights, you, like the lawgiver of old, may carry with you the reflection of His brightness, to illumine and to vivify the common associations and the every-day affairs of life.

Not a few here will doubtless remember how an eloquent living preacher in a striking image employs the distant view of the towers of your own Durham—of my own Durham—seen from the neighbourhood of the busy northern capital only in the clearer atmosphere of Sundays—as an emblem of these glimpses of the Eternal Presence, these intervals of Sabbatical repose and contemplation, when the furnaces and pits cease for the time to pour forth their lurid smoke, and in the unclouded sky the towers of the celestial Zion reveal themselves to the eye of faith. Let this local image give point to our thoughts to-day. "Unto Thee lift I up mine eyes, O Thou that dwellest in the heavens.