This law that a man shall live by his labour is a two-edged law. If a

man produce what the community needs, he should himself profit by the

production; but, on the other hand, if a man will not work, neither

should he eat. Only the man who produces what other men need, only the

man who by his industry or capability contributes to the good of the

community, has any right to profits. Quick and easy manipulations of

money, shrewd and risky dexterities which yield no real benefit to the

community, deserve no remuneration. It is a blind, sordid, and

contemptible spirit that hastes to be rich by one or two successful

transactions that profit no one. A man should be content to live on

what he is worth to the community. Here also our minds are often

confused by the complexities of business; but on that account it is

all the more necessary that we firmly adhere to the few essential

canons, such as that "trading ceases to be just when it ceases to

benefit both parties," or that a man's wealth should truly represent

his value to society. Conscience enlightened by allegiance to the

Spirit of Christ is a much more satisfactory guide for the individual

in trade, speculation, and investment than any trade customs or

economic theories.

3. A third ground on which Paul rests his claim to be supported by the

Church is ordinary gratitude: "If we have sown unto you spiritual

things, is it a great thing if we shall reap your carnal things?" Some

of the Churches founded by Paul spontaneously acknowledged this claim,

and wished to free him from the necessity of labouring for his own

support. They felt that the benefit they had derived from him could

not be stated in terms of money; but prompted by irrepressible

gratitude, they could not but seek to relieve him from manual labour

and set him free for higher work. This method of gauging the amount of

spiritual benefit absorbed, by its overflow in material aid given to

the propagation of the Gospel would, I daresay, scarcely be relished

by that monstrous development the niggardly Christian.

4. Lastly, Paul argues from the Levitical usage to the Christian. Both

in heathen countries and among the Jews it was customary that they who

ministered in holy things should live by the offerings of the people

to the temple. Levites and priests alike had been thus maintained

among the Jews. "Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach

the Gospel should live of the Gospel." Were there no recorded command

of the Lord to this effect, we might suppose Paul merely argued that

this was the Lord's will; but among the original instructions given to

the seventy who were first sent to preach the kingdom of heaven, we

find this: "Into whatsoever house ye enter, there remain, eating and

drinking such things as they give, for the labourer is worthy of his

hire."

That evils may result from the existence of a paid ministry no one

will be disposed to deny. Some of the most disastrous abuses in the

Church of Christ, as well as some of the gravest political troubles,

could never have arisen had there been no desirable benefices.

Lucrative ecclesiastical posts and offices have necessarily excited

the avarice of unworthy aspirants, and have weakened instead of

strengthening the Church's influence. Many wealthy ecclesiastics have

done nothing for the benefit of the people, whereas many laymen by

their unpaid devotedness have done much. In view of these and other

evils, it cannot surprise us to find that again and again it has

occurred to good men to suppose that on the whole Christianity might

be more effectively propagated were there no separate class of men set

apart to this work as their sole occupation. But this idea is

reactionary and extreme, and is condemned both by common-sense and by

the express declarations of our Lord and His Apostles. If the work of

the ministry is to be thoroughly done, men must give their whole time

to it. Like every other professional work, it will often be done

inadequately; and I daresay there is much in our methods which is

unwise and susceptible of improvement: but the ministry keeps pace

with the general intelligence of the country, and may be trusted to

adapt its methods, even though too tardily for some ardent spirits, to

the actual necessities. And if men give their whole time to the work,

they must be paid for it, a circumstance which is not likely to lead

to much evil in our own country so long as the great mass of ministers

are paid as they presently are. It is hardly the profession which is

likely to be chosen by any one who is anxious to coin his life into

money. If the laity consider that covetousness is more unseemly in a

Christian minister than in a Christian man, they have taken an

effectual means of barring out that vice.

Paul felt himself the more free to urge these claims because his

custom was to forego them all in his own case. "I have used none of

these things: neither have I written these things, that it should be

so done unto me; for it were better for me to die, than that any man

should make my glorying void." Here again we come upon the sound

judgment and honest heart that are never biassed by his own personal

circumstances or insist that what is fit for him is fit for every one.

How apt are self-denying men to spoil their self-denial by dropping a

sneer at the weaker souls that cannot follow their heroic example. How

ready are men who can live on little and accomplish much to leave the

less robust Christians to justify on their own account their need of

human comforts. Not so Paul. He first fights the battle of the weak

for them, and then disclaims all participation in the spoils. What a

nobility and sagacity in the man who himself would accept no

remuneration for his work, and who yet, so far from thinking

slightingly of those who did or even being indifferent to them, argues

their case for them with an authoritative force they did not

themselves possess!

Nor does he consider that his self-denial is at all meritorious. He

has no desire to signalize himself as more disinterested than other

men. On the contrary, he strives to make it appear as if this course

were compulsory and as if no choice were left to him. His fear was

that if he took remuneration, he "should hinder the Gospel of Christ."

Some of the best incomes in Greece in Paul's day were made by clever

lecturers and talkers, who attracted disciples, and initiated them

into their doctrines and methods. Paul was resolved he should never be

mistaken for one of these. And no doubt his success was partly due to

the fact that men recognised that his teaching was a labour of love,

and that he was impelled by the truth and importance of his message.

Every man finds an audience who is inwardly impelled to speak; who

speaks, not because he is paid for doing so, but because there is that

in him which must find utterance.

This, says Paul, was his case. "Though I preach the Gospel, I have

nothing to glory of: for necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto

me, if I preach not the Gospel!" His call to the ministry had been so

exceptional, and had so distinctly and emphatically declared the grace

and purpose of Christ, that he felt bound by all that can constrain a

man to the devotedness of a lifetime. Paul felt what we now so clearly

see: that on him lay the gravest responsibilities. Had he declined to

preach, had he complained of bad usage, and stipulated for higher

terms, and withdrawn from the active propagation of Christianity, who

would or could have taken up the task he laid down? But while Paul

could not but be conscious of his importance to the cause of Christ,

he would arrogate to himself no credit on account of his arduous toil,

for from this, he says, he could not escape; necessity was laid upon

him. Whether he does his work willingly or unwillingly, still he must

do it. He dare not flinch. If he does it willingly, he has a reward;

if he does it unwillingly, still he is entrusted with a stewardship he

dare not neglect. What then is the reward he has, giving himself, as

he certainly does, _willingly_ to the work? His reward is that "when

he preaches the Gospel he makes the Gospel of Christ without charge."

The deep satisfaction he felt in dissociating the Gospel of

self-sacrifice from every thought of money or remuneration and in

offering it freely to the poorest as his Master's fit representative

was sufficient reward for him and incalculably greater than any other

he ever got or could conceive.

In other words, Paul saw that however it might be with other men, with

him there was no alternative but to preach the Gospel; the only

alternative was--was he to do it as a slave entrusted with a

stewardship, and who was compelled, however reluctant he might be, to

be faithful, or was he to do it as a free man, with his whole will and

heart? The reluctant slave could expect no reward; he was but

fulfilling an obligatory, inevitable duty. The free man might,

however, expect a reward; and the reward Paul chose was that he should

have none--none in the ordinary sense, but really the deepest and most

abiding of all: the satisfaction of knowing that, having freely

received, he had freely given, and had lifted the Gospel into a region

quite undimmed by the suspicion of self-seeking or any mists of

worldliness.

In declining pecuniary remuneration, Paul was acting on his general

principle of making himself the servant of all and of living entirely

and exclusively for the good of others. "Though I be free from all

men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the

more." It was from Paul that Luther derived his two propositions which

he uttered as the keynote of the resonant blast "on Christian Liberty"

with which he stirred all Europe into new life: "A Christian man is

the most free lord of all, and subject to none; a Christian man is the

most dutiful servant of all, and subject to every one." So Paul's

independence of all men was assumed and maintained for the very

purpose of making himself the more effectually the servant of all. To

the Jew and to those under the Law he became as a Jew, observing the

seventh day, circumcising Timothy, abstaining from blood,

accommodating himself to all their scruples. To those who were without

the Law, and who had been brought up in Greece, he also conformed

himself, freely entering into their innocent customs, calling no meats

unclean, appealing, not to the law of Moses, but to conscience, to

common-sense, to their own poets. "I am made all things to all men,

that I might by all means save some"--a course which none but a man of

wide sympathy and charity, clear intellect, and thorough integrity can

adopt.

For Paul was no mere latitudinarian. While accommodating himself to

the practice of those around him in all matters of mere outward

observance, and which did not touch the essentials of morality and

faith, he at the same time held very definite opinions on the chief

articles of the Christian creed. No amount of liberality of sentiment

can ever induce a thoughtful man to discourage the formation of

opinion on all matters of importance. On the contrary, the only escape

from mere traditionalism or the tyranny of authority in matters of

religion is in individual inquiry and ascertainment of the truth. Free

inquiry is the one instrument we possess for the discovery of truth;

and by pursuing such inquiry men may be expected to come to some

agreement in religious belief, as in other things. No doubt

righteousness of life is better than soundness of creed. But is it not

possible to have both? It is better to live in the Spirit, to be meek,

chaste, temperate, just, loving, than to understand the relation of

the Spirit to God and to ourselves; but the human mind can never cease

to seek satisfaction: and truth, the more clearly it is seen, will the

more effectually nourish righteousness.

Again, Paul had an end in view which preserved his liberality from

degenerating. He sought to recommend himself to men, not for his sake,

but for theirs. He saw that conscientious scruples were not to be

confounded with malignant hatred of truth, and that if we are to be

helpful to others, we must begin by appreciating the good they already

possess. Hostile criticism or argument for the sake of victory

produces no results worth having. Vain exultation in the victors,

obstinacy and bitterness in the vanquished--these are worse than

useless, the retrograde results of unsympathetic argument. In order to

remove a man's difficulties, you must look at them from his point of

view and feel the pressure he feels. "The greatest orator save one of

antiquity has left it on record that he always studied his adversary's

case with as great, if not still greater, intensity than even his

own;"[6] and certainly those who have not entered into the point of

view of those who differ from them are not likely to have anything of

importance to say to them. In order to "gain" men, you must credit

them with some desire to see the truth, and you must have sympathy

enough to see with their eyes. Parents sometimes weaken their

influence with their children by inability to look at things with the

eyes of youth, and by an insistence upon the outward expressions of

religion which are distasteful to children and suitable only for

adults. Children have a high esteem for justice and courage, and can

respond to exhibitions of self-sacrifice, and truth, and purity; that

is to say, they have a capacity for admiring and adopting the

essentials of the Christian character, but if we insist upon them

exhibiting feelings which are alien to their nature and practices

necessarily distasteful and futile, we are more likely to drive them

from religion than to attract them to it. Let us beware of insisting

on alterations in conduct where these are not absolutely necessary.

Let us beware of identifying religion in the minds of the young with a

rigid conformity in outward things, and not with an inward spirit of

love and goodness. Are you striving to gain some? Then let these words

of the Apostle warn you not to seek for the wrong thing, not to begin

at the wrong end, not to measure the hold which truth has over those

you seek to win, by the exactness with which all your ideas are

carried out and all your customs observed. Human nature is an

infinitely various thing, and often there is the truest regard for

what is holy and Divine disguised under a violent departure from all

ordinary ways of manifesting reverence and piety. Put yourself in the

place of the inquiring, perplexed, embittered soul, find out the good

that is in it, patiently accommodate yourself to its ways so far as

you legitimately may, and you will be rewarded by "gaining some."

[6] See Mill's _Liberty_, p. 21.

_NOT ALL WHO RUN WIN._

"And this I do for the Gospel's sake, that I might be partaker

thereof with you. Know ye not that they which run in a race run

all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain. And

every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all

things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an

incorruptible. I therefore so run, not as uncertainly; so fight

I, not as one that beateth the air: but I keep under my body, and

bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have

preached to others, I myself should be a castaway."--1 COR. ix.

23-27.

XIV.

_NOT ALL WHO RUN WIN._

In the preceding part of this chapter Paul has proved his right to

claim remuneration from those to whom he preached the Gospel, and he

has also given his reasons for declining to urge this claim. He was

resolved that no one should have any ground for misapprehending his

motive in preaching the Gospel. He was quite content to live a bare,

poor life, not merely that he might keep himself above suspicion, but

that those who heard the Gospel might see it simply as the Gospel and

not be hindered from accepting it by any thought of the preacher's

motives. This was his main reason for supporting himself by his own

labour. But he had another reason, namely, "that he might be himself a

partaker of the benefits he preached" (ver. 23). Apostle though he

was, he had his own salvation to work out. He was not himself saved by

proclaiming salvation to others, no more than the baker is fed by

making bread for others or the physician kept in health by prescribing

for others. Paul had a life of his own to lead, a duty of his own to

discharge, a soul of his own to save; and he recognised that what was

laid before him as the path to salvation was to make himself entirely

the servant of others. This he was resolved persistently to do, "lest

that by any means, when he had preached to others, he himself should

be a castaway."

Paul had evidently felt this danger to be a serious one. He had found

himself tempted from time to time to rest in the name and calling of

an apostle, to take for granted that his salvation was a thing past

doubt and on which no more thought or effort need be expended. And he

saw that in a slightly altered form this temptation was common to all

Christians. All have the name, not all the reality. And the very

possession of the name is a temptation to forget the reality. It might

almost seem to be in the proportion of runners to winners in a race:

"All run, but one receiveth the prize."

In endeavouring to warn Christians against resting in a mere

profession of faith in Christ, he cites two great classes of instances

which prove that there is often ultimate failure even where there has

been considerable promise of success. First, he cites their own

world-renowned Isthmian games, in which contests, as they all well

knew, not every one who entered for the prizes was successful: "All

run, but one receiveth the prize." Paul does not mean that salvation

goes by competition; but he means that as in a race not all who run

run so as to obtain the prize for which they run, so in the Christian

life not all who enter it put out sufficient energy to bring them to a

happy issue. The mere fact of recognising that the prize is worth

winning and even of entering for it is not enough. And then he cites

another class of instances with which the Jews in the Corinthian

Church were familiar. "_All_ our fathers," he says, "were under the

cloud, and _all_ passed through the sea, and _all_ were baptized unto

Moses in the cloud and in the sea." All of them without exception

enjoyed the outward privileges of God's people, and seemed to be in a

fair way of entering the promised land; and yet the majority of them

fell under God's displeasure, and were overthrown in the wilderness.

Therefore "let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall."

The Isthmian games, then, one of the most ancient glories of Corinth,

furnished Paul with the readiest illustration of his theme. These

games, celebrated every second year, had in ancient times been one of

the chief means of fostering the feeling of brotherhood in the

Hellenic race. None but Greeks of pure blood who had done nothing to

forfeit their citizenship were allowed to contend in them. They were

the greatest of national gatherings; and even when one State was at

war with another, hostilities were suspended during the celebration of

the games. And scarcely any greater distinction could be earned by a

Greek citizen than victory in these games. When Paul says that the

contending athletes endured their severe training and underwent all

the privations necessary "to obtain a corruptible crown," we must

remember that while it is quite true that the wreath of pine given to

the victor might fade before the year was out, he was welcomed home

with all the honours of a victorious general, the wall of his town

being thrown down that he might pass in as a conqueror, and his statue

being set up by his fellow-citizens. In point of fact, the names and

deeds of many of the victors may yet be read in the verses of one of

the greatest of Greek poets, who devoted himself, as laureate of the

games, to the celebration of the annual victories.

But however highly we raise the value of the Greek crown, the force of

Paul's comparison remains. The wreath of the victor in the games was

at the best corruptible, liable to decay. No permanent, eternal

satisfaction could result from being victorious in a contest of

physical strength, activity, or skill. But for every man it is

possible to win an incorruptible crown, that which shall always and

for ever be to him a joy as thrilling and a distinction as honourable

as at the moment he received it. There is that which is worthy of the

determined and sustained effort of a lifetime. Put into the one scale

all perishable distinctions, and honours, and prizes, all that has

stimulated men to the most strenuous endeavours, all that a grateful

nation bestows on its heroes and benefactors, all for which men "scorn

delights and live laborious days;" and all these kick the beam when

you put in the other scale the incorruptible crown. The two are not

necessarily opposed or incompatible; but to choose the less in

preference to the greater is to repudiate our birthright. As victory

in the games was the actual incentive which stimulated the youth of

Greece to attain the perfection of physical strength, beauty, and

development, so there is laid before us an incentive which, when

clearly apprehended, is sufficient to carry us forward to perfect

moral attainment. The brightest jewel in the incorruptible crown is

the joy of having become all God made us to become, of perfectly

fulfilling the end of our creation, of being able to find happiness in

goodness, in closest fellowship with God, in promoting what Christ

lived and died to promote. Must we say that there are men who have no

ambition to experience perfect rectitude and purity? Are we to

conclude that there are men of so grovelling, besotted, and blind a

spirit that when opportunity is given them to win true glory, perfect

expansion and growth of spirit, and perfect joy they turn away to

salaries and profits, to meat and drink, to frivolity and the world's

routine? The incorruptible crown is held over their head; but so

intent are they on the muck-rake, they do not even see it.

To those who would win it Paul gives these directions:--

1. Be temperate. "Every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate

in all things." Contentedly and without a murmur he submits himself to

the rules and restrictions of his ten months' training, without which

he may as well not compete. The little indulgences which other men

allow themselves he must forego. Not once will he break the trainer's

rules, for he knows that some competitors will refrain even from that

once and gain strength while he is losing it. He is proud of his

little hardships, and fatigues, and privations, and counts it a point

of honour scrupulously to abstain from anything which might in the

slightest degree diminish his chance of success. He sees other men

giving way to appetite, resting while he is panting with exertion,

luxuriating in the bath, enjoying life at pleasure; but he has scarce

a passing thought of envy, because his heart is set on the prize, and

severe training is indispensable. He knows that his chances are gone

if in any point or on any occasion he relaxes the rigour of the

discipline.

The contest in which Christians are engaged is not less, but more,

severe. The temperance maintained by the athlete must be outdone by

the Christian if he is to be successful. There are many things in

which men who have no thought of the incorruptible prize may engage,

but from which the Christian must refrain. All that lowers the tone

and slackens the energies must be abandoned. If the Christian indulges

in the pleasures of life as freely as other men, if he is unconscious

of any severity of self-restraint, if he denies himself nothing which

others enjoy, he proves that he has no higher aim than they and can of

course win no higher prize. The temperance here enjoined, and which

the Christian practises, not because it is enjoined, but because a

higher aim truly cherished compels him to practise it, is a habitual

sober-mindedness and detachment from what is worldly in the world. It

is that temper of spirit and that sustained attitude towards life

which enable a man to rule his own desires, to endure hardness and

find pleasure in so doing. No spasmodic, occasional efforts and

partial abstinences will ever bring a man victorious to the goal. Many

a man denies himself in one direction and indulges himself in another.

He macerates the flesh, but pampers the spirit by vanity, ambition, or

self-righteousness. Or he denies himself some of the pleasures of

life, but is more besotted by its gains than other men. Temperance to

be effectual must be complete. The athlete who drinks more than is

good for him may save himself the trouble of observing the trainer's

rules as to what he eats. It is lost labour to develop some of his

muscles if he do not develop all of them. If he offends in one point,

he breaks the whole law.

Temperance must be continuous as well as complete. One day's debauch

was enough to undo the result of weeks during which the athlete had

carefully attended to the rules prescribed. And we find that one lapse

into worldliness undoes what years of self-restraint have won. Always

the work of growth is very slow, the work of destruction very quick.

One indiscretion on the part of the convalescent will undo what the

care of months has slowly achieved. One fraud spoils the character

for honesty which years of upright living have earned. And this also

is one of the great dangers of the spiritual life: that a little

carelessness, a brief infidelity to our high calling, or a passing

indulgence suddenly demolishes what long and patient toil has been

building up. It is like the taking out of a pin or a ratchet that lets

all we have gained run down to its old condition.

Beware then of giving place to the world or the flesh at any point. Be

reasonable and true. Recognise that if you are to succeed in winning

eternal life, all the spiritual energy you can command will be

required. So set your heart on the attainment of things eternal that

you will not grudge missing much that other men enjoy and possess.

Measure the invitations of life by their fitness or unfitness to

develop within you true spiritual energy.

2. Be decided. "I run," says Paul, "not as uncertainly," not as a man

who does not know where he is going or has not made up his mind to go

there. To be among those who win as well as among those who run, we

must know where we are going, and be quite sure we mean to be there.

We have all some kind of idea about what God offers and calls us to.

But this idea must be clear if we are to make for it straight. No man

can run straight to a mere will-o'-the-wisp, and no man can run

straight who first means to go to one house or station and then

changes his mind and thinks he should go to another. We must count the

cost and see clearly what we are to gain and what we must lose by

making for the incorruptible prize. We must be resolved to win and

have no thought of defeat, of failure, of doing something better. It

is the absence of deliberate choice and reasonable decision which

causes such "uncertain" running on the part of many who profess to be

in the race. Their faces are as often turned from the goal as towards

it. They are evidently not clear in their own minds that all strength

spent in any other direction than towards the goal is wasted. They do

not distinctly know what they mean to be at, what they wish to make of

life. Paul did know. He had made up his mind not to pursue comfort,

learning, money, respect, position, but to seek first the kingdom of

God. He judged that to spread the knowledge of Christ was the best use

to which he could put his life. He knew where he was going and to what

all his efforts tended. Every life is unsatisfactory until its owner

has made up his mind what he means to do with it, until it is governed

by a clearly conceived and firmly held aim. Then it flies like the

arrow to its mark.

What then do the traces of our past life show? Do we see the straight

track of a well-steered ship, which has deviated not a yard from its

course nor wasted an ounce of power? Has every footfall been in direct

advance of the last, and has all expenditure of energy brought us

nearer the ultimate goal? Or are the traces we look back on like

ground trodden by dancers, a confused medley all in one spot, or like

the footsteps of saunterers in a garden backwards and forwards,

according as this or that has attracted them? Has not the course of

many of us been like that of persons lost, uncertain which direction

to pursue, eagerly starting off, but after a little slackening their

pace, stopping, looking round, and then going off in another

direction? For some weeks a great deal of ardour has been apparent,

the whole man girt up, every nerve strained, the whole attention

directed towards spiritual victory, arrangements made to facilitate

communion with God, new methods devised for subordinating all our work

to the one great aim, everything gone about as if now at last we had

found the secret of living; and then in a surprisingly short time all

this eagerness cools down, doubt takes the place of decision,

discouragement and failure breed distrust of our methods, and we lapse

into contentment with easier attainments and more worldly aims. And at

length, after many false starts, we are ashamed to begin any arduous

spiritual task for fear of ceasing it next week. We think that the

surest way to make fools of ourselves is to adopt a thorough-going

Christian practice, so much do we count upon ourselves flagging,

wearying, altering our course. How many times have we been rekindled

to some true zeal, how often have we gathered up our scattered

energies and concentrated our efforts on the Christian life, and yet

as often have we gone back to a dreamy, listless sauntering, as if we

had nothing to secure, no end to reach, no work to accomplish.

Are we likely ever to reach the goal thus? Will the goal come to us,

or how are we ever to reach it? Are we nearer to it to-day than ever

before? Are not our minds yet made up that it is worth reaching, and

that whatever does not help us towards it must be abandoned? Let us be

clear in our own minds as to the matters which tempt us aside from the

straight path to the goal and are incompatible with progress; and let

us determine whether these things are to prevail with us or not.

3. Be in earnest. "So fight I, not as one that beateth the air," not

as one amusing himself with idle flourishes, but as one who has a

real enemy to encounter. What a blush does this raise on the cheek of

every Christian who knows himself! How much of this mere parade and

sham-fighting is there in the Christian army! We learn the art of war

and the use of our weapons as if we were forthwith to use them in the

field; we act over and learn many varieties of offensive and defensive

movements, and know the rules by which spiritual foes may be subdued;

we read books which direct us about personal religion, and delight in

those which most skilfully lay open our weaknesses and show us how we

may overcome them. But all this is mere fencing-school work; it kills

no enemy. It is but a species of accomplishment like that of those who

learn the use of the sword, not because they mean to use it in battle,

but that they may have a more elegant carriage. A great part of our

spiritual strength is spent in mere parade. It is not meant to have

any serious effect. It is not directed against anything in particular.

We seem to be doing everything that a good soldier of Jesus Christ

need do save the one thing: we slay no enemy. We leave no foe

stone-dead on the field. We are well trained: no one can deny it; we

could instruct others how to conquer sin; we spend much time, and

thought, and feeling on exercises which are calculated to make an

impression on sin; and yet is it not almost entirely a beating the

air? Where are our slain foes? This apparent eagerness to be holy,

this professed devotedness to the cause of Christ--are they not mere

flourish? We do not mean to strike our enemies; we for the most part

only wish to make ourselves believe we are striking them and are

zealous and faithful soldiers of Christ.

Even where there is some reality in the contest we may still be

beating the air. We may be able to say that we have apprehended the

reality of the moral warfare to which every man is called in this

life. We may be able honestly to say that if our sins are not slain,

it is neither because we have not recognised them, nor because we have

aimed no blows at them. We have made serious and honest efforts to

destroy sin, and yet our blows seem to fall short; and sin stands

before us vigorous and lively, and as ready as ever to give us a fall.

Many persons who level blows at their sins do not after all strike

them. Spiritual energy is put forth; but it is not brought fully,

fairly, and firmly into contact with the sin to be destroyed. In most

Christian people there is a great expenditure of thought and of

feeling about sin; their spirit is probably more exercised about their

sins than about anything else: and a great deal of spiritual life is

expended in the shape of shame, compunction, penitence, resolve,

self-restraint, watchfulness, prayer. All this, were it brought

directly to bear on some definite object, would produce great effect;

but in many cases no good whatever seems to result.

Paul's language suggests that possibly the reason may be that there

remains in the heart some reluctance quite to kill and put an end to

sin, to beat all the life out of it. It is like a father fighting with

his son: he wishes to defend himself and disarm his son, but not to

kill him. We may be willing or even intensely anxious to escape the

blows sin aims at us; we may be desirous to wound, hamper, and limit

our sin, and keep it under control; we may wish to tame the wild

animal and domesticate it, so as to make it yield some pleasure and

profit, and yet be reluctant to slay it outright. The soul and life of

every sin is some lust of our own; and while quite anxious to put an

end to some of the evils this lust produces in our life, we may not be

prepared to extinguish the lust itself. We pray God, for example, to

preserve us from the evils of praise or of success; and yet we

continue to court praise and success. We are unable to sacrifice the

pleasure for the sake of the safety. Therefore our warfare against sin

becomes unreal. Our blows are not delivered home, but beat the air.

Unconsciously we cherish the evil desire within us which is the soul

of the sin, and seek to destroy only some of its manifestations.

The result of such unreal contest is detrimental. Sin is like

something floating in the air or the water: the very effort we make to

grasp and crush it displaces it, and it floats mockingly before us

untouched. Or it is like an agile antagonist who springs back from our

blow, so that the force we have expended merely racks and strains our

own sinews and does him no injury. So when we spend much effort in

conquering sin and find it as lively as ever, the spirit is strained

and hurt by putting out force on nothing. It is less able than before

to resist sin, less believing, less hopeful, inwardly ill at ease and

distracted. It becomes confused and disheartened, disbelieves in

itself, and scoffs at fresh resolves and endeavours.

Finally, Paul tells us what that enemy was against which he directed

his well-aimed, firmly planted blows. It was his own body. Every man's

body is his enemy when, instead of being his servant, it becomes his

master. The proper function of the body is to serve the will, to bring

the inner man into contact with the outer world and enable him to

influence it. When the body mutinies and refuses to obey the will,

when it usurps authority and compels the man to do its bidding, it

becomes his most dangerous enemy. When Paul's body presumed to dictate

to his spirit, and demanded comforts and indulgences, and shrank from

hardship, he beat it down. The word he uses is an exceptionally strong

one: "I keep under;" it is a technical term of the games, and means to

strike full in the face. It was the word used of the most damaging

blow one boxer could give another. This unmerciful, overpowering blow

Paul dealt to his body, resisting its assaults and making it helpless

to tempt him. He thus brought it into subjection, made it his slave,

as the winner in some of the games had a right to carry the vanquished

into slavery.

It was probably by sheer strength of will and by the grace of Christ

that Paul subdued his body. Many in all ages have striven to subdue it

by fasting, by scourging, by wakefulness; and of these practices we

have no right to speak scornfully until we can say that by other means

we have reduced the body to its proper position as the servant of the

spirit. Can we say that our body is brought into subjection; that it

dare not curtail our devotions on the plea of weariness; that it dare

not demand a dispensation from duty on the score of some slight bodily

disturbance; that it never persuades us to neglect any duty on the

score of its unpleasantness to the flesh; that it never prompts us to

undue anxiety either about what we shall eat or drink or wherewithal

we shall be clothed; that it never quite treads the spirit under foot

and defiles it with wicked imaginings? There is a fair and reasonable

degree in which a man may and ought to cherish his own flesh, but

there is also needful a disregard to many of its claims and a

hardhearted obduracy to its complaints. In an age when Spartan

simplicity of life is almost unknown, it is very easy to sow to the

flesh almost without knowing it until we find ourselves reaping

corruption.

Probably nothing more effectually slackens our efforts in the

spiritual life than the sense of unreality which haunts us as we deal

with God and the unseen. With the boxer in the games it was grim

earnest. He did not need any one to tell him that his life depended on

his ability to defend himself against his trained antagonist. Every

faculty must be on the alert. No dreamer has here a chance. What we

need is something of the same sense of reality, that it is a

life-and-death contest we are engaged in, and that he that treats sin

as a weak or pretended antagonist will shortly be dragged a mangled

disgrace out of the arena.

_FALLACIOUS PRESUMPTIONS._

"Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how

that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through

the sea; and were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the

sea; and did all eat the same spiritual meat; and did all drink

the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock

that followed them: and that Rock was Christ. But with many of

them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the

wilderness. Now these things were our examples, to the intent we

should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted. Neither

be ye idolaters, as were some of them; as it is written. The

people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play. Neither

let us commit fornication, as some of them committed, and fell in

one day three-and-twenty thousand. Neither let us tempt Christ,

as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed of serpents.

Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured, and were

destroyed of the destroyer. Now all these things happened unto

them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon

whom the ends of the world are come. Wherefore let him that

thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. There hath no

temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is

faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are

able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape,

that ye may be able to bear it. Wherefore, my dearly beloved,

flee from idolatry. I speak as to wise men; judge ye what I say.

The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of

the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the

communion of the body of Christ? For we being many are one bread,

and one body: for we are all partakers of that one bread. Behold

Israel after the flesh: are not they which eat of the sacrifices

partakers of the altar? What say I then? that the idol is

anything, or that which is offered in sacrifice to idols is

anything? But I say, that the things which the Gentiles

sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would

not that ye should have fellowship with devils. Ye cannot drink

the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be

partakers of the Lord's table, and of the table of devils. Do we

provoke the Lord to jealousy? are we stronger than He?"--1 COR.

x. 1-22.

XV.

_FALLACIOUS PRESUMPTIONS._

In discussing the question regarding "things offered unto idols," Paul

is led to treat at large of Christian liberty, a subject to which he

was always drawn. And partly to encourage the Christians of Corinth to

consider their weak and prejudiced brethren, partly for other reasons,

he reminds them how he himself abridged his liberty and departed from

his just claims in order that the Gospel he preached might find

readier acceptance. Besides, not only for the sake of the Gospel and

of other men, but for his own sake also, he must practise self-denial.

It would profit him nothing to have been an apostle unless he

practised what he preached. He had felt that in considering the

spiritual condition of other men and trying to advance it he was apt

to forget his own; and he saw that all men were more or less liable to

the same temptation, and were apt to rest in the fact that they were

Christians and to shrink from the arduous life which gives that name

its meaning. By means of two illustrations Paul fixes this idea in

their minds, first pointing them to their own games, in which they saw

that not all who entered for the race obtained the prize, and then

pointing them to the history of Israel, in which they might plainly

read that not all who began the journey to the promised land found

entrance into it.

The Israelites of the Exodus are here introduced as exemplifying a

common experience. They accepted the position of God's people, but

failed in its duties. They perceived the advantages of being God's

subjects, but shrank from much which this implied. They were willing

to be delivered from bondage, but found themselves overweighted by the

responsibilities and risks of a free life. They were in contact with

the highest advantages men need possess, and yet failed to use them.

The amount of conviction which prompts us to form a connection with

Christ may be insufficient to stimulate us to do and endure all that

results from that connection. The children of Israel were all baptized

unto Moses, but they did not implement their baptism by a persistent

and faithful adherence to him. They were baptized unto Moses by their

acceptance of his leadership in the Exodus. By passing through the Red

Sea at his command they definitely renounced Pharaoh and abandoned

their old life, and as definitely pledged and committed themselves to

throw in their lot with Moses. By passing the Egyptian frontier and

following the guidance of the pillar of cloud they professed their

willingness to exchange a life of bondage, with its security and

occasional luxuries, for a life of freedom, with its hazards and

hardships; and by that passage of the Red Sea they were as certainly

sworn to support and obey Moses as ever was Roman soldier who took the

oath to serve his emperor. When, at Brederode's invitation, the

patriots of Holland put on the beggar's wallet and tasted wine from

the beggar's bowl, they were baptized unto William of Orange and their

country's cause. When the sailors on board the _Swan_ weighed anchor

and beat out of Plymouth they were baptized unto Drake and pledged to

follow him and fight for him to the death. Baptism means much; but if

it means anything, it means that we commit and pledge ourselves to the

life we are called to by Him in whose name we are baptized. It draws a

line across the life, and proclaims that to whomsoever in time past we

have been bound, and for whatsoever we have lived, we now are pledged

to this new Lord, and are to live in His service. Such a pledge was

given by every Israelite who turned his back on Egypt and passed

through that sea which was the defence of Israel and destruction to

the enemy. The crossing was at once actual deliverance from the old

life and irrevocable committal to the new. They died to Pharaoh, and

were born again to Moses. They were baptized unto Moses.

And as the Israelites had thus a baptism analogous to the one

Christian sacrament, so had they a spiritual food and drink in the

wilderness which formed a sacrament analogous to the Christian

communion. They were not shut out of Egypt, and imprisoned in the

desert, and left to do the best they could on their own resources. If

they failed to march steadily forward and fulfil their destiny as the

emancipated people of God, this failure was not due to any neglect on

God's part. The fare might be somewhat Spartan, but a sufficiency was

always provided. He who had encouraged them to enter on this new life

was prepared to uphold them in it and carry them through.

One of the expressions used by Paul in describing the sustenance of

the Israelites has given rise to some discussion. "They did all

drink," he says, "the same spiritual drink, for they drank of that

spiritual Rock that followed them; and that Rock was Christ." Now

there happened to be a Jewish tradition which gave out that the rock

smitten by Moses was a detached block or boulder, "globular, like a

beehive," which rolled after the camp in its line of march, and was

always at hand, with its unfailing water-supply. This is altogether

too grotesque an idea. The fact is that the Israelites did not die of

thirst in the wilderness. It was quite likely they should; and but for

the providential supply of water, so large a company could not have

been sustained. And no doubt not only in the rock at Rephidim at the

beginning of their journey and the rock of Kadesh at its close, but in

many most unlikely places during the intervening years, water was

found. So that in looking back on the entire journey it might very

naturally be said that the rock had followed them, not meaning that

wherever they went they had the same source to draw from, but that

throughout their journeyings they were supplied with water in places

and ways as unexpected and unlikely.

Paul's point is that in the wilderness the food and drink of the

Israelites were "spiritual," or, as we should more naturally say,

sacramental; that is to say, their sustenance continually spoke to

them of God's nearness and reminded them that they were His people.

And as Christ Himself, when He lifted the bread at the Last Supper,

said, "This is My body," so does Paul use analogous language and say,

"That Rock was Christ," an expression which gives us considerable

insight into the significance of the Israelitish types of Christ, and

helps to rid our minds of some erroneous impressions we are apt to

cherish regarding them.

The manna and the water from the rock were given to sustain the

Israelites and carry them towards their promised land, but they were

so given as to quicken faith in God. To every Israelite his daily

nourishment might reasonably be called spiritual, because it reminded

him that God was with him in the wilderness, and prompted him to think

of that purpose and destiny for the sake of which God was sustaining

the people. To the devout among them their daily food became a means

of grace, deepening their faith in the unseen God and rooting their

life in a true dependence upon Him. The manna and the water from the

rock were sacramental, because they were continuous signs and seals of

God's favour and redeeming efficiency and promise. They were types of

Christ, serving for Israel in the wilderness the purpose which Christ

serves for us, enabling them to believe in a heavenly Father who cared

for them and accomplishing the same spiritual union with the unseen

God which Christ accomplishes for us.

It was in this sense that Paul could say that the rock was Christ. The

Israelites in the wilderness did not know that the rock was a type of

Christ. They did not, as they drank of the water, think of One who was

to come and satisfy the whole thirst of men. The types of Christ in

the old times did not enable men to forecast the future; it was not

through the future they exercised an influence for good on the mind.

They worked by exciting there and then in the Jewish mind the same

faith in God which Christ excites in our mind. It was not knowledge

that saved the Jew, but faith, attachment to the living God. It was

not the fragmentary and disjointed picture of a Redeemer thrown on the

screen of his hopes by the types, nor was it any thought of a future

Deliverer, which saved him, but his belief in God as his Redeemer

there and then. This belief was quickened by the various institutions,

providences, and objects by which God convinced the Jews that He was

their Friend and Lord. Sacrifice they accepted as an institution of

God's appointment intended to encourage them to believe in the

forgiveness of sin and in God's favour; and without any thought of the

realized ideal of sacrifice in Christ, the believing and devout

Israelite entered through sacrifice into fellowship with God. Every

sacrifice was a type of Christ; it did foreshadow that which was to

be: but it was a type, not because it revealed Christ to those who saw

or offered it, but because for the time being it served the same

purpose as Christ now serves, enabling men to believe in the

forgiveness of sins.

But while in the mind of the Israelite there was no connection of the

type with the Christ that was to come, there was in reality a

connection between them. The redemption of men is one whether

accomplished in the days of the Exodus or in our own time. The idea or

plan of salvation is one, resting always on the same reasons and

principles. The Israelites were pardoned in view of the incarnation

and atonement of Christ just as we are. If it was needful for our

salvation that Christ should come and live and suffer in human nature,

it was also needful for their salvation. The Lamb was slain "from the

foundation of the world," and the virtue of the sacrifice of Calvary

was efficacious for those who lived before as well as for those who

lived after it. To the mind of God it was present, and in His purpose

it was determined, from the beginning; and it is in view of Christ's

incarnation and work that sinners early or late have been restored to

God. So that everything by which God instructed men and taught them

to believe in His mercy and holiness was connected with Christ. It was

to Christ it owed its existence, and really it was a shadow of the

coming substance. And as the shadow is named from the substance, it

may truly be said, "That Rock was Christ."

These outward blessings then of which St. Paul here speaks had very

much the same nature as the Christian sacraments to which he tacitly

compares them. They were intended to convey greater gifts and be the

channels of a grace more valuable than themselves. But to most of the

Israelites they remained mere manna and water, and brought no firmer

assurance of God's presence, no more fruitful acceptance of God's

purpose. The majority took the husk and threw away the kernel; were so

delayed by the wrappings that they forgot to examine the gift they

enclosed; accepted the physical nourishment, but rejected the

spiritual strength it contained. Instead of learning from their

wilderness experience the sufficiency of Jehovah and gathering courage

to fulfil His purpose with them, they began to murmur and lust after

evil things, and were destroyed by the destroyer. They had been

baptized unto Moses, pledging themselves to his leadership and

committing themselves to the new life he opened to them; they had been

sustained by manna and water from the rock, which plainly told them

that all nature would work for them if they pressed forward to their

God-appointed destiny: but the most of them shrank from the hardships

and hazards of the way, and could not lift their heart to the glory of

being led by God and used to fulfil His greatest purposes.

And so, says Paul, it may be with you. It is possible that you may

have been baptized and may have professedly committed yourself to the

Christian career, it is possible you may have partaken of that bread

and wine which convey undying life and energy to believing recipients,

and may yet have failed to use these as spiritual food, enabling you

to fulfil all the duties of the life you are pledged to. Had it been

enough merely to show a readiness to enter on the more arduous life,

then all Israel would have been saved, for "all" without exception

passed through the Red Sea and committed themselves to life under

God's leadership. Had it been enough outwardly to participate in that

which actually links men to God, then all Israel would have been

inspired by God's Spirit and strength, for "all" without exception

partook of the spiritual food and the spiritual drink. But the

disastrous and undeniable result was that the great mass of the people

were overthrown in the wilderness and did never set foot in the land

of promise. And men have not yet outlived this same danger of

committing themselves to a life they find too hard and full of risk.

They see the advantages of a Christian career, and connect themselves

with the Christian Church; they instinctively perceive that it is

there God is most fully known, and that the purposes of God are there

concentrated and running on to direct and perfect results; they are

drawn by their better self to throw in their lot with the Church, to

forget competing advantages, and spend themselves wholly on what is

best: and yet the difficulty of standing alone and acting on

individual conviction rather than on current understandings, the

wearing depression of personal failure and insufficiency for high and

spiritual attainment, the distraction of the haunting doubt that after

all they are making sacrifices and suffering privations which are

fruitless, unwise, unnecessary, gradually betray the spirit into

virtual renunciation of all Christian hopes and into a practical

willingness to return to the old life. And thus as the wilderness came

to be spotted all over with the burial-places of those who had left

the Red Sea behind them with shouts of triumph and with hopes that

broke out in song and dancing, as the route of that once jubilant host

might at last have been traced, as the great slave-routes of Africa

are traceable, by the bones of men and the skeletons of children, so,

alas! might the Church's march through the centuries be recognised by

the far more horrifying remains of those who once, with liveliest hope

and unbroken sense of security, joined themselves to the people of

Christ, but silently lost hold of the hope that once drew them on and

either stole away on private enterprises of their own and were

destroyed of the destroyer, or withered in helpless imbecility,

murmuring at their lot and stone-blind to its glory. As the retreat of

Napoleon's "grand army" from Moscow was marked by corpses wearing the

French uniform, but bringing neither strength nor lustre to their

cause, so must shame be reflected on the Church by the countless

numbers of those who can be identified with Christ's cause only by the

uniform they wear, and not by any victories they have won. There were

in the wilderness districts through which no Israelite would willingly

pass, districts in which many thousands had fallen, and which were

branded as vast "graves of lust," places whose very name stirred a

deeper horror and raised a quicker blush on the Israelite's cheek than

is raised on the Englishman's by the mention of Majuba Hill or

Braddon's defeat. And the Church's territory also is spotted with

those vast charnel-houses and places of defeat where even her mighty

have fallen, where the earth refuses to cover the disgrace and blot

out the stain. These are not things of the past. While women and

children are starved though they toil all day and half the night, with

eagerest energy and the skill necessity gives; while life is to so

many thousands in our land a joyless and hopeless misery; while trade

not only panders to covetousness and selfishness, but directly

contributes to what is immoral and destructive, we can scarcely speak

of the "glorious marching" of the Church of Christ. We have our places

of horror, which no right-hearted Christian can think of without a

shudder.

But while the distinction between the life we naturally seek and that

to which God calls us is felt by all from age to age, the forms in

which this distinction makes itself felt vary as the world grows

older. To all men living in a world of sense it is difficult to live

by faith in the unseen. To every man it is the ultimate, severest test

of character to determine for what ends he will live and to carry out

this determination; but the temptations which avail to draw men aside

from their reasonable decision are various as the men themselves. Paul

names the temptations to which the Corinthians, in common with the

Israelites, were exposed: idolatry, fornication, murmuring, tempting

Christ. He saw clearly how difficult it was for the Corinthians to

discard all heathen customs, how much of what had been brightest in

their life they must sacrifice if they were to renounce absolutely the

religion of their parents and friends and all the joyous, if

licentious, customs associated with that religion. Apparently some of

them thought they might pass from the Christian communion to the

heathen temple, and after partaking of Christ's sacrament eat and

drink in the idolatrous festival, entering into the entire service.

They seemed to think that they might be both Christians and pagans.

Against this vain attempt to combine the incompatible Paul warns them.

Do not tempt Christ, he says, by experimenting how far He will bear

with your conformity to idolatry. Some of the Israelites did so, and

were destroyed by serpents. Do not murmur that you are hereby severed

from all the enjoyments of life, dissociated from your heathen

friends, blackballed in society and in business, excluded from all

national festivals and from many private entertainments; do not count

up your losses, but your gains. Your temptations are severe, but

"there hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man."

Every man must make up his mind to a certain kind of life and go

through with it. No man can unite in his own life all advantages. He

must deliberate and choose; and having made his choice, he must not

lament what he loses or be tempted from striving to gain what he

judges best by weakly and greedily craving for the second-best also.

He may win the first prize; he may win the second: he cannot win both,

and if he tries, he will win neither.

The practical outcome of all that Paul has thus rapidly passed in

review he utters in the haunting words, "Let him that thinketh he

standeth take heed lest he fall." In this life we are never beyond the

reach of temptation. And these temptations to which all of us are

exposed are real; they do sufficiently test character and show what it

actually is. Our suppositions regarding ourselves are often untrue.

There is no reality corresponding. Our state is actually not such as

we conceive it to be. We are at ease and complacent when we ought not

to be at ease. We think we stand secure when we are on the point of

falling. We live as if we had reached the goal when the whole journey

is yet before us. Our future may be very different from what we wish

or expect. Mere satisfaction with our present condition is a very

insecure foundation on which to build our hope for the future. Mere

reliance on a profession we have made, or on the fact that we are

within reach of means of grace, tends only to slacken our energies.

Heedlessness, taking things for granted, failure to sift matters

thoroughly out, an indolent unwillingness to probe our spiritual

condition to the quick--this is what has betrayed multitudes of

Christians. "Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed

lest he fall."

If determined wickedness has slain its thousands, heedlessness has

slain its tens of thousands. Through lack of watchfulness men fall

into sin which entangles them for life and thwarts their best

purposes. Through want of watchfulness men go on in sin which

exceedingly provokes God, till at last His hand falls heavily upon

them. Every man is apt to lay too much stress on the circumstance that

he has joined himself to the number of those who own the leadership of

Christ. The question remains, How far has he gone with his Leader?

Many an Israelite compassionated the poor heathen whom he left behind

in the land of Egypt, and yet found that, with all his own apparent

nearness to God, his heart was heathen still. Whoever takes it for

granted that things are well with him, whoever "thinketh he

standeth"--he is the man who has especial and urgent need to "take

heed lest he fall."

_THE VEIL._

"Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ. Now I praise

you, brethren, that ye remember me in all things, and keep the

ordinances, as I delivered them to you. But I would have you

know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the

woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God. Every man

praying or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his

head. But every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head

uncovered dishonoureth her head: for that is even all one as if

she were shaven. For if the woman be not covered, let her also be

shorn: but if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven,

let her be covered. For a man indeed ought not to cover his head,

forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is

the glory of the man. For the man is not of the woman; but the

woman of the man. Neither was the man created for the woman; but

the woman for the man. For this cause ought the woman to have

power on her head because of the angels. Nevertheless neither is

the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in

the Lord. For as the woman is of the man, even so is the man also

by the woman; but all things of God. Judge in yourselves: is it

comely that a woman pray unto God uncovered? Doth not even nature

itself teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a shame

unto him? But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her:

for her hair is given her for a covering. But if any man seem to

be contentious, we have no such custom, neither the Churches of

God."--1 COR. xi. 1-16.

XVI.

_THE VEIL._

At this point of the Epistle Paul passes from the topics regarding

which the Corinthians had requested him to inform them, to make some

remarks on the manner in which, as he had heard, they were conducting

their meetings for public worship. The next four chapters are occupied

with instructions as to what constitutes seemliness and propriety in

such meetings. He desires to express in general his satisfaction that

on the whole they had adhered to the instructions he had already given

them and the arrangements he had himself made while in Corinth. "I

praise you, brethren, that ye remember me in all things, and keep the

ordinances, as I delivered them to you." Yet there are one or two

matters which cannot be spoken of in terms of commendation. He heard,

in the first place, with surprise and vexation, that not only were

women presuming to pray in public and address the assembled

Christians, but even laid aside while they did so the characteristic

dress of their sex, and spoke, to the scandal of all sober-minded

Orientals and Greeks, unveiled. To reform this abuse he at once

addresses himself. It is a singular specimen of the strange matters

that must have come before Paul for decision when the care of all the

Churches lay upon him. And his settlement of it is an admirable

illustration of his manner of resolving all practical difficulties by

means of principles which are as true and as useful for us to-day as

they were for those primitive Christians who had heard his own voice

admonishing them. In treating ethical or practical subjects, Paul is

never superficial, never content with a mere rule.

In order to see the import and importance of this matter of dress, we

must first of all know how it came to pass that the Christian women

should have thought of making a demonstration so unfeminine as to

shock the very heathen around them. What was their intention or

meaning in doing so? What idea was possessing their minds? Throughout

this long and interesting letter, Paul is doing little else than

endeavouring to correct the hasty impressions which these new

believers were receiving regarding their position as Christians. A

great flood of new and vast ideas was suddenly poured in upon their

minds; they were taught to look differently on themselves, differently

on their neighbours, differently on God, differently on all things.

Old things had in their case passed away with a will, and all things

had become new. They were made alive from the dead, they were born

again, and did not know how far this affected the relationships with

this world into which their natural birth had brought them. The facts

of the second birth and the new life took such hold upon them, that

they could not for a time understand how they were yet connected with

the old life. So that for some of them Paul had to solve the simplest

problems, as, for example, we find that the believing husband was in

doubt whether he should live with his wife who remained an unbeliever,

for was it not abhorrent to nature that he, the living, should be

bound to the dead, that a child of God should remain in the most

intimate connection with one who was yet a child of wrath? Was this

not a monstrous anomaly, for which prompt divorce was the fit remedy?

That such questions as these should be put shows us how difficult

these early Christians found it to adjust themselves as children of

God to their position in a corrupt condemned world.

Now one of the ideas in Christianity which was newest to them was the

equality of all before God, an idea well calculated to take powerful

and absorbing hold of a world half slaves, half masters. The emperor

and the slave must equally give account to God. Cæsar is not above

responsibility; the barbarian who swells his triumph and is afterwards

slaughtered in his dungeon or his theatre is not beneath it. Each man

and each woman must stand alone before God, and for himself and

herself give account of the life received from God. Alongside of this

idea came that of the one Saviour for all alike, the common salvation

accessible to all on equal terms, and partaking of which all became

brethren and on a level, one with Christ and one therefore with each

other. There was neither Greek nor barbarian, male nor female, bond

nor free, now. These three mighty distinctions that had tyrannized

over the ancient world were abolished, for all were one in Christ

Jesus. It dawned on the barbarian that though there was no Roman

citizenship for him nor any entrance into the mighty commonwealth of

Greek literature, he had a citizenship in heaven, was the heir of God,

and could command even with his barbaric speech the ear of the Most

High. It dawned on the slave as his fetter galled him, or as his soul

sank under the sad hopelessness of his life, that he was God's

redeemed, rescued from the bondage of his own evil heart, and

superior to all curse, being God's friend. And it dawned on the woman

that she was neither man's toy nor man's slave, a mere luxury or

appendage to his establishment, but that she also had herself a soul,

a responsibility equally momentous with the man's, and therefore a

life to frame for herself. The astonishment with which such ideas must

have been received, so subversive of the principles on which heathen

society was proceeding, it is impossible now to realize; but we cannot

wonder that they should by their fresh power and absorbing novelty

have carried the Christians to quite the opposite extremes from those

at which they had been living.

In the case before us the women who had been awakened to a sense of

their own personal, individual responsibility and their equal right to

the highest privileges of men began to think that in all things they

should be recognised as the equals of the other sex. They were one

with Christ; men could have no higher honour: was it not obvious that

they were on an equality with those who had held them so cheap? They

had the Holy Ghost dwelling in them; might not they, as well as the

men, edify Christian assemblies by uttering the inspirations of the

Spirit? They were not dependent on men for their Christian privileges;

ought not they to show this by laying aside the veil, which was the

acknowledged badge of dependence? This laying aside of the veil was

not a mere change of fashion in dress, of which, of course, Paul would

have had nothing to say; it was not a feminine device for showing

themselves to better advantage among their fellow-worshippers; it was

not even, though this also, also! falls within the range of possible

supposition, the immodest boldness and forwardness which are

sometimes seen to accompany in both sexes the profession of

Christianity; but it was the outward expression and easily read symbol

of a great movement on the part of women in assertion of their rights

and independence.

The exact meaning of the laying aside of the veil thus becomes plain.

It was the part of female attire which could most readily be made the

symbol of a change in the views of women regarding their own position.

It was the most significant part of the woman's dress. Among the

Greeks it was the universal custom for the women to appear in public

with the head covered, commonly with the corner of their shawl drawn

over their head like a hood. Accordingly Paul does not insist on the

face being covered, as in Eastern countries, but only the head. This

covering of the head could be dispensed with only in places where they

were secluded from public view. It was therefore the recognised badge

of seclusion; it was the badge which proclaimed that she who wore it

was a private, not a public, person, finding her duties at home, not

abroad, in one household, not in the city. And a woman's whole life

and duties ought to lie so much apart from the public eye, that both

sexes looked upon the veil as the truest and most treasured emblem of

woman's position. In this seclusion there was of course implied a

limitation of woman's sphere of action and a subordination to one

man's interests instead of to the public. It was the man's place to

serve the State or the public, the woman's place to serve the man. And

so thoroughly was it recognised that the veil was a badge setting

forth this private and subordinate position of the woman, that it was

the one significant rite in marriage that she assumed the veil in

token that now her husband was her head, to whom she was prepared to

hold herself subordinate. The laying aside the veil was therefore an

expression on the part of the Christian women that their being assumed

as members of Christ's body raised them out of this position of

dependence and subordination.

This movement of the Corinthian women towards independence, on the

ground that all are one in Christ Jesus, Paul meets by reminding them

that personal equality is perfectly consistent with social

subordination. It was quite true, as Paul himself had taught them,

that, so far as their connection with Christ went, there was no

distinction of sex. To the woman, as to the man, the offer of

salvation was made directly. It was not through her father or her

husband that the woman had to deal with Christ. She came into contact

with the living God and united herself to Christ independently of any

male representative and on the same footing as her male relatives.

There is but one Christ for all, rich and poor, high and low, male and

female; and all are received by Him on the same footing, no

distinction being made. While then in things civil and social the

husband represents the wife, he cannot do so in matters of religion.

Here each person must act for himself or herself. And the woman must

not confound these two spheres in which she moves, or argue that

because she is independent of her husband in the greater, she must

also be independent of him in the less. Equality in the one sphere is

not inconsistent with subordination in the other. "I would have you

know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman

is the man; and the head of Christ is God."

The principle enounced in these words is of incalculable importance

and very wide and constant application. Whatever is meant by the

natural equality of men, it cannot mean that all are to be in every

respect on the same level, and that none are to have authority over

others. The application of Paul's principle to the matter in hand

alone here concerns us. The woman must recognise that as Christ,

though equal with the Father, is subordinate to Him, so is she herself

subordinate to her husband or her father. In her private worship she

deals with Christ independently; but when she appears in public and

social worship, she appears as a woman with certain social relations.

Her relation to Christ does not dissolve her relations to society.

Rather does it intensify them. The inward change that has passed upon

her and the new relation which she has formed independently of her

husband only strengthen the bond by which she is tied to him. When a

boy becomes a Christian, that confirms, and in no degree relaxes, his

subordination to his parents. He holds a relation to Christ which they

could not form for him, and which they cannot dissolve; but this

independence in one matter does not make him independent in

everything. A commissioned officer in the army holds his commission

from the Crown; but this does not interfere with, but only confirms,

his subordination to officers who, like himself, are servants of the

Crown, but above him in rank. In order to the harmony of society,

there is a gradation of ranks; and social grievances result, not from

the existence of social distinctions, but from their abuse.

This gradation then involves Paul's inference that "every man praying

or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his head. But

every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered

dishonoureth her head." The veil being the recognised badge of

subordination, when a man appears veiled he would seem to acknowledge

some one present and visible as his head, and would thus dishonour

Christ, his true Head. A woman, on the other hand, appearing unveiled

would seem to say that she acknowledges no visible human head, and

thereby dishonours her head--that is, her husband--and so doing,

dishonours herself. For a woman to appear unveiled on the streets of

Corinth was to proclaim her shame. And so, says Paul, a woman who in

public worship discards her veil might as well be shaven. She puts

herself on the level of the woman with a shaven head, which both among

Jews and Greeks was a brand of disgrace. In the eye of the angels,

who, according to the Jewish belief, were present in meetings for

worship, the woman is disgraced who does not appear with "power on her

head;" that is to say, with the veil by which she silently

acknowledges the authority of her husband.

This subordination of the woman to the man belongs not merely to the

order of the Christian Church, but has its roots in nature. "Man is

the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man."

Paul's idea is that man was created to represent God and so to glorify

Him, to be a visible embodiment of the goodness, and wisdom, and power

of the unseen God. Nowhere so clearly or fully as in man can God be

seen. Man is the glory of God because he is His image and is fitted to

exhibit in actual life the excellencies which make God worthy of our

love and worship. Looking at man as he actually and broadly is, we may

think it a bold saying of Paul when he says, "Man is the glory of

God;" and yet on consideration we see that this is no more than the

truth. We should not scruple to say of the Man Christ Jesus that He

is the glory of God, that in the whole universe of God nothing can

more fully reveal the infinite Divine goodness. In Him we see how

truly man is God's image, and how fit a medium human nature is for

expressing the Divine. We know of nothing higher than what Christ

said, did, and was during the few months He went about among men. He

is the glory of God; and every man in his degree, and according to his

fidelity to Christ, is also the glory of God.

This is of course true of woman as well as of man. It is true that

woman can exhibit the nature of God and be His glory as well as man.

But Paul is placing himself at the point of view of the writer of

Genesis and speaking broadly of God's purpose in creation. And he

means that God's purpose was to express Himself fully and crown all

His works by bringing into being a creature made in His image, able to

subdue, and rule, and develop all that is in the world. This creature

was man, a masculine, resolved, capable creature. And just as it

appeals to our sense of fitness that when God became incarnate He

should appear as man, and not as woman, so does it appeal to our sense

of fitness that it is man, and not woman, who should be thought of as

created to be God's representative on earth. But while man directly,

woman indirectly, fulfils this purpose of God. She is God's glory by

being man's glory. She serves God by serving man. She exhibits God's

excellencies by creating and cherishing excellence in man. Without

woman man cannot accomplish aught. The woman is created for the man,

because without her he is helpless. "For as the woman is of the man,

even so is the man also by the woman."

But as man becomes actually the glory of God when he perfectly

subordinates himself to God with the absolute devotedness of love, so

does woman become the glory of man when she upholds and serves man

with that perfect devotedness of which woman so constantly shows

herself to be capable. It is in winning the self-sacrificing love of

man and his entire devotion that God's glory appears, and man's glory

appears in his power to kindle and maintain the devotion of woman. Not

in independence of God does man find either his own glory or God's,

and not in independence of man does woman find either her own glory or

man's. The desire of woman shall be to her husband; in the honourable

devotedness to man which love prompts, woman fulfils the law of her

creation; and it is only the imperfect and ignoble woman who has any

sense of humiliation, degradation, or limitation of her sphere in

following the lead of love for the individual. It is through this

honourable service of man she serves God and fulfils the purpose of

her existence. The woman who is most womanly will most readily

recognise that her function is to be the glory of man, to mould, and

elevate, and sustain the individual, to find her joy and her life in

the private life, in which the affections are developed, principles

formed, and all personal wants provided for. And man, on his part,

must say,

"If aught of goodness or of grace

Be mine, hers be the glory."

For, as a French writer says, "her influence embraces the whole of

life. A wife, a mother--two magical words, comprising the sweetest

sources of man's felicity! Theirs is the reign of beauty, of love, of

reason, always a reign. A man takes counsel with his wife; he obeys

his mother: he obeys her long after she has ceased to live, and the

ideas he has received from her become principles even stronger than

his passions."[7]

[7] See Landels' _True Glory of Woman_.

The position assigned to woman as the glory of man is therefore far

removed from the view which cynically proclaims her man's mere

convenience, whose function it is "to fatten household sinners," "to

suckle fools and chronicle small beer." Paul's view, though adopted

and exhibited in individual instances, is far as yet from commanding

universal consent. But certainly nothing so distinguishes, elevates,

purifies, and balances a man in life as a high esteem for woman. A man

shows his manliness chiefly by a true reverence for all women, by a

clear recognition of the high service appointed to them by God, and by

a tender sympathy with them in all the various endurance their nature

and their position demand.

That this is woman's normal sphere is indicated even by her

unalterable physical characteristics. "Doth not even nature itself

teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him? But

if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her; for her hair is given

her for a covering." By nature woman is endowed with a symbol of

modesty and retirement. The veil, which signifies her devotement to

home duties, is merely the artificial continuation of her natural gift

of hair. The long hair of the Greek fop or of the English cavalier was

accepted by the people as an indication of effeminate and luxurious

living. Suitable for women, it is unsuitable for men; such is the

instinctive judgment. And nature, speaking through this visible sign

of the woman's hair, tells her that her place is in private, not in

public, in the home, not in the city or the camp, in the attitude of

free and loving subordination, not in the seat of authority and rule.

In other respects also the physical constitution of woman points to a

similar conclusion. Her shorter stature and slighter frame, her higher

pitch of voice, her more graceful form and movement, indicate that she

is intended for the gentler ministries of home life rather than for

the rough work of the world. And similar indications are found in her

mental peculiarities. She has the gifts which fit her for influencing

individuals; man has those qualities which enable him to deal with

things, with abstract thought, or with persons in the mass. Quicker in

perception and trusting more to her intuitions, woman sees at a glance

what man is sure of only after a process of reasoning.

These arguments and conclusions introduced by Paul of course apply

only to the broad and normal distinction between man and woman. He

does not argue that women are inferior to men, nor that they may not

have equal spiritual endowments; but he maintains that, whatever be

their endowments, there is a womanly mode of exercising them and a

sphere for woman which she ought not to transgress. Not all women are

of the distinctively womanly type. A Britomarte may arm herself and

overthrow the strongest knights. A Joan of Arc may infuse into a

nation her own warlike and patriotic ardour. In art, in literature, in

science, feminine names may occupy some of the highest places. In our

own day many careers have been opened to women from which they had

hitherto been debarred. They are now found in Government offices, in

School Boards, in the medical profession. Again and again in the

history of the Church attempts have been made to institute a female

order in the ministry, but as yet both the clerical and the legal

professions are closed to women.[8] And we may reasonably conclude

that as the army and navy will always be manned by the physically

stronger sex, so there are other employments in which women would be

entirely out of place.

[8] The experience of the Society of Friends throws light on

this matter.

But it will be asked, Why was Paul so exact in describing how a woman

should comport herself while praying or prophesying in public, when he

meant very shortly in this same Epistle to write, "Let your women keep

silence in the Churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak;

but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the Law.

And if they will learn anything, let them ask their husbands at home;

for it is a shame for women to speak in the Church"? It has been

suggested that although it was the standing order that women should

not speak, there might be occasions when the Spirit urged them to

address an assemblage of Christians; and the regulation here given is

intended for these exceptional cases. This may be so, but the

connection in which the absolute prohibition is given rather militates

against this view, and I think it more likely that in his own mind

Paul held the two matters quite distinct and felt that a mere

prohibition preventing women from addressing public meetings would not

touch the more serious transgression of female modesty involved in the

discarding of the veil. He could not pass over this violent assertion

of independence without separate treatment; and while he is treating

it, it is not the speaking in public which is before his mind, but the

unfeminine assertion of independence and the principle underlying

this manifestation.

Besides the direct teaching of this passage on the position of woman,

there are inferences to be drawn from it of some importance. First,

Paul recognises that the God of nature is the God of grace, and that

we may safely argue from the one sphere to the other. "All things are

of God." It is profitable to be recalled to the teaching of nature. It

saves us from becoming fantastic in our beliefs, from cherishing

fallacious expectations, from false, pharisaic, extravagant conduct.

Again, we are here reminded that every man and woman has to do

directly with God, who has no respect of persons. Each soul is

independent of all others in its relation to God. Each soul has the

capacity of direct connection with God and of thus being raised above

all oppression, not only of his fellows, but of all outward things. It

is here man finds his true glory. His soul is his own to give it to

God. He is dependent on nothing but on God only. Admitting God into

his spirit, and believing in the love and rectitude of God, he is

armed against all the ills of life, however little he may relish them.

To all of us God offers Himself as Friend, Father, Saviour, Life. No

man need remain in his sin; none need be content with a poor eternity;

no man need go through life trembling or defeated: for God declares

Himself on our side, and offers His love to all without respect of

persons. We are all on the same footing before Him. God does not admit

some freely, while He shrinks from the touch of others. It is as full

and rich an inheritance that He puts within the reach of the poorest

and most wretched of earth's inhabitants as He offers to him on whom

the eyes of men rest in admiration or in envy. To disbelieve or

repudiate this privilege of uniting ourselves to God is in the truest

sense to commit spiritual suicide. It is in God we live now; He is

with us and in us: and to shut Him out from that inmost consciousness

to which none else is admitted is to cut ourselves off, not only from

the deepest joy and truest support, but from all in which we can find

spiritual life.

Lastly, although there is in Christ an absolute levelling of

distinctions, no one being more acceptable to God or nearer to Him

because he belongs to a certain race, or rank, or class, yet these

distinctions remain and are valid in society. A woman is a woman still

though she become a Christian; a subject must honour his king although

by becoming a Christian he is himself in one aspect above all

authority; a servant will show his Christianity, not by assuming an

insolent familiarity with his Christian master, but by treating him

with respectful fidelity. The Christian, above all men, needs

sober-mindedness to hold the balance level and not allow his Christian

rank entirely to outweigh his social position. It forms a great part

of our duty to accept our own place without envying others and to do

honour to those to whom honour is due.

_ABUSE OF THE LORD'S SUPPER._

"Now in this that I declare unto you I praise you not, that ye

come together not for the better, but for the worse. For first of

all, when ye come together in the Church, I hear that there be

divisions among you; and I partly believe it. For there must be

also heresies among you, that they which are approved may be made

manifest among you. When ye come together therefore into one

place, this is not to eat the Lord's Supper. For in eating every

one taketh before other his own supper: and one is hungry, and

another is drunken. What? have ye not houses to eat and to drink

in? or despise ye the Church of God, and shame them that have

not? What shall I say to you? shall I praise you in this? I

praise you not. For I have received of the Lord that which also I

delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus the same night in which

He was betrayed took bread: and when He had given thanks, He

brake it, and said, Take, eat: this is My body which is broken

for you: this do in remembrance of Me. After the same manner also

He took the cup, when He had supped, saying, This cup is the new

testament in My blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in

remembrance of Me. For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink

this cup, ye do show the Lord's death till He come. Wherefore

whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this cup of the Lord,

unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.

But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread,

and drink of that cup. For he that eateth and drinketh

unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not

discerning the Lord's body. For this cause many are weak and

sickly among you, and many sleep. For if we would judge

ourselves, we should not be judged. But when we are judged, we

are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with

the world. Wherefore, my brethren, when ye come together to eat,

tarry one for another. And if any man hunger, let him eat at

home; that ye come not together unto condemnation. And the rest

will I set in order when I come."--1 COR. xi. 17-34.

XVII.

_ABUSE OF THE LORD'S SUPPER._

In this paragraph of his letter Paul speaks of an abuse which can

scarcely be credited, still less tolerated, in our times. The most

sacred of all Christian ordinances had been allowed to degenerate into

a bacchanalian revel, not easily to be distinguished from a Greek

drinking party. A respectable citizen would hardly have permitted at

his own table the licence and excess visible at the Table of the Lord.

How such disorders in worship should have arisen calls for

explanation.

It was common in Corinth and the other cities of Greece for various

sections of the community to form themselves into associations, clubs,

or guilds; and it was customary for such societies to share a common

meal once a week, or once a month, or even when convenient daily. Some

of these associations were formed of persons very variously provided

with this world's goods, and one of the objects of some of the clubs

was to make provision for the poorer members in such a manner as to

subject them to none of the shame which is apt to attend the

acceptance of promiscuous charity. All members had an equal right to

present themselves at the table; and the property held by the society

was equally distributed to all.

This custom, not unknown in Palestine itself, had been spontaneously

adopted by the primitive Church of Jerusalem. The Christians of those

early days felt themselves to be more closely related than the members

of any trade guild or political club. If it was convenient and suitable

that persons of similar political opinions or belonging to the same

trade should to some extent have common property and should exhibit

their community by sharing a common meal, it was certainly suitable

among Christians. Speedily it became a prevalent custom for Christians

to eat together. These meals were called _agapæ_--love-feasts--and

became a marked feature of the early Church. On a fixed day, generally

the first day of the week, the Christians assembled, each bringing

what he could as a contribution to the feast: fish, poultry, joints of

meat, cheese, milk, honey, fruit, wine, and bread. In some places the

proceedings began by partaking of the consecrated bread and wine; but

in other places physical appetite was first appeased by partaking of

the meal provided, and after that the bread and wine were handed

round.

This mode of celebrating the Lord's Supper was recommended by its

close resemblance to its original celebration by the Lord and His

disciples. It was at the close of the Paschal Supper, which was meant

to satisfy hunger as well as to commemorate the Exodus, that our Lord

took bread and brake it. He sat with His disciples as one family, and

the meal they partook of was social as well as religious. But when the

first solemnity passed away, and Christ's presence was no longer felt

at the common table, the Christian love-feast was liable to many

corruptions. The wealthy took the best seats, kept hold of their own

delicacies, and, without waiting for any common distribution, each

looked after himself, and went on with his own supper, regardless of

the fact that others at the table had none. "Every one taketh before

other his own supper," so that, while one is hungry and has received

nothing, another at this so-called common love-feast has already taken

too much and is intoxicated. Those who had no need to use the common

stock, but had houses of their own to eat and to drink in, yet, for

the sake of appearances, brought their contribution to the meal, but

consumed it themselves. The consequence was that from being truly

love-feasts, exhibiting Christian charity and Christian temperance,

these meetings became scandalous as scenes of greedy selfishness, and

profane conduct, and besotted excess. "What shall I say to you? shall

I praise you in this? I praise you not." In this Paul anticipates the

condemnation of these occasions of revelry and discord which the

Church was obliged to pronounce after no great lapse of time.[9]

[9] For a highly coloured description of the love-feasts see

Renan's _St. Paul_, pp. 261-270.

Thus then arose these disorders in the celebration of the Lord's

Supper. By the conjunction of this rite with the social meal of the

Christians it degenerated into an occasion of much that was unseemly

and scandalous. To the reform of this abuse Paul now addresses

himself; and it is worth our while to observe what remedies he does

not propose as well as those he recommends.

First, he does not propose to disjoin absolutely and in all cases the

religious rite from the ordinary meal. In the case of the richer

members of the Church this disjunction is enjoined. They are directed

to take their meals at home. "Have ye not houses to eat and to drink

in? or despise ye the Church of God, and shame them that have not?...

If any man hunger, let him eat at home." But with the destitute or

those who had no well-provided homes another rule must be adopted. It

would shame the Christian community, and quite undo its quickly won

reputation for brotherly love and charity, were its members observed

begging their daily bread on the streets. It was equally unseemly for

the rich to accept and for the poor to be denied the meal furnished at

the expense of the Church. And therefore Paul's recommendation is that

those who can conveniently eat at home should do so. But as no quality

of the Christian Church is more strictly her own than charity and no

duty more incumbent or more lovely than to feed the hungry, it could

not dishonour the Church to spread in it a meal for whosoever should

be in need of it.

Again, although the wine of Holy Communion had been so sadly abused,

Paul does not prohibit its use in the ordinance. His moderation and

wisdom have not in this respect been universally followed. On

infinitely less occasion alterations have been introduced into the

administration of the ordinance with a view to preventing its abuse by

reclaimed drunkards, and on still slighter pretext a more sweeping

alteration was introduced many centuries ago by the Church of Rome. In

that Church the custom still prevails of receiving communion only

under one kind; that is to say, the communicant partakes of the bread,

but not of the wine. The reason for this is given by one of their most

authoritative writers as follows: "It is well known that this custom

was not first established by any ecclesiastical law; but, on the

contrary, it was in consequence of the general prevalence of the usage

that this law was passed in approval of it. It is a matter of no less

notoriety that the monasteries in whose centre this observance had its

rise, and thence spread in ever wider circles, were led by a very nice

sense of delicacy to impose on themselves this privation. A pious

dread of desecrating, by spilling and the like, even in the most

conscientious ministration, the form of the sublimest and the holiest

whereof the participation can be vouchsafed to man, was the feeling

which swayed their minds.... However, we should rejoice if it were

left free to each one to drink or not out of the consecrated chalice;

and this permission would be granted if with the same love and concord

a universal desire were expressed for the use of the cup as from the

twelfth century the contrary wish has been enounced."[10] One cannot

but regret that this reverence for the ordinance did not take the form

of a humble acceptance of it, in accordance with its original

institution; and one cannot but think that the "pious dread of

desecrating" the ordinance would have sufficiently prevented any

spilling of the wine or other abuse, or have sufficiently atoned for

any little accident which might occur. And certainly, in contrast to

all such contrivances, the sanity of Paul's judgment comes out in

strong relief; and we more clearly recognise the sagacity which

directed that the ordinance should not be tampered with to suit the

avoidable weaknesses of men, but that men should learn to live up to

the requirements of the ordinance.

[10] Möhler's _Symbolism_, i., 351.

Again, Paul does not insist that because frequent communion had been

abused this must give place to monthly or yearly communion. In

after-times, partly from the abuses attending frequent communion and

partly from the condition of the cities into which Christianity found

its way, a change to rarer celebration was found advisable; and, for

reasons that need not here be detailed, the Church catholic, both in

the East and in the West, settled down to the custom of celebrating

the Lord's Supper weekly: and for some centuries it was expected that

all members of the Church should partake weekly. Paul's reluctance to

lay down any law on the subject suggests that the abuse of this or any

other ordinance does not arise simply from the frequency of its

administration. It is quite natural to suppose that the inevitable

result of frequent communion is an undue familiarity with holy things

and a profane carelessness in handling what should only be approached

with the deepest reverence. That familiarity breeds contempt, or at

any rate heedlessness, is certainly a rule that ordinarily holds good.

As Nelson said of his sailors, hardened by familiarity with danger,

they cared no more for round-shot than for peas. The medical student

who faints or sickens at his first visit to the operating theatre soon

looks with unblenching face on wounds and blood. And by the same law

it is feared, and not without reason, that if we observed frequent

communion, we should cease to cherish that proper awe, and cease to

feel that flutter of hesitation, and cease to be subdued by that

sacredness of the ordinance which yet are the very feelings through

which in great measure the rite influences us for good. We think it

would be impossible to pass every week through those trying moments in

which the soul trembles before God's majesty and love as exhibited in

the Lord's Supper; and we fear that the heart would instinctively

shrink from the reality, and protect itself against the emotion, and

find a way of observing the ordinance with ease to itself, and that

thus the life would die out from the celebration, and the mere husk or

form be left.

It is, however, obvious that these fears need not be verified, and

that an effort on our part would prevent the consequences dreaded. Our

method of procedure in all such cases is first to find out what it is

right to do, and then, though it cost us an effort, to do it. If our

reverence for the ordinance in question depends on its rare

celebration, every one must see that such reverence is very

precarious. May it not be a merely superstitious or sentimental

reverence? Is it not produced by some false idea of the rite and its

signification, or does it not spring from the solemnity of the

paraphernalia and human surroundings of it? Paul seeks to restore

reverence in the Corinthians not by prohibiting frequent communion,

but by setting more clearly before them the solemn facts which

underlie the rite. In presence of these facts every worthy communicant

is at all times living; and if it be merely the outward equipment and

presentation of these facts which solemnize us and quicken our

reverence, then this itself is rather an argument for a more frequent

celebration of the rite, that so this false reverence at least might

be dissipated.

The instincts of men are, however, in many cases a safer guide than

their judgments; and there is a feeling prevalent that very frequent

communion is not advisable, and that if it be advisable it should be

reached not at a bound, but step by step. The main point on which the

individual should insist on coming to some clear understanding with

himself is whether his own reluctance to frequent communion does not

arise from his fear of the ordinance being too profitable rather than

from any fear of its ceasing to profit. Does not our shrinking from it

often mean that we shrink from being more distinctly confronted with

the love and holiness of Christ and with His purpose in dying for us?

Does it not mean that we are not quite reconciled to be always living

on the holiest motives, always under the most subduing and purifying

influences, always living as the children of God, whose citizenship is

in heaven? Do we shrink from the additional restraint and the fresh

and effectual summons to a life, not higher and purer than we ought to

be living--for there is no such life--but higher and purer than we are

quite prepared to live? Putting to ourselves these questions, we use

this rite as the thermometer, which shows us whether we are cold,

lukewarm, or hot, or as the lead heaved from time to time, which shows

us the depth of water we have and the kind of bottom over which we are

holding our course.