Then there are our sermons. If remember rightly, this paper had this sentence in it, or one to this effect, "The leas said about our
dreadful utterance, if Paul ws mons better." Truly a right, as T believe he was, when he said, that we are not "sent te baptize, but, to preach the Gospel it true, either that we have been sent to preach a thing called the Gospel, which is hope-easly dey in itself, or it means that we have made'a hopeless mess in our efforts to commend a thing full of life and interest. The complaint is not that sermons are long. Spurgeon's wore long, but yet, as the once said, no one had ever been fable to build a chapel big enough to hold all the people who wanted to hear him at the same time. People do not object to length, sermons are not dry. You can' b short and dry, as this story shows. 'A newly-ordained clergyman asked Douglas Jerrold to hear his first sermon. Jerrold went and heard it, and the preacher ordeal was over, And now, we will come to the ook, that T have named. Not so. Jong' ago, all the people who had 89 much to say about the dryness of the Christian faith and life and church had a shock. A "Life of Christ" appeared in Italy that became the sensation of the day. Eaition after edition appeared.
were snapped up at once. It fron' coat "Crchated ly other languages, English among them. It been eagerly read everywhere. Some of us remember the sensa caused by the story called "The Mystery of a Hansom Cab," and Mr. Brown of New York," and Helen's Babies." It has had a similar great run. Publishers and author and readers have all been happy. Tt seems incredible that a new Life of Christ should have such ann, There are so many and such excellent ones; Canon Farrat's, Geikie's, David Smith's and others. Then there are the original and incomparable Lives, which we call Gospels, and which are sold by the milieu by the Bible, Soci there it is; Papi popular novels in eieveltions What then is the conclusion fo be drawn from the success of Papi "Life of Christ"? This, that it is all nonsense to talk of the dryness of the Gospel. If the world thinks there then it must be our fault. Here is 1 book that tells a story that must be familiar fo us all; a story that has been told and preached and Arthor his knights; marshals, and Jesus The Fool Hath Said iw His Heart, Now, as to. the church, and as to the Gospel and all that we mean by Christianity being a "valley of dry hones." It shows almost i credible shallowness and want of observation to say such a thing. Begin with the day in which we live. If there is anything that stares one in the face, it is that in one way oF other the Gospel is the one live thing of the day. It is at the root of the great part of our "problems;"" it is quoted in support of theories of economics and. polities and against them. The point is that no one thinks it can be left out. For that is the remarkable thing about Jesus Christ. No one can leave Him entirely out of consideration for any considerable time. There are the people who have no in Him at all, who have "given Christianity." "You would think, that as ours are free countries, these people would let those who want to be Christians alone; that they would say, "Well, let them worship Christ if they' like, they can do no harm." But it is not so. They show a bitterness to Christ and Christianity that they donot show to Buddhism or any other faith. They rather boom these others as picturesque. And the reason is this; that you cannot treat Christianity as a matter of mere antiquarian interest as you can other religions and philoso! That is a remarkable fact, but it is tion, and hundreds have "died for their faith in Christ, as readily as the first Christians did. Christ is so great, that, if people think about at all, they are either for Him or against' Him, as He said they would be. There are the United States of America. The Americans are a busy and shrewd people. They pride themselves on not wast ig time. Yet here is their country split almost in two over the Fundamentalist and Modernist controversy. Able editors, who have a fine nose for what will take the Public, give it front page position. Clearly in the States the Gospel is, not a "valley of dry bones." No one can say of the doctrines of the Vir~ gin: Birth, of Bibieal Inspiration, of the Lord's death for sin, and His rising physically from the dead, "The States are full of bones, and, behold they are very many, and, lo, they are very dry." Indeed not. Here is, indeed, a remarkable thing, a great nation of 110,000,000 fof educated people being compelled to answer the old, old, and eternally vital question, "What think ye of Christ?"
The Only True Rest.
We might pass in review the history of the Christian Church, and ask any candid mind whether that has been a "valley of dry. bones." 'There is the story in the "Acts of Apostles." That, was hardly dry for the apostles.' As it has been wittily said, the finest tribute ever given to two unknown men is that given to Aristarchus and Gaius, that "they "were PAUL'S com: anions in travel." You had to be man to go. through it preaching Everyone seems to haves, pla for spending the Boxer Indeunity money which the, Tailed States Congress has Some would spend it. for iver Conservancy so. att 30,000,000 people may" not starve. They say that they cin gel enough rice out of the valley to feed every Chinese in the country two months? rations of rie. They also say that riesha coolies, bandits, beggars anid come from. the ished by the uncontrolled activities of the Huai and its afluents, Another would spend it to develop Tsing Hua College into a great research university, Still another would establish schools in China taught by Americans, Some would use it to pay China's-unpaid bills to Amer~ tean merchants and seem to advocate usin tinue educating experts in jazz and the use of the. choice phraseology of American slang.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.