me. It is that which I, so far, am becoming. In love then, at least, though perhaps not separably from love, there is much imitation, conscious and unconscious, of the Spirit which revealed itself to the world on Calvary. There may be no inherent beauty in asceticism. There may be no form of asceticism which is not, sometimes, the product of mean and selfish impulses; which does not, sometimes, draw justly upon itself the condemnation, and even contempt, of healthy consciences. But alas! for us if we cannot also, in this context, see how directly the ascetic spirit may be the irresistible outcome of pure love. The daily unselfishness-more and more smiling and spontaneous-the quiet stringency and gladness of detailed self-discipline; do we not see how this, as the unconscious, or the conscious, imitation of the Cross, by one who is in love with the Crucified, may be just the natural homage, the relief which will not be denied, of a devoted love, welling up and bubbling over in act? Be it what it may as cold self-conscious rule, at least as the expression and relief of over-flowing love, asceticism, even the exactest, is not only blameless but beautiful. It is also, in very large measure, a practical token of the thing we are looking for: a secret of the process of the real translation of Calvary, contemplated and loved, into the inmost characterizing reality of the spirit of the loving worshipper.

But in dwelling so long on contemplation and love as if within these lay the secret of the answer to the question asked just now, we lay ourselves open, no doubt, to more questions than one. Thus it may be asked whether, on this interpretation, the only real value of Calvary and the Ascension, as historically objective realities, is to supply a basis for my emotions to work upon? They constitute, no doubt, a marvellous revelation; an over-mastering appeal; a perfect example; a supreme

object and motive for love. Is this all? Is this, and this only, their part in my redemption? And, if so, are they really indispensable at all? Would not the appeal and motive be the same, if I really believed in them as appeal and motive, even if they never actually happened? It might be strange, perhaps, that the deepest of all effects should follow upon a mistaken estimate of fact. But, strange or not strange, would not the same effects after all really follow in fact from an erroneous belief in Calvary and the Ascension, as from a true one, if only the erroneous belief were sufficiently protected from every suspicion of doubt? And if so again, then is not the whole thing a reappearance, in very thin disguise, of what we always understood by a subjective theory of the atonement,—rather than, what it seemed to promise to be, any real reconciliation or synthesis of subjective with objective?

There is one form of question-with branching consequences. And here is another. If contemplation, imitation, love, are adequate as the keynotes of explanation, it may well be asked-is such a contemplation or such a love as is required, itself within the possibilities of the human character? Are my conditions such, that this process of emotional transformation, can be by me maintained, or even begun? And the answer must certainly be that, consistently with the conditions of human experience, on the basis of human initiative or human accomplishment,—no, it is not a possibility! To offer to me, being what I know myself to be, the sacrifice of Christ as an incitement, or an example, is not useless only-but worse than useless. It is, you urge, the most beautiful of ideals. But-the loftier the ideal, the more absolutely is it, to me, unapproachable. It is, you urge, the most moving, the most constraining, object of affection. I can see that it is so or that it ought to be.

But even while I assent with part of my mind, there is that in me by which I feel and know that I cannot altogether be in love with an object of love so inaccessible to me, just because it is more supremely lovable than I can conceive or desire. No; on its side-even I can see that everything is indeed complete: but-on my side-it is the "I" which is incapable. To appeal to me for what is impossible to me, is only to convict and to crush. I need something first which will not merely make appeal to, or draw out, the best that is in me; but which will change and transform the very meaning and possibility of that fatal word "I."

The word "I" is the point at which all such theory breaks down. Surely discussions of atonement,-of its relation to me or mine to it-have often been in vain, because they have tried to explain it apart from any examination of the meaning of the fatal word "I,”—as though the word "I" were a word of obvious meaning, and as though from first to last, throughout the process the word retained its one obvious meaning unchanged. Its meaning is far from remaining either simple, or unqualified. On the contrary, the whole clue to my apprehension of Atonement lies, it may be, in the changing content and significance of that one keyword "I."

This is the answer to the second question. And from the second we go back to the first. And here again we have to answer No! It is not all, nor anything approaching to all, the part borne in my redemption by Calvary and the Ascension that they should offer to me a model, or a motive, or an object of love. But what is far more, and is an integral part in any understanding or explanation of the Atonement,-the life of Christ, consecrated upon the Cross, consummated in the Ascension, itself constitutes the very basis of the possibility, nay more, of the vital and present and experienced reality

of that change in the meaning of the "I" and its capacities, without which any motive or model or ideal object for affection, would serve only to condemn and destroy.

We, then, have not reached-we have hardly as yet even touched upon-the heart of the matter. The heart of the matter would lie in the exposition, and realization, of Pentecost. The atonement as a transaction without ourselves-expound it how you will-is not yet consummated for us. In terms simply of a transaction without ourselves, the mystery of the atonement cannot be expounded. This is why so many expositions of the atonement are, to us, justly inconclusive, or worse. They have tried to explain the method, or justice, of its relation to us. And they stop short at a point at which its relation to us is not yet properly real. What Jesus in Himself suffered, or did, on Calvary, you may perhaps explain in terms of Calvary. The meaning of His Ascension into Heaven, you may in some part at least explain without looking onwards to its further effects. But the relation of what He did to us, its working, its reality for and in us, you can only explain at all in terms of Pentecost. An exposition of atonement which leaves out Pentecost, leaves the atonement unintelligible—in relation to us. For what is the real consummation of the atonement to be? It is to be-the very Spirit of the Crucified become our spirit-ourselves translated into the Spirit of the Crucified. The Spirit of the Crucified, the Spirit of Him who died and is alive, may be, and please God shall be, the very constituting reality of ourselves. Here as always when we come to the deeper truths of Christian exposition, all is found to turn, not on explaining away, but on making vital and real, that membership, unity, identification with Christ, which is so familiar a feature of Scriptural language. He who could say with the most unaffected sincerity, "I determined not to know anything

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among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified," said also "far be it from me to glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world hath been crucified unto me, and I unto the world," and "I have been crucified with Christ; yet I live; and yet no longer I but Christ liveth in me." I am appealing only to our own language, familiar indeed as language at every turn, which yet we find it too often almost impossible to assimilate or to conceive. "Grant us therefore, gracious Lord, so to eat the flesh of Thy dear Son Jesus Christ, and to drink His Blood, that our sinful bodies may be made clean by His Body, and our souls washed through His most precious Blood, and that we may evermore dwell in Him, and He in us."

Now we have made no attempt at all hitherto to enter upon the exposition of Pentecost, the crucial doctrineprofessed so often, and so often without a meaning!— of the Holy Spirit, as constituting the Church. But at least the things which we have tried to say may serve to illustrate the cardinal principle, that Calvary is the condition, precedent and enabling, to Pentecost. The objective reality is completed first, that it may be indeed subjectively realized. Christ is crucified first and risen before our eyes; that Christ crucified and risen may be the secret love and power of our hearts. Calvary without Pentecost, would not be an atonement to us. But Pentecost could not be without Calvary. Calvary is the possibility of Pentecost: and Pentecost is the realization, in human spirits, of Calvary.

The Spirit of the crucified Christ could not become our spirit, nor we live on, and by, Him, till Christ was crucified, and ascended, and enthroned. The Spirit of human penitence could not be ours, till penitence had been realized in humanity. The Spirit of human 2 Gal. vi. 14. 3 Gal. ii. 20.

I Cor. ii. 2.