scientific revolution which, as Mr. Gladstone has said, opened to us the antipodes and the solar system, did not shake it. The Renaissance, which, in bringing to light the literature of the past, laid new foundations for all literature, did not touch it. It seemed as if the confession of its faith in Jesus Christ was fixed as far above the perils that threatened the Church, as the sky is above the mists which cover the earth. Even the reformers, who in all ages are reshaping the Church and reestablishing the foundations upon which salvation shall rest, added nothing and altered nothing in the testimony the Church has given to its belief in Jesus Christ the Son of God, its Lord, its Redeemer, its King. It stands, as he does, the same yesterday and to-day and forever.1

We come now to the closing question. It is as if again we heard Jesus sweeping aside the testimony of the disciples, of the Church, and of the world, and saying: "But, beloved, who do you say that I am?" It is a searching question. That beautiful spirit, that far-famed, tender-hearted man, Dr. William E. Channing, said: "To know Jesus Christ is to approach his soul, to comprehend his spirit, to see how he thought and felt and purposed and loved." And the word is eternally true-but it is not the whole truth. It is not the testimony of the Church. To know Jesus

1 See Note 10.

Christ is to approach his soul, to comprehend his spirit, to see how he felt and thought and purposed and loved-but far more is it to know him who purposes and loves and grieves; to hear his voice who says, "Come unto me and live;" to know him, not simply as the Jesus who on the hills of Galilee and in the streets of Jerusalem testified to a loving God and Maker of all-but to see him in the awful sacrifice on

Calvary, to know that he gave himself for us. It is to behold him now as the risen and living Christ, our Saviour and our Friend, comforting, pardoning, sustaining; as he hears our prayers, as he leads his children by the hand in their daily service, as he presses home upon them his assurance of the divine grace and a present pardon, and as he opens to us the vision of a heavenly home where he stands to welcome us to himself.

In confirmation of the faith of the Church comes the testimony of her saints through the centuries, certifying to the loving and abiding presence with them of that Jesus in whom they believed. "Eighty and six years have I served him," said the aged Polycarp, in the arena. "How can I blaspheme the name of my King and my Lord?" So bishops and presbyters, philosophers and soldiers, young men of beauty, and scholars of high cultivation, widows and maidens, slaves and shepherd boys, in the amphitheater and on

the rack, cried to the present Christ, and laid down their lives for him.

"Whom dost thou worship?" said the consul to Pionius writhing on the rack. "I worship Him who made the earth and stars, and gave me life, and is my God." "Dost thou mean him who was crucified?" "Certainly I do, Him whom the Father sent for the salvation of the world."

And the testimony of the martyrs is the testimony of consecrated Christians to-day. We read it in Livingstone's last record in his journal, in his lonely hut in the Bangwuolo wilderness, as, bowed in prayer, he summoned his failing strength to write, and was found kneeling and dead at daylight: "March 19th, 1872. Birthday. My Jesus, my King, my life, my all! Again I dedicate myself to thee."

We hear it in the life of that young missionary in India who passed away saying, "India is Christ's;" in the last words of the brilliant young McCall of the Livingstone-Congo mission, dying in mid-work: "Lord, I gave myself, body, mind and soul, to thee; I consecrated my whole life and being to thy service, and now if it please thee to take myself instead of the work which I would do for thee, what is that to me? Thy will be done." Harrington in Massai land, and Keith Falconer among his Arabs in Aden, and Coleridge Patterson sacrificed to the savages in Melane

sia, and Pinkerton dead on the borders of Umzila's country, and Bagster at Bihé, and the host of other beautiful lives freely given for Christ and his gospel, what are they but so many parts of the undying song of the ages, in testimony to Christ our Lord?

It is the testimony from martyrs and missionaries, from humble homes and from scenes of heroic sacrifice, from men of every nation and clime, who first have found Jesus Christ the Saviour who laid down his life in atoning sacrifice for their sins, and then, confessing his name, and giving themselves to his service, have had revealed to them the face of the living Christ, who came to be with them through their pilgrimage, to sustain them in their service, to comfort them in their trials, to pardon them in their follies, to welcome them home at last, when they shall see his face and be like him.'

1 See Note 11.