choice and appointment of men and nations, to certain privileges and services, and for certain definite purposes, culminating in that of Christ Himself as Saviour and Lord of men, and of Christian believers to the life and service of God and His kingdom. In St. John's Gospel, also, we have the choice and election of some to a special service of Christ, but this is in order that the world may believe. Men are also said to be chosen in Christ, who represented all, and who died for all. All is from the sovereignty of God, but it is a sovereignty wholly worthy of the God of Love and Righteousness. Nowhere, with respect to eternal salvation, can we find it said or suggested that God has chosen some and left others with no possibility of being saved, or that any one is excluded, except through his own unbelief or disobedience.

The election is not an unconditional one. It depends on our response to God's call, on our faith in, and fidelity to, Christ. We are exhorted, just because of our election, to 'give the more diligence to make our calling and election sure,' if we do so, we shall find an abundant entrance into the eternal kingdom. We are told to work out our salvation with fear and trembling; for it

is God that worketh in us.' We are warned to give heed, 'lest any man fall after the example of unbelief. Even Paul kept his body under, 'lest after having preached to others he himself should be a castaway.' The election, choice, calling, complete provision for our eternal salvation are real, definite, determinate, on God's part; but, as in everything else that God purposes on our behalf, our response must be given and our co-operation secured.

It was natural, and in every way most desirable that the apostles should encourage the Gentile believers by assuring them of the extension to them of God's calling and election, and of the complete provision that had been made according to the eternal purpose of God for their salvation. Nothing could better confirm them in the Faith or sustain them under the bitter opposition of those who regarded themselves as being exclusively the elect people. But we trust that enough has been said to show that the affirmation of such election is the very same thing as those statements which abound side by side with it (and which are for that very reason so found), that God had purposed in Christ, and had in Him made provision for, the salvation of all men.

ACTS XVII. 27, 28.

That they should seek God, if haply they might feel after Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us: for in Him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain even of your own poets have said, For we are also His offspring.'-R. V.

EXPOSITION.

'That they should seek God.'- 'God' is a better supported reading than 'the Lord'; but it has by some been regarded as a correction, made under the impression that the Lord' would not have been used before a heathen audience, as being liable to misapprehension from its applicability to the emperor.-Cook.

'If haply they might feel after Him and find Him.'— Here St. Paul himself adopts the refinement of the Greek style of speech. For by using a form of the hypothetical sentence which indicates a somewhat dubious hope, he avoids the direct and unpleasant assertion that men-the

Athenians included-had signally failed in their search after God. Instead of conspicuously realizing His presence, as by touch of hand, they had groped about, like men in the dark, without success.-RACKHAM.

'Though He is not far from each one of us.'-The speaker appeals, as he does in Ro 215, to the witness borne by man's consciousness and conscience. There, in the depths of each man's being, not in temples made with hands, men might find God and hold communion with Him. It was natural, in speaking to the peasants of Lystra, to point to the witness of the 'rain from heaven and fruitful seasons.' It was as natural, in speaking to men of high culture and introspective analysis, to appeal to that which is within them rather than to that which was without.ELLICOTT.

'For in Him we live, and move, and have our being.' -This conclusion follows from the divine nature-God as God is omnipresent; and so the apostle is led on to the doctrine of our dwelling in God, with all that it involves. If God is the giver of life and breath and all things, in Him we literally live and move and are. The continued

existence of our physical life, the exercise of our faculties, and-what is alone true being or life-our self-conscious existence, with all its intellectual and spiritual activity, all these so depend upon God that we can be said to be in Him. This doctrine was also that of the Stoics, though they would have rather spoken of God being in us.RACKHAM.

'As certain of your own poets have said.'-Aratus of Soli in Cilicia, a countryman of Paul's (270 B.C.), and Cleanthes, the successor to Zeno (300 B.C.). Both were Stoics

From Zeus begin we; never let us leave

His name unloved. With him, with Zeus, are filled
All paths we tread, and all the marts of men;

Filled, too, the sea,

and every creek and bay;

And all in all things need we help of Zeus,
For we too are his offspring.

The Phanomena of Aratus.

It is not perhaps an unfair inference that a man who could quote so aptly from the poets as here, in 1 Co 1535 and in Tit 112, could have done so at other times if occasion had required.-ELLicott.

'For we are also His offspring.'-So Adam is called in Lk 33 the son of God, and God is described in Heb 129 as the Father of our spirits.-RENDALL.

THE SERMON.

Not Far from any One of Us.

By the Rev. E. Johnson, M.A.

When men begin seriously to think about God, they are apt to imagine Him exalted in the height of His infinite power and shrouded from them in the inaccessible mysteries of His being. But again and again the gospel emphasizes the nearness of God to men, and presses home this fact in different ways. First, God proved His nearness

to man by sending His Son Jesus Christ to the earth in the form of a man; and, secondly, by the coming of the Holy Spirit to dwell within the hearts of men; for what can be nearer to a man than his own heart?

But it is in a somewhat different sense from either of these that St. Paul here speaks of the nearness of God. He is taking a wide view of human nature, and his doctrine is that through all the ages men have been groping after God while all the time He was close to them and was revealing Himself daily in nature.

I. Let us distinguish between the revelation of God through nature and through the Holy Scriptures. The revelation in nature is the oldest. From the very beginning man, looking at the wonders of the sky and the earth, had forebodings

of God. Nature, we may say, is the inarticulate, Scripture the articulate voice of God. But nevertheless the inarticulate utterance is a very real one. Addison describes the heavens as proclaiming their great Original, the sun as publishing to every land the work of an Almighty Hand; the moon takes up the wondrous tale, the planets confirm the tidings as they roll, and spread the truth from pole to pole. Nature speaks more to our imagination, and Scripture more to our understanding. Nature is like the 'songs without words' of a great composer, which so powerfully affect us without the intervention of a single articulate word.

II. Let us look at some of the constant tokens in Nature of the near presence of God. Perhaps the most apparent is the sun, the breaking forth of his glory at morning and at evening has always been the most significant natural revelation of the glory of God. On a sunny morning we feel how good a thing is life, every breath we draw sends some thrill of pleasure to the brain. We long to express our thanks for this beauty and joy to someone, and that is just the instinctive response of the heart to the presence and goodness of God. But sometimes Nature has the power of giving us a sudden flash of higher revelation, she can even suggest to us the thought of the immortality of the soul. We feel that the God who spread out the immeasurable horizon and who raised the lofty mountains, also made man, and made him with a heart to beat and a mind to think, made him to live and not to pass into nothing. Everything in nature speaks of life, not of death.

But after all Nature can only dimly suggest to us those truths which we need for our full peace and salvation. We require the definite articulate revelation to interpret the inarticulate. For example, when we look upon a storm, watch the vivid flashing of the lightning, and listen to the thunder's awful roar, we are compelled to realize the greatness of our own sin. Nature, however, can do no more. She cannot tell us how to get rid of sin; for that we must go to the articulate gospel. Then afterwards we will have still more joy in Nature. We will no more have the terrible shrinking from ourselves, but will be glad to live in this beautiful world, having the hope ever present of soon exchanging these scattered glimpses of Him for a perfect vision, an unclouded fellowship of joy.

New Testament Idea of Personality.

By Dr. Charles Cuthbert Hall.

In Him we live, and move, and have our being here St. Paul asserts Man's life in God. In one of his letters to the Thessalonians he declares God's Life in Man-God Himself sanctify you wholly, body, soul, and spirit. By combining these two thoughts, we have the New Testament idea of Personality. Life itself is the important thing— what a man is, not what he does. How much richer and worthier would the lives of many be if they asked, Who am I? Whence am I? What am I? before What shall I do? Personality is the great fact that precedes conduct. So this subject is a practical one. Conduct and destiny are founded on one's own thought about one's self. And this basis of self-knowledge keeps one from being blown about by every wind of passion or prejudice.

Whatever life may be, we know that it is something given, not self-derived. The New Testament idea is that man touches that great Life which was from all eternity. In Him every part of us lives-body, soul, and spirit. To think of the bodily life as an outcome of the Life of the Infinite God, brings the glory of the Divine into the physical-as Christ dwelt in a body, and so made it and all manhood a consecrated thing.

Man has a thinking mind, an emotional nature. As the functions of the body reveal life, so do the energies of the mind. We all know something of its throb and rush, its eager questioning and reasoning, which may mean suffering or joy. This vitality of thought also, says the apostle, is the offspring of God. Its origin is in Him.

Man has a spirit. In some the spirit may be lying unconscious, dead because of sin, and so exercising none of its functions; but in others there will be spiritual response, will and purpose going toward the Living God. This movement is life, taken directly from contact with the Life of God.

The New Testament idea of Personality goes further than this of Man's Life in God; it speaks also of God's Life in us. Not only does every part of our life depend on Him, but He lives in us to make every part of our life worthy. He would sanctify our bodily life so that it might be a fit temple of the Holy Spirit. He would sanctify our minds and make our mental life strong and beautiful. And He would sanctify and preserve

our spirits, educating them and making them worthy to be light-bearers in the world.

St. Paul's message to every individual is to live daily as one whose whole personality-body, soul, and spirit-is knit to the very Life of God, and is being lived in by the Eternal Sanctifier.

ILLUSTRATIONS.

I FALTER where I firmly trod,
And falling with my weight of cares
Upon the great world's altar stairs,
That slope through darkness up to God;

I stretch lame hands of faith, and grope
And gather dust and chaff, and call
To what I feel is Lord of all,
And faintly trust the larger hope.

TENNYSON's In Memoriam.

That they should seek God.-On one occasion when Bunyan was endeavouring to pray, the tempter suggested 'that neither the mercy of God, nor yet the blood of Christ, at all concerned him, nor could they help him by reason of his sin; therefore it was vain to pray.' Yet he thought with himself, I will pray.' 'But,' said the tempter, 'your sin is unpardonable.' 'Well,' said he, 'I will pray.' 'It is to no boot,' said the adversary. And still he answered, 'I will pray.' And so he began his prayer. 'Lord, Satan tells me that neither Thy mercy nor Christ's blood is sufficient to save my soul. Lord, shall I honour Thee most by believing Thou wilt and canst? or him by believing Thou neither wilt nor canst? Lord, I would fain honour Thee by believing that Thou canst and wilt.' And while he was thus speaking, as if some one had clapped him on the back,' that scripture fastened on his mind, 'O man, great is thy faith.'

CONFUCIUS said: 'Respect the gods, but keep them at a distance,' and in agreement with this teaching, the modern Chinaman is an agnostic, denying that he owes duties to God, inasmuch as he does not know His character, and has no assurance about a future state. What a contrast does this present with the sentiments of a David or a Paul. 'My soul thirsteth for God.' 'They should seek God.'

Not far from each one of us.-The workmen who built that well-known sanctuary, Christchurch, noticed that in their midst moved a mysterious helper, ever ready to toil and take his share in rearing the house of prayer, but absent when the weekly hour for payment came round. Nobody knew who he was or whence he came, but they grew accustomed to his assistance, and looked on him as one of themselves. One day they were in great trouble, for a necessary beam was found to be too short for its intended position, and this meant hindrance and delay. They went home, feeling discouraged, but next morning they found the beam had been fitted to its place, and all had been made right by the mysterious workman, who shared their labour. Then, says the legend, they knew that One only could have

adapted the wonderful beam. They showed what had been done to all around, and the place was called Christchurch from that time forward.

THE sun, the moon, the stars, the seas, the hills, and the plains,

Are not these, O soul, the vision of Him who reigns? Speak to Him, thou, for He hears, and spirit with spirit may meet;

Closer is He than breathing, and nearer than hands and feet.

IT is said that Lord Craven lived in London when the plague raged. His house was in that part of the city since called Craven buildings. On the plague growing epidemic, his lordship, to avoid the danger, resolved to go to his seat in the country. His coach-and-six was accordingly at the door, his baggage put up, and all things in readiness for the journey. As he was walking through the hall with his hat on, his cane under his arm, and putting on his gloves, in order to step into his carriage, he overheard his negro saying to another servant, I suppose, by my lord's quitting London to avoid the plague, that his god lives in the country and not in town.' The poor negro said this in the simplicity of his heart, as really believing in a plurality of gods. The speech, however, struck Lord Craven very sensibly, and made him pause. My God,' thought he, 'lives everywhere, and can preserve me in town as well as in the country. I'll even stay where I am.' He immediately ordered his horses to be taken from the coach, and the luggage to be brought in.

He continued in London, was remarkably useful among his sick neighbours, and never caught the infection.

FOR REFERENCE.

D'Arcy (C. F.), Idealism and Theology, 65.

Barton (G. A.), The Roots of Christian Theology as found in the O.T., 45.

Drummond (H.), Natural Law in the Spiritual World, 261.
Drummond (J.), Via, Veritas, Vita.

Gibson (J. G.), Stepping Stones to Life, 79.
Gould (S. B.), Our Parish Church, 75.

Hall (C. C.), Gospel of the Divine Sacrifice, 267.
Harris (H.), Short Sermons, 149.

Hodge (C.), Princeton Sermons, 2.

Kuyper (A.), The Work of the Holy Spirit, 222.
Macleod (A.), Days of Heaven upon Earth, 62.
Martineau (J.), Hours of Thought, vol. ii. 103.
Oosterzee (J. J. van), Year of Salvation, vol. ii.
Pattison (M.), Sermons, 193.

Pusey (E. B.), Parochial and Cathedral Sermons, 503.
Shaw (J. F.), Studies for the Pulpit, part i. 138.
Spurgeon (C. H.), Facsimile Pulpit Notes, 5.
Stier (R.), Words of the Lord Jesus, vol. i. 140.
Tholuck (A.), Hours of Devotion, 3.
Vaughan (D. J.), Questions of the Day, 134.
Vaughan (C. J.), Temple Sermons, 528.
Wagner (C.), Courage, 33.

Whiton (J. M.), New Points to Old Texts, 109.
Wilberforce (B.), Sermons preached in Westminster
Abbey, 60.

THAT the so-called 'Original of Ecclesiasticus' contains portions of two translations of Ecclesiasticus made from the Syriac and a daughter version of the Greek, has been repeatedly asserted by the present writer, and the arguments adduced by Professor Nestle in the article 'Sirach' in Hastings' Bible Dictionary are quite sufficient to prove the point. It is, however, of interest to prove it from the evidence of the literature of the Jews.

A definite statement concerning the destruction of the original of Ben-Sira's work is to be found in a passage of the Babylonian Gemara, rescued from oblivion by Rabbinowicz in his Various Readings, ix. 304. A form of the text preserved

Sira's), we should expound the valuable texts that are therein.'

Of the three books which contain this sentence, one, the commentary of Abu'l-'Afiyah, was printed at Salonica in 1798; the others are less accessible. For the hypothetical clause, 'had not our Rabbis destroyed,' Rabbinowicz approves of the conjecture 'although our Rabbis destroyed.' But does

mean 'to destroy'? To find out what sort of operation is meant by it, it is best to examine the passages in which it occurs. In a tradition about king Hezekiah (Pesachim, 56a, Berachoth, 10b, Kamḥi on 2 K 203), he is praised for having ganaz'd a book of medical prescriptions. This, says Rashi, is because the people used to rely on

ganaz by the Arabic azāla, 'caused to cease.' The matter is of consequence to him, for he wrote medical books himself, and therefore is at pains to show that the book ganaz'd by Hezekiah was a book of unlawful prescriptions. It does not occur to Maimonides that the word can mean anything less than 'destroy.' Had it meant 'set aside for the use of certain privileged persons,' Maimonides would not be compelled to defend the act on the ground that the book contained unlawful matter.

Pesachim, 62b: 'Rami son of Judah said: "From the day on which the Book of Genealogies was ganaz'd, the strength of the wise became enfeebled, and the light of their eyes grew dim."' Rashi renders ganaz'd 'was forgotten,' in accordance with his theory that such a book could not have been written. This is an error with reference to the time before the rule against writing anything but mikrā; for in Yebamoth, 49a, we read that R. Simon B. Uzzai found a genealogical roll at Jerusalem. Rashi's opinion is, however, in accordance with the Gemara (l.c.). 'R. Shamlai came before R. Jochanan: he said, "Let my lord recite to me the Book of Genealogies."—He said, "We do not recite." Yet it is clear that the day whereon it was ganaz'd cannot mean the day on which it was forgotten, since that process would occupy many days; but the day whereon it was destroyed. And the process was one which took the book out of the reach of the wise as well as the unwise.

Of the process of destruction we get a vivid account in Sabbath 115a. (Tosefta ibid. sec. 14). 'A copy of the Targum of Job was brought before R. Gamliel: he ordered the builder to sink it under the foundations.' R. Jose B. Jehudah says a trough full of clay was passed over it. This statement occasions difficulty: is it permitted to destroy such books by the hand? Rather they are to be left in a place where they will perish, and so they rot or perish of themselves.' The difficulty, then, is not as to the ultimate fate of such booksthat in any case is certain; it is only whether nature should be left to do all the work, or should be assisted.

The passage is of interest as containing a definite statement concerning the fate of Ben-Sira's book. Since it had been destroyed, the quotations from it in the Talmud could only have been preserved by oral tradition; and indeed this was obvious from their nature to men of modern critical ability, such as the retranslator Ben-Zev. It assigns to Ben

Sira sayings which are not his; it assigns sayings of his to others; and reproduces with extreme inaccuracy the genuine sayings which it correctly ascribes to him. This phenomenon is explicable on the ground that there was no existing original by which the quotations could from time to time be checked; explicable on no other supposition.

The study of these quotations leads, however, to results of interest besides confirming the assertion of the Gemara that the book had been destroyed. The Mishnah which leads to the discussion in the B. Gemara is to the effect that, 'according to R. Akiba, whoever read in the exoteric books forfeited eternal life.' The ground for this doctrine is not given in the Bab. Talmud, but is preserved in the Midrash R. on Numbers, sec. 14. Eccles 1212 is thus interpreted by the Midrash: 'and more than these, my son, beware against making many books: no end': i.e. whosoever adds to the twenty-four books is to have no end, which is shown from Daniel to signify eternal life. Exoteric books must therefore in the original tradition have meant books outside the twenty-four. This sense of the phrase also appears very clearly in the Midrash R. on Numbers, sec. 15: ""planted like courses of priests" (Eccles .c.); hence the wise have said that it is unlawful to read in the exoteric books: just as the courses of priests are twenty-four, so the books are twenty-four.' There can be no doubt that in these passages exoteric books mean books that are not in the Canon.

On the other hand, in sec. 14 of the same Midrash, the phrase must mean something different. Whoever reads a verse that is not in the twenty-four books is as bad as if he read in the exoteric books.' If this sentence has a meaning, exoteric must mean something more than nonbiblical.

The Jerusalem Gemara glosses the Mishnah. thus: 'exoteric: such as the books of Ben-Sira and the books of Ben-Laanah.' It is an error to ascribe this gloss to R. Akiba, whose words it explains. The source of it is (confessedly) the Midrash on Eccles 1212, where the books of Ben-Sira and Ben-Tagla are taken as examples of books other than the twenty-four. Whether Laanah or Tagla be the more correct form cannot easily be determined. The Bab. Gemara gives the phrase 'exoteric books' the sense books of the Christians'; 'he says books of the Christians': Rab Joseph says, 'even one who reads in Ben