The prophet of the Exile might have said to both that in expecting a king to reign over this denationalized people they were only cherishing at pious dream. For in prophecy the clothing of the idea was the temporal thing, and inspiration, in the sense of the correct reading of the future, did not appertain to it. The great religious conceptions that the historical details clothed were the permanent things. In them was the inspiration of the Most High. In speaking of them the prophets spoke better than they knew. The prophets as they spoke of the coming king, of the purified nation, of the holy man of God, of the suffering Servant, had no consistent idea of the actual Messiah who was to be. Their various conceptions, indeed, seemed to be self-contradictory, unable to be combined in any one character. We fail to consider, we who have been trained to see in Christ the fulfilment of the promise of the Messiah, how marvellous the fulfilment of that promise was. We import our knowledge of Christ into the conscious conceptions of the prophets. But the prophets saw nothing of this; and yet each in his own measure, underneath the historical circumstances of his day, was expressing, as God

had put it into his heart, the idea that was afterwards to be made actual in the Messiah.

It was in this that the inspiration of the prophets lay. To understand it we must begin with Christ and work backward, seeing at each stage the development of the Messianic idea that was to eventuate in the Messiah. Just as it is through man, the highest product of evolution, that we can see the meaning of many of the processes in the lower creation that without the completion of them all in him would seem purposeless, so it is through Christ, in whom religion became absolute, perfect, that we can comprehend the contribution that each prophet, under the guise of the temporal, made to the completion of the spiritual idea. Herein is the inspiration of God; not in the predictions concerning historical details, not in the political forecasts, but in the enunciation underneath those things, and with the full meaning of their words not understood by the men who spoke them, of the principles of the kingship of God, of His power over a nation's life, of His nearness to His own people, of His willingness to substitute His own suffering for theirs, those principles realized in flesh and blood in His own Son, Jesus Christ.

JEREMIAH VIII. 20.

'The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.'-R. V.

EXPOSITION.

'The harvest is past.'-These again are the words of the people, whose despair at being thus rejected by God takes the form of a proverb.-Cook.

'The summer is ended, and we are not saved.'-In Is 169, Jer 401o, and elsewhere the word summer' is rendered by 'summer fruits.' The summer' (better the fruitgathering) is ended, and yet they are not saved from misery and death. All has failed alike. The whole formula had probably become proverbial for extremest misery. It is well to remember that the barley-harvest coincided with the Passover, the wheat-harvest with Pentecost, the fruit-gathering with the autumn Feast of Tabernacles.-PLUMPTRE.

WHEN the harvest was over and the fruit-gathering ended, the husbandmen looked for a quiet time of refreshment. Judah had had its harvest-time' and then its fruitgathering'; its needs had been gradually increasing, and,

on the analogy of previous deliverances (cf. Is 184 3310), it might have been expected that God would have interposed, His help being only delayed in order to be the more signally supernatural. But we are not saved (or rather, delivered).— T. K. CHEYNE.

THE SERMON.

The Prophet's Lament. By the Rev. S. A. Tipple.

No prophet ever carried a sadder or heavier burden than Jeremiah. He was timid and sensitive, but he had to become a 'man of contention.' His message was one of disaster, and his cry was ever 'No hope, no hope.' Judgment had been foretold against Judah, and the fears of the people had been aroused and they had plunged into religious activity to avert their punishment. And now they were self-satisfied once more-they had

succeeded in appeasing God's wrath. It was to this people that Jeremiah was sent with the message that their reformation was useless-it was superficial, and, underneath, the mass of corruption was untouched. It is not to be wondered at that Jeremiah shrank from his message and rebelliously said, 'I will not make mention, I will not speak any more,' until the word was in his heart as a burning fire shut up in his bones, and he was weary with forbearing, and he could not stay.'

Sometimes it may be better to refrain from meddling with hopes even though we see their baselessness, but sometimes it is the kindest thing to scatter them. So it was with the people of Judah. The hope that their reforms had secured them against God's anger was not only a delusion, it was a snare. It was unfitting them to bear their punishment, when it should fall, with the humble submission which would make it beneficial to them.

'The harvest is past, . . . and we are not saved,' was the cry of Jeremiah. How many of us echo this cry as we contemplate ourselves after seasons which have held special opportunities, how disappointing have the summers proved, how small has been the gathering of the harvest!

And, again, we remember situations with a humiliating sense that we have not become the men, in moral nature, which they afforded us the opportunity of becoming. We recall the anniversaries and the quiet Sabbaths when we were touched by higher impulses and resolved to go on to better things. We grieve that now those things have not the quickening impulse they once had. Let us remember that so long as we are able to weep that we cannot weep there is hope for us.

What is it with us all but failure? We have not worked out our appointed salvation, we have fallen far below the high aspirations with which we set out. And still we feel that something has been reaped, though it be only a penitent sense of shortcoming which we have gained. Even that is the seed-grain which will bear fruit behind the veil.

The Seasons of the Soul.

By the Rev. W. J. Dawson.

In the seventh verse of this eighth chapter Jeremiah calls attention to the migration of the birds. The stork, the turtle, the crane, and the

swallow obey the whisper of the Creator, and on the approach of winter fly to summer lands. Man alone pays no heed to the seasons,-the spiritual seasons of his soul,—and at last is forced to acknowledge 'The summer is ended, the harvest is past, and we are not saved.'

There are times in the life of all when God seems far away, and the right course visionary and impractical; there are also times when God is near, and goodness is easy and alluring. These are the seasons of the soul.

i. There are three things to notice about the seasons of the soul, and the first is that you cannot command them. They are given. Our bodies are affected by a thousand outside forces-sounds, visions, odours, fragrances, and flavours. When we are thus affected by the earthly, may we not be equally affected by the heavenly? In the world of intellect there is a thing called genius. It cannot be acquired, and it comes without being sought. In the spiritual world the corresponding fact is the divine visitation of God, and the name

for it is grace. This grace may come to us in

many ways which seem to have no relation with religion,-through a book which has interested us, through a strain of music or the beauty of nature, -and we are mystically gladdened, helped, and directed. God's name for this visitation is grace. Robert Louis Stevenson has said about it: 'We walk upon it, we breathe it we live and die by it; it makes the nails and axles of the universe.' And it comes unsought. I was found of them that sought Me not; I was made manifest to them that asked not after Me.'

ii. The second point to be noticed about the seasons of the soul is that we can use them-the grace of God visits us that we may use the grace. But many men hear God's message, and thrill to it, and do not act. They say, 'to-morrow I will go and work.' Of men such as these Oliver Wendell Holmes says, 'they die with all their music in them.' Not to profit by the message is as good as never to have had it, for salvation is the appropriation of God's grace, and every man receives a call. Every man has had his soul softened and his heart touched by a desire for goodness, and that was his chance.

iii. And now we come to the most tragic truth of all-we may miss the season of God's grace. Every day we see men missing great opportunities, either through indolence or carelessness. Can we

hide from ourselves the truth that in the same way men miss the seasons of God's grace? We may not limit the magnanimity of God, but within the limits of this world men lose their last chance. They live and die without ever appropriating God's grace. They let the seasons of God visit them in vain, till at last they utter the bitterest of all cries, 'The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.'

ILLUSTRATIONS.

Procrastination. -Mr. Bart Kennedy, in his recent and fascinating book, A Tramp in Spain, hits off the indolence of the average Spaniard in this graphic fashion: 'The Spaniards are the most dignified loafers in the world. To-morrow is for them the day of days. On that day everything will come all right. "Manana." The word, as the man of Spain uses it, not only means to-morrow, but it means the future that is dim and far away—the future not yet to be defined, a time of haze and golden possibility, of accomplishment and greatness yet to come.' This reliance on to-morrow is not peculiar to the Spaniards; it is the ruin of thousands in spiritual things. The Holy Spirit saith "To-day" for soul decision and service.-H. O. MACKEY.

Lost Opportunities.-The harvest is past.' The coach has gone on, and we have missed it; the tide flowed, and we might have caught it, but we have waited so long that it has ebbed. We neglected our opportunities at home, we were disobedient, unfilial, hard-hearted, and now we stand at the gate-post and cry our hearts out, because we had not a chance of doing something for the father and mother whom we neglected in their lifetime.-JOSEPH PARKER.

A MESSAGE has been sent to me to come and see a sick person. Nothing was said about coming at once; and so, having something else to do, I have put off going, and have found it was too late on the morrow. Mr. Arnot, in his book on the Proverbs, tells a story of an artist with whom the late Queen made an appointment for a sitting for a certain hour at the Palace. The artist was in no hurry. He arrived some minutes late, to find that the Queen had been at the appointed time, and was gone. And so he lost his opportunity.-JEFFREY'S The Way of Life, p. 285.

-

Not Saved. The harvest must be gathered during 'the time of harvest,' or it cannot be gathered at all. The hay must be made while the sun shines, or there will be no stacks of hay when the winter comes. If the farmer allows the opportunities that come to him in the summer sunshine and harvest time to pass by unimproved, he must reap, instead of wealth and plenty, poverty and want. The verse before us is the lamentation of a people who have allowed the harvest time of spiritual opportunity and the sunshine of favourable circumstances to pass without doing those things which would have secured their salvation, and who realise in the end that they are not saved. The lament of these people may some day be the cry of many who have allowed

their day of salvation' to pass by without seeking the Saviour. 'Now,' says the apostle, 'is the day of salvation.' There is no promise of another day. The present moment may end the summer time of many. How sad if, in the next, they should have to cry, 'not saved.'-THORNE'S Notable Sayings, p. 172.

A SURVIVOR from the wreck of the Princess Alice relates a distressing and heartrending scene in connexion with the rescuing of some of the passengers of that ill-fated vessel. She was in one of the small boats which was as full as possible with rescued passengers. Struggling in the water were many other poor drowning creatures, some of whom laid hold of the boats and entreated to be taken in, but that was quite impossible, as they were already overcrowded, and for one more there was absolutely no room.' Still they would not let go their hold, and fought hard for dear life to get into the boats. Overcrowded as they were, it

was clear that the boats ladened with the rescued would be capsized unless those hanging on were driven away. The poor creatures had at last to be beaten off, for they would not relax their hold, and they were left to perish because there was no room' for them in the boat.-A. HILL.

SOMETIMES, too, the night comes in a still sadder form. The night of deadness when we no longer care to work, the night of hardened habits which we cannot break, and which take from us even the desire to live lives of fruitful activity and faithfulness. There comes a time when those words of the vision of the Revelation have their stern fulfilment : 'He that is unjust, let him be unjust still: and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still.' The man who has chosen idleness will at last be unable to rise to any effort of labour; the selfish will grow in selfishness till the voices that call for his sympathy and help fail to reach his ear, and the man who has turned away from his God will find a blank darkness around him in the day of his need.-BRAMSTON'S Fratribus, p. 53.

LATE, late, so late! and dark the night, and chill! Late, late, so late! but we can enter still.

'Too late! Too late! ye cannot enter now.' No light had we: for that we do repent; And, learning this, the Bridegroom will relent. 'Too late! Too late! ye cannot enter now.' No light so late! and dark and chill the night! O let us in, that we may find the light!

'Too late! Too late! ye cannot enter now.' Have we not heard the Bridegroom is so sweet? O let us in, though late, to kiss His feet! 'No, no! Too late! ye cannot enter now.' TENNYSON.

FOR REFERENCE.

Coates (G.), The Morning Watch for Soldiers of the King, 283.

Dawson (W. J.), The Evangelistic Note, 231.
Jeffrey (R. T.), The Salvation of the Gospel, 330.
Harris (H.), Short Sermons, 294.

Nicholson (M.), Redeeming the Time, 321.
Parker (J.), Studies in Texts, vol. v. 149.
Perren (C.), Revival Sermons, 154.
Spurgeon (C. H.), Evening by Evening, 368.
Stewart (J.), Outlines of Discourses.

Thorne (H.), Notable Sayings of the Great Teacher, 169.

Tipple (S. A.), Sunday Mornings at Norwood, 39.
Christian Age, vol. xxviii.

Hannam's Pulpit Assistant, vol. iv.
Homiletic Review, vol. xvi.

THIS article, like its predecessor (THE EXPOSITORY TIMES, p. 393 of this volume), will be confined to the Purgatorio of Dante. And its scope will be further limited to the descriptions of the seven cornici, or terraces, on the Mount of Purgatory itself (cantos ix.-xxvii.), thus excluding the details. of the Ante-Purgatory (cantos ii.-viii.), which, though extremely interesting in themselves, do not seem to provide much material that can be used, simply and intelligibly, for the practical and homiletic purposes which these articles are primarily meant to serve.

Those seven terraces are occupied by the corrective punishment (for it must be remembered throughout that in Dante's view all the punishment in Purgatory is essentially corrective, and therefore it is that we can safely draw from it illustrations of earthly punishment) of seven separate sins-those which were catalogued in the medieval Church as the Seven Vitia Capitalia, or Deadly Sins. It is a list which, with some slight variations, one of which will be noticed presently, has been used long and widely, and it may still be regarded as practically valuable as well as historically interesting. There is, indeed, but one serious fault that can be found with it from the point of view of modern ethics-and surely no less from the point of view of the proportion of scriptural teaching-namely, the omission of any mention of the class of sins which includes hypocrisy and insincerity and unveracity. As Dr. W. Bright puts it, when preaching on Sincerity towards God,' from the text Ps 516, and referring also to Ps 152 525(4) 5511 1017, Zec 816, Eph 415. 25, Rev 218, etc.: 'Is it not strange and sad that, in the face of such passages as these, good men who were to wield vast ethical influence should have drawn up a list of seven mortal sins, and yet have

left out falsehood?' (Morality in Doctrine, p. 224). He adds in a note: 'Cardinal Newman, far otherwise, makes "unveracity" one of the three "offences against the majesty of God"; the others being impurity and cruelty' (Grammar of Assent, p. 412). We are apt to think of the virtue of strict truthfulness as being more highly valued among northern and Teutonic, than among southern and Latin, peoples; but as to Dante himself, there is no reason to suppose that he personally, any more than Cardinal Newman, would have thought falsehood too slight a sin to be regarded as 'capital' or 'mortal.' More easily it might be argued on the other hand, by those who remember how he wrote in the Inferno about hypocrites (canto xxiii.), falsifiers (cantos xxix.xxx.), and traitors (cantos xxxii.-xxxiv.), that he regarded it as too degrading and too deadly a sin to admit of purgatorial cleansing. But it is enough for us to say that he simply accepted on Church authority, and used as part of the framework for this part of his poem, the catalogue of sins which would be most familiar in catechisms and penitentials and sermons. Just so in our own country, later on in the same century, Chaucer adopted the same catalogue in the treatise on penitence known as 'The Persone's Tale.'

Let us then look through the seven sins which form the items in that catalogue. It may be useful in each case, first, to collect a few of the most salient and instructive of the texts which are likely to suggest the subject of the particular sin to the preacher or teacher, and then to show how, in trying to enforce the need and the nature of due penitence for that sin in this life, he may be helped by illustrations drawn from Dante's projection of such penitence into another sphere.

FIRST TERRACE: THE PROUD.

CANTOS X. 27-XII.

Some texts in point, besides those mentioned immediately below, would be Pr 334, quoted in Ja 46 and 1 P 55, Dt 82. 16, Ps 1311 1386, Pr 112 1533 165.19.

1. Now, first, it should be observed how completely consistent with the whole Christian scheme of ethics, and especially with the sayings of our Lord Himself, is the fact that pride stands foremost in Dante's list of sins, and is punished on that terrace which is the lowest on the Mountain of Purgatory, and therefore the farthest from Paradise and from the Divine Presence. Of the seven deadly sins, typified in the poem by the seven P's (i.e. peccata) marked on Dante's forehead (Purg. ix. 112, etc.), this one must be washed away before the others can be dealt with. As, then, in Holy Scripture, the first beatitude is that pronounced upon the poor in spirit' (Mt 5), as the humblest are 'the greatest' (Mt 184, cf. 2027 f.), and therefore the proudest must be the least, in the kingdom of heaven, as the 'meek and lowly' heart is the very essence of the imitation of Christ (Mt 1129), so here Dante places the subjugation of pride first among the necessary processes of repentance and purgation. He follows in this case the usual classification and order of sins, although he does not seem to have felt towards pride the personal contempt and disgust with which he regarded the sins of avarice and gluttony, and although (or should we rather say because ?) he looked upon it as his own besetting sin, as he indicates distinctly in Purg. xiii. 136 ff. 2. But there is something more to be observed. Though, as has been said, it was usual in Dante's time to count the deadly sins as seven, and to reckon pride as the first of them, this had not always been the case. Some earlier writers, beginning with Cassian, extended the list to eight, placing vainglory (inanis gloria), which of course is one specific form of pride, among the seven, but also placing pride itself (superbia) outside of that number, either before the commencement or after the conclusion of the list, as being a kind of summary of all its items, 'an inclusive vice,'1 and,

1 Moore's Studies in Dante, ii. 185, where the discussion of the 'Deadly Sins' is very full and complete. A short reference to the subject will be found in THE EXPOSITORY TIMES, vol. xv. p. 302.

as it called in agreement with Ecclus. x. 15 (Vulgate), 'the beginning of all sin,' or, in Chaucer's language, 'the general rote of all harmes.' Now, it is remarkable that Dante, though not by the same means, accords to pride a quite exceptional position among sins, as being not merely primum inter paria, but as alienating men in a very special and fundamental manner from goodness and from God. For before he can enter Purgatory even as a spectator, he has to submit to a certain preliminary process of cleansing and enlightenment, which is thus described in the charge of Cato to Virgil, who is to be Dante's guide and guardian'Go, then, and see thou gird this man about With a smooth rush, and that thou wash his face, So that thou cleanse away all stain therefrom.'

Purg. i. 94-96. ·

And it is certain that in the allegorical interpretation which all such details were intended by Dante to bear, the reed with which he was to be girded represents humility. As Mr. Tozer well expresses it, in his Commentary on these lines, 'Just as in Scripture "a bruised reed" is used to signify repentant humility (Is 423), so here the rush, which bends before the beating of the waves [see lines 102-105], suitably represents the attitude of the soul entering Purgatory, where it submits itself to correction' (p. 196). The incident will thus be a particularly apt illustration of the scriptural counsel, 'all of you gird yourselves with humility' (1 P 55 R.V.), where the verb used (èykoμßwσaσbe) in its literal meaning implies such a knotting as would have fastened Dante's pliant rush. 3. Returning to the description of the first terrace, a striking expression of Dante's may be quoted to show how utterly, in his view, pride spoils and renders worthless all actions that are prompted by it. In the course of a noble invective, he thus exclaims

O ye proud Christians! wretched, weary ones!
Who in the vision of the mind infirm [or, diseased]
Confidence have in your backsliding steps.

Purg. xi. 121-123.

It is the expression 'backsliding,' or rather 'retrograding steps,' that is to be particularly noticed. It implies that Christians who are letting themselves be influenced by a thing so contrary to their profession as pride 'are so blinded to their condition, that they are confident of reaching their goal, and do not perceive that their steps are retrograding and leading them to perdition' (Scartazzini, in