magnified? We should aspire to the two elements of greatness which God gave to Joshua, though in us they take a different form. 1. Honour or esteem. We may well dispense with the obsequious or the ceremonious, but we cannot be indifferent to the respectful. Homage we can do without, but the esteem of the wise and good we crave and should secure. 2. Influence. Such power as Joshua wielded few of us can exercise: but influence is open to us all. In the home in which we live, in the school in which we teach or learn, in the sphere of daily activity, in the social circle, and in the Church of Christ, we can all be exerting influence: we can be such and can live such lives that we shall be continually restraining from the evil, and impelling toward the right and the true course. And how will God magnify us? (1) By building up in us a strong Christian character. In that strange experience through which God caused Joshua and Israel to pass (chap. iii.), both he and the priests were disciplined in faith, in obedience, and in steadfastness. For to enter the river Jordan, and especially to remain in its bed while all the people passed over, was both illustration and confirmation of these graces of the soul. By the privileges of the Gospel and by the outworkings of His Providence God is building us up in these, and in other, attributes of character, and is thus "making us great" and strong in His sight. (2) By closely associating Himself with us. Joshua was magnified in the sight of Israel in that thenceforth he was known to be a man who had God upon his side, to be one who could lean on God's strength and be sustained. God magnifies His servant now by causing him to be regarded by all who know him as one who walks with God, with whom God dwells, on whose tide the Holy One, the Almighty One is ranged. Thus He fulfils His word, "them that honour Me I will honour." There is WE CAN EXTEND OR III. A GREATNESS CONFER. 1. We magnify God when we adore Him and celebrate His greatness and His faithfulness. 2. We magnify Christ when we commend Him and His Gospel by lip and by life when we constrain others to know and feel the pricelessness of His love, the excellency of His service, the greatness of His promises (See Phil. i. 20). 3. We make our brethren great, in the best sense, when we lead them into the path of heavenly wisdom. "Thy gentleness," said the Psalmist, "hath made me great." By our gentleness, by our patience, by our untiring love, by our winning goodness we may make great in the sight of God those who are still far off from truth and righteous ness. SECOND SUNDAY AFTER GOING UP TO THE BATTLE. Hath not the Lord God of Israel commanded, Go and draw toward Mount Tabor. And Barak said, If thou wilt go with me, then I will go. And she (Deborah) said, I will surely go with thee.-JUDGES iv. 6-9. WE are apt to look upon the battles recorded in this Book of Judges as engagements of no great consequence. But if it was important in the interests of civilization and of religion that Persia should not crush Greece, that Carthage should not annihilate Rome, that Spain should not annex Holland and England, so was it important in a very high degree that Canaan should not conquer and extinguish Israel. These struggles, therefore, may have had no slight bearing even on the future of our race. We may be interested in them, as we are (more deeply) interested in the great battles of our own time and land. But whatever romance, genius, heroism may be found on the battlefield, let us rather concern ourselves with I. THE NOBLER WARFARE THAT IS OPEN TO US ALL. There is a long and hard campaign being fought out before our eyes. There are two great forces in the field that have been opposing one another, and that will oppose until one or the other is utterly defeated one is the force which makes for truth, righteousness, well-being; and the other is the force which makes for evil, unrighteousness, ruin. There are three great divisions in each army on the one side are philanthropy, virtue, and godliness in all their forms; on the other, are crime, vice, and ungodliness in all their forms. On the one side or the other each one of us is serving, bringing to it the strength of his spirit, the influence of his life. II. GOD'S SUMMONS TO SERVE ON THE SIDE OF TRUTH AND RIGHTEOUSNESS. "Hath not the Lord God of Israel commanded, saying, Go," &c. As Barak was charged by Jehovah Himself to go up to the battle, so does our God summon us all to enter upon this holier warfare. He, the Divine Father of our spirits and Lord of our lives, made us what we are in order that we might be like Himself, living His life, and doing His work, making the most and best of our powers. With the "hearing ear" we may hear Him say, "Go, bear your witness, strike your stroke, do all that lies within you to make this world betterto dispel its darkness, to assuage its sorrow, to uproot its evil, to carry light and help and healing to the children of men." The Saviour of our souls comes to us, as He once went to Matthew, and with commanding authority He says, Follow Me, the Leader and Commander of the people, the great Captain of salvation; fight under My banner, serve in My ranks; along with Me help the ignorant to know, the enslaved to become free, the sinful to be reconciled, the dying to lay hold on eternal life. III. THE HUMAN INSTRUMENTS OF THE DIVINE CALL. Barak was summoned by a woman, by the prophetess and patriot, Deborah. God calls us in many ways to His service. It may be by some strong word of Scripture; or it may be by some decisive ordering of our life in His holy Providence; but, oftenest, it is by some human voice. It is the gentle persuasion of the mother, or the guiding voice of the father, or the counsel of the teacher, or the appeal of the preacher, or it may be the winning voice of the little child that leads to higher paths and nobler life. It is not often in the strange and startling vision, but in the every-day privilege and the common influence of the home and the school and the sanctuary that the Lord our God calls us to go up to the nobler strife. IV. OUR INFLUENCE UPON ONE ANOTHER. "If thou wilt go with me, I will go," &c. Barak may have been right in requiring to serve in His cause, we may not make con- WILLIAM CLARKSON, B.A. of duty cannot be settled by majorities. The size of the image does not signify. Man's glory is in his uprightness, and not in his stature or strength. Without moral stamina a man is only the painted picture of a man. Like a worm-eaten ship, he is a hollow shell, and will collapse on the first pressure of heavy weather. II. The worst form of tyranny is that which would force men to violate ther moral convictions. It has been said that "if all mankind save one were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would no more be justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind." A single man has often been right against the world. The three Hebrews were right against the Babylonish nation. To deprive posterity of the opinion held by one man is robbery. III. This story shows how God is with those who dare to do right, and how at last right becomes might. Never has the world heard falser teaching than the fine doctrine that almighty power is on the side of the strongest battalions. Right is to become might. Good alone is deathless, and must prevail. God presides over the final lot of humanity. Evil must perish. Nothing unjust can hope to endure.-(Edward B. Mason). The episode offers to us a study of moral trial. I. It points first to its origin. 1. This is in the circumstances of life. We do not have to seek moral trial; it comes to us in the ordinary course of events, as it did to ancient Jew and early Christian. 2. It is helped on by enemies. The Babylonians who had been supplanted in the king's favour by these Jews, upstarts as they must have seemed, were not unwilling to bring the young men into difficulty and to let loose the displeasure of the king upon them. 3. The stress of moral trial comes in some special form suited to our occupation, habits of thought, and weaknesses. Along these lines every day moral tests are being applied in peculiar forms to every soul. 4. Moral trial comes to us in the form of an alternative. It is to do this or that. The very possibility of the alternative is what makes trial trial, and gives to the choice of the virtuous side its excellence. 5. Such tests of the soul come by permission of God. He permitted the imbroglio of the three young men with the king to develop. He knows all the time, and allows these divers temptations to come to us for our good. II. The three Hebrews show us how trial is to be met. 1. We see at the foundation of their resistance a high sense of duty. The merits of the case were plainly before them. The alternative was not indistinct; it was either to serve idols or to serve the true God. Many people who intend to lead good lives might have accommodated themselves to circumstances and followed the multitude Conscience, which spoke in them as it speaks in us, pointed plainly to the line of duty. A quick conscience is uncomfortable often, for it often has to antagonize our desires. But it is a blessed strife. Its discomfort is one of heaven's kindnesses to us. ness. 2. The young men met the king with firmTheir minds were made up. But if we act with such determination, may we not make moral mistakes? (1) We must settle moral questions definitely, for the sake of conduct. Abstract moral questions may be held more or less in suspense, but where something must be done, we must think, take counsel, and pray, then close the matter and go forward. cannot expect to be helped in moral decisions by those whose point of view is wholly different from our own. If we agreed with them, we might well wonder if our moral judgments were not at fault. (2) We 3. The three Hebrews did not dally with considerations of expediency or side issues of any sort in their relation to their moral trial. In moral questions there is but one point to be marked: is it right? 4. They left the outcome to God. The outcome, whichever way it should be, was not one of the data to be taken into consideration by them in determining the rightness or the wrongness of the matter. The issue belonged wholly to God. III. What was the meaning of this trial to them ? 1. It served for the confirmation of their faith. Job said, "Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him." This is faith, stripped of all irrelevancies-pure faith, depending on God just for the sake of depending. That is the very highest form of faith. 2. There was here also the ennoblement of character. For the increase of faith in God must tend to the betterment of life. Suffering is the price we pay for moral progress. Therefore "count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations." 3. We see here a testimony to God. Men always need to have testimony of this sort from their fellows. The Gospel is propagated along the line of acquaintance. God works through the witnessing of men to Himself. The miracle of the saving of life out of the fiery furnace was a tremendous evidence of the reality of Jehovah. Every man has some influence. To testify that we believe in God, and to keep on testifying thus when troubles come upon us, is to preach the very best kind of sermons. 4. There was here an example to others. Men usually weak are sometimes made heroes by seeing others endure. Character is contagious. Faith in us helps faith in others. IV. The issue from the trial. 1. The escape shows us that God thought upon them. They had rightly neglected the thought of the consequences of their position. That belonged to God. And He had not neglected His part. 2. God was present with them. Whether the three captives saw the figure or not, they had the sustaining blessing of His presence. 3. God rescued them. It will not do to lay it down as an invariable rule that God will always save us from the natural consequences of doing right. History tells us quite otherwise in its record of Christian persecutions. In any case, whether God rescues us in this way or not, He rescues our souls, and makes the end good, however it comes about. 4. He works in ways we cannot understand. The miracle set before us here is wholly incomprehensible. And in strange ways God sometimes steps in to save us where danger comes upon us as the result of doing right. He makes the wrath of man to praise Him. He makes failure success. V. Special lessons speak to us as we leave this study. 1. There are trials for faith always and everywhere. 2. God is great. He never loses His grasp upon the government of things. The antagonism of evil is wholly by His per mission. 3. All things do work together for good to them that love God.-(D. J. Burrell. D.D.) THE DEN OF LIONS. THE episode offers us a study of two contrasted personalities: that of Darius and that of Daniel. I. Darius, to be sure, was a king, and as not very many are kings, and none of us surely will ever be, he may seem to be removed from the possibility of moral teaching to us. But it is not so. Strip off the state robes and the crown and we find him a man like others. 1. His character belongs to the type of wellmeaning but weak men. But while Darius shows a certain amount of good intention, we see that it was mixed with conspicuous moral weakness. He permitted himself to be made the tool of others, and to be used by them to carry out an infamous conspiracy. Look around you and see how many there are who have not the deliberate intention of doing wrong, who, on the contrary, wish to be kind and honest, who still abandon themselves to the drift of opinion about them, let strong and unprincipled men lead them, and find themselves doing those things they did not intend to do, they hardly know how. Such a man is most pitiable. For, like Darius, he constantly finds himself confronted with situations, to deal with which rightly he has incapacitated himself by his constant yielding to the unworthy influence of others. 2. Darius' after-thoughts are characteristic of such a disposition as his. We see him filled with useless regrets. "He was sore displeased"; when Daniel was in the lions' den he "went to his palace and passed the night fasting; neither were instruments of music brought before him; and his sleep went from him." Such sorrow was eminently proper. But it was no remedy or excuse for the thing which caused it. Obedience is better than regret. But what a pity he did not recognize his responsibility before he acted as well as afterward. Then he would have proceeded with more deliberation, caution, and conscientiousness. It is something to recognize that our deeds are ours, but the best time to recognize it is before we commit them. he has thoughtlessly set the machinery in motion, he clutches at things outside it, hoping they may stop it. As he puts Daniel into the den he says, with the despair of one who tries to trust in that which he does not After really believe, "Thy God whom thou servest continually, He will deliver thee." Here was no true trust in Jehovah; he does not call him my God, or our God, but refers to him as Daniel's God. He shows himself in the irrational position of trusting for another in that in which he did not trust for himself. The helplessness of it is an evidence of the confusion which existed in his moral nature. 3. The issue of the matter throws back more light on Darius' character. When God had saved Daniel's life, as He hoped against hope, Darius set about doing justice to those who had involved him in this difficulty. They, with their wives and children, were cast into the den whence Daniel had been rescued. Weak men rise on occasion to heroism. But an even life of righteousness is better. Darius is found also proclaiming that all his subjects must worship Daniel's God. This again is a praiseworthy act. It shows a willingness on the king's part to do that which was right in view of Daniel's rescue. But we must not make too much of this proclamation. It was the act of a religious eclectic, not of a sincere worshipper of Jehovah. II. Daniel stands out in noble contrast to the well-meaning but weak king. 1. His character is seen to be strongstrong, not with the rigidity of a passing emotion, but with the even, persistent immobility of disposition which comes through habit along a definite line. Darius had habits as well as Daniel, but they were not produced, like his, through fidelity to principle. Such men as Daniel, having made up their mind to a life according to high principle, are prepared to take the consequences. Daniel's selfpossession remained with him all through the trial. Trusting in God, he found equanimity. When the king ordered the den to be opened there was no haste on Daniel's part to escape, no excitement. 2. The immediate result of the incident to Daniel was a miraculous salvation. He escaped the lions' jaws in safety. But, although the day of miracles may be past, God's angels still live and are still guardians for His children. If they work through natural law to protect us until our hour comes, is their protection any the less real? One reason which is given for this supernatural protection is that God loves those who strive to be like Him. Another reason for Daniel's rescue is given us, which has reference to the means, as the former to the cause: he was saved alive "because he believed in his God." By faith we receive the bodily protection God grants us through the years. By faith we receive that greater safety which concerns the soul. 3. The more remote results of the ocurrence were a wide proclamation of God and a new prosperity for Daniel. Daniel's misfortune, like Paul's, turned out to the furtherance of God's truth. To Daniel there came new power and blessing. "So this Daniel prospered in the reign of Darius, and in the reign of Cyrus the Persian." In the long run fidelity to principle pays, even in an external way. The two characters, that of King Darius and that of Daniel, illustrate the choice that is offered us between the service of God and the service of men, and the consequences respectively. (D. J. Burrell, D.D.) THE MESSIAH'S REIGN. THE characteristic features of the Messiah's reign, as thus conceived, are as follows: I. The Messiah's reign is a reign of righteousness and deliverance for the poor and oppressed (vers. 2, 4, 12-15). His government is based on principles of justice and equity. In it He aims to secure the welfare of all the people. As the majority of mankind are poor and weak, whose helpless condition invites attack and exposes them to wrong and oppression, He especially aims to protect the poor in the enjoyment of their rights and rescue them when oppressed. "He shall judge thy people with righteousness." "He shall save the children of the needy." "For He shall deliver the needy when he crieth; and the poor that hath no helper." 'He shall redeem their soul from oppression and violence; and precious shall their blood be in His sight." This is the true ideal of government. It accords with the instinctive convictions of men in their sober, thoughtful moments as to what ought to be in every well-ordered state. Impartial justice should characterize its attitude toward all. II. The Messiah's reign results in extraordinary peace and prosperity to His people. A reign of righteousness naturally results in peace. Let the selfishness and passions that prompt to injustice and oppression be effectually restrained, let righteous dealing |