ADVENTURE FOR GOD. Crown 8vo. THE CONSOLATIONS OF THE CROSS. Small 12mo. LEADERSHIP. Crown 8vo. LIBERTY AND OTHER SERMONS. Crown 8vo. THE MIND OF CHRIST JESUS ON THE CHURCH OF THE LIVING GOD. Small 8vo. PRESENCE. Small 12mo. THE SPLENDOR OF THE HUMAN BODY. Small 12mo. WITH GOD IN THE WORLD. Small 12mo. THE REVELATION OF DISCOVERY. Crown 8vo. PRISONERS OF HOPE. Crown 8vo. THE INSPIRATION OF RESPONSIBILITY, AND OTHER PAPERS. Crown 8vo. A MASTER BUILDER: BEING THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF BISHOP SATTERL

NEW IMPRESSION LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON FOURTH AVENUE & 30TH STREET, NEW YORK BOMBAY, CALCUTTA, AND MADRAS 1919 Copyright, 1899, by Longmans, Green, & Co. First Edition, August, 1899 Reprinted January, 1900, January, 1902 October, 1905, February, 1908 August, 1910, February, 1912 October, 1912, November, 1912 January, 1914 February, 1916 January, 1919 TO MY FRIENDS JOHN W. WOOD, SILAS MCBEE AND JAMES L. HOUGHTELING...

Charles Darwin says somewhere that "the only object in writing a book is a proof of earnestness." Whether it is the only object, may be a question; it is certainly one object. And the poorest book that ever went to press, merits respect, provided that its writer is sincere and speaks from conviction. It is this and the sense that "thought is not our own until we impart it" to others, that has encouraged me to write these pages—originally a series of papers prepared for the Saint Andrew's Cross,

It is productive of much mischief to try to make people believe that the life of prayer is easy. In reality there is nothing quite so difficult as strong prayer, nothing so worthy of the attention and the exercise of all the fine parts of a great manhood. On the other hand there is no man who is not equal to the task. So splendid has this human nature of ours become through the Incarnation that it can bear any strain and meet any demand that God sees fit to put upon it. Some duties are individua

Yes, prayer is speech Godward, and worship is man's whole life of friendship with God, flowing out, as it were, of all that tide of emotion and service which is love's best speech. It is by thinking, then, of the nature of fellowship between man and man, which is the most beautiful thing in the world excepting only fellowship with God, that we can get substantial help in developing the life of prayer. Consider the Christian fellowship of two noble characters. It is "the greatest love and the gre

Quite a sufficient guide as to how God should be addressed is afforded by the Lord's Prayer. It was given by the Master in response to the earnest request of His disciples for instruction in prayer. Brief, compact and complete, it is as it were the Christian seed-prayer. Once let it be planted in the heart of a Church or the soul of a child of God and it will grow into the glowing devotion of wondrous collects and rich liturgies. Indeed there is no Christian prayer worth anything which does not

Probably the greatest result of the life of prayer is an unconscious but steady growth into the knowledge of the mind of God and into conformity with His will; for after all prayer is not so much the means whereby God's will is bent to man's desires as it is that whereby man's will is bent to God's desires. While Jesus readily responded to the requests and inquiries of His disciples His great gift to them was Himself, His personality. He called His apostles that they "should be with Him." The al

Of course, friendship with God must be tried. Not only can true friendship stand any strain to which it may be put, but it even needs to be thus tested in order to be solidly set. It is like the knot that becomes more fixed and firm at each new pull of the cord. The faith and affection which will cling to a friend when all the forces of disunion seem combined to bring about a separation, are so tempered by the experience involved as to defy every conceivable enemy, and to discover new depths of

But the best of us do not always rise to the opportunity which temptation presents. A gust comes for which we are not prepared, and we are swept off our feet. And the earliest penalty of sin visits the transgressor simultaneously with its committal—that depressing sense of loneliness and separation from God that has been the bitter experience of every one, and that is so graphically represented in the story of the first act of disobedience. Every one who does wrong, by the deed of wrong itself,

Friendship is not only with God but also in God. Fellowship with God has for its corollary fellowship with man in God. And the latter in the greatness of its dignity and privilege is second only to the former. The religion of Christ does not allow of one without the other. The Church, which is the divinely ordered means by which man is admitted into and sustained in his fellowship with God, is also the ideal society of men. God never considers men apart from, but always as a part of, a great soc

The official temper of mind is by no means the only bar to wide fellowship. Exclusiveness and temperamental dislike are responsible for a great many sins against brotherly love, and must be fought down by every true follower of our Lord. When men are left to themselves, they gravitate into mutually exclusive groups composed of congenial classes or of congenial types. But Christianity steps in and breaks up these little sets, in order to blend them into one varied and splendid whole. The vision w

Thus far little has been said of the more corporate aspect of the spiritual life—of army movements, so to speak. Our minds have been chiefly on the duties of men in their individual capacity. Not that any one can ever behave so that he alone is affected by his output of energy. Whether consciously or unconsciously every human being that breathes, according as he moves his will upwards or downwards, elevates or hinders his fellows. The most secret passages of life should be traversed with referen

The Eucharist is the Church's great central act of corporate worship. It would be strange, considering the origin of this wonderful mystery, were it otherwise. Even those who regard it as a bare memorial of the historic occurrence of Christ's Passion and nothing more, however highly they may honour the ordinary round of prayer and praise, approach the Eucharist with unwonted awe. Of course no one conception of its character is complete, as its various and stately names testify. So bound up with

The breadth of the Christian's vision is exceeded only by its height, and his influence is coterminous with nothing less than the human fabric of which he is a part. By faith man penetrates into the heaven of heavens and reaches the very presence of God himself, a privilege and duty which belong not to a favoured few but to the race. is a truth of universal application. But just as the stars must not limit man's vision as he gazes up, neither must the horizon limit his vision as he looks abroad.

The responsibility of the sons of God has been the theme of this book, and the writer trusts that in dwelling upon the duties of the Christian life he has not failed to bring out something of its glory and inspiration. But the thing out of which we can gather the largest help to fulfil our responsibility is the responsibility itself. If God dwells high up on the hills of difficulty, He has a throne, too, in the heart of every claim made on human character. [38] The presence in our life of a diff

There is no truth so thrilling as that which speaks of God's abiding presence, not merely with but in His creation, though He is neither limited by nor dependent upon it. Having created, He sustains, sustains from within, so that the most recent manifestation of energy, whether in the radiance of a sunrise or the smile on a child's face, is not the reflection of a far-off movement of God, but an indication of His present working. God is behind the world of things, controlling and using all that