for an universal blessed union of all reformed churches, both at home and abroad, against our common enemies; and that all they, who do confess the holy Name of our dear LORD, and do agree in the truth of His holy Word, may also meet in one holy Communion, and live in perfect unity and godly love.1

On the basis of the Reformation everything is possible. We can come together for common worship without violating any "principle": we can discuss together as fellow-disciples the common interests of CHRIST'S Kingdom: we can revise our systems without humiliation in deference to the new needs which the War has disclosed: we can face, with the confidence of Faith and in the strength of united Prayer, the moral and intellectual questions of our time which challenge, or seem to challenge, our inherited standards inherited standards of faith and conduct: we can pass under examination every part of the rich heritage of the past, not that of the first four centuries only, or of the last four, but that of all the centuries since the first, for in all the HOLY SPIRIT was active as Teacher, Guide, and Comforter of CHRIST'S People, and by the aid of the same Divine SPIRIT we in our time also can bring forth from our rich and manifold Treasure "THINGS NEW AND OLD." Reject that basis of 1 Vide WILKINS, Concilia, vol. iv. p. 619.

the Reformation, and do not deceive yourself. Nothing is possible: you may multiply conferences, and indulge in the language of an almost exaggerated fraternity, but you will effect nothing. Antiquarian investigations into the probable origins of the Christian Ministry may fitly amuse the leisure of the learned, but they have no relevance to any religious issue. Nothing that historians can agree upon with respect to such matters can alter the fact that the sanction of CHRIST, demonstrated by the "FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT," rests on the great new departure" of the Reformation. There can be no going back on that.

"WITH FREEDOM DID

CHRIST SET US FREE: LET US STAND FAST, AND NOT BE ENTANGLED AGAIN IN A YOKE OF BONDAGE."

That is the whole gist of my Message to you who are Nonconformists, and to my fellow-Anglicans alike. In circumstances of far greater peril to our religion and to our country than those which suggested SANCROFT'S appeal, I plead for the recognition of the essential agreement of those who accept the Reformation. I do so in the interest, not merely of immediate efficiency for the tasks which are coming upon us, but also in the interest of a completer Reconciliation presently a Reconciliation which shall embrace all the members of the Chris

tian Family. To seek the fellowship of the unreformed Churches of East and West, while leaving our own kith and kin, who share our religious point of view and are in daily contact with us, estranged and disowned, is to deceive ourselves, and to court defeat. "Charity begins at home." Let us first solve the problem of effective union among ourselves, whom so many forces of the Past and of the Present are drawing together, and then it may be that the yet larger ideal will claim us.

History, that is the

Voice of the SPIRIT in Christian experience, is an ever-present, ever-active Teacher. In following the guidance which unfolds itself in History the CHURCH moves forward to that supreme consummation which the prophetic vision of ST. PAUL beheld when he dwelt with reverent enthusiasm on the Glory of CHRIST, the Reconciler and Redeemer of Mankind. As Jew and Gentile in the past, so Catholic and Protestant in the future shall finally meet in a common devotion to HIM. "FOR HE IS OUR PEACE, WHO MADE BOTH ONE, AND BRAKE DOWN THE MIDDLE WALL OF PARTITION, HAVING ABOLISHED IN HIS FLESH THE ENMITY, EVEN THE LAW OF COMMANDMENTS CONTAINED IN ORDINANCES: THAT HE MIGHT CREATE IN HIMSELF OF THE TWAIN ONE NEW MAN, SO MAKING

PEACE: AND MIGHT
ONE BODY UNTO GOD THROUGH THE CROSS,
HAVING SLAIN THE ENMITY THEREBY: AND HE
CAME AND PREACHED PEACE TO YOU THAT WERE
FAR OFF, AND PEACE TO THEM THAT WERE NIGH:
FOR THROUGH HIM WE BOTH HAVE OUR ACCESS
IN ONE SPIRIT UNTO THE FATHER."

RECONCILE THEM BOTH IN

XXIII

THE UNCHANGING FACTOR IN

CHRISTIANITY1

JESUS CHRIST is the same, YESTERDAY, AND TO-DAY, YEA, AND FOR EVER.-Hebrews xiii. 8.

I. THERE is nothing which appeals so powerfully to human nature as the notion of unchanging persistence, for that notion stands in welcome contrast with human life and its conditions. We live in a world

of ceaseless change, and we ourselves share the general instability. "Life is a stream in which no man twice dips his foot," said HERACLEITUS, and the thought is echoed by the more religious thinkers of Israel: "WE ARE STRANGERS BEFORE THEE, AND SOJOURNERS, AS ALL OUR FATHERS WERE: OUR DAYS ON THE EARTH ARE AS A SHADOW, AND THERE IS NO ABIDING." It is, indeed, the case that we may easily allow ourselves to be cheated by the relative stability of some factors of our experience.

1 Preached in the City Temple on March 25, 1917, in the Evening.