To the same effect is the testimony of other Scriptures. In the Epistle to the Ephesians St. Paul exhibits the mystery of marriage as showing forth that union which is betwixt Christ and His Church. But if his words be attentively considered, it will be seen that he contemplates the wifehood of the Church as only incipient as yet. Christ's present work is to "sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word," that one day He may be able to present it to Himself as a bride to her bridegroom, "a glorious Church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but holy and without blemish." To use the language of the old creation (as the Apostle himself goes on to do), the Church is now being formed out of Christ, as Eve was formed out of Adam. "We are of "—that is, out of "His flesh and of His bones." Hereafter God will bring to the Second Adam the woman He has made for Him, that she may be His help-meet. The same truth is indicated by the figure of betrothal used by St. Paul in writing to the Corinthians. "I have espoused you" he says "to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ."* As an ambassador for his Master, he has effected the betrothal; but the marriage has yet to come, and the bride's part now is to make herself ready. When her preparation is complete, in the change of her vile body into the likeness of her Bridegroom's glorious body, then the bridal day shall dawn.

But this is when the Marriage shall be; we have not yet said what it is. That indeed no tongue can tell, no words can paint. The seeing Him as He is, the being made like unto Him, the change into His image from

* 2 Cor. xi. 2.

glory unto glory, the full communion, the fellowship in work and joy, all that the highest wedded union of man and woman can be, but sublimed into heaven's own perfectness-this is the Marriage of the Lamb.

"O happy, happy Bride!

Thy widowed hours are past;
The Bridegroom at thy side,

Thou all His own at last!
The sorrows of thy former cup
In full fruition swallowed up!"

To be of this Bride of the Lamb is the calling of all who are baptized into Jesus Christ. Let us not be content with anything short of it. We are called to be Christ's, as Christ is God's; to share His mind, to drink into His spirit, to see with His eyes and feel with His heart. He has betrothed us to Himself; and we must prepare to be His help-meet in the ages to come, the sharer of His throne of blessing. Let this thought dwell in us day by day, that we may grow more and more into conformity to His image and acquaintance with His ways; that so, when the bridal day shall come, He may find us a true partner of all His work and all His joy, able to sympathize with Him and to understand Him, fit to be trusted with His deepest counsels and employed on His weightiest matters. How would it be with an earthly maiden, were she told that the noblest man in all the land had chosen her to be his future wife? Such anticipation, such preparation, such high aspiring and awful joy should be ours whom He has elected to be His, Who is the chiefest among ten thousand, and altogether lovely.

FOURTH SUNDAY AFTER CIRCUMCISION.

Spiritual Leprosy.

Matt. viii. I-4.

LEPROSY is in many points a type of sinfulness. But there is one feature in which the two are very dissimilar. No one who was leprous could be ignorant of the fact that somewhat was wrong with him. It was indeed for the priest to discern whether it was the true plague or no. But there it was in any case, differencing him from his fellows, a thing to be burdened with, a mischief from which deliverance must be sought.

It was otherwise once with sin. Man dwelt as it were in a vast lazar-house, where there was no cleanness in any to convince of uncleanness the others around him. He knew not the plague of his own heart; for there was no health to compare it with, and we only know light by its contrast with darkness. And therefore God sent him, first the Law which told of Himself, and then the living Law, the very Image of the Father, which revealed Him. The Law convinced of sin. It told man of another life beside the leprous one; and called upon him to rise into it. Man could not but respond to the call. He acknowledged that the life presented to him was his own true existence; he felt ashamed that he was not living it; and yet he did not the thing he would. He could but shave his head, and cover his lip, and cry, Unclean, unclean.

The living Law, as embodied in Jesus Christ, no less

convinced of sin,—indeed, rather more. By the written Law we hear of the better life by the hearing of the ear, -but now our eyes behold it; wherefore we abhor ourselves, and repent in dust and ashes. But there is something in His eyes which overcomes the shame of defilement by the hope of cleansing. Every spiritual leper who has seen Him by faith has cried out, "Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean." And to every one so crying He has answered, "I will; be thou clean." Nor has He said it only but, putting forth His hand, has touched the corrupted flesh, and it has come again as the flesh of a little child. To touch a leper of old was not to help him, but to partake of his uncleanness. But the touch of the Holy One of God incurs no defilement, and rather purifies. It was so when He took our fallen nature: it was so when in that nature, cleansed by His assumption of it, He walked among men. He bare our sins without partaking of them: He healed us of the plague without its contagion coming near to Him. He, the King of men, stood then and stands now among them; and by His royal touch cures of their evil all who come to Him for aid. And we come to Him still. Privileged to feed on His very substance, we yet pray as we do so—

"Cleanse us, unclean, with Thy most cleansing blood :

and again—“that our sinful bodies may be made clean by His Body, and our souls washed in His most precious Blood." Our access to the Sacrament is made with the "Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean:" and the Sacrament itself is the Lord touching us, saying, “I will be thou clean." Only let us see that the cleansing It would have availed the leper but little that his disabilities were removed, that he was

:

we seek is one indeed.

permitted to re-enter the camp, and mix with his fellows. Unless the plague disappeared from his flesh, the boon was but nominal: the substance of the evil would still shut him off, though no outward restriction barred him. And so with the spiritual leprosy of sinfulness. We seek not so much for the penalty of sin to be remitted, as for sin itself to be abolished, its body to be destroyed in us, that henceforth we should no more serve it. This it is

we seek from every touch of our Saviour's gracious hand : and this it is He gives. His touch assures of forgiveness, indeed; but at the same time it conveys remission: the disease is healed as the guilt is pardoned. Come we,

then, and show ourselves to the priests of God, that they may satisfy us and all others that we are cleansed indeed. Come we and offer the gift that the Apostle has commanded,* even the presenting of our bodies a living sacrifice, for a testimony unto all that God in Christ has healed us of a truth.

Bearing one another's burdens.

Gal. vi. 2, 5.

"BEAR ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ Every man shall bear his own burden."

To almost every truth there are two opposite sides,so opposite, that they may even seem contrary the one to the other. The greater the thinker, the more will his writings abound in such seeming contradictions. He sees both sides of the truth, and not one side only: but he

Kom. xii. I.