THE TRUE EXHIBITION OF POWER.

ST. LUKE, Xxiii. 34, 35.

"And they parted His raiment, and cast lots. And the people stood beholding. And the rulers also with them derided Him, saying, He saved others; let Him save himself, if He be Christ, the chosen of God."

THE Consciousness of power, without the permission to use it, is a great trial-greater far than helplessness; for the necessity imposed by weakness does in one way constitute strength. Men die composedly because they cannot resist death. They submit without murmuring, because complaint is useless. Much which strikes us as fortitude may be traced to this strength of an inevitable necessity; and to it, therefore, may be ascribed many of those examples of calmness in the prospect of the grave and of a Judgment to come, which startle us when exhibited by persons who, we have too much reason to fear, have no well-grounded hope of salvation. But to feel superior to all weakness, and yet to lie helpless; to know in ourselves that with only a wish we could be free, and yet to remain captive; to feel the excruciating throb of torture, and voluntarily to compel ourselves to submit to it,

when at one word, one look, perfect ease might be ours; this requires a strength which, even when exhibited by a fellow-creature, excites our wondering admiration; when exhibited by Him who was God, must bow us to the dust in awe.

For if the greatness of endurance increases with the consciousness of power, the endurance of our Redeemer must have been as infinite as His Divine nature.

“Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and He shall presently give me twelve legions of angels ?" It was the thought which arose to His mind, when He first delivered Himself to His enemies. He could save Himself; and in the hour of His human weakness we know that He had even desired to do so. But the awfulness of His unutterable Majesty, which had been asserted at the bar of Pilate, and the consciousness of which had rendered Him silent to the mocking questions of Herod, was now hidden. He was hanging upon the Cross silent-not, as it must have seemed, with the voluntary silence of Divinity, but with the exhaustion of the death of humiliation-and then it was that the scornful cry arose, "He saved others; let Him save Himself, if He be Christ, the chosen of God."

It could scarcely have been the mockery of merely human enmity. We recognise in it the repetition of that same temptation of the Devil: "If Thou be the Son of God, command these stones

to be made bread." Give the proof of Divinity. Save thyself, and in saving thyself save others.

But our Redeemer, with the full consciousness of strength, bore meekly the taunt of weakness. He refused to convince by a miracle those for whose sake He had given Himself to death. And in that mighty self-control, that endurance, infinite beyond the power of human words, He gives a lesson to the humblest and the weakest, who, in the temptations of daily life, may be called upon to bear reproach when self-justification is unlawful, yet at hand; or to yield to a specious act of real evil for the sake of good to those they love.

For are not these temptations, forms, under which this great trial endured by Christ-which we may be inclined to think could in no way be brought near to ourselves,-is, in fact, from time to time, presented to us.

Power greater than we are permitted to use is more or less placed in all our hands; and though we may, perhaps, think that it approaches to irreverence to liken such trials to that of our blessed Redeemer, when in the midst of His agony He refused to give to the mocking Jews the token of His divinity, we may be quite certain that if we do not thus liken them, we shall not be able to bear them. It is the experience of us all that we fail in small matters; that we can overcome what are called great temptations, but that we sink under light ones. Satan tempts us by these small things; by them he undermines our strength, and

prepares the way for what we consider real sins. And how is this? Because we despise them, and, not seeing the magnitude of the evil principle involved in them, have no idea of the magnitude of the good principle which must be summoned to our aid if we would resist them. The Life of Christ is an example to the world. If so, then, it must be applicable to all ages, positions, and circumstances; and none can be so humble, and no trials so petty, as to be beyond its influence. We are to take up our Cross daily; therefore, we must daily live and act as those who are crucified to their own inclinations; and, therefore, must the thoughts and words of the crucified Saviour be in their measure ours likewise. And is it really so easy a duty to have power, but not to use it except under certain limits? When God gives us the power of speech, and self-justification is to be withheld because " soft answer turneth away wrath ?" When He bestows a talent, and forbids it to be displayed-when He gives wealth and generosity, and tells us that justice and prudence must put limits to our liberality when He endows us with warm feelings, and we are not permitted to give way to them—and when, because of our silence, or humility, or prudence, or self-control, we are taunted as having no means of gratifying ourselves, and no feeling for our fellow-creatures-is there, indeed, no trial for us? Then, indeed, are we more miserable than in our extremest humiliation we will allow, more weak than

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even in our weakest moments we can bring ourselves to confess.

For we fall; who does not fall ?—in these ways, and in others like them, daily, hourly. We fall because we look at such temptations not as Christ saw them when He hung upon the cross to be our example; but as the world sees them when it separates the life of the Christian from the life of the human being; and decides that the trials incident to daily existence are too petty to have any connection with the preparation of heart, which through God's grace is to fit us for Heaven.

If our Redeemer vouchsafed to liken our cross to His, who are we that we should dare to say that the resemblance may with safety be rejected? In Heaven, if it should please God to bring us there, we shall doubtless see all things clearly; and there will it be made known to us what is the real proportion of the temptations which now come to us under so many different forms, and appear to be of such unequal value. And there, perhaps, also, we shall learn the preciousness of that quiet, firm spirit of self-mastery, which is lord over its own strengthcan hold even its own power in subjection; its preciousness when exercised by those who hang on their cross daily by their Saviour's side, and measuring themselves, so far as they may, by Him, lose all thought of self in the contemplation of His superhuman endurance.