Oh, fairest legend of the years,
With folded wings, go silently ! Oh, flower of knighthood, yield your place
To One who comes from Galilee.
To wounded feet that shrink and bleed, But press and climb the narrow way,
The same old way our own must step, For ever, yesterday, to-day.
For soul can be what soul hath been, And feet can tread where feet have trod.
Enough to know that once the clay Hath worn the features of the God.^
^ Daily Smig, p, 151,
GENESIS I. 26, 27 67
^ One of the most precious memories of my life is that of my own father's victorious death. After thirty years in the ministry he passed away while yet in the prime of manhood. He died of consumption, and at the last was very feeble ; so feeble, indeed, that he could scarcely make his voice audible. The last night came. He whispered to my mother again and again, " It is well with me, it is well with me." Then he said, "When the last moment comes, if I feel I have the victory I will tell you . . . but if I cannot speak I will raise my hand." As the grey morning light stole into the death-chamber my mother saw that the end had come. His lips moved. She stooped to catch the words, but there was no sound ; his power of articulation had gone. The next moment he seemed to realize it, and, with a smile on his dying face, he lifted his thin, worn hand for a few seconds, and then it fell on the pillow, and he was not, for God had taken him.^
0, may I triumph so,
When all my warfare's past, And, dying, find my latest foe
Under my feet at last.
» J. T. Parr.
Fellowship.
Literature.
Banks (L. A.X Tlie World's Childhood, 300, 312.
Blunt (J. H.), in Miscellaneous Sermons (edited by Lee), 93.
Brandt (J. L.), Soul Saving, 157.
Collyer (R.), Nature and Life, 153.
Evans (D. T.), in Sermons by Welshmen in English Pulpits, 28.
Greer (D. H.), From Things to God, 98.
Hanks (W. P.), The Eternal Witness, 98.
Hayman (H.), Sermons in Rugby School Chanel, 159.
Ingram (A. F. W.), The Call of the Father, 51.
Keble (J.), Sermons for the Christian Year : Septuagesima to AsL
Wednesday, 139. Kingsley (C), The Oospel of the Pentateuch, 36. Macmillan (H.), The Touch of God, 23. Matheson (G.), Moments on the Mount, 1. Morgan (E.), The Calls of God, 17. Oosterzee (J. J. van), The Year of Salvation, i. 5. Parkhurst (C. H.), Three Gates on a Side, 69. Parks (L.), The Winning of the Soul, 51. Raleigh (A.), Quiet Besting Places, 235. Shepard (J. W.), Light and Life, 141. Smellie (A.), In the Secret Place, 209. Spurgeon (C. H.), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, vii. No. 412 ; 1. No
2900. Tyng (S. H.), The Peoples Pulpit, New Ser., ii. 167. Vaughan (C. J.), in 77i.« World's Gi-eat Sermons, vi. 69.
„ (J.), Sermons to Children, 177. Christian World Pulpit, Ixviii. 277 (Campbell). Contem/porary Pulpit, 2nd Ser., i. 108 (Keble).
Fellowship.
And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day : and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden. And the Lord God called unto the man, and said unto him, Where art thou?— Gen. iii. 8, 9.
If this is veritable history, it is also parable. It is the record of the first fear, the first blush, the first self-concealment. So common are all these experiences to-day, that it is difficult to con- ceive the time of innocence and assurance when they did not exist. Yet man, made in the image of God, enjoyed unclouded communion with his Creator. There was no withdrawal of light on the part of God, and there were no mists of doubt exhaled from earth to obscure its clear shining. God talked with man. Adam delighted in the voice of God. But in the evil hour of temptation all this was changed. Disobedience unclothed the conscience. Its garment of innocence was lost, and they knew that they were naked. The spiritual condition which their sin had produced was symbolized in the physical. They mistook the sign for the sub- stance. The fig-leaf aprons were their first vain effort. But this was not enough. The approach of God convinced them of its insufficiency, and so they sought shelter among the trees of the garden. But even here God followed them with mingled words of justice and of love. This is the fountain-head of all earth's woes. This is the little cloud of sins which has overspread the heavens with the darkness of despair, and threatens now the storm of wrath. This is the beginning of that great necessity, which, foreseen, had already in the council of eternity drawn forth the pitying love of God, and had already secured the acceptance and condescension of the Son of God, as the second Adam of the race.
•^ Nearly all the most eminent Biblical scholars are now agreed that the clue to the meaning of this third chapter of Genesis is to be found by regarding it as an allegory or parable rather
72 FELLOWSHIP
than as an historical document in the modern sense of the term. Even a scholar so cautious and conservative as Dean Church says in one of his books, " Adam stands for us all — for all living souls who from generation to generation receive and hand on the breath of human life." The author of what Archbishop Temple has called " the allegory of the garden of Eden " is both a poet and a prophet. As a poet he has created an ideal conception of the typical natural man. As a prophet he spells out for us, in language coloured by Eastern imagery, the drama of a great crisis in the history of mankind. Look at the story of what is called (though not in the Bible) the " fall of Adam," superficially, and you may regard it as a legend, such as those of Hercules and Prometheus. Look at it deeply and seriously, and you see in it the inspired work of a master mind, gifted with profound spiritual insight, who sees the greatness of man even in ruin, who knows what sin means, and what fruit it bears. It is not the voice of a chronicler of past events that is heard here. It is the voice of a preacher who speaks to the soul in image and parable^ It is for the sake of the spiritual truth wrapped up in it that the story is told.^