* C. Vince, The Unchanging Saviour, 170.
PSALM XIX. 7-9 341
the heaviest pressure of calamity, and with not a ray of hope as to things earthly, there would still be that in our souls which would give a most indignant negative to Satan's question about Job, " Does he serve God for nought ? " ^
^ If we see law not as something external, an obligation im- posed on us from without, a despotism against which we cannot rebel, and to which we can only sullenly submit ; if we see law as the law of our own life, the fruit of the tenderest and highest love, the commandments are seen not to be grievous, and obedience becomes sweet and natural. We know the difference between obedience dictated by fear and obedience dictated by love. When we are brought into a personal relation to God and enter into fellowship with Him, we realize that even in the making of our own moral life, in the creating of our own character, we are fellow- workers with God. We desire the same end as He does, and it is the best end.^
^ If people would but read the text of their Bible with heartier purpose of understanding it, instead of superstitiously, they would see that throughout the parts which they are intended to make most personally their own (the Psalms) it is always the law which is spoken of with chief joy. The Psalms respecting mercy are often sorrowful as in thought of what it cost; but those respecting the law are always full of delight. David cannot contain himself for joy in thinking of it — he is never weary of its praise : " How love I Thy law ! it is my meditation all the day. Thy testimonies are my delight and my counsellors; sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb." ^
^ There is a beautiful little sentence in the works of Charles Lamb concerning one who had been afflicted : " He gave his heart to the Purifier, and his will to the Sovereign Will of the Uni- verse." But there is a speech in the third canto of the Paradiso of Dante, spoken by a certain Piccarda, which is a rare gem. I will only quote this one line : In la sua volontade e nostra pace (In His will is our peace). The words are few and simple, and yet they appear to me to have an inexpressible majesty of truth about them, to be almost as if they were spoken from the very mouth of God. It so happened that (unless my memory much deceives me) I first read that speech on a morning early in the year 18.36, which was one of trial. I was profoundly impressed and power- fully sustained, almost absorbed, by these words. They cannot
^ A. P. Peabody, King^s Chapel Sermons, 101.
- H. Black, Edinburgh Sermons, 75.
^ Euskin, Modern Painters ( Works, vii. 192).
342 THE PERFECT LAW
be too deeply graven upon the heart. In short, what we all want is that they should not come to us as an admonition from without, but as an instinct from within. Thoy should not be adopted by effort or upon a process of proof, but they should be simply the translation into speech of the habitual tone to which all tempers, affections, emotions, are set. In the Christian mood, which ought never to be intermitted, the sense of this conviction should recur spontaneously ; it should be the foundation of all mental thoughts and acts, and the measure to which the whole experience of life, inward and outward, is referred. The final state which we are to contemplate with hope, and to seek by discipline, is that in which our will shall be one with the will of God ; not merely shall sub- mit to it, not merely shall follow after it, but shall live and move with it, even as the pulse of the blood in the extremities acts with the central movement of the heart. And this is to be obtained through a double process ; the first, that of checking, repressing, quelling the inclination of the will to act with reference to self as a centre ; this is to mortify it. The second, to cherish, exercise, and expand its new and heavenly power of acting according to the will of God, first, perhaps, by painful effort in great feebleness and with many inconsistencies, but with continually augmenting regularity and force, until obedience become a necessity of second nature.^
Time was, I shrank from what was right
From fear of what was wrong; I would not brave the sacred fight,
Because the foe was strong.
But now I cast that finer sense
And sorer shame aside; Such dread of sin was indolence,
Such aim at Heaven was pride.
So, when my Saviour calls, I rise,
And calmly do my best; Leaving to Him, with silent eyes
Of hope and fear, the rest.
I step, I mount where He has led;
Men count my baitings o'er; — I know them; yet, though self I dread,
I love His precept more.^
^ W. E. Gladstone in Life, by John Morley, i. 215. ^ Cardinal Newman, Verses 07i Various Occasions, 83.
Hidden Faults.
Literature.
Barrett (G. S.), Musings for Quiet Hours, 23,
Binnie (W.), Sermons, 187.