^ There is a meadow in a lonely place between high rocks on the banks of Lake Lucerne. In that spot, five hundred years ago, one still, dark evening, three patriot soldiers, with stout blades and sturdy hearts, met to spend the night in long and earnest prayer to God. " Where the Spirit of the Lord was, there was liberty " ;
* E, H. Hopkins, The Law of Liberty in the Spiritual Life, 86. » E. H. Hopkins.
2 COR. in. 17 77
and Swiss Independence dates from that night. " The knowledge of the Lord " has not yet " filled the earth as the waters cover the sea"; but there is coming a time when, as we are told, it shall ; when all the kingdoms of this earth's monarchs shall become the absolutely free kingdoms of our spirits' Ruler, " the Lord, and of his Christ." Adam's degenerate sons, banished from Paradise — i.e., limited in liberty on account of sin — shall again regain it. Along the pathway of the world's progress, we need not hear alone the wails of woe and the clanking chains of bondage ; we need not see alone the flames of cherished institutions, and the stifling smoke of conflict. Beyond all these, there is a stretch of heaven's own blue. There is a gleam of lofty walls. There is the flashing of a flaming sword withdrawn. Between wide open gates, there waits for all the garden.^
A voice from the sea to the mountains, From the mountains again to the sea:
A call from the deep to the fountains, 0 spirit ! be glad and be free !
A cry from the floods to the fountains, And the torrents repeat the glad song.
As they leap from the breast of the mountains, 0 spirit ! be free and be strong !
The pine forests thrill with emotion
Of praise, as the spirit sweeps by; With a voice like the murmur of ocean.
To the soul of the listener they cry.
0 sing, human heart, like the fountains,
With joy reverential and free; Contented and calm as the mountains.
And deep as the woods and the sea.*
^ G. L. Raymond, The Spiritual Life, 305, ' Charles Timothy Brooks,
Transformed by Beholding.
n
Literature.
Aitchison (J.), The Children's Own, 143.
Aitken (W. H. M. H.), The Revealer Revealed, 81.
Barton (Q. A.), The Roots of Christian Teaching as found in the Old
Testament, 20. Boyd (A. K, H.), Sunday Afternoons in a Univtrsity City, 298. Davison ("W. T.), The Indwelling Spirit, 313. Dearden (H. W.), Parochial Sermons, 98. Dode (M.), How to Become Lihe Christ, 3. Hoare (E.), Great Principles of Divine Truth, 187.
„ „ Sanctification, 61. Hopkins (E. H.), The Law of Liberty in the Spiritual Life, 99. Jerdan (C), Messages to the Children, 410. Laidlaw (J.), Studies in the Parables, 245. Leckie (J.), Life and Religion, 146. Lightfoot (J. B.), Cambridge Sermons, 96. M'Cosh (J.), Gospel Sermons, 132. MacDonald (Q.), Unspoken Sermons, iii. 42. Maclaren (A.), Sermons Preached in Manchester, ii. 77. Macnutt (F. B.), The Riches of Christ, 135. Manning (H. E.), Sermons, iv. 369. Newman (J. H.), Parochial and Plain Sermons, 254. Price (A. C), Fifty Sermoiis, vi. 193. Selby (T. G.), The Lesson of a Dilemma, 243. Smith (D.), Man's Need of God, 201.
Wilberforce (B.), Sermons Preached in Westmiiister Abbey, 112. British Congregationalist, March 2, 1911 (J. H. Jowett). British Weekly, March 2, 1911 (J. H. Jowett). British Weekly Pulpit, iii, 179 (H. Drummond). Cliristian World Pulpit, 11. 136 (B. "Wilberforce) ; Ixxiii. 123 (W. M.
Mackay). Churchman's Pulpit : Fifth Sunday after Easter, viii. 258 (W. R.
Huntington). Homiletic Review, xix. 143 (L. Young). Keswick Week, 1908, p. 110 (E. W. Moore). People's Pulpit, No. 1 (A. G. Brown). Sermon Year Book, ii. 120 (M. Dods).
Transformed by Beholding.
But we all, with unveiled face reflecting as a mirror (A. V. beholding as in a glass) the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord the Spirit (A.V. even as by the Spirit of the Lord).— 2 Cor. iii. i8.
It Ib certain that there is nothing but character that we can carry out of life with us, and that our prospect of good in any future life will undoubtedly vary with the resemblance of our character to that of Jesus Christ, which is to rule the whole future. We all admit that ; but almost every one of us offers to himself some apology for not being like Christ, and has scarcely any clear reality of aim of becoming like Him. Why, we say to ourselves, or we say in our practice, it is really impossible in a world such as ours to become perfectly holy. One or two men in a century may have become great saints ; given a certain natural disposition, and given exceptionally favouring circumstances, men may become saintly ; but surely the ordinary run of men, men such as we know ourselves to be, with secular disposition and with many strong, vigorous passions — surely we can really not be expected to become like Christ, or, if it is expected of us, we know that it is impossible. On the contrary, St. Paul says, " We all." Every Christian has that for a destiny — to be changed into the image of his Lord. And he not only says so, but in this one verse he reveals to us the mode of becoming like Christ, and a mode, as we shall find, so simple and so infallible in its working that a man cannot understand it without renewing his hope that even he may one day become like Christ.