who speuke of clergymen who "out the throe.ta of their sermons by their livee ; " but there are me.ny who, without doing this, inve.lide.te their worde by their o.ctione. It is well for ne to remember that persona.I che.ro.cter is the best preparation for the. pulpit. " Facta, non verba; " this is, and will be increasingly, the demand of the o.ge upon the prophetic order. "Non magna eloqwiimur sea viivimua." This must be more o.nd more the response of the minietry. 8. It waa brave anul fearless. On three occasions this court preacher took his life in his he.nd (oh. xvii. 1; xviii. 2; xxi. 19). On one occasion he seems to have quo.ilod (eh. xix. 8), but even then it does not o.ppear that he fled from any present duty, or, like Jonah, declined any commission. His ministry as a whole was boldly discho.rged as in the presence of tho Eterno.l, "Before whom I stand." He saw none other the.n his Master. Like another preacher before royalty, Massillon, he spoke as if he saw Dce.th standing at hie elbow. Like Daniel, he knew that his God could deliver him. The fear of man is cast out when we realize the presence of God (lea. Ii. 12, 18). 4. lt was seemingly a failure. If others did not think so, he did. We know that no work, ree.lly and trnly done for God, can be wasted (Isa. lv. 11) ; but we are often tempted to think it is. But it must be such work as will stand the trial by fire (1 Cor. iii. 18). It has been strikingly said, "li any man's work is a failure, the probability is that it is beco.uee he is e. failure himself." Still, it is for our comfort to remember, in times of depression, that the greatest of the prophets saw little or no fruit of hie labours. He we.a persuaded that even the unexampled miracles that he wrought were of little or no avail (eh. xix. 10). We find that when there were seven thousand secret followers of the Lord. God, Elijah thbught himself left alone. And indeed the state of Israel, even after the ordeal of Carmel, might well lead him to take the gloomiest and most despairing view of the situation. Jezebel pursues her infamous we.y. The son of Ahab sends to consult a foreign oracle, and ignores the God of Ismel. The fire must come down e. second time and bum up the idolaters instead of the bullock e.nd the altar. But all the same, we know that his work was not in vain. Nor co.n ours be, if done like hia. We have nothing to do with immediate successes. "One man soweth, another reapeth." Nor is success in e.ny shape mentioned in our instructions. That is God's part, not ours. We have but to sow the seed, He must make it grow. The world worships success- or what it co.He success-and. the greo.test of ministries-Elijab's, Jeremiah's, Ezekiel's, our blessed Lord'&--were o.ll failures from o. worldly point of view. Vere. 8-7.-The Solitary Place. We have just seen that it was from the wilderness tho.t Elijah went forth into the busy, wicked world, o.nd to the anxious, dangerous work of a prophet. He, like his antitype, was in the desert " until the time of his showing unto Israel" (Luke i. 80). There, in secret communion with God, he ho.d gainei\ strength for the encounter; there be bad. meditated over the grievous apostasy of his people, o.nd had " vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their evil deeds•• (2 Pet. ii. 8). And there, as he "prayed earnestly that it might not rain," the word of the Lord. came to him and bnmed in his bones (J er. xx. 9), o.nd bore him into the presence of the king (Amos iii. 8). But it is now for us to observe that no sooner had he entered upon hie ministry, e.nd. delivered his first brief message, than be was sent into the desert-it may be, the same desert- o.go.in. The word of the Lord stro.ightway bids him turn eastward and bide in the brook Cherith. Now the word Cherith means separation. This section conse- quently mo.y fittingly speo.k to us of the need of separation, of the uses of solitude o.nd retirement in the discipline of the eo.ints. From Elijah'e sep:1ration from his work o.nd the world we may glean some lessons o.s to our own. Observe- !. Solitude was necessary to Elijah's safety. He must hide or lose his Leo.cl. When Jezebel cut off the prophets of the Lord (eh. xviii. 13), wo may ho sure ho would not be spared. Was it not because of him indeod that the others were attacked'} Had his dwelling been with mon, the messengers of Ahab would. assuredly ho.ve found. him o.nd elo.in him (eh. xviii: 10). So it is som~times n0co~- 1e.ry, for the life of our souls, that we should flee mto the desert. It 1s at our peril 892 THE FIRST DOOK OF KINGS. [ on. xvn. 1-24'
tha.t we ete.y in Sodom. We must "escape to the mountain.'' It may be from some enchantress, whose whoredoms and witchcrafts are as cruel as J ezebel's ; it may be from companions whose snares are more perilous than Ahab's sword ; it may be from a society hardly less pestilent than that of Israel. There o.re times when our only safety is in flight. Those hermits who buried themselves in the Thebaid, or who burrowed in the rocks of the Wt\dy Feiran, the world has only a smile for their folly, and it is no doubt true that God would have us leaven the world, not leave it. But it would have been well if some had, for a time at least, followed their example. How many souls have perished because they would not enter into their chambers and shut their doors and hide themselves until the indig- nation be ovelJ)ast (Isa. xxvi. 20) ; because they had not the courage to disappear for a while, if only into their closets. " He that wilfully stands still to catch dangers, tempteth God instead of trusting him." 2. Solitud,e was neceaawry to his soul's health. It is remarkable how God's elect messengers, each in his tum, have been sent " apart into a desert place to rest awhile" (Mark vi. 81). Moses must spend forty years in the great and terrible wilderness; must spend forty days and forty nights in Horeb, the Mount of God. Elijah himself only emerges from the Cherith to go to another biding-place at Zarephath, and from Zarephath he passes almost directly to the same wilderness and the same mount where Moses was. The Baptist's life was al.most divided between the desert and the prison. St. Paul must learn his gospel in Arabia. A.nd our Holy Lord, He must begin His ministry by a forty days' fast, and from time to time must seek a quiet place to rest and pray. A.ll men who are much before the world need their times of retirement. In the " loud stllllning tide of human care and crime" it is difficult t.o hear the whispers of God in the soul. Now the voices of nature, such as men hea.r in solitude, are among the voices of God. Nature has been called" God's great green book." " One impulse from a verne.1 wood May teach you more of me.n, Of mornl evil e.nd of good, The.n all the so.gee ce.n.''