HOMILETICS. Ver. 2.-" .Altogether lovely." "'l'hou art fairer than the children of men." Immense learning and ingenuity have been expended in the attempt to find some historic occasion for this psalm-some Jewish original of these royal portraits, the ,king antl the bride. Solomon has naturally been thought of, a~ a type, Calvin thinks, of Christ; but the <lcscription does not suit him. Even Jehoram and Athaliah, Ahab and Jezebel, have bad their advocates. The great Jewish commentators take the psalm as a prophecy of Messiah. Vere. 6, 7, quite inapplicable to Solomon, are in Heb. i. 8, 9 applied to Christ. We need not, therefore, bewilder ourselves in a fruitless quest, but may at once see our Saviour in these joyful and adoring words. I. PROPHECY 18 HERE CLOTHED IN POETRY, AND DECKED WITH ALLEGORY, Th•i question, therefore, arises-How far may this description be nnderstood of our Saviour's personal presence, when he lived as Man among men? The four Gospels contain no single descriptive trait.. Some ancient Jewish writers strangely held that Messiah would be a leper, because Isaiah speaks of him as "smitten" (liii. 4). Some Christians have seemed to find pleasure in supposing our Lord signally devoid of manly beauty. Calvin more reasonably explains Isa. liii. 2 of the absence of worldly pomp and regal state. Bacon, noting that few great men have been eminent for personal beauty- though there are some remarkable exceptions-says, "That is the best part of beauty which no picture can express; no, nor the first view of life." This kind of beauty-the son! speaking through the countenance-is what we cannot suppose absent in our Lord Jesus. We may gather from the Gospels that he had o. more than princely nobleness, and a surpassing charm of graciousness. When men came into bis presence they were impelled to fall at his feet. Yet little children ran at his call to nestle in his arms. Busy men, when he said, "Follow me," left all and obeyed. The wretched and perishing recognized in him their Deliverer. Jesus nlone among men grew from infancy to the prime of manhood with mind and body untainted with sin. It is not said "fairest of men," but "fairer than the children of men;" he is not merely pre-eminent, but alone.' "The temple of his body" was a fit habitation for " the fulness of the Godhead." Bred to active toil in the pure mountain air, he had a frame capable of immense exertion. He could be heard by thousands in the open air. After a day of toil, not only speaking for hours, but by his intense sympathy taking on himself the burdens of suffering and sorrow he lifted from others, he would oliwb some mountain with the free step of a mountaineer, and spend the night in prayc,r. Even in his last inconceivably awful sufferings, we see no evidence of bodily We!ikness. After the agony of Gethsemane, the sleepless night of insult and torture, the terrible Roman scourge, and six hours on the cross, our Saviour's last words were uttered "with a loud voice," and he expired not from exhaustion, but from a broken heart. Add to all this that in bis heart dwelt love, such as no other ever held; and that behind the veil of his human nature was the majesty of indwelling Deily. Who can suppose that the counteMnce of Jesus was a ruaRk to hide that grace and glory, not a mirror to reflect it? II. THE nEAUTY 01!' WHICH ALL OUTWARD GRACE, MAJESTY, LOVELINESS, 18 nUT THE SHADOW, nELONOB IN TRANSCENDENT MEASURE •ro THE Lonn JESUS. 'l'he lost " image of God," defaced lineaments of which only remain in our ordinary human nature, reappears in him in full perfection (John xiv. 9). We read in him nil that most concerns us to know concerning God-his character and bearing townrds ourselves. The amazing claim made by the Bible (unheard of elsewhere) that man was made in God's likeness, seems contradicted by the whole current of our world's history. But who can deny that no lower style fits the life and personal character of Jesus? (Somo of the strongest testimonies are from professed unbelievers.) In the most admirablo characters great excellence is commonly balanced by co1nsponding defects. But what excellence or virtue can you find in him, either falling short of the highest vigour or strong at the expense of some other? What is his chief feature? Love? Ilut not at the cost of the severest truth, the strictest justice. Holiness? Yet he was the Friend of sinners. Benevolence? But you can no more imagine him weakly indulgent, or imposed upon, than deaf to any real cry of need. Would you see the glory of the sunbeam? You must not gaze on the sun itself, but on the flowers, lea1·011, meadows rsALMB. 2 L,, 354: THE BOOK OF PSALMS. [PS. XLV, 1-17.
forests, hills, clouds, ocean, which his light clothes with their endless variety of colour and beauty. So the beauty of our Saviour's character is to be read in the hearts he drew to him, the lives he changed and hallowed, the characters he moulded, the homes he blessed, the love he inspired; in the track of life be has left-he only-in our dnrk world. But you need the open eye (Isa. liii. 2; John i. 14; ix. 39). .An unbeliever may admire his portrait in the Gospels, as he would a character in fiction. But to those who seek and trust him, Jesus reveals himself (John xiv, 21-23; 1 Pet, i. 8; ii. 7),
HOMILIES BY V.ARIOUS AUTHORS.