Ver. 7 (first clause).-The generOUB challenge. The trio clauses of this verse will all be best nnderstood if they are sufficiently viewed as what may be called representa- tive words. They stand for a whole type of thought, fact, truth. 'l'hese same challenges and assurances linked, we find repeated much later in the life of Christ (Luke xi. 29). It adcls to our conviction that these utterances of our great Teacher were of the nature that might be designated very studied and deliberate, very designed and far on-looking. The three claw;es cannot for a moment be supposed to be merely repetitions, nor even merely three ways of puttin 6 the same essential thing. They require to be considered aeriatim. Each grows ou that which precede8 it, and the added force is only obtainable at the end. The first of the clauses is sure to be the most generic, elementary, fnndamental. The prospect which it holds out seems to one BOmetimes vague, sometimes too comprehensive to be anything but the language of extravagance or exaggeration. It has had the effect perhaps of producing misgiving in t.he heart. Note then- L CHRIST 18 BOT SPEJ.JWIIG OF KEN IN TIIEIR WIDE, SOJ.TTERED1 tJNCEllTJ.lN ou. vn. 1-29.] THE GOSl'EL ACCORDING TO ST. MATTHEW. 301
BELATI0NB TO TOE W0BLD AND TO ONE ANOTHER; BE HAS TBE BEGINNING 01!' BIB OWN SCHOOL BEFORE lIIM, WHICH SHOULD INDEED BECOME LARGE AND VARIOUS TILL IT GATHERED ALL IN ITB EMBRACE, AND IT IS WHAT THESE, AS BIS LEARNERS, RIB FOLLOWERS, BIB BERVANT8, MAY RELY UPON, THAT HE DECLARES. Let the world speak for itself, publish its manifesto, which it does large enough, loud enough, false enough. Jesu~ here speaks his own manifesto, and it is deficient by no means in large- ness, but awaiting the test of quality and reliableness I Ever since, all who have in any sense, in any eppreciable degree, really known Jesus, have been investigating, testing, pronouncing upon these two things-what his Word is good for, and how good he is to his Word. II. CHRIST BAB AN OPEN EAB AND AN OPEN BAND; FOSTERS EXPECTATION, AND DOES NOT DISAPPOINT IT; INVITES PBAYEB-PRAYEB WIDE, VARIOUS, IMPORTUNATE, LARGE-AND THEN DEALS BOUNTIFULLY FROM BIS TREASURY AND WITH BIS OWN INFINITE RESCURCEB. Facts all answer to these assertions. The very genius of Christ's truth points to them. That truth is not repressive to the mind, not contracting to the heart, not crushing to the life, not adverse to knowledge, to civilization, to brotherly fellowship, to practical benevolence. To all appearance Christ himself was nowhere without exciting a vast amount of inquiry and a. vast variety of it. Never was breath of wind so healthful, so enlivening, so purifying by a millionth part, as was the breath of his Word. And wherever his truth has travelled, rested, paid the casual visit, or rooted itself, its force has been of s milar kind. It has taught and provoked men to ask for things outside of and above themselves, and with no idle fancy and no unre- warded desire has their eye rolled from earth to heaven. Things they never dreamed of before have become visions of brightness at which they gazed, objects of attraction that never lost their power, and of solemn practical quest which they never rested till they found and secured. They have been led to want to ask, kave asked, and have found. In all this world there is no asking which comes near to that which Christ has originated in it--so large, so various, so deep or again high in its nature, and so richly rewarded. Souls ask, and souls have given to them, beyond all ambition's ask- ing, or love of money's asking, or love of pleasure's asking, or love of life's asking, or the goading of misery's asking. Most native, therefore, to the spirit of Christ was it, is it, to say "Ask," and in his radiant generosity of nature to "give" tc the asking! Oh! wonderful fountain of fresh life, Giver of good, Pitier of sorrow, Rescuer from death-it is he whose free, unqualified invitation needs but one short word in which to express itself, and that word" Ask."-B.
Ver. 7 (second clause).-'.ffie challenge to the seeker. When we pass on to the con- sideration of this second challenge, with accompanying assurance, of Jesus Christ, we may at once inwardly notice a leading difference between it and that which went before, and that difference one in the nature of an advance. It is true that when a child "asks" he expects to receive, and to receive "bread," and not a "stone," at the hand of his father. Aud Jesus emphasizes this fact to his present purpose: "lf ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much me-re shall that Father of yours, which is in heaven, give good gifts to them that ask him?" On the other hand, it is a most certain thing that when as grown men we" ask "-not like children asking of their father-our voice is not very acceptable to the world, even when it is attended to, and very often is not attended to. "Asking" is not liked. And it is no little evideuce of this that we do not like "asking." We all feel that a solitary act of asking means some sort and some little degree of humiliation; more ask- ing means that we are run into some extremity; and perpetual asking, that we are lost to self-respect. Nor have we fashioned this rough code without some good reason; for we have been sometimes sharply l'eminded that stones may be sent for bread, and serpents for fish. But, again, who can deny that the world has some admiration for the man who" seeks"? The be';ter part of the world despise those who live ever on the "esk" system, b•1t are prone to respect those who set to work, "quit them like men," and "seek" with mind and heart and strength. May we not, then, note, that while Christ does love, for his own rea84 ins and in bis own sense, what the world and the better part of it do not over and above love, viz. the "askers," yet this is no reason why he does not love the "seekers"? "Faith without works is dead." And 110 in a 302 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. MATTHEW. [on. vu. 1-29,