Ver. 14.-The givi'Tlg of the se/,f This is the most beautiful of the sentences in thia Epistle. Christ came not merely to teach, or to reveal the fatherhood of God, but to give himself. I. HE DID THIS IN HIS LIFE. All his exquisite sensibilities were bruised in a world of selfishness and sin. The sorrows and griefs of men hurt him. He did not merely give his thoughts, or give his time, or give his infinite help. He "ga.ve himself." II. HE DID THIS IN HIS DEATH. As our Sacrifice be gave himself, "that he might r~deem us from all iniquity;" not from guilt alone, but from every form of evil. The perfectly voh1ntHry character of our Saviour's redemptive mission is seen in such expressions as " 1 come to do thy will, 0 God," a.nd when concerning his life he says, "No m,m taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself." This voluntaryism on his part itself destroys all those critical objections to the atonement which were once raised against the suffering of the innocent one for the guilty; for, in the first place, Christ " gives himself," and, in the second place, he does ir. for a worthy end; not that he may aµpease the wrath of his Father, but that he may honour his moral government by his perfect obedience onto death, and that he ma.y redeem men from more than the curse of the Law, viz. from all iniquity. Thus, again, the end of the gospel is character-tha.t this earth may be as the garden of the Lord, in which all iniquity may be down- trodden and destroyed.-W. M. S. Ver. 16.- Cultivation of respect. "Let no man despise thee." For through the personal influence even the first apostles and teacl,ers had to win their way. L RELIGIOUS TEACHERS NEED ESPECIALLY TO REMEMBER THAT EVKN WORLDLY MEN DESPISE HYJ'OCRITEf,. If men recommend a medicine they do not take, or exhort to obedience of a law which they do not themselves obey, or seek to inspire admiration for a virtue which they only wear as a cloak, or affect a love to the Saviour which ends in Do self-de11ial or sacrifice, they are hypocrites, and men despise them. JI. RELIGlOUf! TEACHERS NEED ESPECIALLY TO Rl':MEMBER THA'i' Ml':N WHO ARE DESPISEU HA VE NO REAL POWEii.. That is, of course, rightly despised ; for they may be wrongly despised. lt is written of our Lord, "He was despised and rejected of men." So that we must keep in remembrance the fact that what St. Pa.ul meanH is" deservedly .J.eapi&ed." No rhetoric, no argu?1~nt, no brilli_ancy of thought, no ahility_ of ~~pl!cation er illustration can make any miu1ster of Chn~t really nseful and effective it h1a rha- on. n. 1-Hi.] THE EPISTLE TO TITUS. 39
meter and repuLation are justly despised. As "Ossili" says, "character is higher than intellect."-W. M. S.