to

meats." This means the body has appetites and there are provisions intended and fitted satisfy them. Christianity allows man to partake of those provisions in nature necessary to satisfy and strengthen his physical nature. To act thus is to act in harmony with the constitution of nature. All animal existences act in this way. Christianity, instead of requiring you to starve the body by fastings, and to exhaust its energies by painful pilgrimages and selfmortifications, says, "Eat and be satisfied, eat and be strong, take care of your bodies."

If you

choose to eat the meat offered to idols, to allay your appetites and to invigorate your frames, well eat it. Feeding the body, however, Christianity regards though proper, as very temporary, both the food and the body must perish. They are not like spiritual existences, and spiritual supplies that have regard to an unmeasured hereafter. Not so with the

body, "All flesh is grass.' We observe—

II. That it recognises

INDULGENCE IN THE GRATI FICATIONS OF THE BODY AS

WRONG. "Now the body is not for fornication but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body." This is not a necessity of the body, like eating and drinking, but an immoral indulgence of its propensities. Man should attend to his bodily propensities, as reliefs, not as gratifications. He who' attends to his physical propensities in order to get pleasure out of them, sinks lower than a brute, violates the laws of his nature, degrades his being, and offends his God. Hence intemperance, whether in eating or drinking is a moral outrage. The crime and curse of men in all ages have been seeking happiness out of the gastric, the sexual, and other propensities of their physical being. We observe―

III. That it recognises that the PROPER TREATMENT OF THE BODY IS TO IDENTIFY IT WITH CHRIST. First: It

is a property of Christ. It is "for the Lord, and the Lord for the body." It is not ours, we are its trustees, not its proprietors; we hold it "for the Lord," and we should use it according to His directions. It is His will that it should be used by the soul to convey from the external universe quickening and hallowing impressions of the Divine, and used to express and develope the holy thoughts and purposes which such impressions should produce. It is to let in God to the soul, and to reveal God to our race. Secondly: It is a member of Christ. "Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ?" If we are genuine Christians, He regards even our bodies as having a vital connection with Him. He had a human body, and that human body raised to heaven is the model into which our bodies shall be changed. This being so, the prostitution of the body to sensual indulgence of any kind is an incongruity and an out

rage. "Shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid. What? Кпого ye not that he which is joined to an harlot, is one body, for two saith he shall be one flesh. But he that is joined to the Lord is one Spirit," &c. Thirdly: It is a temple of Christ. "What? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you which ye have of God?" Christ by His Spirit claims the body as a temple in which He is to dwell, be revealed, and worshipped. It is His property, "Ye are bought with a price, therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's." The language here is of course figurative. It does not mean that there was a strictly commercial transaction in the re-. demption of man, a literal quid pro quo, for the thing spoken of pertains to spiritual interests and relations, and not to

commerce.

praying or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his head.

not

But every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head," &c. It is here implied that both the man and the woman are to prophesy, teach, and pray; one instead of the other, but each independently. However closely related the man and the wife may be, however dependent one is on the other, neither can perform the spiritual and religious obligations of the other. There is no sharing of duty here, no shirking of obligation, each must stand alone before God. We are taught here that

III. There is a DIFFER

ENCE BETWEEN THEM IN

OUTWARD ASPECT. There are two points here concerning the difference. First: A difference in the way in which they are to appear in public. The man is to appear with an uncovered head, the woman with a covered head. "If the woman be not covered, let her also be

shorn, but if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn, or shaven, let her be covered. For a man, indeed, ought not to cover his head." The woman's head is to be covered with her hair or a veil, or both. Who shall divine the meaning_of the tenth verse? "For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head, because of angels." To me this is utterly incomprehensive. Secondly: This difference is adventitious rather than natural. Is there any reason in nature why a man's head should be uncovered, and a woman's covered, why one should wear long hair, and the other short? No such meaning seems reasonable; the uncivilised tribes know nothing of it. The reason can only be traced to custom. Paul indeed says, "Doth not even nature itself teach you that if a man have long hair it is a shame unto him?" But nature does not seem to teach us that, but custom and conventional propriety. Hence Paul says, "If

any man seem to be contentious, we have no such custom;" by which he means, I understand, that whoever may contend to the contrary, such custom-as that woman

a

should pray and preach with uncovered headswas not known by Paul in other Churches, and that the Church at Corinth should not do so.

THREE practical truths may be fairly deduced from this paragraph

I. That ATTENDANCE ON

THE INSTITUTIONS OF RELIGION MAY PROVE PERNICIOUS RATHER THAN BENE

I

FICIAL. "Now in this that I declare unto you praise you not, that ye come together not for the better but for the worse." The Apostle in this verse censures the Corinthians that they came together to the Lord's Supper, and were made "worse" rather than "better." Men cannot be made religious, an irresistible moral force is a contradiction in terms, an impossibility in fact. Hence it comes to pass that the highest redemp

The

tive forces on man often conduce to his ruin. Gospel proves in the case of all hearers either the savour of life unto life, or of death unto death." Pharaoh's heart was hardened under the ministry of Moses, and the hearts of the men of Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum were hardened under the ministry of Christ. Another truth here is

II. That ASSEMBLING TOGETHER FOR RELIGIOUS PURPOSES DOES NOT NECESSARILY IMPLY UNITY OF SOUL. "For first of all when ye come together in the church I hear that there be divisions among you, and I partly believe it. For there must