have for its object the provision for every child of a fair opportunity to become the best possible outcome of the gifts bestowed upon him or her by Almighty God. Where the individuality of one of our citizens has not fair play afforded it, the State is probably the poorer, and we have failed in the highest patriotism. The patriot is one who will not primarily live for his own advantage. His desire will not be to gain ease for himself, but to secure happiness for his fellows. The man who overreaches in competition, who succeeds by cunning, may have what Bacon calls "crooked wisdom;" but he will leave his country not the better, but the worse, for his having lived. Such men, indeed, merit to be " unwept, unhonoured, and unsung." They are festering sores, destructive of the true health of any state. All that makes men to be estranged the one from the other, that breeds suspicion, that causes forgetfulness of national brotherhood, is hurtful to the needs of the general number. The patriot, again, is one who will be specially careful of the interests of those who perform for the State those duties which strictly belong to each one of us. The soldier, the sailor, are prominent instances of the class to which this applies, but there is no one who is doing his work honestly and well, who is not in some sense benefiting the whole land, and who is not a vicarious labourer. We should, then, each one of us, make a determined effort to lighten life's load the one for the other. We have no business to put unnecessary temptation in the way of those who work for us. The provision of innumerable drinking-saloons, the fostering of every kind of opportunity for gambling, these are matters which call for State action. The latter of these is, in the opinion of many, almost the most serious danger menacing our land. Some doubt, and that not without evidence of the truth of their view, whether drunkenness is as great a curse, to the young especially, as gambling. Would that we could provide some counteracting influence and interest for those likely to come under its baneful power! In all these directions true patriotism demands that active interest shall be taken by the State, whilst undue interference with individual liberty is avoided. In fact, there is no matter affecting the general wellbeing as to which the lover of his country will not be on fire. If any one should fancy that the consequence of this zeal for the good of the whole body would be neglect of individual interests, our reply would be, that the only true success in life is that which is achieved by those who recognize their responsibility in regard to others. Christ gave wholesome teaching when He insisted that "whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; and whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant;" and for all real Christians there is a strong incentive to such a life in the words, "Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many." If we look through the records of past ages, if we think of those to whom are raised enduring monuments, we find that the most lasting success is that of self-sacrifice. True though it be that there has not always been "selection of the fittest" for honourable mention, still the desire has generally been to commemorate the labours of those who lived and died servants of their country. The soldier, the sailor, the statesman, the physician, the divine, the man of science,—these are the ones whom we delight to honour, when we know that they cared less to advance themselves than to bless their country. So, then, the ambitious man can give nobility to his natural desire to shine, by using his powers in the service of his fellows. The greater our wealth, the more influential our position, the higher our gifts, the 1 Matt. xx. 26-28. more it is laid upon us to spend and be spent for others. It is true that we must not confine our ideas of service within the borders of our own land; there is a Christian patriotism which remembers the brotherhood of man, and which knows no boundaries; still the first care must be in regard to that country in which our lot is cast, and towards which our hearts are most strongly drawn. If we are members of no mean land, if we are citizens of a leading nation, the more we assist in making it a happy and, in the best sense, holy State, the better its influence upon the rest of the human family. It must not be forgotten that when lands have fallen from their high position, it has been through their degrading themselves, and becoming hurtful to their own interests and to those of others. "The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof." These words tell us the same truth which experience teaches to peoples as well as to individuals. Privilege involves responsibility. Glorious opportunities are before Englishmen today. Our race is now more influential than ever before in the history of the world. A new idea of life and duty has arisen, and there is a place for every one to fill. Let us each, in God's Name, do our part, and then the time is not far distant when we shall see our land not merely the richest, but the brightest, the best, the freest, and consequently the most Christian, in the world. So long as there is one untended sick-bed, one unrelieved poor person, one unavenged injustice, one preventible misery permitted, there is work for us to do. What better lot for any one of us than to give our lives in order that the existence of our brothers, the lot of Englishmen, may be the brighter for our self-sacrifice? There was gathered in the Temple of Theseus at Athens, during the battle of Marathon, an anxious crowd of citizens, who eagerly looked out towards that plain on which was being decided the fate of the nation. Suddenly a figure is seen approaching, and when he gets near it is noticed that he is clothed as a warrior, and that his steps are feeble. However, he climbs on, up the hill on which the temple stands, and reaches the entrance. Raising his hands aloft, he cries out to the assembled multitude, "Victory, O Athenians!" and falls dead at their feet. The man's one desire had been the safety of his land, and he died bringing a message of comfort and success to his countrymen. Be it ours, in our day and according to our opportunities, to be messengers of brightness to our England; to delight to suffer for the land we love; to assist in winning to all that is true and godlike the men and women who are bound to us by the holy tie of national brotherhood. We may have an uphill struggle; we may be misunderstood; we may seem to fail; we may have our trial before Pilate; we may have our Cross. But we know of what glory Calvary is the antechamber; and even if we did not, so long as the world is the better for us, so long as the truth prevails, who would stay to consider what he himself might have to suffer? It is not the object of this address to suggest how in matters of detail this conception of Christian patriotism shall be carried into effect. Its purpose will be attained if it stimulates the desire of but one Englishman to devote himself to the service of his country, and to help forward for humanity generally that time when there shall be in all respects a satisfying of the "armies of the homeless and unfed," "And liberated man, All difference with his fellow-mortal closed, PEACE AND WAR. BY THE REV. J. LLEWELYN DAVIES, D.D. "If it be possible, as much as in you lieth, be at peace with all men."-ROM. xii. 18. THERE is a line in the "Faery Queen" in which Spenser notes the unshrinking resolution with which loving pity faces darkness, filth, and foul smells, in setting itself to rescue a half-dead captive out of a dungeon. "Entire affection," he says, "hateth nicer hands"-hands, that is, too nice or fastidious to put themselves to such work. Similarly, we are insisting in some of these lectures, Whole-hearted Christianity hateth nicer hands. There have been persons, even divines of high reputation, to whom war has seemed too repulsive a fact for Christianity to have anything to do with. They have regarded wars between nations as inevitable; they have not been able to understand how the course of the world could dispense with them; but war is so dreadful to Christian feeling, that they have concluded that the only thing for religion to do is to pass by on the other side. To us the spirit of Christ is bearing witness that our faith must not pass anything by on the other side. The worst and most impracticable things in the world are those which belief in Christ is specially called to affront and to attack. We have no right to turn away from blood and carnage, or to admit |