ture? Then God calls us to conquer it, as our Prayer Book speaks, "to crucify the old man, and utterly abolish the whole body of sin." And think of this :-such as were like you, such as have lived here among you, and have departed in God's faith and fear, now know more than the wisest and most learned men on this earth. The difficulties that puzzle us are no difficulties to them; the many things which here we shall never know are clearer than light to them. "Now," as S. Paul says, "we know in part;" but there they know even as also they are known. God grant us so to know Him in this life, that in the life to come we may know all things, for JESUS CHRIST'S sake to Whom, with the FATHER and the HOLY GHOST, be all honour and glory for ever. Amen. SERMON XLII. UNKNOWN SAINTS. 9. Nicholas. December 6. "THY FATHER WHICH SEETH IN SECRET, HIMSELF SHALL REWARD THEE OPENLY."-S. MATTH. VI. 4. THE Saint of to-day, S. Nicholas, is one of whom we know scarcely anything certain but his name. That he was a Bishop in Asia, and that he did great wonders in the Name of CHRIST; this is all that is told of him. But it is enough. His good deeds are written in heaif they are not written on earth: his crown is none the less bright there, because we know not the way in which he won it here. ven, There is, I think, something in thus keeping the memory of a Saint of whom we know next to nothing, which ought to be very comforting to you. It is what the Church delights to do. The blessed Apostles themselves, have for the most part, left no long catalogue of their actions behind them. The long, patient toil, the love to those nations among whom they went, their wisdom, their meekness, their miracles, their suffer life that those words were true, "The harves Consider this. We have been praying this I do not mean that we, if it were left to o are to wish for so sudden a death. "Give an of thy stewardship, for thou mayest no lo steward," are words that we should not wish in a hurry. We pray against it in the Lita say every night, "Almighty God grant us Town in the wa eping nothin It is wh des the logue toil, th thei ht, and a perfect ?SSIN e. Neverthelesting. The ath, yet shall be being ot that which side in g 3 a is ed easured by number of in mir unto men, and leased Gon, and washed es, ere, into taken away, let that wiede derstanding or dent de perfect in a fine Su nd our Los tes fe hether He shall eme ve f ect Him, or when they have at t "and find them so, w We cannot judge certainly ertainly-of any one whom Go takes foo. But he hope we have for some may be so very ding to e almost certainty. And if we have a right to a hope all of immortality about any one, it is about her of hom I am speaking. I am not afraid to say, Let me e the death that she died, and let my last end be like ers! Now, if there was one thing above mother ich makes me say so, it was the way in which de stantly acted up to those ends, Water do, do it heartily, as to the Ln, and not to? If there be first willing mind, is ampl LOW ESUS that have chat it at sayho shall e in the the other n the devil ve seen some ay have been or shall be, the Low can we doubt. ave formerly lived in f grace, and are now ation? If our LORD'S e been: for He says, ings, their constancy, their death, are known only to God. And so it is, and it must be, with respect to the greatest number of those who are the followers of CHRIST. Neither now, nor hereafter, will they be famous in the history of the Church. Just as in a battle, we know nothing of the names of the soldiers who fought, and who conquered; all we hear is who the generals were so it is in that great struggle which the Church is now carrying on, and to the end of the world will be carrying on, against the devil and all his powers. We know nothing of those thousands of true Christians who help on this battle by their prayers and their holy lives. Only those who have the chief posts are known to men, those who by learning, or courage, or talents, are able to do the chief service to GOD. But remember this: in every battle, it is after all the soldiers, and not the generals, who win it. In the battle between the Church and the devil, it is the meaner and humbler children of the Church who do the most for GOD. The hearty, earnest cry of a poor man, before he goes out to his day's work, is as acceptable to CHRIST as the longer prayers of those who have more time for prayer. It is not the length or the learning of the prayer that He looks at, but its faith and its earnestness. And now think, when we say of any, the meanest of GOD's servants, on his departure out of this world, that we believe him to be happy, that we cannot doubt of his salvation, how much we tell of his history. Look back to the long line of those who, from the foundation of this College, have lived and died where you now live, and where you hope to die. Out of those hundreds, |