"I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven, and was incarnate, and was made man," how could it be that we should ever have arrayed ourselves against Him?

Supposing however that we had, still our case would not have been absolutely hopeless, for, be it remembered, that Christ Himself was not preached with the accompanying power of the Holy Ghost till after Pentecost, and many of those who cried "Crucify Him" were pricked to the heart, and asked, "What shall we do?" But our Lord did such wondrous works; His words were so very full of grace; He spake as never man spake, so that perhaps it is scarcely right to suppose that we could have resisted the power of His words. Let us take, then, the case of His servants, His Apostles. Could it be that we could have heard them without believing what they said that we could ever have disputed with them-opposed them—done our utmost to destroy their influence in the Church?

Now let us look this matter in the face.

When we think of an Apostle, what do we picture to ourselves? Perhaps the more ignorant of us think of the figures of the Apostles they have seen in pictures, on the walls of rooms, or in the painted windows of churches. They think of a man with a ring of bright light

encircling His head, perhaps with his face throwing out rays of glory as the face of Moses when he came down from the Mount. The most of us, however, think of one whose words came with irresistible power. We feel sure, that if God were now to send an Apostle upon the earth, one word from him would suffice to settle any dispute, to heal any division, to establish or disestablish any Church. Take St. Paul; this Church is dedicated to him. The cathedral of by far the largest city in the world is dedicated to him. The commentaries on his Epistles alone would fill not volumes but libraries. A book, a very interesting and learned book, has been written on his ship-. wreck; more than one treatise has been written on his conversion; more than one on his thorn in the flesh.

How then did he appear in the eyes of the men of his day? We will not speak of the heathen; one of them called out to him, "Thou art beside thyself; much learning doth make thee mad." We will not speak either of the Jews, but of Christians, his own Churches. Was his word always law to them? Was all safe and smooth under his eye? Far, far from it. He was considered in his day, and by some who owed their very souls to him, as the leader of a party-a party that was, in the estimation of its opponents, in the wrong-perhaps, too, in the minority.

He had to see his converts leave him and attach themselves to men who flattered their prejudices and ministered to their self-conceit. He had to write to the Galatians, all of whom had been won to Christ by him, "Am I become your enemy because I tell you the truth?" In one Epistle he tells us what his opponents said of him: "His letters, say they, are weighty and powerful, but his bodily presence is weak, and his speech contemptible." He had to threaten Christian Churches who owed their existence to him that he would come to them with the rod, the rod of severe, stern, well-merited reproof. He had to do what we may be sure to a man of his exceeding humility and gentle feeling was harder still, he had to recount his sufferings, his works, his privations, and to show that in these veritable marks of Christ's cross he was not one whit behind the chiefest of the Apostles.

So, my brethren, it is as uncertain as possible that if you and I had lived in those daysdays of miracles, of inspiration, of direct revelation-we should have necessarily chosen the right side, i.e., the Apostles' side. And yet there can be no doubt that if the New Testament be true those who were against the Apostle were against the Holy Spirit, whose instrument he was. I do not mean to say that they blasphemed against the Holy Spirit, and so committed the unpardonable sin, but still they

opposed the Spirit; they went contrary to the truth which the Spirit taught.

And now let us turn to the incident recorded in the text: "Some believed the things which were spoken, and some believed not." This is said of the Jews in the city of Rome. Suppose, for a moment, that you had been a descendant of Abraham living then in that great city. We will suppose that you were religious; that you kept the law so far as you could keep it in a heathen city you would also attend your synagogue, and hear there the Pentateuch and the Prophets read, and take part in chanting the Psalms. But, being a Jew, you would belong to a scattered people, whose real home was far away in Palestine; and you would continually hear news from the head-quarters of your religion-from Jerusalem. Strange and unwelcome rumours would come again and again to your ears from the city of the God of your fathers. You would hear that the Ancient Church was being rent asunder or undermined. You would hear how vast numbers of your coreligionists, even of the very priests, were day by day falling away to the religion of One Jesus Whom your rulers had crucified, but Who was affirmed, though He had been put to death in the sight of the whole city, to be yet alive in heaven, and in a place there far higher than that of David your hero, far higher than that of Moses your lawgiver, far higher than that of Abraham

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your father, even at the right hand of the God of Fathers. Those who came to you your from Jerusalem would speak everywhere against this new sect. You could not be unmoved at the thought that so many were forsaking, as you thought, the right way. Whilst, perhaps, you were musing on these things a message would come to you that one of the leading teachers of this new faith, and the one, too, who had made himself most obnoxious because he preached that there was no distinction between Jew and Gentile, but that all who believed in this Jesus were all one in Him, all equal in God's sight-that this very man was in Rome, and desired to see you at the house where he was lodging as a prisoner-he being unable to come to you because of his bonds. You betake yourself there; you find its court, its enclosure, that is, crowded with your own countrymen and co-religionists; and in the midst a man of no commanding personal appearance, and no pretensions to eloquence, calling himself an Apostle of the Jesus of Nazareth against Whom you have heard so much.

This man has your sacred books, your Old Testament, which you know, or think you know, so well, before him. And from these books he is earnestly disputing with the heads of your countrymen, endeavouring to persuade them of the truth of a matter which if it be