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"By seeing Him that is

But how is he to stand it? invisible," a so the Apostle answers. Who that has had to undergo a painful operation does not know the support that is given by holding the hand of a sympathising friend until it is all over? And faith places the hand of the persecuted in the Hand of Christ. "Fear not," He says, "for I am with thee: I have called thee by thy name; thou art Mine." It is thus that the world, when doing its worst, is vanquished. Thus was it vanquished by young and weak and friendless men and women and children in the first ages of the Church, who were strong in faith" thus is it vanquished now by every one who resolves for Christ's sake to live a life of high duty and self-denial, amid opposition and under difficulties.

b

It is faith in the Son of God, Who of His unspeakable mercy took our flesh, and died, and rose again for us, that enables us to rise to a higher, purer, truer conception of what life is and means, and so to overcome the world. Human law cannot do this. But law, in a Christian land, makes the task easier. Law is the cover, the fence which shelters the infant life of religion, and protects its tender growth from violence and outrage. And religion in turn reinforces law. Religion makes obedience to law welcome, "not only for wrath, but also for conscience' sake:" it arrests at the fountain-head those passions which, in their unrestrained indulgence, are at war with law. Law and religion work on the same side, and in parallel lines; law punishes that which religion would prevent. Religion does much more work in the conscience than is necessary for the purposes of law; but, excepting under circumstances which are happily exceptional, law, when prosecuting its stern errands of justice, can appeal to the sanction of religion.

a Heb. xi. 27.

VOL. II.

b Isa. xliii. I.

c Rom. xiii. 5.

I

For the complete wellbeing of man, nothing can be more untoward than a collision between the behests of the religious conscience and the public administration of justice. The Roman magistrates and the martyrs whom they sentenced in the first ages of the Church, ought in the interests of humanity to have been on the same side. For if human life is protected by order, it is only permanently enriched by sacrifice; and as prevention is better than cure, so the motives which make crime unwelcome or impossible are more powerful agents than the strong arm which punishes its perpetrators. Law, in short, cannot overcome the world: it can only regulate its course. If men would rise above it they must gaze on Him Who overcame it when He died upon the Cross and rose from the Grave, and Who permits His true servants to lay hold on His pierced Hands, and to share in His glorious victory.

SERMON XXVII.

THE GOOD SHEPHERD.

PERH

ST. JOHN X. II.

Jesus said, I am the Good Shepherd.

a

ERHAPS no one Gospel, during the whole course of the Church year, speaks to us more directly, more persuasively, than that which is appointed for to-day. The Sunday of the Good Shepherd, as in some parts of Christendom this day has been called, has an interest for us, "the sheep of His pasture," which need not be insisted on.

I.

In the first eighteen verses of the tenth chapter of St. John there are three distinct allegories. First comes the allegory of the Shepherd; next that of the Door; lastly that of the Good, or Beautiful, or Ideal Shepherd. These, I say, are allegories rather than parables. An allegory differs from a parable, as a transparency might differ from a painting on canvas. In the parable, the narrative has a body and substance, so to call it, of its own; it has a value which is independent of its application or interprea The Second Sunday after Easter.

b Ps. c. 2.

tation; it often lends itself to more interpretations than one. In the allegory, the narrative suggests its one obvious interpretation step by step; narrative and interpretation are practically inseparable; it is impossible to look steadily at the picture presented to the mind's eye by the allegory, without perceiving the real persons and events to which it refers, moving almost without disguise behind it. One illustration of this occurs in the allegory of Sarah and Hagar, which St. Paul interprets for us in the Second Lesson of this afternoon. And another will

be supplied as we proceed with the passage before us.

In order to understand the three allegories, we must remind ourselves that in the East a sheepfold is not a covered building, but a simple enclosure of some extent, surrounded by a wall or palisade. Within this enclosure are collected many flocks of sheep, which have wandered far and wide during the day under the care of shepherds. The shepherds lead them to the enclosure or fold at nightfall; and during the night a single herdsman, here called the porter, keeps the gate, and guarantees the safety of the collected flocks. In the morning the various shepherds return to the fold to claim their respective flocks at the hand of the night-porter: they knock at the gate of the enclosure and he lets them in. Then each for himself separates his own flock from the others with which during the night they have been intermixed; each again leads his sheep forth to the day's pasturage.

Our Lord's three allegories place us face to face with the pastoral life of the East at three different periods of the Eastern day. In the first, the allegory of the Shepherd, it is still the freshness of the early morning. The dew is on the ground: the shepherds are returning to the fold to claim their flocks, which have been assembled

a Gal. iv. 21-31.

within it during the night. If a robber endeavours to lead away some of the sheep, he must find entrance into the fold in some dishonourable way. He does not attempt. the door, where he knows that he will be recognised and arrested. He climbs over some other part of the enclosure. He comes for no good purpose; he comes only to kill and to destroy. The porter only opens the gate to the regular shepherds the shepherd calls his own sheep by name, and they know his voice. He leads them forth from the fold he does not drive, he walks before them: they follow him, because they know him and trust him.

Here we are The fold which

The second allegory is that of the Door. in the hot noontide of the Eastern day. is here implied, without being mentioned, is not that in which the sheep were collected during the night. It is a day-enclosure, to which, during the hours of burning sunshine, the sheep may retire for rest and shade, and out of which they may wander at will to seek for pasture. In this allegory there is no mention of a shepherd: he has disappeared. The most important feature is the door of the mid-day fold. The door of this fold is the guarantee of safety and of liberty to the sheep. "I am the Door," says our Lord: "by Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture." a

In the third allegory, that of the Good Shepherd, we have reached the evening. Already the shadows are lengthening upon the hills, and the shepherds have collected their flocks to lead them to the night-enclosure. As the darkness gathers, the flock is attacked by wolves who lie in ambush for it. The Good Shepherd, who loves his sheep with a personal affection, throws himself between his imperilled flock and their cruel enemy, and in doing so sacrifices himself: "he giveth his life for the

a St. John x. 9.

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