ceptions, we maintain our unshaken faith, not in abstract, material flesh and blood, but in the actual objective, effective presence with the believing communicant of the whole divine-human Person of Christ. We are unable, and we do not care, to explain the nature of the fact scientifically; but we do know that he is as fully and as really with us in the sacrament as the minister or the fellow-communicant sitting by our side. Face to face and heart to heart and hand to hand, he recognizes and speaks to us, and we recognize and speak to him; and when we speak he hears, and when he hears his whole divine-human heart responds.

4th. Since, then, Christ is personally and immediately and literally present, our communion with him is direct and real. The Greek words xowvwvia, the act or state of copartnership, the having all things in common, and μsToy, participation, are in the New Testament indiscriminately translated "communion" and "fellowship." In the one body all the vital organs have communion. The brain and the heart and the lungs and the stomach. reciprocally live in and through each other. Communion between is copartnership and fellowship. The most entire, unlimited and intimate of all human communions is between husband and wife in a true marriage. The most absolute and intimate of all communions in the universe is between Father, Son and Holy Ghost in the one Godhead. The most absolute and intimate communion between God and the creation is that established through the divine-human Person of Christ with his believing people. This is both symbolized and actually effected in the Lord's Supper-symbolized in our eating bread and drinking wine, actually effected by our immediately

receiving into our souls, through faith, the actuallypresent Christ, his whole Person and all the benefits his blood purchases, and by our unreservedly giving to him and his taking our whole selves as consecrate to him. There is no figure in the world which expresses more adequately this absolute entire reception, appropriation and assimilation of another than that of eating and drinking. We incorporate the whole Christ entire and all his offices and work into our personal characters and lives. We freely give, and Christ takes, immediate possession of our whole selves, all our potentialities and activities, for ever. Throughout every octave of our spiritual nature every chord is attuned and brought into exquisite harmony in response to the transcendent mind and spirit of Christ. Hence the Lord's Supper is characteristically called the "Communion," "for the cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion (zowvia, copartnership) of the blood of Christ? the bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ ?"

And if we have communion with Christ, the common Heart and Head of all, we must have communion one with another. All at the same table, all in the same ecclesiastical fellowship, all of every name and rite now living on the face of the earth and eating of one bread and drinking of one cup, all of all ages and dispensations, through these sacred elements receive the universal Christ, both theirs and ours, and experience that eternal life, that undying joy, which from the Head flows to and through all his members. Herein, on every Communion Sabbath, we visibly proclaim our faith and fellowship with the one everywhere-present Christ,

and in him with "the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints."

5th. And, finally, this holy Supper is, in conformity with its inner nature, called by way of eminence "the sacrament." The sacramentum, in classical Latin, came to mean specially the soldier's oath. The army, halting under the shadows of the great primeval forests, gathered in its new recruits, and by the terrible ceremonial of the soldier's oath they were bound to an unconditional loyalty to their imperial leader, who reigned from his seat at the head of the host. A victim having been offered in sacrifice, his blood was poured into the hollow of their convex shields. The new soldier, plunging his right hand into this sacrificial blood and raising it to Heaven, swore by all most sacred to be faithful, heart and act, to his master through life and through death. This, of course, implied a reciprocal pledge of protection and benefit from the lord to his loyal follower. So Jesus went in person to the feast, and taking the broken bread and poured wine, the symbols of his crucified body and shed blood, he swears to each of us to fulfill for us and in us his whole mediatorial work-to secure for us, body and soul, his complete salvation culminating in the bosom of God. And we with streaming eyes, taking in our hands and mouths the same tremendous symbols, swear, looking straight into the face of our present Lord, to keep back no part of the price, but to place on the altar of his service all we are and all we possess, without reserve or change for ever. Take the shoes from off your feet and step lightly, for the place is most holy on the inner side of the veil. And when you go down and out into world again, remember that the binding sanc

tion of this great sacrament rests on you every moment of your lives.

V. Our blessed Saviour told us when he instituted this holy Supper just before his death, "I will not any more eat thereof [of this Passover] until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God" (Luke 22:16); and again, "I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom" (Matt. 26: 29).

[The MS. shows that the conclusion of this Lecture was left unwritten.]

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LECTURE XVIII.

THE STATE OF MAN AFTER DEATH AND THE RESURRECTION.

WE come now to the fourth and last department of systematic theology, usually designated by the common term Eschatology, or the science of last things. The great departments of Anthropology and of Soteriology relate to events and matters of personal experience which have come to pass. The topics embraced in the department of Eschatology relate to events and experiences yet future to us. This fact, of course, accounts for the comparative vagueness and absence of uniformity which characterize the faith of the great historic churches upon the several points involved in this department. The whole region lies entirely beyond our experience. We can know anything on these points only as it is definitely revealed in the Word of God. And it must ever be remembered that this revealed Word was not given us to satisfy our curiosity or to afford us the material for speculation, but simply to afford us a practical ground of faith and hope and a guide to the performance of duty. Beyond this information thus afforded the Scriptures will not carry us. One of the wisest reflections ever made on the matter of biblical prophecies was that by the great Sir Isaac Newton—viz. "That prophecy was not given in order to make men prophets." And it is just as profoundly true that no