hypocrisy. Every Christian could be above them. Such are these:Profane language. Some that, with bowed head and eyes reverently cast down, handled the symbols of the Saviour's body on the Sabbath, in the same or following week use His name to give point or fierceness to an oath. Or they damn themselves or their fellow-communicants, because they have not received the attention to which they thought themselves entitled. Or they have been found drunk; or cheating in business; or keeping lewd company. Or they shew a bitter unloving spirit towards others, and give hard, perhaps ill words, to those to whom on the Sabbath they gave the body and blood of the Lord. Or the tone of their life is the reverse of Christian. They are full of the spirit of the world. There is nothing in them superior to what is in others. The holy communion does not make them holy. No traces of a holy spirit are in them.

In

Now, to these things I make no reply. They admit of none. many cases the facts may be exaggerated. In others the sins are rarevictories of temptation. But in too many they are wilful, habitual, unresisted.

Do you ask, What have you to say to us, then? Are we not quite right? Should not these things weigh with us?

I say, Yes; as to the facts you are mainly right, and they should weigh very seriously with you. But you err in the conclusion you draw from them. You say: I will not do this at all, because some do it who should not. Or: I will not do this in any way, because some do it in a wrong way. That is, you let the sin of others keep you from doing your duty; others doing duty in a wrong way keep you from doing it in the right

way.

Is that right? Can others' sin relieve you of your duty? Who fixes duty for every soul? Is it others' faithfulness? Can others' profanity relieve you of a duty your Lord and Master has appointed you?

The sin of other men is certainly to have an influence with you. But the influence is to be this,-to make you careful to do your duty rightly. Their failure is to point out a danger, and quicken you to avoid it. It is to make you say-NOT, I will not do it at all,-BUT, I will not do it so; I I will do it better. But is there not just a tinge of pride in the spirit that says, If I did this at all, I would do it so much better than you, that I will not do it with you. I would do it so much better, I will not do it till you cease to do it. When you do it better I may join you; but not till then, for men would think I did it no better than you.

Have they not the right to say,-Friend, we are doing it in the best way we can? Come, shew us how to do it better. They have. And perhaps, when you set to do it, you will find it prove to be-as you found all work you had not tried-harder to do well than you imagined.

The other form of reverence that keeps many from Christ's table is this-the high and holy nature of the ordinance. They say it deserves a devoutness, a sincerity, a warm affection far above any that is general or habitual. The fairest, the purest, the best of human nature, should be brought to this service. Unalloyed devotion should be there. A devotion that is not perfect in purity and intensity is insufficient to go there

with. The love set forth there calls for the bloom of the spirit, for the richest and rarest feelings of the heart. So they form beautiful pictures of how it should be done, how they would like to do it. They will wait for a love that is pure and fervent; for a tone of spirit that is reverent, lowly, full of awe and gratitude. They will not go till they have a high and holy purpose firmly rooted in their minds. They will wait till their sincerity is so manifest that none can question it; so white, so beautiful and spotless will their life be.

All that is very beautiful: so beautiful few can dare doubt its being all true and right. It is so seductive in its transparent childlike simplicity, few can resist it. The holy nature of the ordinance at once suggests, yea, demands, the holy character of the observers. Both should be alike—like Christ, like communicant. All should befit the holy loving Jesus. No crookedness, no flaws, no ugliness, no wounds, bruises, and sores. The table of Christ must be no pool of Bethesda, but a holy temple, in which none sets foot that is not pure and perfect.

If it could be so it would be very pleasant. But the question is: Are you to put off doing your duty till you can do it faultlessly? Is the man with the true artist spirit to handle no colours, or touch no canvas, till he can paint faultless pictures? Is the runner not to start for the goal till he be at it? Is not the sensible way to say,-that is our goal, we aim to be such. We are not there yet, but we press on the way to it. We do this, not because we can do it as we ought, but because we know that only doing it as, by Christ's help, we can, will ever make us to do it as we ought.

And our ideas of beauty are all wrong when brought alongside of Christ's. He sees beauty when we see only deformity. In His eyes-to the horror of men-the sinners were more lovely than the righteous; and at His table the sorrowful, contrite, penitent communicant, that has flagrant sin to mourn, and mourns over it, and whose spirit is, as it were, clothed in sackcloth, is a sight that thrills His heart with joy. The tears of penitence are His jewels. He would sooner eat with the returning prodigal, than with the scornful paragon of excellence that never was from home. No. Christ asks not perfection, either in love, conduct, holiness, or service. He asks sincerity. And sincerity, though the root of, is far from, mature perfection. He asks but one thing,-that it be true and a fact, that you are His disciple, and that He is your Lord and Master. You may not have learned all He has to teach, or learned any of it fully. You may not be able to do all He bids. But if you are heartily learning, and by His grace striving to do His teaching; if He has the Master's place in your heart, and the Master's authority over your will and conduct, though you are no perfect servant, He owns, welcomes, blesses you at His table.

This reverence for Christ's table, this high idea of the purity that befits it, is all very beautiful. But it may easily be misused. And is it not misused when we let it keep us from obeying a command of Christ's? Are we not right to suspect the reverence that bids us disobey our Saviour?

II. I come to the second reason that keeps many from Christ's table.
I wish I could believe there was no second reason. I wish I could

believe that only reverence for Christ and His table made any shun it. I know that some are influenced by reverence, and by reverence only. I honour and would seek to conserve the noble purity of spirit that disdains to dishonour anything of Christ's. I do all honour to the youthful nobility of heart that desires to serve Christ with the best, and purest, and truest it has. And I can sympathize even with its error. I can feel how natural it is not to be content to serve Christ with the best it has. I can understand how it should, in the glow of its enthusiasm, forget that Christ asks to be served only with the best one has, and not only with the best he can imagine, or the best he hopes to have.

I would fain think no meaner motives prevailed with any. But stern, ugly facts deny me that luxury. Too many obey motives of low, mean origin; not reverence for Christ, but distrust of Him; not regard for Him, but dread. And the source of their dread and distrust is this—that Christ asks the control of the life.

There are things of which some are not prepared to give Christ unlimited, absolute control. They are not satisfied that His control would be exercised to their benefit and happiness. Perhaps they are even sure it would not. They have plans which would have to be given up if Christ were honestly accepted as Lord and Master. There are plans that would have to be adopted if Christ became Leader. Pleasure would cease to be the aim of life. And in place of it, which is so soft, so sunny, so innocent in look, and luscious to the taste, there would come duty, severe in aspect, stern in tone, bitter to the taste, the shadow feared of many. And for the path strewn with flowers, making the air drowsy with their fragrance, there would be the rough, flinty path, hemmed in on either side with quick-set hedge, and traced by the bloody footprints of them that have gone before. And for the luscious fruit overhead there would be on the shoulder, all the way, the bitter Rood. Life would be a course of self-crucifixion, instead of self-gratification.

Or meaner still may be the fear. A sin-one only-forbids. They see and are honest enough to feel that they would have to part with it, if Christ became Master, and they cannot make the sacrifice yet.

And to such I say, If you will not cast out your sin, do not pretend to make Christ Master. Be sincere, though you be sinful. Reject Christ honestly, rather than receive Him falsely. If you will not be a John or Paul, do not be a Judas. Just because some do call Christ Master and live in sin, don't you do it. Do not call Him Master till you are ready to crucify your chosen sin. Only,-Do not forget that you have crucified Christ, and crowned a sin-whether lust, or lie, or pleasure-your king.

Others do not go so far, being less honest. They keep from Christ's table, because they fear being asked for proof of any love-any devotedness to Christ. They think the minister will be strict-particular with them. He will not be easy-loose enough. He will make it too much of a real serious step.

Now, to this I have an answer. It is this: No man dare ask of you more than Christ asks, and none dare take less. He does either at his peril. I have no right to set a barrier to Christ's table that He has not set; and as little right have I to remove any He has set. If you find me

asking more than Christ asks, you ought to refuse to give it; and you ought also to rebuke me if you find me content with less.

But, every minister must be honest with his people. It is only his duty to them to see that they are what they should be. It is simply kindness to them to insist that they should have what Christ asks. You would dismiss your physician if he were to let you, after illness, go abroad without what fits for the fatigue, and work, and risks of life. His kindness is to make sure that you have the conditions of safety-that you have the conditions of health. And why should that minister be judged most gentle most humane and considerate that lets his people do what he does not know they are fit to do safely and profitably-that lets them go where they are unfit to go-where it is wrong in them to gowhere their spiritual nature is deeply injured, the conscience seared, and God's Spirit quenched? Is it not true gentleness to insist that, what they, before God, declare to be true, they should prove to be true?

For your protection, let me say in closing: "Obey this command of Christ early. Obey it so soon as you can honestly and truly call Christ your chosen Saviour. Obey it early; when you can do it for no other reason than that the thing is true. Do it while young; when all can see that only love to Christ can have made you do it. Do not wait. If you wait other reasons for doing it will come into play, and you will find it difficult to do it for love of Christ, and not for those other reasons. Do not wait till some change in your place or plan in life approaching, makes you do it; till business, profession, or marriage forces you to do, from necessity or decency, what can only be done in purity and sincerity when it is done because the heart urges to it.

And if you ask me, When do you mean we should do it?-I answer, When, under the drawing of Christ's love and Spirit, you have been led to receive the Saviour as your Master, and to shape your life by His will, He helping you. If you are of age to be fit to do that, it is time to do this. When you can humbly, under Christ's eye, say you have done so, then, not sooner, nor later, is your time to shew that He is your Master, by obeying, along with other commands of His, this, His high command, to remember publicly, with others, His disciples, His dying love.

Over-Preparation!

By MRS. SKINNER.

"I TELL you what the truth of the matter is, that class is too much for me, and I won't take it again." The speaker, a tall stalwart young man, threw himself down in a chair near the fire, and spread out his hands to catch the heat. Ugh! how cold it is! I was loath to leave this fire; and how I wish I never had!"

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"Hadn't you prepared your lesson?" asked an elderly lady, sitting on the other side of the fire.

"Prepared my lesson! Well, I'll tell you what I did, and then you shall decide as to whether I prepared or not. I read two Outlines on the

Lesson, the Notes, Farrar's Life of Christ, at least the part bearing on the lesson, and a commentary, and looked up a dictionary of illustrations." "That will do, don't tell me any more."

"But did I prepare the lesson enough?”

"I should think so. But what is it you complain of in the class?" "Their inattention, rudeness, tricks. I just feel as if I accomplished nothing. They will not listen to me, and perhaps it will be doing them a kindness to stay away."

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Suppose all the teachers did that?"

"Of course, you will have to reason the thing all round before you give a grain of sympathy. But I'll just give you a history of the afternoon, and then you will see if I have not just cause to complain. First of all, some of them were late, and when spoken to about it, were rude; and one boy who comes very irregularly said he didn't care if he never came at all. Through the opening service there was the usual amount of chatter, pinching, and pin-pricking; but I did not notice that so much, for my thoughts were far away. As soon as teaching commenced one boy began to shuffle his feet about, and in spite of my asking him several times to keep them still, he kept on with it all the afternoon. The boy next to him seems to smell so of dirt, or tobacco, or something disagreeable; and the next one actually was asleep part of the time! I could hardly believe it, but he certainly was. I asked one boy what Jesus Christ once did on the Sea of Galilee, and would you ever guess the answer?' He made the water into wine.' But there, it is no good going on any further. You can judge from what I have told you how useless it is for me to go on any longer. To lengthen the list would only tire you."

"It is best though to know all the truth."

"I have told it," he answered, rather impatiently; and the tea being brought in just then, the subject dropped.

"Isn't our teacher a rum 'un ?" said one of these boys, as some of the members of the class stood together after the school had been dismissed. "He shouldn't lecture about not coming; why, he's often away hisself." "And late sometimes," said another.

"I sat on his coat tails this afternoon," said the first speaker, "and he did give such a tug at 'em as fairly upset me on to Sam. I couldn't help laughing; and then he said I was always laughing, when it was him as made me."

"Come along home, lads," said a third, "I can't stand here any longer; my feet feel as if they'd burst."

"Chilblains again?"

"Yes, I didn't know how to sit all the afternoon."

Two more of the boys in that class were just then already entering their home.

"O mother,” said one, as he sat down to the neatly spread table, "I do wish they'd put us in another class. Our teacher is so dry, it's like listening to a sermon."

"And what do you think, mother?" said the other one, "Fred told him that Jesus made the Sea of Galilee into wine."

"Never!"

"He did. Didn't you?"