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NEW SERIES.

APRIL, 1886. VOL. XVIII, No. 4.

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J. H. VINCENT, Editor.

J. M. FREEMAN and J. L. HURLBUT, Associates.

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[Entered at the Post-office at New York, N. Y., as second-class mail matter.]

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"We have no hesitation in saying that, all things considered, the OXFORD TEACHERS' BIBLES are better for

the Sunday-school teacher than any other with which we are familiar."-Sunday-School Times.

"All things considered, we prefer the OXFORD TEACHERS' BIBLES to the London-and it is between these two that the choice is commonly to be made."Sunday-School Times, September 25, 1880.

"It is only fair to state that, in the light of later examination, we have seen no reason to change our expressed opinion that the OXFORD TEACHERS' BIBLE is the most serviceable for the use of the ordinary Sunday-school teacher."-Sunday-School Times, February 24, 1883.

"The OXFORD TEACHERS' BIBLE, the invaluable companion for the working teacher which it now is."Sunday-School Times, February 7, 1885.

Be sure the "Oxford imprint is on each book, thus:

OXFORD:

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COMMUNION WARE.

We have facilities for selling the above ware in Extra Heavy Silver Plate. best goods made, at extremely low prices. Write for circular. Address PHILLIPS & HUNT, 805 Broadway, New York.

SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHERS

who desire to obtain more complete training for their work may address Rev. J. L. Hurlbut for circulars of the

Assembly Normal Union,

A Course of Normal Study by Correspondence.

Fee of membership, 25 cents per year. Text-books for sale by PHILLIPS & HUNT, 805 Broadway. New York.

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A NEW Book by the Old House.

Messrs. LowRY & DOANE promise a NEW Book of Sunday School Songs, in April, one fully equal to any of their former popular works.

The NEW Song Book will embrace a number of NEW features, will be gotten up on an entirely NEW plan, in a NEW shape, and will be printed from beautiful NEW type. It is sure to please and will create a NEW interest in the Song Service. It will be sold at a NEW price, $25 per 100 Copies, in Boards.

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NEW SERIES.

APRIL, 1886.

The Crescent and the Cross.
KIND was my friend who, in the Eastern land,
Remembered me with such a gracious hand,
And sent this Moorish crescent which has been
Worn on the haughty bosom of a queen.

No more it sinks and rises in unrest
To the soft music of her heathen breast;
No barbarous chief shall bow before it more,
No turbaned slave shall envy and adore.
I place beside this relic of the sun

A cross of cedar brought from Lebanon,
Once borne perchance by some pale monk who trod
The desert to Jerusalem-and his God.

Here do they lie, two symbols of two creeds,
Each meaning something to our human needs;
Both stained with blood, and sacred made by faith
By tears and prayers and martyrdom and death.

That for the Moslem is, but this for me!
The waning crescent lacks divinity;
It gives me dreams of battle, and the woes
Of women shut up in dim seraglios.

But when this cross of simple wood I see,
The Star of Bethlehem shines again for me,
And glorious visions break upon my gloom-
The patient Christ and Mary at the tomb.

-T. B. Aldrich.

The Easter Ideal.

ST. PAUL reaches down into the recesses of the Easter story, and he draws thence an idea fair and white, like one of the lilies blooming in our churches Easter day. It is that the life of faith and holiness to which a soul new-born is admitted sustains the relation of a resurrection to the old life of self and sin. As Christ came up from the grave, so those in Christ have had a resurrection. Let us emphasize the thought in our class teachings. It carries along several weighty truths which the scholar may not VOL. XVIII.-4

VOL. XVIII, No. 4.

realize, and yet they are there to influence him. It is like the vessel's cargo, not seen by outsiders and yet packed in the hold and borne along by it. Of these truths, one is that the author of all spiritual change is the Holy Ghost arousing the soul from its tomb. Again, when thus risen, what an exalted life does Christ's risen life reflect as in a mirror and hold up as the ideal life for our imitation? Don't dwarf that high standard of the newly risen life in Christ, but ask how can one of God's children knowingly lower it? How can we again put on the grave-clothes of the old death in trespasses and sin? How can we cherish corruption and gratify any thought of revenge, dishonesty, or impurity? Soaring toward heaven, the songs of the New Jerusalem trembling on its lips, how can the soul falter, droop its wings, and sink toward the earth? If we make this thought plain and prominent, the Easter glory will not simply be a picture to please our scholars' fancy, but we set a star in the heavens toward which they may steadily rise.

No Altar.

He is amiable and intelligent. He has a "harp" even now; how he loves to sing! He is active in prayer-meetings and nobody can put himself on the Lord's side quicker than he. He is enthusiastic; he loves to wave the palm-branch and shout that he is bound for glory. And still notwithstanding various good points, he is not successful as a teacher. One may be intelligent, cheerful, have a harp and a palm-branch, be enthusiastic and ready at testimony, but if he has an altar of sacrifice that has a small top, he will be a deficiency on the Sunday-school records. His Sunday-school work costs him little, and his aim would seem to be that it shall cost him less. He has an easy, slide-along time. He does not know about sacrifice for his work. Harvests do not come without sweat and ache. Sac

rifice is the price of the world's progress. Calvary is the ransom paid for souls. Opposite to worth stands work. Let Sunday-school service cost. Let it cost time and thought. Let it cost leg-work: let there be visitation from house to house. Above all, let there be knee-work, "strong crying and tears." Teacher, find the measure of your altar-top.

Lessons from John's Gospel. WITH April we begin a series of lessons on the gospel of John, to be continued through the rest of the year. To aid our readers in an appreciation of this delightful book, we publish in this number of the JOURNAL an article from Dr. Steele, Principal of the Wesleyan Academy, Wilbraham, Mass., and one from Dr. Terry, Professor in Garrett Biblical Institute, Evanston, Ill. Dr. Terry also gives us several excellent outlines of the gospel. We are sure that the thoughts of these eminent biblical scholars will be read with pleasure and profit.

Methodism in the Lessons of the Second Quarter.

BY D. A. WHEDON, D.D.

ST. JOHN's gospel is peculiarly a narrative of God incarnate in man. The Ebionites denied Christ's divinity and pre-existence, and the Docetists denied his humanity. Against these errors, therefore, St. John, in Lesson I, asserts, first, the eternal Godhead of our Lord, and second, that he became truly man. In harmony with the lesson is the title of Article II: "Of the Word, or Son of God, who was made very Man." The Methodist doctrine of the Person of Christ is thus stated in the Article: "The Son, who is the Word of the Father [begotten from everlasting of the Father], the very and eternal God, of one substance with the Father, took man's nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin; so that two whole and perfect natures, that is to say, the Godhead and Manhood, were joined together in one person, never to be divided; whereof is one Christ, very God and very Man," etc. (The clause in brackets belongs to the Article, its omission being doubtless a typographical error. It ought to be restored.*) Against Jews, Mohammedans, and all Unitarians, it teaches that he is the true and eternal God, and neither a mere man nor a created being midway between God and man. Against the Apollinarians, who denied him a rational spirit, making his Godhead a substitute for it, it teaches that he was truly Man, in body, soul, and spirit, like to us in all things, sin only excepted. Against the Sabellians, who denied a trinity of persons in the divine nature, and held a trinity merely of outward manifestation, thus making Christ's Sonship external and temporary, it teaches that he is eternally Son of the Father, and that the union of natures in the God-man will continue forever.

* According to Emory (Hist. Disc., p. 109) the phrase was omitted in 1786. He evidently regards the omission as accidental. See also Sherman, Hist. Disc.,p. 112.-ED.

Our Lord, in Lesson IV, discourses on regeneration. Methodism insists upon its indispensable necessity to childship to God or to entrance into heaven. As to its nature, the Church Catechism defines it as the "new birth of the soul in the image of Christ, whereby we become the children of God." It differs from justification in that the latter is a work done for us by God in heaven and witnessed to us by the Holy Spirit sent for that purpose, while this is a work done in us by the same Holy Spirit. It is a change in the moral nature in which, supernaturally, by the direct action of the Spirit, the love of God becomes the dominant affection of the soul, subduing all other affections to itself, and power to overcome evil and to obey and serve God is bestowed. The soul is thus, in a measure, made Christ-like. This is a perfect regeneration, but not a perfect sanctification, for it is only sanctification begun. The difference is not in kind but in degree, and the completion should be earnestly sought by every believer. Methodists do not think, with their Calvinistic brethren, that the new birth is bestowed in order to repentance and seeking pardon of sin, but that repentance and faith are pre-requisites to it, and that pardon and the new heart are given at the same moment. Nor do they think with their Ritualistic brethren that baptism, or the being "born of water," can regenerate the soul. They regard it as the external symbol of the real regeneration wrought by the Holy Spirit. The latter is a necessity; the former is a duty to be neglected by

none.

Personal testimony to Christ (Lessons VI and II) is a practical matter on which Methodism has from the first placed weighty emphasis. It has insisted on personal experience as essential to Christian character and life, and then on the testimony of it both to their brethren and to the world. Organized, it appears in the weekly class-meeting and the occasional love-feast, where Christians are encouraged, comforted, and blessed, and sinners are often led to Christ. The preacher or the teacher who knows Christ and tells what he knows of him is the truly successful one. But, as in the lessons, Methodism has taught its people to go personally to sinners and, alone with them, to tell them of Jesus and bring them to him. That question of grave discussion of recent days, "how to reach the masses," is, in the light of these lessons and our Methodist history, of easy solution-go after them. Go, and tell them the old, old story, and win them to the cross. Thousands are hungry to hear what Christians know of Christ.

The Holy Spirit (Lesson XI) has always been in the world, but, in God's plan, Christ's enthronement was necessary before he could in his fullness be given. We are in the dispensation of the Spirit. Its light, its knowledge, and its privileges are greater than the world previously knew. The work of the Spirit in the soul is deeper and more powerful. Just as Christ's sacrifice transcends all its types, so does the Spirit's fullness transcend what men could receive of his grace before.

The Character of the Record.

BY REV. G. M. STEELE, D.D.

IN studying the life of Christ it is desirable that we carefully consider the character of the writings from which we derive our information. These are comprised in four brief treatises popularly known as "the four gospels," written severally by men who lived in the time of Christ, two of them by his immediate companions, and the other two by persons who were intimate with certain of the apostles. Altogether they do not occupy as much space as one half of an ordinary 12mo book, and they severally average scarcely as much as a moderate modern pamphlet.

They do not profess to be biographies or complete lives of Jesus; but they are rather fragmentary and somewhat disconnected memoirs or collected reminiscences. Yet they so set forth the prominent facts and characteristics of this remarkable life that the world has received a vivid impression of a grand, unique, and perfect Person, the greatness of whose humanity can be accounted for only on the supposition that it was also divine.

One remarkable characteristic of these writings is their freedom from any literary intention. The writers evidently aim to give the world such facts of Christ's career as will convey a clear impression of his character and of his object in coming into the world. They give no connected or protracted doctrinal discussions. They are as simple and as free from all preconceived theories and theological or philosophical bias as it is possible to conceive. They do not even profess to give their statements of facts in a wholly logical or chronological order; but only as the events come uppermost in their minds and press for expression do they utter them. Another characteristic of all these writers is their silence in respect to many things on which multitudes of people, reasonably or unreasonably, desire information. There is not the least attempt to gratify a vulgar curiosity, or to indulge in any spirit of gossip. We have nothing at all about Christ's personal appearance, and only the most meager intelligence concerning his childhood and youth. Two of the evangelists do not allude to any event in his life till the beginning of his public career. Only one of them gives us the slightest glimpse of him during the twenty-seven or twenty-eight years between his infancy and his baptism, and that one speaks only of a single event in that long period. Yet out of these records of a small fraction of a not very long life comes an influence affecting humanity more powerfully than all other lives that have been lived on this planet since the world began!

Three of these memoirs, though entirely independent of each other, appear to have been written from nearly the same point of view, though perhaps addressed to different parties; they also present in large measure the same facts. For this reason they are called "the synoptical gospels." Their reminiscences are, for the most part, confined to Christ's Galilean experiences.

John, the fourth evangelist, appears to have writ

ten many years after the others. His work is, to a considerable extent, supplementary to theirs. He also has a different purpose. He gives more full information concerning Christ's ministry in Judea and Jerusalem, and sets forth more fully the spiritual character and doctrines of the new dispensation.

The main design of John's gospel, according to many eminent biblical scholars, was to present the true spiritual character of Christ's work among men. It was particularly intended to meet the wants of many believers who had been affected by the mystical and unreasonable notions set afloat by certain teachers and by which some sincere disciples were bewildered and likely to receive great damage. These teachers, in attempting to set forth an exclusively spiritual conception, had adopted several speculative doctrines from heathen philosophy, incorporating them with some abstract Christian truths, and thus formed a vague system dissevered from the great substantial facts on which Christianity was based. In endeavoring to correct this tendency John does not attack these false views in a controversial manner. He aimed rather by the power and excellency of the truth to draw men away from their errors and then to make common cause with what was noblest and purest in the hearts of those whose correction he sought. In doing this he has also addressed himself in a wouldrous manner to the wants of the truly spiritualminded in all times and nations. It is thus that the most earnest and devout souls, those who have taken in in largest measures the deep things of God, have found in this gospel more profound satisfaction than anywhere else in the sacred writings. It will be noticed, too, how he avoided the perils of those against whom he wrote by building his grand spiritual structure upon the simple and yet solid facts implied in the Christ of history.

It was wholly in keeping with this intent that he should also have had a subordinate purpose of supplementing the earlier narratives. There are incidents, parables, and discourses not contained in them. Yet there are also so many points of coincidence with the previous writers as to render it not difficult to combine all into one harmonious presentation.

Yet again we have here the remarkable fact to which allusion has already been made that there is an utter silence concerning many things which human curiosity so largely craves-an utter absence of any disposition to make, I will not say a sensational story, but one that is merely popularly interesting. There was no other among all the friends of Jesus who could have given us so much of entertaining incident pertaining to the human life of Jesus. His mother was probably a relative of the mother of Jesus, and there was evidently a close intimacy between them. Then, in accordance with that incalculably tender commission of Jesus on the cross, Mary had become a member of John's family. How many things might he have learned concerning the boyhood and youth of the wonderful child! And these unquestionably he had learned. But

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