it such as it had utterly lost when Jesus himself appeared. The old free inspiration had died away: no more prophets, no more revelations, as the people believed. So they came to develop a popular respect, love, and devotion to the records of their older inspirations such as, perhaps, the world has hardly ever seen. They built a hedge, as they said, about the law. They developed a belief that every word, every phrase, in the Old Scriptures, had some hidden meaning, some remarkable power. And they developed methods of interpretation by which texts were turned into charms and amulets. They came to worship the letter itself; and this worship of the letter became a bondage that the people could hardly bear.

I wish to give you one little specimen, showing the condition of thought in regard to only one phase. See to what a point they carried reverence for the Sabbath, the observance of a particular day after a particular fashion. The lawyers and the scribes, who taught the people, prescribed the kind of oil that should be used in the temple, what kind of knots might be tied on the Sabbath, how far a man might walk, what load he might carry. He must not bear the weight of a dried fig; for that would be considered work. He might carry a locust egg, because that was believed to be a charm that would cure the ear-ache. He might carry a fox's tooth, because that was supposed to prevent sleeplessness. He might carry the nail of a man who had been crucified, because that was good for the ague. He might not wear sandals with nails in them, because if he walked through the grass he might knock off some of the seeds from the grasses or grain, which might be construed as threshing. It was questioned whether a cripple who had a wooden leg might walk on the Sabbath. Some argued that, as it was not a natural leg, it was a burden, and, if he carried it, it was work. It was forbidden to set a broken bone on the Sabbath, and a tailor might not go out with his needle. It was believed that the Sabbath was kept in heaven and in hell; and it was said of one brook that it was so pious that it

ceased to flow on the Sabbath day. These as illustrating one department of Jewish life and thought, and what a system of set formulas, of dead and dried ritualism, the grand, free-flowing religion of Isaiah and the prophets had become. Into the midst of this condition of things came Christianity. Now, I wish to hint some things that may help us to comprehend the naturalness of the growth of Christian thought, and how it came to possess the power it did over the popular mind.

I have already told you how easy it was to believe in deifying a man, so that you can see how natural the belief might grow that Jesus himself was something more than human. I want you also to note the utterly uncritical condition of mind of the world at that time, how easy it was to believe in wonder stories. They had absolutely no knowledge of any system of natural law or order. When it was said that a man's eyes had been cured of blindness by a touch, or that a man had even been raised from the dead by the utterance of a word, there was no system of natural law in their minds that raised a difficulty of belief. We talk to-day about a miracle's being impossible, because we do not believe that natural laws are disregarded or broken in this fashion. We say things must happen under the law of cause and effect; but in the popular mind at that time there was no law of cause and effect, no system of natural order, so there was no sort of difficulty to them in believing anything. Sometimes I think it is wonderful, not that the New Testament contains stories of miracle and marvel, but that there are so few. Indeed, the New Testament contains only a small part of the stories that did grow up. Clusters of others more marvellous still gathered round the memory of Jesus, only they were not accepted as authentic by those who had the decision as to what should constitute the sacred book.

Note one thing: that, with their conception of God and his relation to the world, it was easy for them to believe in the infallibility of a book. There was no critical knowledge as to authorship. If a man issued a book at that time, when

books were so rare and only in manuscript, and said it was the work of Isaiah or Jeremiah, there was no one who could prove that it was not true. A man did issue a book, and said that it was the work of Enoch, the seventh from Adam, an old patriarch before the flood. It was accepted generally as authentic. There was no critical question concerning it, though we find some of the Church Fathers discussing how it escaped the wreck of things at the flood, and how it came down to within a hundred years of Jesus without any one knowing that such a book was in existence! So you see that, when such a question came up then, there were no such criticisms as would face us to-day with similar problems.

But, on the other, grander side, the side I love more to deal with, let me hint to you some of the reasons why Christianity came as such a gospel, such a glad tidings to the world. I have shown to you the decay of belief on the part of the people in the old gods. Here came a religion proclaiming not only a God of power, but a Father in heaven, a Father who equally loved all his children. Here came a religion very different from what the people had been accustomed to, one that proclaimed universal brotherhood. Terence, an old Latin writer, indeed, had attained a point where he could say, "I am a man, and whatever is human is not foreign to me"; but this was only an isolated, individual utterance. Here came a religion, popular in its sweep and power, declaring through the mouth of one of its greatest apostles that God hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth. Here was a doctrine appealing to the lowest stratum of society as to the highest, declaring the equality of all in the presence of Heaven. It blotted out all distinction between master and slave. Here was a kingdom to be established, the only condition of citizenship in which was goodness, love, brotherhood. There was no distinction of rich and poor, of master and slave, no distinction of man or woman. As Paul said, and in the light of this morning's discussion you ought to get the ringing power of his meaning, in Jesus Christ there is neither bond nor free,

neither male nor female: there is only brotherhood. Woman had hardly been recognized as having a soul before, in some parts of the world. Here, in spite of the fact that Paul told women that they must be keepers at home and not speak in public, in spite of the fact of this personal restriction of his, he preached a gospel concerning the essential thing, the equality of womanhood, that was a gateway through which she might march out to conquest of the earth in disregard of his own petty restrictions.

Here, then, was a gospel indeed to the poor. We find the apostle saying to them: Do not worry about your condition. If you are a slave, no matter: it will not be for long. Suppose you are poor: it is only for a little while. Suppose you are beaten, afflicted, discouraged: be patient, brethren, the coming of the Lord is at hand, and all this is to be set right. Do you not see what a power the proclamation of a gospel like that would have? how it would go forth over the Roman Empire?

Mightier than all these was the great hope which Christianity proclaimed in the face of defeat, in the face of oppression, in the face of death. The ancient world had indeed a belief in a future life; but it had come to be a dim and fading thing. They did not look forward to it with any happy thought. It was not desirable: it was only less desirable than being exterminated. Homer makes Achilles express the belief in a future life; but the nature of that future life was so undesirable to him that he said he would rather be a keeper of swine in this world than to be the king of all the dead. It meant leaving the bright sunshine, the blue sky, the green earth, the waving trees, the music of the waters; it meant leaving this pulsing flesh-and-blood reality, and going down to the shadow-world that hardly had any real existence at all. But here came Christianity proclaiming,— I am not raising the question as to the truth of its prophecy, - proclaiming absolute conquest over death, so that Paul himself could say to depart and be with Christ was far better than anything he could look forward to here. There

came a belief that flamed in the heart of the people and burned up all doubt,— a belief so real, so tangible, so mighty, that it made men go to the stake singing, that it made women face the lions in the arena with a smile, looking into the faces of their persecutors with pity, and pleading with their last breath that they might accept the faith for which they themselves so joyfully died.

Do you wonder that Christianity conquered Rome? Do you not see how the world was ready? and that Christianity was born into conditions fitted to give it what it has had, a life of two thousand years?

And now, our Father, let us, in a faith deeper, grander than any the world has ever seen, consecrate ourselves, not necessarily to the old belief of the past, but to the deathless hope of the world in its eternal service for Thee. Amen.