cheered warriors in the heat of perilous conflict, and inspired labourers in every noble cause, and made thousands of obscure and nameless heroes in every hidden place of earth. It is the pillar of light which shines before the journeying host. It is the secret watchword of the army, given not to the leaders alone, but flashing like fire through all the ranks. When that thought descends upon us, it kindles our hearts and makes them live. What though we miss the applause of men; what though friends misunderstand, and foes defame, and the great world pass us by? There is One that seeth in secret, and followeth the soul in its toils and struggles, -the great King, whose approval is honour, whose love is happiness; to please Him is success, and victory, and peace.

There are a million ways of pleasing Him, as many as the characters of men, as many as the hues and shades of virtue, as many as the conflicts between good and evil, as many as the calls to honest labour, as many as the opportunities of doing right and being good. That is the broad meaning of this eleventh chapter of the Hebrews, with its long roll of different achievements, with its list of

men and women of every age, of every quality and condition, slaves and freemen, leaders and followers, warriors and statesmen, saints and sinners, and silent martyrs, and nameless conquerors; there are a million ways of pleasing God, but not one without faith. Numberless forms of energy, but none without heat. Myriad colors of beauty, but none without light. All is cold and black until the sun shines. A universe of possibilities of goodness spreads before you, but not one of them can be realized unless you have faith. For without faith it is impossible to please God.

But why should this be so? Is it an arbitrary requirement which the Divine Being makes of his creatures, or is there a deep reason for it in the nature of men and the conditions of human life? I do not believe that God is ever arbitrary. He is indeed omnipotent, and He has the power to demand of us whatsoever He will. But there is always a wise and holy reason in his demands. Sometimes we cannot understand it; it lies too deep for us. But sometimes we can understand it; it lies within our reach. And in the present case I think we can easily see

just why faith is necessary to the success of every effort to please Him.

Faith is not a strange and far-away thing which can only be explained to us by a revelation. It is a principle of common life. We exercise it every day. It is simply the confidence in something which is invisible; as the Apostle says, "it is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Every time you receive the testimony of your fellow-men, every time you trust in the qualities of their character which are beyond the reach of your vision, every time you rely upon a law of logic in an argument, upon a law of nature in your action, upon a law of morality in your conduct, you exercise faith. It is the condition of reason, of activity, of human society. "All polities and societies," says a wise observer, "have come into existence through the trust of men in each other," and, we may add, through their trust in unseen principles of equity, and in future results of prudence, and in One higher than themselves whom they could neither see nor name. Take away confidence in the invisible, and the whole fabric decays, crumbles, and falls in ruin.

Thus, even from the human point of view, faith is necessary. But from the Divine. point of view, it must appear infinitely more essential.

Man is made to know as much as possible, to do as much as possible, and to be as good as possible. In the sphere of knowledge, in the sphere of action, in the sphere of character, faith is the one element that gives life and power to please God.

I. Look first at the sphere of knowledge, the understanding of the world and of life. We stand in a strange and mysterious universe, with certain faculties to help us to a comprehension of it. First, we have the senses, and they tell us how things look, and taste, and sound, and feel. Then we have the reasoning powers, and they enable us to discover how things are related to each other, how causes are followed by effects, how great laws control their action and reaction. But is there not something beyond this, a depth below the deep and a height beyond the height? Every instinct of our nature assures us that there must be. The lesson of modern thought is the limitation of science and philosophy. But outside of this narrow

circle lie the truths that we most desire and need to know. In that unexplored world dwells God. Why should we hesitate to confess that we must have another and a higher faculty of knowledge? The astronomer has keen eyes, but he knows their limitation, and he does no discredit to them when he uses the telescope to bring near the unseen stars. The entomologist has quick sight, but he does not disparage it when he turns to the microscope to search a drop of water for its strange, numberless forms of life. Reason is excellent and forceful, but beyond its boundaries there is a realm which can only be discerned by faith. Where science ends, where philosophy pauses, faith begins.

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By faith we understand that the worlds have been framed by the word of God, so that what is seen hath not been made out of things which do appear."

Mark the words: By faith we understand. It is a principle of comprehension, then, not of confusion; something which clarifies and enlarges the vision. It discloses not only the crigin but also the purpose and the meaning of things. It is not the contradic