piness of heaven, and so heaven itself, cannot be popularized, any more than the delight of a finished scholar, in a finished intellectual production, can be brought down to the apprehension, or, rather, within the experience, of an illiterate person. Christ is an object of perception and of interest to each one of us, as truly as Washington is an object of perception and of regard, as truly as Milton, Newton, Cowper, Nelson, or Napoleon Bonaparte are objects of interest, to those who admire genius or martial prowess. As each of these distinguished men will be variously estimated, accordingly as they are contemplated by men more or less fitted, by natural temperament, genius, acquired powers, and, preëminently, by similarity of experience and pursuits, so Christ will be best understood by those who have most conformed their lives to his model. He who, by the use of similar military tactics, and by something approaching to equal prowess, has attempted successfully the very achievements of Napoleon Bonaparte, will and must have an appreciation of him and delight in his exploits which cannot be shared by another. This is a natural and an unalterable principle. It. is laid deep in the foundations of the human mind. And in this I conceive that we are bound to find evidence of the

Divine wisdom, in thus offering a bounty to every lover of Christ to become like him, in order that we may "see him as he is."

The elemental heaven of this knowledge of Christ we have in every contemplation of his works; in our scrutiny of the minute, in our survey of the comprehensive. The ardent lover and friend of Christ cannot give a passing glance at the fleecy cloud that sails across the azure sea above him, without an emotion of complacency, joy, or rapture, peaceful or ecstatic, as may chance to be the measure or character of his own receptivity at the instant. John Foster longed for an atmosphere of universal consciousness. It grieved him to think how many objects there were to which he had no conscious relations; which awakened in his bosom no decided sentiment; how many days, hours, or moments in which his faculties were dormant. He would have not one single object in the entire circuit of creation unsuggestive; not an hour, not a moment, void of intellectual and cordal vitality. Towards such an enviable condition of existence we are tending; and in the bright, blissful consummation, all will be redolent of Christ. Our present life is like a morning in the Patent Office. One glances at the countless models, and says within himself: In

each of these is the soul of the inventor. And in every work under the sun is the genius and the love of Christ. We admire the wisdom which devised and directed the law of gravitation. We can never sufficiently admire the principles, already adverted to in the chapter on Creation Objective, which control the material world; and these principles are interesting to us as emanating from, and indicating, an infinitely wise and kind Being. Away with the miserable pantheism which would rob us of a personal Friend. The creation of intelligences, which we have contemplated in the chapter on Creation Subjective, the perceptive faculties, the reasoning powers, the persuasive logic and rhetoric of an earnest human will, the exercises of a human heart, the development of sensibilities, all these disclose to us the skill and love of Christ, and, in so doing, disclose to us our heaven.

In fact, every knowable item ever presented to the mind of man may be perceived to lead to Christ. As nature never suffers her votary to arrest her, but evermore leads him to pursue that which is beyond, so Christ, though always present, always accessible, is always interminable, always inexhaustible. The more we think, the more clearly we perceive all knowledge to be

related. Thought leads on to thought, and the thinker finds himself possessed of the freedom of the universe. Everywhere he finds the presence of him who made and links the whole. He finds that, as all knowledge emanates from Christ, it cannot but be related; and he also finds that he who has Christ has all.

With these truths before us, surely it will be allowed that in Jesus Christ Objective we have now a happiness eminently superior to all earthly enjoyment; a felicity which is, and must be, of the very happiness of heaven.

"My little children, of whom I travail in birth again, until Christ be formed in you."-PAUL TO THE GALATIANS.

O, wonder-working God,

What germs of life are thine!

That thou shouldst lodge in this poor clod,

And make its substance thine.

JOHN says of Christ: "He came unto his own, and his own received him not. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God."

There is a breadth of meaning in this assurance which words cannot compass; a weight of blessing which words cannot support. Power to become the sons of God! One can conceive of an ignorance so besotted as to listen, with vacant countenance and unmoved soul, to the offer of the friendship and favor of the wisest, most powerful, and best of all the princes, potentates, and scholars of the earth. We are not surprised