(whatever they may seem) an open sepulchre, breathing forth the taint of corruption and death, because nothing but death is there. There is one Christ; one Spirit; "one name given amongst men whereby we must be saved;" one Book sent into the world by God as the infallible record of Truth; and if men depart therefrom, however much they may clothe their aberrations in garments of light, yet there is no light in them. They serve Satan, and not God. Yet nothing, perhaps, as I have already said, is more feebly appreciated than the influence of the tongue in the service of evil, except indeed it be, the value attached by the Lord to its service in the cause of good. We find it difficult to recognise that any among Christ's people here, can be capable of being addressed by Him in such words as these: "Thy lips, O my spouse, drop as the honeycomb: honey and milk are under thy tongue." What a contrast with the venom of asps! Yet so it is when the lips keep knowledge; when they are established in the grace of the sanctuary where redemption hath brought in everlasting peace; when they speak (it may be in a private and hidden sphere) words of truth and soberness drawn from the Scriptures of Truth; when they speak humbly in confession, or supplication, or thanksgiving unto God; or minister comfort to them to whom comfort is due; or speak to the world of righteousness and coming judgment and present grace as declared in the blood of the Lamb: in all such cases, that which distils from such lips is as the dew of heaven, and whether rejected or received, it has before God a preciousness unspeakable and eternal, that no circumstances can alter-a preciousness that may be despised or forgotten on earth, but which is remembered in the Heavens.

Yet believers are not unfrequently ready to say, "If it be so, why am I thus ?" If the service of Christ's people be thus pleasing and acceptable in His sight, why is their service not prospered? Why is the excellency and beauty of Truth hidden? Why do not our testimonies which, because of the truth that is in them, we know to be precious, attract, not indeed to ourselves (that we desire not) but to Him? Why are they so rejected and despised? Is it not because they have so failed in our hands through our weakness, that the Lord is displeased with us and will not prosper them? There may be, and no doubt often are occasions when it is so. The remnant of Israel in the days of Haggai when they ceased to care for the Temple of the Lord and thought only of their own houses, were not blessed, but smitten. (See Haggai i.) But there are also occasions when it is

otherwise. In the case before us there had been rightly directed energy,-holy and acceptable service, yet she who rendered it, is described as "a garden inclosed; a spring shut up; a fountain sealed." A garden inclosed may be well protected and preserved; its walls may be walls of strength and security; but an inclosed garden is not one whose beauties are made manifest: they are recognised and known only by its possessor. They are beauties that dwell, virtually, in a secret place. An inclosed garden is not the emblem of that that enlarges its limits, and advances upon the rude waste around, and spreads verdure and beauty over surrounding desolation. Nor is a shut up spring, a sealed fountain, an emblem of diffusion. Waters "shut up" may be most precious-the fact of their being sealed shows that they are precious in the sight of their possessor. They may exist too in exhaustless plenitude, ready to flow forth like the cool streams from the snows of Lebanon on scorched and burning plains below. Yet such waters may be despised; no channels may be made ready to welcome and direct their flow; the arid waste may continue to wither, and that which is ready to be as "a fountain of gardens," causing fragrance and beauty to flourish and abound, remains shut up-its vivifying power existing seemingly in vain.

Facts and the Scripture abundantly testify that such is the Church's present relation to the moral waste around. Even in the days of its early strength, before weakness and decrepitude overtook its testimonies, its beauties were unrecognised by any save its Heavenly Lord, or those whom He called His friends. None others cared to look upon the holy enclosure; or if they entered and looked on it, it was only to despise and to withdraw. The garden cultivated by the hand of Truth, blooms with plants of heavenly fragrance. "Spikenard and saffron; calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of frankincense; myrrh and aloes, with all the chief spices" are there-all plants of heavenly fragrance, but not delighted in by the Egyptian heart that dwells by the flesh-pots, and hungers after its garlic, leeks, and onions-feeding nature's strength with nature's food.

But darkness shall not always reign. "The fountain of gardens" shall not always be as a fountain shut up and sealed. An hour is coming when its streams shall flow forth in living power, unchecked and prospered in their course. "Israel shall blossom and bud, and fill the face of the world with fruit." "Truth shall spring out of the earth, and righteousness shall look down from Heaven." In the mean while, "the Church of the first-born ones" now militant in the midst

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of suffering and sorrow, has to wait in patience of hope. It has to remember that however restricted its sphere, it may be itself as a garden yielding plants of fragrance, precious in the sight of its Lord. And even if the Church unitedly ceased to be this, individual Christians may in their several spheres be as pleasant plants of fragrance. If only one solitary Christian were left in the world and he walked in grace, there would still be that in the earth which Christ would discern and recognise as a plant of heavenly fragrance.

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There was no one of Christ's servants, perhaps, who had so strong an apprehension as the Apostle Paul, of the value and preciousness of the Church as a garden in the estimate of its Heavenly Lord. Therefore he laboured to make it a garden abounding in plants of fragrance. "Now," said he, "I The full energies of his heart were given to it. live if ye stand fast in the Lord." And his efforts were not in vain. He could speak of the Churches amongst whom he laboured and whom he nurtured (being gentle among them, even as a nurse 'epistles of cherisheth her children) he could speak of them as Christ, known and read of all men." They livingly expressed the mind of Christ. Their doctrines and their manners were in conformity with the Truth as revealed in God's holy Word. The fragrance of Truth was found in the garden of the Lord. The Apostle recognised it, and he knew that the grace of his Lord would recognise it. He could, as it were, hear the voice of his Master saying, "Thy plants are an orchard of pomegranates, with pleasant fruits; camphire, with spikenard, spikenard and saffron; calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of frankincense; myrrh and aloes, with all the chief spices." The Apostle, and many others far weaker and more unworthy than the Apostle, regarded and were entitled to regard words such as these as expressive of the Divine estimate of their humble and despised labour. Such was the place occupied by She was thus comher who is addressed in the passage before us. forted-she was thus encouraged. The plants about which she had laboured had their fragrance recognised by Him for whom she had trained them. He came to view them, and He called both on the north wind and the south wind to blow upon His garden-that garden whose plants He had before pronounced to be hers-in order that the "Awake, O north wind; and come, spices thereof might flow out. thou south; blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow out."

The north and south winds are evidently symbolic of two diverse

and contrasted influences, to both of which the garden of the Lord is, from time to time, subjected here. The chill northern blast may so blow as to wither and destroy, or it may be so moderated as to revive and strengthen. It can invigorate by its cold, and develop qualities which more gentle influences fail to elicit. In the case before us it was called upon to awake, not that it might destroy, but that it might refresh and bring forth into development. "Endurance" is a grace that needs for its development the presence of the northern wind. Courage and soldiership can have little place where quietness and peace reign. "Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ." On the other hand, there are graces that peculiarly flourish under the gentle influences of the south. Job felt it so, when, smitten by the northern blast, he looked back upon the time when other influences, gentle and peaceful, prevailed around him, and when in his prosperity he forgot not the Lord, but served Him with ready heart, and out of his abundance spread blessing over others, making the widow's heart sing for joy, "Oh that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me: when his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked through darkness; When the ear heard me,

then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me: because I delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me and I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy. I put on righteousness, and it clothed me: my judgment was as a robe and a diadem. I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame. I was a father to the poor: and the cause which I knew not, I searched out. And I brake the jaws of the wicked, and plucked the spoil out of his teeth. Then I said, I shall die in my nest, and I shall multiply my days as the sand. My root was spread out by the waters, and the dew lay all night upon my branch. My glory was fresh in me, and my bow was renewed in my hand. Unto me men gave ear, and waited, and kept silence at my counsel. After my words they spake not again; and my speech dropped upon them. And they waited for me as for rain; and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain. If I laughed on them, they believed it not; and the light of my countenance they cast not down. I chose out their way, and sat chief, and dwelt as a king in the army, as one that comforteth the mourners. But now they that are younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have disdained to have

set with the dogs of my flock." Job greatly prospered-spiritually prospered under the gentle influences of the south; but under the withering of the northern blast he quailed and spoke unadvisedly with his lips, justifying himself rather than God. Yet to retain spiritual healthfulness as Job had done under the full sunshine of prosperity, argues no little grace. Stedfastness and faithfulness to God, and to His Truth, are perhaps never more proved than then. Asa, Jehoshaphat and Hezekiah, stood firm in days of adversity: but when prosperity came, they failed-Asa, grievously. The garment which we may prize in the hour that the north wind blows, we may cast from us in the day of the breathing of the gentle south; and the garment so spurned may perhaps prove to be essentially a characteristic part of our pilgrim attire. Amongst all the servants of Christ there has been, probably, no one who has under all circumstances retained his stedfastness so fully as the Apostle Paul. “I know," said he, "both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I am strong as to all things through Christ that strengtheneth me." He found in his very employments an instrumental means of strength. He laboured not for himself; nor simply for the interests of men as men; nor for the Church apart from Truth (for the Church may have selfish interests of its own) but he laboured for the Church that it might be preserved, and established, and enlarged in the knowledge of the revealed Truth of God. And what was the result? That in the midst of the fierce Gentile World, in close contiguity to the mountains of their godless strength, there was found many a spot which was as a garden inclosed, full of plants of heavenly fragrance-plants which he had watched over and cherished as knowing that they were precious in the sight of his Lord. He had well learned to estimate the mountains of Gentile power: he recognised them as dens of lions and leopards; he knew the consequences of the abandonment and desolation of Immanuel's Land; but this knowledge though it caused him anguish and many tears, yet weakened not his strength. He turned with the more thankfulness to his hidden and despised service in the garden of his Lord, finding there the sphere of his present joy. "At present," said he to the Colossians, "I rejoice in my sufferings for you." He did indeed anticipate other joys in the future, but his present joy was in suffering for Christ's people whilst labouring to present each one ripe in faith and of mature growth in Him. All the