physical universe, have not only put man (as we said in the first lecture) in a position to receive a larger and loftier vision of the glory of God, but they have made such a vision indispensable. And they have emphasized, with overwhelming force, the form in which that vision must come in order to meet our needs and strengthen faith for its immense task. If we are not to be utterly belittled and crushed by the contemplation of the vast mass of matter and the tremendous play of force by which we are surrounded; if we are still to hold that the vital is greater than the mechanical, the moral than the material, the spiritual than the physical; if we are to maintain the old position of all noble and self-revering thought, that "man is greater than the universe," - there is nothing that can so profoundly confirm and establish us, there is nothing that can so surely protect and save us from "the distorting influences of our own discoveries," as the revelation of the Supreme Being in an unmistakably vital, moral, spiritual, and human form.

Such a revelation at once rectifies, purifies, and elevates our view of God Himself. For if the Son of God can surrender omnipresence, omniscience, and omnipotence without destroying His personal identity, then the central The supreme pattern of

essence of the Deity is neither infinite wisdom
nor infinite power, but perfect holiness and
perfect goodness. And so from the very
lowest valley of humiliation we catch clear
sight of the very loftiest summit of theology,
the serene and shining truth that God is Love.
In the light of this truth we behold also the
highest perfection of man and the path which love.
leads to it. Love is the fulfilling of the law,
and the supreme pattern of love is the example
of Christ. And whether we look at it from
the divine side as the supreme self-sacrifice of
God, or from the human side as the complete
obedience of man, everything depends upon the
genuineness and sincerity of this example. Un-
less the Son of God truly became man, the In-
carnation cannot be, as Bishop Westcott calls
it, "a revelation of human duties." What
strength could we draw from His victory over
temptation if He was not exposed as we are
to the assaults of evil?1 What consolation
could we draw from His patience if He was
not a man of sorrows and acquainted with
grief? "Jesus Christ," says one of the greatest
of French theologians, "is not the Son of God
hidden in the Son of man retaining all the
attributes of Divinity in a latent state. This
1 See Appendix, note 39.

M

The value of the atonement.

would be to admit an irreducible duality which would make the unity of His person vanish and withdraw Him from the normal conditions of human life. His obedience would become illusory, and His example would be without application to our race. No, when the Word became flesh, He humbled Himself, He put off His glory, being rich He made Himself poor, and became as one of us, only without sin, that He might pass through the moral conflict with all the risks of freedom."1 When we see Him thus, we know what it means to follow Him and to be like Him.

Finally, the whole value of the Atonement, in its reconciling influence on the heart of man, in its exhibition of the heart of God, depends upon the actuality of the Incarnation. If He who died on Calvary was a mere theophany, like the angel of Jehovah who appeared to Abraham, then His death was merely a dramatic spectacle. The body of Jesus was broken, but God was not touched. But if the Father truly spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, then the Father also suffered by sympathy, making an invisible sacrifice, an infinite surrender of love for our sakes. Then the Son also suffered, making a visible sacrifice, and pouring out His soul unto death to redeem us from the fear of death and the power of sin. And this becomes real to our faith and potent upon our souls only when we see the human life of God, agonizing in the garden, tortured in the judgment-hall, and expiring upon the cross. Then we can say

"Oh Love Divine! that stooped to share Our sharpest pang, our bitterest tear." Then we can look up to a God who is not impassible, as the speculations of men have falsely represented Him, but passible, and therefore full of infinite capacities of pure sorrow and saving sympathy.1 Then the dumb and sullen resentment which rises in noble minds at the thought of a Universe in which there is so much helpless pain and hopeless grief, created by an immovable Being who has never felt and can never feel either pain or grief, - that sense of moral repulsion from the idea of an unsuffering and unsympathetic Creator which is, and always has been, the deepest, darkest spring of doubt, fades away, and we behold a God who became human in order that He might bear, though innocent and undeserving, all our pains and all our griefs.

Doubts dis

solve in the thought of God's sympathy.

The finding of the human Christ.

Thus we stand before our doubting age, as David stood before the disillusioned, downcast, despondent Hebrew king, in Robert Browning's splendid poem of "Saul." The word, sought in vain among the glories of nature, among the joys of human intercourse, the word of faith and hope and love and life, comes to us, leaps upon us, flashes through us.

"See the King - I would help him, but cannot, the wishes fall through.

Could I wrestle to raise him from sorrow, grow poor to enrich,

To fill up his life, starve my own out, I would - knowing which,

I know that my service is perfect. Oh, speak through
me now!

Would I suffer for him that I love? So wouldst
Thou so wilt Thou!

So shall crown Thee the topmost, ineffablest, uttermost

crown

And Thy love fill infinitude wholly, nor leave up nor down

One spot for the creature to stand in! It is by no breath,

Turn of eye, wave of hand, that salvation joins issue with death!

As Thy Love is discovered almighty, almighty be proved

Thy power, that exists with and for it, of being beloved!

He who did most, shall bear most; the strongest shall stand the most weak.