in our extremity, and by successive strokes of flattery to bu worship for themselves which should be given to God only

How welcome, then, the appearance of the represen man, who, in reference to this dawning of manhood, is eminently the type of what we ought to be, and the gui what we ought to do. As He will not let men forget that the Son of Man, so He will not have us suppose He has grown the sympathies of His later youth. His history co the temptation in the desert as well as the mount of transfi tion, a fierce fight with the devil as well as the resurrection the grave; and thereby assures His aid when most it is n in the whole education of life. His young manhood mee with sympathy and help just as we go forth to the Armage of our history.

But the representative humanity of Jesus extends to the compass of our life, to its duties and joys, even to its saddes darkest phases, its crushing and agonizing sorrows, an tangled mystery of pain, disappointment, and bereavement. Son of Man was a sufferer by pre-eminence. He took o firmities and bare our sicknesses. Though in the form of He emptied Himself of His glories, and became obedient death, preferring the most painful and ignominious death, that of the cross, rather than commit the slightest infracti the law of God. The Son of Adam did not pass by the c suffering, but in drinking its dregs on the slopes of Olive on the cross, bore away its curse and substituted a benedi cast out its poison and changed it to most nutritious food. suffered being tempted. His brief life was crowded with guish. Sorrowful emotions rolled like tidal waves through heart until they broke it. Grief forced Him to prayer, and impetus to His cries for help. His mind was wrenched pain that no one knew save the Father, and no one save the Son can describe. Since then, such is the more than m influence of the Redeemer, suffering has been seen in a light, and crosses have had a halo of glory that never about a monarch's crown!

As the Son of Man, Jesus claims and exercises the pre tives of a judge and the functions of a king. His peculia

manity gives Him His supreme qualifications for the seat of judgment and the throne of empire. The sinless man has wrestled with the sin of the world and conquered, knows by experience of His own the infirmities and weakness of the flesh, the actual conditions of the conflict in which we are engaged, and is in Himself the standard by which we are to be judged, and therefore "the Father hath committed all judgment unto Him." Because He is the Son of Man He promulgates a new edict concerning the Sabbath, relieves the day of the anathema the Jews had placed upon it, and makes it the minister of the noblest perfection by converting it into the sphere and occasion of purest well-doing. Like a king, also, He dispenses pardons that men may know that the Son of Man hath power on earth to forgive sins; and as such rules in His church: for, when after His ascension He appears on behalf of His kingdom to Stephen, Paul, and John, it is as none other than the Son of Man. The name is, then, fully vindicated and explained by the records of His life. He is our elder brother; and lifted up into fellowship with Him, every member of the race is comforted with a sympathy warm as a mother's love, lasting as the eternal hills, and hopeful as the promises of God. Nothing that is human is alien from Christ. The normal man has raised the dignity of the entire family, sanctified the relations of society, consecrated the lowliest walks of life, made Himself the dear companion and friend of the poor and suffering, and the bright and attractive type of what we should seek to be. Jesus! Saviour! teach us that we may know thy manhood, and help us, that, following thee, we may be more truly men!

The transition is easy from the consideration of the more personal name of Jesus to the official description in the statement that Jesus is the Christ. This, His second name, indicates His relations to the expectations and hopes of Israel, and to the unconscious prophecies of the heathen world. In the thought of the best men of that time the word Christ imaged a heavencommissioned prince, the deliverer of the oppressed people, appearing with satisfactory credentials, and conducting the men of his choice to dignity, freedom, and happiness; a prophet divinely inspired to interpret the mysteries of the past, settle the disputes

s life and the power of His words, that after He had b two days in Sychar many said to the woman, "Now ieve not because of thy saying, for we have heard Him o ves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour - world." Nor did Jesus hold back His claim or speak ab with reserve, except when political fanatics were likely to e their misconceptions into His words, and by using them ir own narrow and earth-born ends, frustrate the spiritu rk He came to perform. No feature of the Saviour's histo more impressive than the transparent honesty with which I countered every one who was bold enough to canvass E ims to the Messiahship set forth in the Old Testament Scri es. He cheerfully submitted to their interrogatory sallie occasionally condescended to reply to men who only ques ned to deride, and inquired to betray. Deception He al red, and the temptation thereto shot from off His pure min a steel point from the polished surface of a diamond. Se sy He rarely sought in His ministry; never from fear of in ry. Impostors court darkness. Honesty and reality love the ht. Deceivers work in shade and gloom. Truth stand th to be seen, handled, and tasted as the word of life. Char anry makes its fervid appeals to impossible tribunals, and asts its claims on criteria that no one can examine. Christity goes at once to the highest court that is in existence at the e of its appearing, and is content to stand or fall by its arrament. Workers in magic put out the light and then usher mselves and their legerdemain on the stage. Christ floods

the whole scene with the light of His presence, and then proclaims with unshaken confidence, "Search amongst my witnesses! Look at my works! Investigate their worth! For which of them do ye stone me? Weigh my character! Who of you convinceth me of sin? Criticise my claims! Look into your Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life, and I affirm that their ungarbled testimony is clearly for me.”

John the Baptist having been in prison for several months, and becoming anxious concerning the establishment of the visible dominion of which he supposed he had been the pioneer, sent two of his disciples to Jesus with the question, "Art thou He that should come, or look we for another?" The reply of Christ claimed the Messiah's office and character on incontestable grounds. "Tell John," said He, "my miracles are wrought amongst the poor in spirit and in goods. I give gladness to the desponding, and joy to the sad. I am the messenger of glad tidings to the people, and blessed is He who is not offended at the mode in which I work, or repulsed by the strongest evidences of my anointing of God." Those works were real, objective, well-attested facts. In gathering crowds they followed the earliest portions of His ministry. Fresh from the conquest of Satan in the wilderness, the proofs of the greatness of His victory accumulated in His repeated destruction of Satan's works. The Jews admitted the reality of His miracles as they did that of the light, were irritated by some of their accidental features, as they might be with the intense heat of a burning sun, and had a rough and sensual method of accounting for the prophet's power, as dishonest men always have of shunting off the line of an uncompromising difficulty. The idea of denying that "mighty deeds did show forth themselves in Him," never entered their minds. They readily confessed His facts, but stoutly quarrelled with His logic. Nevertheless Christ always taught that His miracles were intended to prove that He was sent by the Father, and that they vindicated His claim to be the Messiah. This was Ilis uniform judgment of the value and office of the supernatural in His ministry. Can we allow that claim? Is that judgment just? Let us see. If God the Father sent a being here, endowed with extraordinary powers, and charged to

erings of the hour, would aim chiefly at conferring the m 1 and lasting benefits upon all mankind.

Tow the miracles of Jesus never bear the slightest colori hat blackest vice of the human race-selfishness. His ( prerogrative is not, for so much as a single moment, turn of its beneficent course to gratify any personal vanity, re any personal pleasure. The marvel of Christ's self-r int in the exercise of His irresistible power has impresse t candid minds. And when His omnipotent energies are ex d, they aim with unerring directness to annihilate those fe sources of human misery-the worship of Satan and di t of God, to deliver men from the sophistry of the devil usions, and to unite them with the Saviour and the source nal life. Brethren, is not this the Christ? Do not thes ks of His use of supernatural power prove that He wa inted and sent by the Father? If ever Christ should come He do more miracles, or different miracles from what this did?

But this was not with the Jews the final court of appeal y possessed the oracles of God. The most distinguished ilege of their theocracy was the exclusive claim they had to "word of the Lord." They guarded it with extreme jealas the Magna Charta of their liberties, and the imperishaglory of their decaying nationality. This was the annual ster of their worthies, the album of their warriors, judges, kings, the literature of their wisest and holiest men, and the enance of their spiritual life. No Scripture could compare