mature; let the busy cells in orderly diligence do their appointed work, let them have time to absorb the nutritive elements of earth, and air, and sky; in due season the Apple tree of the garden will meet you with its sudden smile of blossom, the Hawthorn will deck herself in virgin whiteness before your eyes, the Laburnum reach down her clusters of living gold, the Chestnut hold up to heaven its innumerable silver censers, unseen clouds of incense its offering unto God for a sweet smelling savour. Bud, blossom, fruit; in their season; the joy and crown of the year! The Trees of the Lord are full of sap that they may glorify Him with their fruit! "A certain man had a Fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came and sought fruit thereon and found none. Then said he unto the dresser of his vineyard, Behold these three years I come seeking fruit on this Fig tree and find none, cut it down, why cumbereth it the ground?" The application of all this is plain. Is the professing Christian without any fruit of any kind? he has a name to live, but he is dead! Sailing up some of the Scottish lochs on a summer day, and while still at a considerable distance from the shore, the eye is sometimes regaled by what seems thereon the most exquisite tree scenery brightening up and making glorious the dark waters. This as seen at a distance: approaching the shore, and trusting to enjoy still more the lovely vision, what is the surprise and disappointment to find nothing but bare rock, moss-grown stones, dry heather! Whence the illusion? The sun shining out from the fringe of a cloud in a peculiar state of the atmosphere makes all the loveliness: come near to it and there is nothing but the cold bare rock. Like this bare rock, the merely nominal professor may to the observer from a distance (and the nearest can but look from a distance) be "green before the sun," but let the glamour and the gleam which this cast over it be dispelled and it is seen to be all illusion. The sunlight is there, it but withers; the rains fall, only to fall off the bare rock.

It is not all thus: there is the blessed other side. The truly Christian man, the truly spiritual man is a tree of life, bringing forth his fruit in his season, yea, at all seasons; like those trees of which travellers tell, from whose branches all the year round

you may pluck and eat; like that Tree of Life of which the Seer of Patmos tells, the tree which bare twelve manner of fruits and yielded her fruit every month and the leaves for the healing of the nations. The true Christian is a tree of righteousness, and the fruit of the righteous is a tree of life.

3. Beauty, gracefulness, symmetry of parts, proportion. How often we have remarked during the past few weeks what a beautiful object is a tree, its branches swaying in the wind, while every leaf is quivering to the quivering twig, or standing so silently that we could say it slept. In motion, we are captivated with the measured movements of its branches, movements that tell us something of the mystery of the "rhythmic music of the universe"; at rest, we delight ourselves with the order of its parts, the symmetry of its form, the unity of the perfect whole. It is the same with every kind of tree, whether those "trees of God" that raise themselves aloft and seem to seek communion with a higher world, or those more humble ones under the grateful shade of which even prophets have laid themselves down to rest; whether they be those whose dense foliage defies the mid-day sun, or those whose every leaf casts back its shining; whether it be the giant trunk with its great "rounded mass of green," or the slender stem with tapering branch and twig. In all there is the gladness of beauty.

Is there anything here of spiritual suggestion, of spiritual teaching, anything to let us see what manner of men our Maker and Redeemer expects us to become? God delights in the beautiful, else why so many forms of it from His Hands? He is not content with life and growth and fruit, He must have beauty as well; and should we be content till in our experience also we realise it? Let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us. How many unlovely Christians there are! How much that mars the fair face of their religion! Suppose the trees had put out their branches only on one side, leaving the other side unsightly and bare, or suppose they had been wanting in their rounded or tapering completeness, how much less attractive they had been. It is so with many Christian men, they grow all on one side, they are beautiful only at one place. Kind to their families and

friends, ready to help in every good work, but hasty and rude and intemperate in speech; busy at religious meetings and such like, and truly sincere and devout, but not very scrupulous about the truth, and not backward in driving a hard bargain; the very soul of honour and integrity, along with a moody and ungovernable temper and pride almost after the measure of a demon's; devotion to the cause of Christ, which must have its own way, and which if it does not have its own way flings down its tools and sulks and will not work. Looking upon these men only on the one side we say, how beautiful they are; pity that when we come to see them nearer at hand and all round, there is so much of the unbeautiful, the unlovely, the unbecoming which mars our delight.

It is not so with many. There are Christian men and women not a few whose lives can only best be characterised when we call them lovely; so full of harmony they are, so free in obedience to highest law. We are drawn to them by an instinct we cannot resist; in them and upon them we see the beauty of the Lord. We feel that they must have been often and long in the presence of Him who is chief among ten thousand and altogether lovely, and that they have carried away with them the reflection of the glory of His Face. These, to keep to the figure of the text, are the Trees of Righteousness, the planting of the Lord by which He is glorified.

II. THE LESSONS FROM THE CHARACTERISTICS PECULIAR TO SOME TREES.

1. This one to begin with, for example, that every tree has its own peculiar quality, in virtue of which it differs from every other that every individual Christian, every man, has his own peculiar quality in virtue of which he differs, is meant to differ from every other.

:

Looking out upon the Trees in the winter-time, when everything is bare, we see little or nothing of these peculiarities, nothing but the most general features. Wait till the summer has clothed each after its kind with the raiment fit for it! How the colour deepens into the darkest green in the sombre pine, and how it changes by undistinguishable gradation of tint to the most delicate shade in the Scotch Fir: how again, the form comes

out, rounded, massive, slender, dispread; in what diverse ways sending forth, or holding up their branches, each after its own special kind. Here is one-the Poplar-running up its branches almost parallel with the main stem, and every tiniest twig following the same law; and here is another-the Oak-sending out its huge boughs almost at right angles to the main trunk, as if it would show how it defies gravitation and the tempest at the same time. Here is one-the Birch-slender, dispread, sensitive in its every twig and leaf to the gentlest breeze, and here is another the Chestnut-with its "green cloud" of leaves-a massive totality, patient, impressive, calm. Here is one-the Elm-lofty, many branched, holding its great sunshade over our heads; and here is another-the Willow-with its graceful downward droop of branches, contented still to droop. In the Oak strength and endurance; in the Poplar and Birch delicacy and sensitiveness; in the Chestnut full-sounded harmony; in the Elm lofty grandeur; in the Pine grave austerity; for as star differeth from star, so tree differeth from tree in character and glory.

And so in like manner, though in the Church of the living God, this Forest of His Carmel, all be Trees of Righteousness, yet has each of them its own characteristic, and each of them room for the exercise of its own special activity. There is room for Paul and his profound devotion, for Apollos and his eloquence, John and his contemplativeness, Peter and his restless zeal. There is room for the guilelessness of Nathanael, the humility of Philip, the martyr spirit of Stephen, and the righteousness of James. There is room for Lydia and her hospitality, the churches of Achaia and their liberality, the early missionaries and their enthusiasm, the defenders of the faith with their learning, the devout women with their prayers. Or, if you would prefer to go back to that ancient forest where the trees of God, full of sap, stand up to sunlight, and you see their scars as well as their glory, you will find there the faithfulness of faithful Abraham, the gentleness of Isaac, the purity of Joseph; there the meekness of Moses, the courage of Joshua, the integrity of Samuel, the passionate devotion of David; there the wisdom of Solomon, the fire of Elijah, the mingled passion and pathos of Isaiah and of

Jeremiah, the impetuous vehemence of Ezekiel, the seer of visions, and the sage counsellings of Daniel the interpreter of dreams.

2. Special work. This thought is implied, has been anticipated in what has just been said. If we have been endowed with special gifts and graces it is that these may come out in special work; if we have what nobody else has, it is that we may do what nobody else can. Generally true as it is that trees in the mass are of great use in the economy of nature; in the modification of climate for example, or in their effect upon animal existence: it is also specially true that individual trees have their own peculiar ways of producing these results. So true is this of one of them, the Pine tree, that it has been singled out as having been providentially created to teach the great spiritual lesson of individual work. A very special quality of the Pine tree is to send its roots, not downwards as others that require depth of earth, but obliquely, where if it but get a hold it will live. But in this special quality there is the special work: to be a covert, a protection to the rich harvests that are to be reaped behind their friendly shade.

And so in the forests of God, among the trees there, there is special work for special gifts. Some are more fitted for the maintenance and defence of moral purity and sound doctrine, others for the more private comforting and building up of weak or wavering seekers after God, and others still for the promotion of true piety among the young. Well, this is the work which God has given, because He has fitted them to do. Each has his gift; each has his work.

3. But one word with regard to the special lesson which the words of the text so specially teach,—the lesson of worship,—the homage of the creature to the great Creator of all. The Hebrew mind saw nothing out of the way, nothing incongruous in the worship of the Trees. In his ascriptions of praise he calls upon the "fruitful trees and all Cedars," yea, all the trees of the field to rejoice before the Lord. To the Hebrew the stars rayed forth the glory of the Lord, and the everlasting hills bowed themselves down before the God of the whole earth; the voice of the Lord was upon the waters, His way was in the deep, and His path in