not, like

voys, and

under

with im

and circum

stance,

WHEN king's send out ambassadors to repre- God doth sent their person and their interests in foreign men, fit courts, they choose out from amongst the out his enpeople, men of high name and reputation, set forth his well skilled in the ways of the world, and the takings, policy of states; whom, having clothed with posing pomp powers plenipotentiary, and appointed with officers and servants of every kind, they send forth, accredited with royal letters to all court's and kingdoms, whither they may come, furnished with grace and splendour to feast the common eye, and laden with rich gifts to take the cupidity or conciliate the favour of those with whom they have to do. Also, when a or with nation fitteth out a journey or voyage of dis- help. covery, as we now do to the Polar Seas (which, as it is the third time, may it be blessed with threefold success!), they choose out men of fortitude, humanity and skill, upon whom to bestow a valorous and steady crew, who wil not be daunted by the dangers, nor baffled by the difficulties of the work; and having called in the whole science and art of the country, to fortify and accommodate the danger-hunting men, they launch them forth amidst the hearty cheers and benedictions of their country. And

scientific

or with mighty and terrible

preparation;

but

chooseth

when a nation arrayeth its strength to battle for its ancient rights and dominions; or when a noble nation armeth in the cause of humanity to help an insulted sister in the day of her need, as we Britons have oft been called upon to do, the nation is shaken to her very centre with commotion, and every arm and sinew of the land straineth to the work. Fleets and armies, and munitions of war; the whole chivalry, the whole prowess, strength and policy, and oft, the whole wealth of the land muster in the cause; and the chief captains forsake their wives and children, and peaceful homes; and the warlike harness is taken from the hall where it hung in peace; and the bold peasantry come trooping from their altars and their household hearths; and

the trumpet speaketh to the armed throng:" they gather into one, and descend unto the shores of the surrounding sea, whither every fleet ship and gallant sailor have made ready to bear them to the place where the rights of the nation, or the insulted rights of humanity cry upon their righteous arm for redress:and their kinsmen follow them with their prayers, and their wives and children, their fathers, and the households of their fathers, with the assembled congregations, of the people, commit them and their righteous cause to the safe conduct and keeping of the Lord of Hosts.

But, when the King of Heaven sendeth men of no forth these twelve ambassadors to the nations,

condition,

fitteth out these discoverers of the people that sat in darkness and the shadow of death, and furnisheth forth this little army to subvert the thrones, dominions, principalities and powers of darkness which brooded over the degenerate earth, to bring forth the lost condition of humanity, and establish its crown of glory as at the first; he took men of no name nor reputation, endowed with no Greek, with no Roman fame, by science untaught, by philosophy unschooled, fishermen from the shores of an inland sea; the class of men, which of all classes is distinguished for no exploit in the story of the world; Galileans, a people despised of the Jews, who were themselves a despised people. As at first, when God wished to make a man in his own image, after his own likeness, he brought not the materials from heavenly regions, neither created a finer quintessence of matter for the high occasion, but took from the ground a handful of dust, thereon to impress his divine image, and thereinto to breathe the spirit of lives: so the Son of God, himself a servant, despised and rejected of men, when he chose vessels to bear his name before Gentiles and Kings, and the Children of Israel, preferred that they should be empty of human greatness, without any grace or comeliness in the sight of man, without any odour of a good name, or rich contents of learning or knowledge:-that the treasure being in earthen vessels, the praise might be of God. Such men having chosen, for subverting the

C

Interdicteth

pendencies;

ancient thrones of darkness, and recovering the them from world from the perdition of sin and the night of natural de- the grave, he sent them forth, destitute of all visible sustenance, and of all human help, and forbade them to be beholden unto any. "Take nothing for your journey; neither staves nor scrip, neither bread, neither money, neither have two coats a-piece: Provide neither gold nor silver, nor brass, in your purses, nor scrip for your journey, neither have two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves, and salute no man by the way." No means of any sort did he permit for procuring the necessaries of life, or purchasing the helps of their journey; no store of provisions, nor even a scrip for containing what might be offered them by the pity or piety of the people: No raiment nor vesture, with the change of which to comfort their weary and way-worn limbs, besides what was sufficient for nature's modesty and her present necessity. Without staff, without shoes, they fared on their way two by two; their sandalled feet exposed to dust and sultry heat; their bodies to every blast of heaven; their natural wants to man's precarious charity. The most defenceless bird that flies athwart the heavens, the weakest, most persecuted beast that cowers beneath the covert, or scuds along the plain, are better provided with visible help than were these Apostles of the Highest; for the birds of the air have nests to which to wing their flight at even-tide, and the beasts of the earth have holes wherein to screen

themselves from pursuit; but the founders of the spiritual and everlasting kingdom had not where to lay their head.

them off

Whom having thus divided from there and cutteth sources which human weakness hath in the store- from the house and armoury of nature, he next divided help of man, from the resources which she hath in the power and patronage and friendship of men. They are to compose no speeches for the ears of prince or governor, but to speak as the Spirit of Truth gave them utterance; they are not to go from house to house making friends against the evil day, but to abide where they first halted, so long as they are welcome; they are not even to salute a friend, acquaintance, or neighbour by the way. And if, in spite of these preventions, it should come to pass that the people they conferred with, well disposed to them for their word's sake, should take pity upon their unprovided estate, and offer them money to help them on their way; lo, they have no purse for containing it! if they should offer them provision to be their viaticum from town to town; lo, they have no scrip wherein to bestow it! They cannot possess, they cannot accumulate, they are cut off and separate from all fixed and moveable wealth which the world holdeth within its fair and ample bound. What will preserve life, they are to take upon the credit of their universal message, without feeling obligation, for the labourer is worthy of his meat, and they are wholly obliged to another cause. Inno earthly