wrong. See then, why and how the Church absolves.

She only exercises that power which belongs to every son of man. If society were Christian-if society, by its forgiveness and its exclusion, truly represented the mind of God— there would be no necessity for a Church to speak; but the absolution of society and the world does not represent by any means God's forgiveness. Society absolves those whom God has not absolved-the proud, the selfish, the strong, the seducer; society refuses return and acceptance to the seduced, the frail, and the sad penitent, whom God has accepted; therefore it is necessary that a selected body, through its appointed organs, should do in the name of man what man, as such, does not. The Church is the ideal of Humanity. It represents what God intended man to bewhat man is in God's sight as beheld in Christ by Him; and the minister of the Church speaks as the representative of that ideal humanity. Church absolution is an eternal protest, in the name of God the Absolver, against the false judgments of society.

One thing more. Beware of making this a dead formula. If absolution be not a living truth, it becomes a monstrous falsehood: if you take absolution as a mystical gift conveyed to an individual man called a priest, and mysteriously efficacious in his lips, and his alone, you petrify a truth into death and unreality. I have been striving to show that absolution is not a Church figment, invented by priestcraft, but a living, blessed, human power. It is a power delegated to you and to me, and just so far as we exercise it lovingly and wisely, in our lives, and with our lips, we help men away from sin: just so far as we do not exercise it, or exercise it falsely, we drive men to Rome. For if the heart cannot have a truth it will take a counterfeit of truth. By every magnanimous act, by every free forgiveness with which a pure man forgives, or pleads for mercy, or assures the penitent, he proclaims this truth, that "the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins"-he exhibits the priestly power of humanity-he does absolve; let theology say what it will of absolution, he gives peace to the con

science he is a type and assurance of what God is-he breaks the chains and lets the captive go free.

THE RESTORATION OF THE ERRING

GALATIANS vi. 1, 2.-" Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ."

It would be a blessed thing for our Christian society if we could contemplate sin from the same point of view from which Christ and His apostles saw it. But in this matter society is ever oscillating between two extremes, undue laxity and undue severity.

In one age of the Church, the days of Donatism for instance, men refuse the grace of repentance to those who have erred: holding that baptismal privileges once forfeited cannot be got back: that for a single distinct lapse there is no restoration.

In another age, the Church, having found out its error, and discovered the danger of setting up an impossible standard, begins to confer periodical absolutions and plenary indulgences, until sin, easily forgiven, is as easily committed. And so too with societies and legislatures. In one period puritanism is dominant and morals severe. There are no small faults. The statute-book is defiled with the red mark of blood, set opposite innumerable misdemeanors. In an age still earlier, the destruction of a wild animal is punished like the murder of a man. Then in another period we have such a medley of sentiments and sickliness that we have lost all our bearings, and cannot tell what is vice and what is goodness. Charity and toleration degenerate into that feeble dreaminess which refuses to be roused by stern views of life.

VOL. II.

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This contrast too, may exist in the same age, nay, in the same individual. One man gifted with talent, or privileged by rank, outrages all decency: the world smiles, calls it eccentricity, forgives and is very merciful and tolerant. Then some one unshielded by these advantages, endorsed neither by wealth nor birth, sins-not to one-tenth, nor one ten-thousandth part of the same extent: society is seized with a virtuous indignation-rises up in wrath-asks what is to become of the morals of the community if these things. are committed: and protects its proprieties by a rigorous exclusion of the offender, cutting off the bridge behind him against his return for ever.

Now the Divine Character of the New Testament is shown in nothing more signally than in the stable ground from which it views this matter, in comparison with the shifting and uncertain standing-point from whence the world sees it. It says, never retracting nor bating, "The wages of sin is death." It speaks sternly with no weak sentiment, "Go, sin no more, lest a worse thing happen unto thee.' But then it accepts every excuse, admits every palliation : looks upon this world of temptation and these frail human hearts of ours, not from the cell of a monk or the study of a recluse, but in a large, real way: accepts the existence of sin as a fact, without affecting to be shocked or startled: assumes that it must needs be that offences come, and deals with them in a large noble way, as the results of a disease which must be met, should be cured, and can.

I. The Christian view of other men's sin.

II. The Christian power of restoration.

I. The first thing noticeable in the apostle's view of sin is, that he looks upon it as if it might be sometimes the result of a surprise. "If a man be overtaken in a fault.” In the original, anticipated, taken suddenly in front. As if circumstances had been beforehand with the man: as if sin, supposed to be left far behind, had on a sudden got in front, tripped him up, or led him into ambush.

All sins are not of this character. There are some which

are in accordance with the general bent of our disposition: and the opportunity of committing them was only the first occasion for manifesting what was in the heart: so that if they had not been committed then they probably would or must have been at some other time, and looking back to them we have no right to lay the blame on circumstances— we are to accept the penalty as a severe warning meant to show what was in our hearts.

There are other sins of a different character. It seems as if it were not in us to commit them. They were so to speak unnatural to us: you were going quietly on your way, thinking no evil, suddenly temptation, for which you were not prepared, presented itself, and before you knew where you were, you were in the dust, fallen.

As for instance, when a question is suddenly put to a man which never ought to have been put, touching a secret of his own or another's. Had he the presence of mind or adroitness, he might turn it aside, or refuse to reply. But being unprepared and accosted suddenly, he says hastily that which is irreconcileable with strict truth: then to substantiate and make it look probable, misrepresents or invents something else: and so he has woven round himself a mesh which will entangle his conscience through many a weary day and many a sleepless night.

It is shocking, doubtless, to allow ourselves even to admit that this is possible: yet no one knowing human nature from men and not from books, will deny that this might befall even a brave and true man. St. Peter was both: yet this was his history. In a crowd, suddenly, the question was put directly, "This man also was with Jesus of Nazareth." Then a prevarication-a lie; and yet another. This was a sin of surprise. He was overtaken in a fault.

Every one of us admits the truth of this in his own case. Looking back to past life, he feels that the errors which have most terribly determined his destiny were the result of mistake. Inexperience, a hasty promise, excess of trust, incaution, nay, even a generous devotion, have been fearfully, and as it seems to us, inadequately chastised. There may

be some undue tenderness to ourselves when we thus palliate the past: still a great part of such extenuation is only justice.

Now the Bible simply requires that we should judge others by the same rule by which we judge ourselves. The law of Christ demands that what we plead in our own case, we should admit in the case of others. Believe that in this or that case which you judge so harshly, the heart in its deeps did not consent to sin, nor by preference love what is hateful: simply admit that such an one may have been overtaken in a fault. This is the large law of Charity. 1. Again, the apostle considers fault as that which has left a burden on the erring spirit. "Bear ye one another's

burdens."

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For we cannot say to the laws of God I was overtaken. We live under stern and unrelenting laws, which permit no excuse and never hear of a surprise. They never send a man who has failed once, back to try a second chance. There is no room for a mistake; you play against them for your life and they exact the penalty inexorably, "Every man must bear his own burden." Every law has its own appropriate penalty: and the wonder of it is that often the severest penalty seems set against the smallest transgression: we suffer more for our vices than our crimes: we pay dearer for our imprudences than even for our deliberate wickedness.

Let us examine this a little more closely. One burden laid on fault, is that chain of entanglement which seems to drag down to fresh sins. One step necessitates many others. One fault leads to another, and crime to crime. The soul gravitates downward beneath its burden. It was profound knowledge indeed which prophetically refused to limit Peter's sin to once. "Verily I say unto thee.. thou shalt deny Me thrice."

We will try to describe that sense of burden. A fault has the power sometimes of distorting life till all seems hideous and unnatural. A man who has left his proper nature, and seems compelled to say and do things un