It would appear, then, that they are called to a high but dangerous vocation, abounding in opportunities on the one hand, and dangers on the other. The principle of probation, which applies to all men, has for them an application altogether special, and they, even more than members of society in general, require to drink of that water which whosoever drinketh of, he shall never thirst again.* The force of all these considerations is enhanced by the unequivocal tendency of the present, and probably also the coming, time, both to multiply the functions of government and to carry them into regions formerly reserved to the understanding and conscience of the individual, so that their risks are greatly enhanced, together with their rewards for fruitfulness in well-doing. The alternative opened for them by the choice between good and evil is one of tremendous moment. True it is that the New Testament deals in but scanty bulk with the specialties of their profession; but not less true that it sheds for their benefit a whole flood of light on the virtues of humility, charity, justice, and moral courage, without which their profession is but a snare, and promises to them in its earnest and, if possible, systematic perusal, the richest results of a happy experience.

I have referred to the vast multiplication of copies of the Sacred Scriptures through Bible societies and otherwise. If we turn to other portions of the Christian fold than those principally concerned with Bible societies, we must not forget to observe that free and full circulation of the Holy Scriptures was the rule and practice of the entire Christian Church, until in the course of

*John iv. 14.

the sixteenth century jealousies due to the controversies of the time produced, as it would appear, a change of policy in the Latin Church. I have myself purchased in Athens a cheap copy of the tract of St. Chrysostom, in which he presses upon the laity the study of the Holy Bible, and contests the arguments of those indisposed to forward it. This tract was published with the countenance of the Archbishop. I also possess a beautiful copy of the Gospels and Acts without note or comment in a pocket size, printed at Venice in 1544, and another of the same character, also printed at Venice in 1536; both of them without note or comment. In truth, the amount of diffusion of the sacred volume from the era of the invention of printing down to the Reformation is even astonishing. They were translated and printed in almost every European tongue, except the Russian. I find from my learned friend Dr. Ginsburg, that Germany had no less than sixteen complete versions. In France the Versions and Epitomes, taken together, amounted to twenty. England lagged deplorably, and had nothing before Tyndale for the great work of Wycliffe was never printed until half of the nineteenth century had gone by. We must hope that the appreciation of the teaching and feeding efficacy of the Bible is increasing; and that any jealousies associated either with the grave difficulties of translation, or with the possibility that perverse minds may now treat the sacred books as the Epistles of St. Paul were treated in the Apostolic age, are being gradually abated. Why should the dutiful perusal of the Bible raise any apprehension on behalf of the Church, or Kingdom of God, which is exhibited with so much force in important portions of the Old Testament, and set forth, or

presupposed, in almost every page of the New? Does it not seem that God has consigned to us a double witness in the living voice which proclaims that Word throughout the world, and in the unalterable record which provides for maintaining the harmony between that living human voice and the Divine purpose? Not, indeed, that the Bible has either converted the world, or saved Christianity from all error and corruption, any more than it has saved Christians from all sin. But, of the actual faith and love that subsist in the Christian heart, despite the world, the flesh, and the devil, who can doubt that, over and above the corrective action of the Bible, there is a vast portion due to the direct influence, most of all perhaps among English-speaking peoples, of its words upon heart and life?

"Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away." As they have lived and wrought, so they will live and work. From the teacher's chair and from the pastor's pulpit; in the humblest hymn that ever mounted to the ear of God from beneath a cottage roof, and in the rich melodious choir of the noblest cathedral, "their sound is gone out into all lands, and their voices unto the ends of the world." * Nor here alone, but in a thousand silent and unsuspected forms, will they unweariedly prosecute their holy office. Who doubts that, times without number, particular portions of Scripture find their way to the human soul as if embassies from on high, each with its own commission of comfort, of guidance, or of warning? What crisis, what trouble, what perplexity of life has failed or can fail to draw from this inexhaustible treasure

*Ps. xix. 4.

house its proper supply? What profession, what position is not daily and hourly enriched by these words which repetition never weakens, which carry with them the freshness of youth and immortality? When the solitary student opens all his heart to drink them in, they will reward his toil. And in forms yet more hidden and withdrawn, in the retirement of the chamber, in the stillness of the night season, upon the bed of sickness, and in the face of death, the Bible will be there, its several words how often winged with their several and special messages, to heal and to soothe, to uplift and uphold, to invigorate and stir. Nay, more perhaps than this; amid the crowds of the court, or the forum, or the street, or the market-place, when every thought of every soul seems to be set upon the excitements of ambition or of business or of pleasure, there too, even there, the still small voice of the Holy Bible will be heard, and the soul, aided by some blessed word, may find wings like a dove, may flee away and be at rest.

XIII.

SOLILOQUIUM AND POSTSCRIPT.

I. SOLILOQUIUM.

May, 1896.

[The following paper, by MR. GLADSTONE, was communicated by HIS GRACE THE ARCHBISHOP OF YORK to the London newspapers, with a request for its publication.]

THE question of the validity of Anglican Orders might seem to be of limited interest if it were only to be treated by the amount of any immediate, practical, and external consequences likely to follow upon any discussion or decision that might now be taken in respect to it. For the clergy of the Anglican communions, numbering between 30,000 and 40,000, and for their flocks, the whole subject is one of settled solidity. In the Oriental Churches there prevails a sentiment of increased and increasing friendliness towards the Anglican Church, but no question of actual intercommunion is likely at present to arise, while, happily, no system of proselytism exists to set a blister on our mutual relations. In the Latin Church, which from its magnitude and the close tissue of its organization overshadows all Western Christendom, these Orders, so far as they have been noticed, have been commonly disputed, or denied, or