universal rule. It says to the individual Christian: "Your liberty in this matter ought not to be interfered with. So far as the Church is concerned it shall not be interfered with. The Church counsels for you temperance-that is, self-control. But at the same time it advises you that, if in any case you are persuaded that giving up your own liberty will clearly benefit another man, you ought to sacrifice it without hesitation. But then it says: "You must yourself be the judge as to whether the sacrifice of your liberty will help another man. You must be the judge.

You must not allow the conscience of your weak brother to judge for you. His conscience may be as weak as his pity is strong."

Still further, the Master provides the Church as an institution wherein the weak are to be kept up to the standard by the counsel, example, and moral stimulus of those who are stronger. He furnishes the sacraments of the Church, the divine channels of the Holy Spirit, as the means whereby additional strength is vouchsafed to the wills of tempted men. Probably no two men ever lived whose opinions upon the matter are of more value than those of Father Mathew and John B. Gough. They both declared over and over again that recovery from the habit of drunkenness is scarcely to be looked for or expected apart from religion and religious institutions. Father Mathew led his reformed drunkards to the chancel rail, and had them take the vow of temper

ance before the altar. Mr. Gough tried to awaken in each a profound, conscious, religious experience. Both alike fastened the idea of reform to the idea of religion. Only thus, they both declared, was it likely to be safe and to work out good results.

But the thing with which I am concerned just now is not primarily the best method of reforming drunkards, but to ascertain and state what is the law for the ordinary Christian as to the use of drink. There can be no better and shorter formula devised than to say: In this, as in all things else, he should follow the example of his Master, Christ. It will be enough if he follow in His footsteps. It will not be necessary and will hardly be safe for him to try to go beyond or improve upon either the teaching or the practice!

of Jesus.

XXXIII.

THE GOSPEL FOR THE POOR.

"Jesus answered and said unto them, Go and show Jobn those things wbicb ye see: ... the poor bare the gospel preached unto them."-MATTHEW xi. 4, 5.

JOHN THE BAPTIST, lying in the dungeon of a wretched prison and pondering upon the cause which had brought him there, begins to question either the power or the good will of his master, Christ. Thereupon he sends messengers to say to Him: "If You are, indeed, all that I have supposed, what of me? Have You forgotten me? or is the programme which You announced, and which I have been the first to attempt to carry into effect, an impossible programme?" Jesus' reply was a very strange one. He bids the messengers look about them and return to the Baptist and tell him what they had seen. The most striking thing which they saw was that a message of good news was being told to the

poor.

The most common and most widely diffused form of pain in this world is poverty. It is the prolific mother of an innumerable brood of ills. From it spring physical pain, mental distress,

starvation of the affections-a thousand other misfortunes. God spreads a feast in this world for all, but the weak, the foolish, the unfortunate, cannot get to the table. One who is strong snatches his own portion, and that of a dozen others, and the dozen thus robbed go hungry. In their distress they cry out: "Art Thou He that should come, or do we look for another? Is the Gospel of Christ really the last word of comfort to the poor?"

Never did poverty appear so hard as it does to-day. This is not so much because there is more of it, there is probably less of it,-but it hurts more than it ever did before. Every poor man lives to-day in plain sight of the luxuries and pleasures of the rich. A century ago he lived out of sight of them. Then, the poor man's sensibilities have grown in quickness, as have the sensibilities of all men. Besides that, we live in a commercial age. Wealth is the standard of success. The poor man feels not only the lack of physical necessities, but he suffers in his soul with the burning, shameful sense of being a failure. It requires a rare spirit to even sympathize with Professor Agassiz when he said: "I have no time to make money." The absence of social rank or caste makes poverty harder to bear than it has been at other times. Being fixed in a poor caste has its compensations. It enables such a poor man to live according to the custom of his caste. In America there is no

such protection. At any rate, all will agree that there never has been a time when the problem of poverty has so exercised the minds of men as it has to-day. How is it to be solved? Has Christ anything to say in the premises? Many roundly assert either that He has no answer to give, or that His answer is a mockery. Secular science is in the habit of assuming that this is a social question which comes among her perquisites, and is rather inclined to warn the Church off the the premises.

What, then, is the Gospel of Christ for the poor? Before attempting to state it briefly, I would like to call your attention for a moment to the non-Christian gospels which have been promulgated. These are mainly two. Neither of them is satisfactory. The first is the purely economical one. It says that poverty is not natural, but artificial; that it is the consequence of vicious laws and customs; that these laws and customs have either grown up or been established in the interest of the rich; that the cure for existing evils is some better and more equitable mode of distribution-by law, if possible; by force, if necessary. It is probable that a majority of the voters in this country feel more or less in this way. It would be very shortsighted not to take account of this widespread feeling. Carlyle says: "Once upon a time a man named Rousseau wrote a book upon the subject and called it the 'Social Contract.' When it appeared the well