have my homage. I have taken the vow of loyalty before thee, and I will not swerve from it,-God help me! These lips are thine for praise, and these hands are thine in service. Son of God, I love thee truly. And, though scorned and hated for thy sake, I will love thee always, and remain an humble servant at thy blessed feet. Yet, I must tell you, gentlemen, that I am connected with Jesus' Gospel, and occupy a prominent place in it. I am the prodigal son of whom Christ spoke, and I am trying to return to my Father in a penitent spirit. Nay, I will say more for the satisfaction and edification of my opponents. I am not Jesus, but I am Judas, that vile man who betrayed Jesus into the hands of his infuriated persecutors. That man's spirit is in me. The veritable Judas, who sinned against truth and Jesus, lodges in my heart. If I honor Jesus, and claim a place among his disciples, is there not another side of my life which is carnal and worldly and sinful? I am Judas-like so far as I love sin. Then tell me not I am trying to exalt myself. No. A prophet's crown sits not on my head. My place is at Jesus' feet. Fear not then, my friends, that a man of conscious sin, one so vile in his own estimation, will covet high prophetic honors. I can assure you that I have done, and will do, all in my power to suppress this hideous lie which would rank me with Jesus and other prophets. If I really meant to be a prophet, I would try another Dispensation where I would find scope for my ambition, another Church where I could establish my mediatorial position and authority. Believe me, every inch of this man is real, tremendously real. If I wanted honor I would say so at once, without the least reservation. There is nothing so good as outspoken

ness and candour. Whatever my shortcomings might be, I have within me that fearless honesty, which regardless of opprobrium, would tell the public what I really felt. Be assured then that my heart doth not delight in vaingloriousness, but seeks the bumble position of a servant at the feet of Jesus and other masters. I may be rhetorical, a little too metaphorical in what I say. You may accuse me of indulging freely in the poetry of religion. Perhaps it is the Asiatic's fault. The east is the land of poetry. Our literature is all imagery, our language allegory. Almost instinctively these oriental mations talk in parables. And did not Christ Jesus. speak in parables? If I use metaphor, surely you have no right to construe it in its literal sense. You are bound to take my words in the exact sense in which I employ them. But the fact is otherwise. If I say, "I have seen God," you would rush to the inference that I saw a shining light in the heavens with my outward eyes, and you characterize my Godvision as mere imagination! And when I say "I sat with Moses and Jesus," behold, you run and proclaim unto the world I have seen two human figures or rather their ghosts! You would misconstrue a plain piece of poetry, and then ridicule it as a fact of life. Ah! it is the Eastern passion for metaphor, the vein of poetry so characteristic of oriental nations that has caused such misapprehension. Let not poetry mislead you. Ye unimaginative critics, do not confound the spirit with the letter. Show that you are intelligent and honest enough to call a metaphor a metaphor. Do not say I soar into the sky and work miracles in the spiritworld! I make no pretension to supernaturalism. Take me, gentlemen, at my worth. It would be a scandal and a lie to hold me up as the Prophet of

the New Dispensation. My individuality is lost in the community that forms my Church. This dispensation will not tolerate any form of egotism. It hides me in my brother-apostles. It conceals and absorbs the singular in the plural. We are lost in each other, and all distinctive personality is merged in the unity of the common Church. If I speak now, it must be in the name of my Church, the united fraternity of the Apostles of the new gospel. It will probably be said that each dispensation has a central personality, and that, therefore, willingly or unwillingly, I must permit myself to be treated as a Moses or a Chaitanya. Let me tell you that this seems impossible. For we represent a new dispensation. Its distinguishing feature is its immediacy, its denial of a mediator. While other dispensations have their special mediatorial agencies between God and a sinful world, here we have no such thing, no intercessor, no mediator. None of my fellowbelievers takes God at second-hand, but would go direct to Him for light and salvation thinking it wrong to rely upon me or any one else for intercession. The humblest sinner bases his supplication for Divine mercy upon the merits of no saint or martyr, but upon the merits of the Lord alone. In the immediate presence of the Deity, the least among us daily seeks eternal life. Upon every Theist the new gospel imposes the inviolable vow of direct worship. This is the peculiarity of the present dispensation, and in this more perhaps than in anything else, it differs from all other dispensations. There is indeed no place for a prophet-mediator in this dispensation. Why shall I then be accused of harbouring in my mind the mean ambition which the new dispensation so thoroughly interdicts ? Then no more. Enough. We have had en

ough of this accusation and impeachment. My infatuated critics and cruel persecutors will, however, still perhaps go on, and would not stop. Already they have broken my bones and caused my heart to bleed, and often and often, at their hands, have I suffered deep and unutterable agony. For nearly a quarter of a century have I suffered persecution and calumny, and who can deny the shades in the picture of my life are awfully dark and very dismal? Quietly have I endured life's numerous trials, and, thank God, they have greatly contributed to my education and discipline. Do not tell me the honor which the world has given me has turned my head. If honor has turned my head one way, my sorrows and trials have turned it the other way; so that somehow Providence has managed to keep my head in equilibrium. I have shared honor and dishonor, popularity and unpopularity, exaltation and humiliation, and amid these ups and downs of life, I am firm and steady in the safe-keeping of Providence. Be not afraid. God is with us. Some time ago, in Northern India, I was conversing with one of the most pious Christian officials in the land, now an ex-Lieutenant-Governor. In the course of the conversation he looked at me seriously and calmly for some moments, and said-What is it that makes you look so healthy and cheerful? Is it because you have a contented soul? The question took me by surprise, and somewhat confounded me, and I think I was not able to answer it quite satisfactorily. I have since thought over the incident, and the question has recurred to me again and again. There is evidently something in me which suggests this question, and I thank God for it. There is a native buoyancy in my soul which prevents its sinking in the sea of trial, and enables it with

me.

God's grace to rise triumphantly above the billows of danger and difficulty. Amid the dark clouds of trial and tribulation the soul's sunshine often cheers My daily prayer makes my life sweet amid the untold bitternesses which beset me. In my faith I am truly happy. In communion is the secret of my joy. So sweet is my God, that I cannot but feel very happy in Him. Though I cry, He is sure to make me smile. Yes, the world would make me a man of sorrow, but my beloved Father makes me unspeakably happy in the sweet faith He has vouchsafed unto me. Bless Him then, O my soul, who has made thee truly happy! A word of praise I must also offer unto the blessed Son of God, for he too has made me what I am. His sacrificial blood, freely given unto a wicked world, has gone into my lifeblood. While I was in the mother's womb I drank that precious blood, and grew in stature and strength. Let me remark by the way, I speak metaphorically. That is to say, I was born to learn and practise forbearance, of which Jesus furnished so eminent an example. Forbear and forgive, that was the watchword of Christ's life, and those who have drunk his spirit cannot but enjoy the sweetness of forgiving love. If numberless enemies surround you in the battle-field of life, the best way of vanquishing them is to do what Jesus did,-pray for them, for they know not what they do. Surely you can afford to smile at those puny hands which are trying to take the citadel of truth by storm. The soldiers of God must not joke. You must not indulge in the pastime of "destroying mosquitoes with heavy artillery." We have more serious things to attend to in life. We have to deal with eternal verities. Let us think of him who delighted not in resenting enmity, but who, though cruelly reviled, persecuted