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IX.]

THE GOOD SIDE OF HIS CHARACTER.

151

you do not want words to tell you that you must hate it; your impulse, and it is a right one, is to do so. But there may be in the most ruffianly and brutal characters, not merely strength, not merely a clear distinct purpose and a steadiness in following it out-qualities worthy of all admiration, wheresoever and in whomsoever they are foundbut along with these an intense hatred of hypocrisy, a determination to put it down, not for selfish ends, but because it is hateful; which determination is good and inspired by God. The Scripture teaches us to confess this, and by so doing, clears, not confuses, all our ethical conceptions and judgments. We do meet with these characters in the worldcharacters with something devilish lying close beside something which is really divine. And though the devilish is the obtrusive, and may become the pervading, part of the man's soul, you cannot help feeling that the other is in the very depth of it, and marks out what he is meant to be and can be. Honour it; confess that it is not of earthly origin; that it does not spring from any dark root in the selfish nature. Say boldly, "That honesty, that zeal is from above; it has the sign of a celestial parentage; just so far as that governs him he will be a servant of his kind; after times will bless him." But it is also true that the grovelling elements of his character, if they are not destroyed by this nobler fire, will only glare the more fiercely for the light which it sheds upon them, and that soon, when the fire begins to burn low, you will see instead of that glare, nothing but dull smouldering ashes.

"Jehu," says the Scripture, "took no heed to walk in the law of the Lord." It is in the quiet time that a man is tested. Then we find out not only what he can do, but what he is, whether his zeal for righteousness means that

152

THE VICTORY OF THE EVIL SIDE.

[Serm.

he will obey it; whether his hatred for what is false implies an adherence to the true. The test in this case failed. Jehu had destroyed Baal-worship, for that was foreign. He clave to the calf-worship, for that was the tradition of his fathers. And therefore the people went on in the downward course. They had swept away the house of Ahab. But the disease of that house had hold of their vitals. They sought after evil powers; they could not trust God.

Elisha the son of Shaphat and Jehu the son of Nimshi did then carry out together the words of the prophet. For those words depended upon no mortal agency; they were the expressions of an eternal law which in some way or other would fulfil itself. This is the great lesson which the Bible teaches in every page. The righteous Will moves on steadily and irresistably towards its own end; the unrighteous will struggles with it; seems to prevail; is broken in pieces. But seeing that it is Will and not a blind necessity which rules in the armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of men, it is all important whether those who execute its decrees work in cheerful submission to it, or in blindness, with base and private designs. This was the great question for the ministers of God's purpose, whether they were prophets or soldiers to consider then; it is the great question for us now. We may be sure that at the last by our evil doings and the fruits of them, if not by our zeal for that which is sincerely good, we shall help to demonstrate the existence of a divine order in the world, and shall foretell its victory. But it is for us to say in which way we shall perform the divine commission. If we come to no decision, the gravitation of our nature to the earth decides for us. We become sensualists and idolaters on a greater or smaller scale. We execute our trust as Ahab and Joram

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IX.]

ZEAL HUMAN AND EARTHLY.

153

executed theirs; whatever is the traditional conception of our time we fall into and embrace; when that is worn out we go in search of some external novelty. But between the mere selfish idolater and the faithful man, there is, we have seen, an intermediate type of character which many a devotee, many a one whom God would make a champion of His own, too easily admires and adopts. Zeal is so precious a gift, is so much wanted for the service of mankind, it is so rare, that the evil spirit is certain to assault those who possess it, and will not leave them till he has worked hard to make a precious trust from God into his own instrument. And seeing that there are a multitude of kindly compromising men in the world, who represent all energetic indignation against wrong, as unnecessary, disturbing, unphilosophical, unchristian, those who believe that no form of falsehood is to be tolerated, but to be abhorred, who are convinced that good men exist to protest against evil, who remember that He who was meek and lowly, made a scourge of small cords to drive the money-getters out of His Father's house, and that he denounced Scribes and Pharisees as hypocrites,-men, I say with these strong persuasions and lively recollections, are stirred up by the indifference which others exhibit and boast of, to a kind of savageness and fury. They must make their voices heard in the streets, they must if they can, hasten on the purposes of God, and themselves execute part of His wrath. Alas! what are they striving for? It is the driving of Jehu for he driveth furiously'-this is the best memorial that will remain of him who has let his zeal become his master when it was meant to be his servant, and who has counted it a pleasure instead of a hard necessity to destroy. "Oh my father the chariots of Israel and the horses

154 THE HIGHER ZEAL OF THE PROPHET.

[Serm. IX.

thereof," these were the words which a king of Israel of Jehu's house, spoke to Elisha as he lay sick and dying. He felt that a power was passing out of the world which was greater than his, and than that of all the kings who had been before him, because it was power, which-doubtless amidst innumerable confusions and errors, a thousand selfwilled efforts and self-confidences-had yet in the main been consecrated to the God of truth and meekness, had been used in conformity with His mind, and therefore had spread health and peace around it. Was it better to kill the seventy sons of Ahab or to bring up sons of the prophets? To be the executor of God's vengeance on the land or to shew that He was the healer of its sicknesses? To make it clear that Death is the certain wages of sin or to affirm by acts and words that there is One who raiseth the dead? Which mission was the nobler in the old time? Which must be nobler for those who believe that God gave His only begotten Son not to condemn the world but that the world through Him might be saved?

SERMON X.

THE SHEPHERD PROPHET.

LINCOLN'S INN, SEXAGESIMA SUNDAY.-FEB. 15, 1852.

AMOS, VII. 10—15.

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Then Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, sent to Jeroboam, king of Israel, saying, "Amos hath conspired against thee in the midst of the house of Israel. The land is not able to bear all his words. For thus Amos saith, Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of their own land.' Also Amaziah said unto Amos, "Oh thou seer go flee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy there. But prophesy not again any more in Bethel, for it is the king's court and the king's chapel." Then answered Amos, and said to Amaziah, "I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet's son. But I was an herdsman and a gatherer of sycamore fruit. And the Lord took me as I followed the flock, and the Lord said unto me, Go prophesy unto my people Israel.'"

THE Jeroboam spoken of in this passage was the fourth king of the house of Jehu. From the time of Jehu, we hear of the Syrians under Hazael, as the great oppressors of the Samaritan kingdom. "In those days" (that is before the death of Jehu) it is said, "the Lord began to cut

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