have been taught, sometimes they go from one system to another seeking rest and finding none. These last are commonly called sceptics. Do not let us imagine that there is a yawning gulf or abyss of unbelief ready to open upon us in these latter days. That is a way in which people alarm and excite themselves, just as other people terrify their imaginations by applying the prophecies to the times in which they live and the coming struggle among the nations of the earth. There are not many such persons, but yet there are such if we ever cross them in the path of life we shall be surprised to find them leading in many cases correct and moral lives. And the question we then have to consider is, how we shall meet the doubts which they fling in our way or in that of others and the attempts they make to undermine our faith in the truth of Christ. No man will lightly rush into such a controversy as into an argument about politics for the sake of victory or display: the interests concerned are too weighty for that; nor will he meet his opponent with jests and sneers and uncharitable speeches : we cannot argue a man into a religion of love with words of party spirit or hatred. The chief argument must be a holy and meek life, and the chief weapon at the time a serious temper of mind, such as expresses our conviction of the truth of the things which we are saying. Too often where a man's vanity will not allow us to refute his arguments, where the mere narrowness of his mind prevents his comprehending

the length and breadth and height of the love of God, or where our own feeble powers or want of learning may prevent our doing justice to the same, we may draw him to us by the cords of sympathy, we may make him feel that we have something (if indeed we have it) that he has not, something that he would feign have and that human nature itself seems to long for, that he sees to be the support of others on the bed of sickness and in the grave and gate of death. We may draw him from disputes about the facts of Christianity to feel its spirit and power, to live the life of Christ when he is uncertain about the narrative of his life, to pass from vain philosophy and knowledge falsely so called until he is not far from the kingdom of heaven. We can imagine such a person harassed by doubts and difficulties, yet by the grace of God so growing in the practice of the Christian faith that he almost becomes a partaker of the blessing on those who have not seen and yet have believed.

The case of the sceptic, which has just been considered, is not a common one, at least where men have had a Christian education and lived in a Christian country. There are such persons, however, in all the various ranks of society, some endeavouring to scale the heights of philosophy, others laying it down as a principle that this life is to be preferred to another, others led away by an uneasy temper of mind and by the help of a little learning able to doubt what

other men believe. For it is quite true, as has been said, that a little philosophy takes a man from God but a great deal brings him back again. If a man has studied himself out of religion he must study himself into it again. But most of us have not time for study, at least in after life: the inquiry into the first principles of things is a mere name and shadow to us, and the greatest of men have allowed how feeble were their own powers of comprehension, how little they could assert authoritatively beyond what was necessary for daily life. What we can do, what is very near to us, is to live the life of Christ. And this leads us to consider the subject in another way, not as we may seem to stand on a vantage-ground and fight a battle with an imaginary opponent, but as we ourselves may become the opponents with ourselves of the truth that is in Christ-when like Peter we begin to sink, walking upon the sea of life, and need the outstretched hand of the Lord to save us from perishing. Even the Apostle Paul himself found that dark clouds of doubt passed over his mind: his Sun was not always shining: without were fightings, within were fears— and at times the world and all it contained seemed to be in the power of the evil, as at other times ready to burst forth with the revelation of the sons of God.

Confining ourselves then to the influence of doubt and unbelief on our own minds, let us endeavour to trace its causes and their remedies, not as a matter of curious speculation, but as one of deep and near

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interest to us, in reference to which we may do much for ourselves by self-discipline and what has been termed 'the law of a holy life.' Sometimes doubts arise from our coming across a more powerful and vigorous mind than our own, or from reading some book that gets a peculiar hold on our sympathies and tastes, or from one part of our faith being shaken and seeming to involve all, or even as a reaction against the overstrictness of a religious education. It is a great thing if we can hold our head above these difficulties and steer our way through them, not by the help of genius or of learning or criticism, but by that of common sense. Somehow or other they seem to affect men very differently: one man brushes them aside like cobwebs and goes on his way rejoicing to do God service, 'like a giant to run his course,' while another man is talking about them all his life long and seems to find in them an aliment for the natural unhealthiness of his mind. For, after all, doubt is not some great exertion of the mind, but mere weakness, which like some diseases affects us more at one time of life than another; and we may hope to live through it like other disorders. And it is a disorder in which every man must minister to himself, not without the hope that Christ who took upon Him our infirmities will take this also. No man, it has been said, has more doubts than he can carry: nature herself forbids the mind to remain for ever in a state of unrest. And it is in a manner certain, as

we may see by experience, that, if we doubt when we are young, those doubts will pass away in mature life. Even the heathen philosopher Plato said, 'My son, many have ere now doubted of the existence of the gods, but no man ever passed from youth to age without at some time or other believing.'

The waywardness then of these impressions of doubt is of itself their own best solution. They trouble us for a while and then pass away as a dream when one awaketh. How can any rational man attach much weight to that which appears to him different at different times, which is affected by his health or spirits, or even by the disappointments or other circumstances of his life? But there may be cases in which doubts may have had a deeper hold, and cut down, if I may use such an expression, into our life and character. These cases are chiefly two. First, where the mind is already unsettled, and from its own unhappy state has a natural love for doubt as for any other excitement of the intellect; or where from defective previous education it is altogether unable to take the measure of things or form a judgment respecting them, and yet is destitute of any fixed habit of life and conduct which may prevent its being the prey of every passing thought. Illregulated minds are, to use the words of the Epistle, 'clouds without water,' passing ever to and fro upon the earth, and never descending in genial showers to fertilise its bosom. And there are other peculiarities