Secondly, Confirmation is a being confirmed or strengthened by the Holy Spirit of God. It is always the custom of God to give through means. Many people resent this fact and think that God should always give His gifts directly and without the intervention of visible and material means, but when we ask why He ought to do so, there is, of course, no answer, except a vague idea that purely spiritual means are somehow more worthy of God. As a matter of fact, however, God, Who knows much better than we do what is worthy of Him, does usually give through material means. The life of the child does not come straight from God, it is for a long time supported and sustained by the mother, who is the material means through which all the nature and character is developed. Take the most refined and spiritual life that you can imagine among men; it has to be supported by food, and without the material means of food it would quickly perish. It is through water that sins are remitted in Holy Baptism, and by bread and wine that our souls are fed and refreshed in the Holy Communion. Nay, in the greatest instance of all, when God wished to save and redeem the souls of men, a purely spiritual end, He did not choose a purely spiritual means, as He might undoubtedly have done, had He thought fit, but He chose the material process of the Incarnation. His Only Begotten Son took upon Him our flesh and was born of the Virgin Mary and was made man.

From all this we see that there is nothing strange, nothing contrary to God's usual way of working, in His making the gift of His Holy Spirit depend on the outward and visible, the material means of laying on of hands. We are not purely spiritual beings. We are body, as well as spirit, and it pleases God to work by means which apply to body as well as to soul.

These two aspects of Confirmation are emphasised by the service in our Book of Common Prayer. There is a real meaning in, and need for, a public profession. It is very easy nowadays to be a nominal Christian. It makes little or no call on our courage, or our self-sacrifice. In the early days of Christianity things were very different.

If a man professed himself a Christian it was often at the risk of his life. He might at any moment be called upon to do sacrifice to the statue of the Emperor, which was universally regarded as apostasy; if he failed to do this he was liable to be put to death at once. Hence, a man did not become a Christian unless he was convinced of the truth of the Christian faith, and was prepared to face the consequences of his belief. To-day men call themselves Christians just because they were born of Christian parents, because it never occurred to them to call hemselves anything else, because it was the line of least resistance, the simplest and easiest thing to do. Confirmation provides at least some opportunity for facing the facts, and for consciously embracing the Christian faith from higher and better motives. Of course there are those who will not really take the trouble to think, even about their Confirmation, but, if they do not, it is at least their own fault.

It is, however, the other side of Confirmation, the gift and grace of the Holy Spirit, that is of greater importance even than our profession, because God's part is always greater than man's part. Psychology has taught us how very largely our minds are influenced both by the individual and by the collective minds of other men, and the influence of the Spirit of God is far more powerful than the minds of men. If we are to run our Christian course aright we have urgent need of three things at least-initiative, strength, and guidance. We are, most of us, inclined by nature to take the simplest and easiest way; we are not inclined to make efforts which we can avoid, and we most easily agree to leave things as they are. Now the Christian life will not square with this natural tendency to let things alone. It requires effort, exertion, self-discipline, and self-denial. We are none of us over eager to take the initiative in spiritual things, and we need most urgently the help of the Holy Spirit of God, Who is the Lord and Giver of life, from Whom come all good impulses and high desires. It is the work of the Holy Spirit to sanctify us and He does it by putting into our hearts good thoughts and high aspirations.

G

But we need strength. However well we mean, and however high our desires, most of us are woefully lacking in strength to carry them out. Our wills need sorely the strength and power which comes from a higher source than ourselves. Let us always remember that when we will what is right, we have with us the whole power and force of the will of God, the mightiest power in the Universe. The Spirit of God can uphold and strengthen us, and enable us to accomplish that which without Him would be utterly impossible for us. "My grace is sufficient for thee," was the answer of Christ to St. Paul's prayer, and this power of His Spirit He is willing to give still to all that need it.

Lastly, we need guidance. We see such a little way. We are so blind and foolish and make so many and such grievous mistakes. Christ promised that the Holy Spirit should lead us into all truth. It is impossible to overestimate our need of this guidance, or the benefit that we receive from it. Neither initiative nor strength will avail us unless they are directed aright.

Seeing that God is prepared to give us this tremendous gift of His Spirit in Confirmation we do well not to despise or neglect it by failing to present ourselves for it, and we need to come with a spirit of faith, humility, and reverence befitting so great a grace.

XXII.-EXTERNAL ACTS OF WORSHIP

They rest not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come.REVELATION IV. 8.

THE John's description of his vision of the worship

HE passage from which these words are taken is part

of the heavenly host with its concerted action, and humble prostrations, its incense and golden vials, its musical

instruments, its white raiment, its crystal pavement, and great white throne, its golden altar and great candlesticks, and its flashing jewels; but in spite of St. John there are still not a few people who regard all outward aids to, and external expressions of, the spirit of worship with suspicion and dislike, as though they came in some way between the soul and God. This attitude, however well meant, is surely mistaken, and those who adopt it miss much that was intended by God to aid and to develop the spiritual life. It is, of course, true that worship is possible without any external aids at all, but though it is possible to live on bread and water, it does not therefore follow that bread and water are the best and most suitable food for men.

It is true that merely external worship is bad and paralysing to soul and conscience, but it does not follow that because merely external worship is bad therefore external worship cannot be the product of something higher and more spiritual. A child may kiss its mother with the object of getting what it wants, but it does not follow from this that all external signs of affection are bad and to be distrusted.

Let us now consider some of the reasons for the use of external aids to worship.

1. They pervade the whole of the worship of God in the Old Testament. Even those of the prophets who attacked their abuse did not question their use, while Isaiah and Ezekiel employed them freely to illustrate true and spiritual worship. Not only the whole system of sacrifices but the very details of the sanctuary, and the methods of worship, are all attributed to God.

2. Our Lord found the whole elaborate system of Temple worship as practised in His day and He joined in it. He never said one word against it, or hinted that there was anything in it to come between the soul and God. Nay, He upheld the sanctity of the Temple by the only act of violence of which we read in His life, when He made a scourge of small cords and drove out the buyers and sellers and the money-changers who were polluting the House of God by their presence. Had He regarded

the Temple worship as wrong we cannot imagine that He would have been thus zealous in defence of it. The early Christians continued for a long time to attend the Temple services, and we have no hint that any one thought there was anything wrong about them. On the contrary there is a legend that the knees of St. James became hard like those of a camel in consequence of his continual kneeling there in prayer. The separation from Jewish worship came on other grounds and in no way on the question of the externals of worship.

3. As we have already seen the Book of the Revelation of St. John is full of elaborate external aids to worship from the beginning to the end. Symbolism and the external expression of spiritual truths in action are of its very essence. Christian worship was conceived of in terms of the most elaborate and beautiful ceremonial, and there is no evidence to show that the Christians regarded St. John as in any way whatever misrepresenting their ideals or travestying their practice.

4. On the contrary we find among the early Christians an almost bewildering use of sign and symbol. The sign of the Cross was universal. It so happened that the first letters of the words "Jesus Christ God's Son Saviour," made up the Greek word Ichthus, a fish, and consequently the fish was continually used as the sign of Christ, partly no doubt for the sake of safety, but very largely also from the general love of symbolism. Jonah to represent the Resurrection, and a ship to represent the Church are other instances. The use of religious pictures as an aid to worship is very early, and in the catacombs of Saint Callixtus in Rome there is still to be seen a dark little underground church, surrounded by burial passages, where over the old stone altar there is still painted a head of our Lord, the colours of which have retained almost their pristine brilliancy in the age-long darkness.

5. That external means are helpful to express spiritual truths is seen in the fact that bodies far removed from the worship of the Catholic Church have adopted ceremonial and external means of expression for themselves. This