THE QUESTION OF QUESTIONS.

Auckland Star, Volume XXIX, Issue 101, 30 April 1898, Page 4 (Supplement)

THE QUESTION OF QUESTIONS.

By Sir James E. Philipps. Bart., Prebendary of Salisbury.

'What think ye of Christ?'

'—Matt, xxii.,

Did Confucius, did Gautama (the founder of Buddhism), did Mahomet ask for man's love? I trow not. Did Socrates/ or Plato, or any other master of philosophy? It was not so. I think I am right in saying that this claim of love ia a claim peculiar to the Christian religion. It is a distinguishing characteristic of it. It separates Christianity off from any other religion. I am, of course, viewing Christianity as what it is—the outcomo and development of Judaism, for that taught the love of God. Itasks for man's love, and is content and satisfied with nothing short of it. 'If ye love Me,' said Jesus, 'keep My commandments.' And again, 'If any man love Me, My Father will love him.' And again, 'Simon, son Of Jonas, lovest thou me?, Jesus demands our love in return for love. He gives us a large, unstinted measure of love, anil merely asks for that trifling portion of love (for such it must ever be in comparison with His great love) which we can give Him. The late Professor Druxnmond in one of his admirable little books tells-'lp of one whom he says was a man "ox the highest intellect this age has known—a man who shared the burdens of his country as few have done; who hungered for the love of Jesus; who had a passionate desire that he might be loved by Jesus. Men are often exhorted by the preacher to love Jesus, but it is, I think, perhaps, a higher longing, It is a higher platform, this desire to be loved by Him. The words y^hich Pro.f^sspr Rr-ummond quotas of thjs great" man' are:—'You all know, in'somt! relations of life; what it is-to be hungry for love. It is when drawing near to the Lord Jesus Christ, and longing to be, loved by Him, that.l h.<vvi=: the most,yivid.sens^ of unsymmetry, of imperfection, of absolute unworthiness, and of my sinfulneSs.' And hoar the saintly wife of the-felate Dean of Westminster saying on nor death-bed:—-'Speak to me of love I think of God from what I know of loving men and women.' And on another day, when flesh and heart failed, and she had said,' 'Everything is gone; I cannot even think,' the Dean said, 'But you can love.' She replied, 'Yes, that is my identity.' And hear a, perhaps, somewhat unexpected witness to the truth of Christ's divinity. The v great Napoleon, when in exile at "St. Helena, speaking one day of the Deity of Christ, said, '~i. have before now influ.encecl thousands upqn:-.thousands of my feltowmcn. I have stirred their enthusiasm. I have evoked their affection; but then it was by my eye, by my voice, by my presence. They were moved by having me among them, whereas the power of Jesus descends through eighteen centuries unimpaired. Unseen, absent, His love moves men to-day as strongly as when He walked this earth. It has lost none of its force and vitality. He reigns to-day in. millions of human hearts. Millions acknowledge Him to be their Lord and King. Jesus was no man!'

The Prebendary's address will be concluded next week.' . • ■