THE MIND OF THE MASTER.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 10422, 21 April 1897, Page 6

THE MIND OF THE MASTER.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir,— opportune and pleasing editorial herein will create a feeling of interest in this book, which is of its kind one of the most remarkable of the period. If time is a " parenthesis of eternity," Mr. Wateon has demonstrated the first bracket was knocked down by the Master's advene, which enabled the mighty ocean of Divine love to flow freely through the straits and narrows of man's intellectual and spiritual nature. Joyous floodtide will come when the highest aspirations, noblest exercises, and grandest ideals find voice and expression in the kingdom of the Master. Then will the countless myriads of rivulets and streams (surcharged with adoration ami praise) gravitate to the bosom of that ocean whioh was, is, and must ever be their supremo source and pacific reservoir. Some learned doctors point out disease in the vital organs of this production, but in spite of this discovery I think the hook will be longlived, for the theme (if not the treatment) is " in eternal excellency, a joy of man generations." On Mr. Watson's unique threshing-floor all may not be (train ; in the marvellous mine he has skilfully opened out all may not be gold; in the literary superstructure he has nobly reared on the rock of Ages, the building may not be in strict line according Co the traditional canons of ecclesiastical architecture, but I unhesitatingly affirm that on his floor the golden grain and bread of life predominate in his El Dorado the alloy, when contrasted with the precious metal and ingots of pure gold, it but a bagatelle. His deviations from the old ecclesiastical architecture are no slender that only the practised eyye of the eavantcandetect the difference. Moreover his new Temple of Truth required modelling to contain a mighty entity known as the Fatherhood of God. Iβ not the old building so crowded with the Thirty-nine Articles that there is scarcely room for this most precious heritage of the Church-" pearl of great price." So far as 1 can see, Mr. Watson does not build with wood, hay, stubble, neither does he daub with untempered mortar. He may not be a, reaondite scholar, a profound or even an original thinker. If the former, he might have been the progenitor of a learned treatise, pregnant with technicalities, tainted with pedantries, puffed up with metaphysics, leavened with transcendentalism, and though subtle in argument, keen in analysis, yet dry as dust, and having little or no attraction for the average reader. Mr. Watson's book is impassioned, beautiful in diction, bold iu conception. The respective chapters, like mountain peaks, rise in solemn aud imposing grandeur till their summits are bathed in the serene sunlight of exalted truth. Walking with him in the bracing ozone of these lofty regions one hears afresh the words of the Maker as they fall in silvery streams from His hallowed lips, instinct with new beauty, force and meaning. It is only in these altitudes aud amid such inspiring correlations we can giasp and fathom the majesty and profundity of the evangelistic announcement, "And we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, fall of grace and truth."

Prom an eminence Mr. Watsun has summoned couraue to declare that the Church can make ecclesiastics, but it is the Kingdom that produces philanthropists. This and kiudred statements insy have generated the heresy hunt in his favour. In this chase be is not likely to lose either name, fame, or fortuue! -I am, etc., John Abbott. Huretmere, April 20,1897.