ters; but
we do not find that this happens. Hence we must all go through the
mill. Hence death, death to the lower self, is the nearest gate and
the quickest road to life.

Yet this is only half the truth. Christ's life outwardly was one of
the most troubled lives that was ever lived: tempest and tumult,
tumult and tempest, the waves breaking over it all the time till the
worn body was laid in the grave. But the inner life was a sea of
glass. The great calm was always there. At any moment you might have
gone to Him and found Rest. Even when the blood-hounds were dogging
Him in the streets of Jerusalem, He turned to His disciples and
offered them, as a last legacy, "My peace." Nothing ever for a moment
broke the serenity of Christ's life on earth. Misfortune could not
reach Him; He had no fortune. Food, raiment, money--fountain-heads of
half the world's weariness--He simply did not care for; they played no
part in His life; He "took no thought" for them. It was impossible to
affect Him by lowering His reputation. He had already made Himself of
no reputation. He was dumb before insult. When he was reviled, He
reviled not again. In fact, there was

NOTHING THAT THE WORLD COULD DO TO HIM

that could ruffle the surface of His spirit.

Such living, as mere living, is altogether unique. It is only when we
see what it was in Him that we can know what the word Rest means. It
lies not in emotions, or in the absence of emotions. It is not a
hallowed feeling that comes over us in church. It is not something
that the preacher has in his voice. It is not in nature, or in poetry,
or in music--though in all these there is soothing. It is the mind at
leisure from itself. It is the perfect poise of the soul; the absolute
adjustment of the inward man to the stress of all outward things; the
preparedness against every emergency; the stability of assured
convictions; the eternal calm of an invulnerable faith; the repose of
a heart set deep in God. It is the mood of the man who says, with
Browning, "God's in His Heaven, all's well with the world."

Two painters each painted a picture to illustrate his conception of
rest. The first chose for his scene a still, lone lake among the
far-off mountains. The second threw on his canvas a thundering
waterfall, with a fragile birch-tree bending over the foam; at the
fork of a branch, almost wet with the cataract's spray, a robin sat on
its nest. The first was only _Stagnation_; the las