want Christ Himself to say, "Your sins _are_ forgiven
you." We want not merely a wise book to tell us that the good men of old
belonged to Christ's kingdom--we want Christ Himself to tell us that we
belong to His kingdom. We want not merely a book that tells us that He
promised always to be with us--we want Him Himself to tell us that He is
really now with us. We want not merely a promise from a prophet of old
that in Him all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, but a sign
from Christ Himself that this nation of England is really now blest in
Him. In short, we want not words, however true words, however fine
words, _about_ Christ. We want Christ Himself to forgive us our sins--to
give peace and freedom to our hearts--to come to us unseen, and fill us
with thoughts and longings such as our fallen nature cannot give us--such
thoughts and feelings as we cannot explain in words, for they are too
deep and blessed to be talked about--but thoughts which say to us, as if
the blessed Jesus Himself spoke to us in the depths of our hearts, "Poor,
struggling, sinful brother! _thou art mine_. For thee I was born--for
thee I died--thee I will teach--I will guide thee and inform thee with
mine eye--I will never leave thee nor forsake thee."

Well--you want _Him_--and you want a sign of Him--a sign of His own
giving that _He is among you this day_--a sign of His own giving that He
has taken you into His kingdom--a sign of His own giving that He died for
you--that He will feed and strengthen your souls in you with His own life
and His own body.

Then--there is a sign--there is the sign which has stood stedfast and
sure to you--and to your fathers--and your forefathers before them--back
for eighteen hundred years, over half the world. There is the bread of
which He said, "Take, eat, this is my body which is broken for you."
There is the wine of which He said, "This cup is the New Covenant in my
blood, which is shed for you, and for many, for the forgiveness of sins."
There is His sign. Don't ask _how_. Don't try to explain it away, and
fancy that you can find fitter, and soberer, and safer, and more gospel-
sounding words than Jesus Christ's own, by which to speak of His own
Sacrament. But say, with the great Queen Elizabeth of old, when men
tried too curiously to enquire into her opinion concerning this blessed
mystery--

"Christ made the Word and spake it,
He took the bread and brake it,
And what His Word d