incoming strength of living
truth warm from the lips of God_! Stand we here--each for himself?
Indeed we must do so; for unless we do, abiding in this consciousness
as to our calling and our work, we shall lack full furnishing for toil
and accomplishment, for noble battle, for glorious victory!

And if it comes to pass that sometimes the preacher fails to realise
the greatness of his position and the true distinction of his message,
and that his preaching suffers loss of effectiveness as a result of
such failure, it also comes to pass, not infrequently, that he fails to
realise, as he should, the _great purpose his efforts are meant to
serve_. This failure also must hinder his preaching of the success it
should command. Behind the labours of the humblest of the preaching
army lies the purpose which lay back of all God's dealing with the
race, which moved Him to give His only begotten Son; the purpose for
which He who was rich and for our sakes became poor, came to earth and
"was found in fashion as a man." The purpose behind the preaching of
the preacher is one with the purpose behind the cross; it is, in short,
that purpose of infinite love which contemplates and designs the
salvation of the race. "The Son of Man is come into the world to seek
and to save that which was lost." "_That which was lost!_" The
meaning of this word is surely not exhausted in the application of the
text to individual wanderers however great their number. The whole
world "was lost," and to seek and to save the world, "from the rivers
to the ends of the earth," He came--to bring back all humanity to
faith, obedience, love, purity, happiness and glory.

For the attainment of the highest possibilities wrapped up in himself
and his work the preacher must be possessed by this imperial design.
He must _feel_ that he is fighting in a campaign for world
conquest--for that and no smaller end. We hear, in these days, a good
deal about imperialism in politics. We are encouraged to teach this
imperialism to our children, and the argument advanced in support of
the advice is that the learning of the lesson will have influence on
the way in which the scholar will perform the humblest tasks awaiting
him in life. The Imperialist, it is said, will find himself saved by
his imperialism from sordid views and actions, from all temptation to
make small personal ends the measure of his service as the days go by.
Experience, alas! has hardly justified the