crimson shed a glow
On the old man's hair, as white as snow;
The nurse came softly--'Look, Greg!' she said,
Ay, the rose had bloomed, but the man was dead."

And the meaning of all this is, not that the rose itself saved this
hardened sinner. No; but it led him to think of the lessons of his
childhood, when he had been taught about Jesus, "the Rose of
Sharon". It led him to think about his sins. It led him to repent of
them; to pray to Jesus; to exercise faith in him; and in _this way_
he became a changed man, and was saved. And so, though we speak of
him as--"a man saved by a rose;" yet it was the power of Jesus, "the
Great Teacher," exercised through that rose, which led to this
blessed change and saved Greg's soul from death.

And thus we have spoken of five things which help to make up the
greatness of Jesus as a Teacher. These are--The Great Blessings--The
Great Simplicity--The Great Tenderness--The Great Knowledge--and the
Great Power connected with his teachings. Let us seek the grace that
will enable us to learn of him, and then we shall find rest for our
souls!

CHRIST TEACHING BY PARABLES

We have spoken of our Saviour as "The Great Teacher," and tried to
point out some of the things in his teaching which helped to make him
great. And now, it may be well to speak a little of the illustrations
which he made use of as a Teacher. These are called--_parables_. Our
Saviour's parables were illustrations. This is what is meant by the
Greek word from which we get the word parable. It means something
_set down by the side of another_. When we teach a lesson we are
setting something before the minds of our scholars. But suppose it is
a hard lesson and they do not understand it. Then we use an
illustration. This is something set down beside the lesson to make it
plain. Then this, whatever it be, is a parable.

At the beginning of his ministry, our Saviour did not make much use
of parables. But, after he had been preaching for some time, he made
a change in his way of teaching, in this respect. He began to use
parables very freely. His disciples were surprised at this. On one
occasion, after he had used the parable of the Sower, they came to
their Master and asked him why he always spake to the people now in
parables? We have our Saviour's answer to this question in St. Matt,
xiii: 11-18. And it is a remarkable answer. The meaning of it is that
he used parables for two reasons: one was