t word
of ministry ran parallel with these two Beatitudes. When He spoke them
He began with poverty of spirit, and passed to mourning and consolation,
and when He opened His lips in the synagogue of Nazareth He began with,
'The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He hath anointed Me to
preach good tidings unto the poor, to give unto them that mourn in Zion
a diadem for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise
for the spirit of heaviness.'

THE THIRD BEATITUDE

'Blessed are the meek! for they shall inherit the earth,'--MATT, v.
5.

The originality of Christ's moral teaching lies not so much in the
novelty of His precepts as in the new relation in which He sets them,
the deepening which He gives them, the motives on which He bases them,
and the power which He communicates to keep them. Others before Him had
pronounced a benediction on the meek, but our Lord means far more than
they did, and, both in His description of the character and in the
promise which He attaches to it, He vindicates the uniqueness of His
notion of a perfect man.

The world's ideal is, on the whole, very different from His. It inclines
to the more conspicuous and so-called heroic virtues; it prefers a
great, flaring, yellow sunflower to the violet hiding among the grass,
and making its presence known only by fragrance. 'Blessed are the
strong, who can hold their own,' says the world. 'Blessed are the meek,'
says Christ.

The Psalmist had said it before Him, and had attached verbally the same
promise to the word. But our Lord means more than David did when he
said, 'The meek shall inherit the earth.' I ask you to think with me
now, first, what this Christian meekness is; then, whence it issues; and
then, whither it leads.

I. What Christian meekness is.

Now, the ordinary use of the word is to describe an attitude, or more
properly a disposition, in regard to men, especially in regard to those
who depreciate, or wrong, or harm us. But the Christian conception of
meekness, whilst it includes that, goes far deeper; and, primarily, has
reference to our attitude, or rather our disposition, towards God. And
in that aspect, what is it? Meek endurance and meek obedience, the
accepting of His dealings, of whatever complexion they are, and however
they may tear or desolate our hearts, without murmuring, without
sulking, without rebellion or resistance, is the deepest conception of
the meekness which Christ pronounces b