Salvation by Grace 113 of his vast and wealthy environment. It was a bright and gaily colored wing of a native bird. The color and life of trackless leagues sampled within the confines of an envelope! And when we have made a compact little phrase to enshrine the secret of Grace, I feel that however fair and radiant it may be, we have only got a wing of a native bird, and be wildering stretches of wealth are untouched and unrevealed. No, we cannot define it.” DESIRE FOR SALVATION It cannot be pretended that all men desire to be saved. Would to God that it were so! A lack of the sense of sin is still the most perilous omen of today, as Mr. Gladstone declared it was in his time. Were he now alive, he would, we believe, repeat those portentous words with added emphasis, for this lack—this fatal lack—is approved and fostered by certain of those whose solemn endeavor it should be to pre vent and condemn it. A fatal lack it assuredly is, for if a sense of sin be absent, what hope is there of a longing for salvation, of a cry for mercy, or of appreciation of a Saviour ? So long as men imagine themselves to be potential Christs, there is little likelihood that they will be sufficiently discon tent with self to look away to Jesus, or, indeed, to suppose that they are other than rich and increased in goods and in need of nothing. No, no; all men do not desiderate salvation, though we sometimes think that there has come to all men at some time or other, before the process of hardening was com plete, some conscience of sin, some apprehension as to the future, some longings, faint and fitful it may be, to be right with God, and assured of heaven. There is, moreover, a much larger number than we suppose of really anxious souls. Deep desire is often hidden under a cloak of unconcern, and there is sometimes a breaking heart under a brazen breast. In addition to, and partly in consequence of, this lack of a sense of sin, there is much misconception as to the nature of
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