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of Israel, the Royal Prince of David’s line; and, as a man, His duty was only to His own people.  And this woman was a Greek, a Syro-phenician by nation—of a mixed race of people, notoriously low and profligate, and old enemies of the Jews.

      Then, it seems, He went into a house, and would have no man know it.  But, says St Mark, “He could not be hid.”  The mother’s wit found our Lord out, and the mother’s heart urged her on, and, in spite of all His rebuffs, she seems to have got into the house and worshipped Him.  She “fell at His feet,” says St Mark—doubtless bowing her forehead to the ground, in the fashion of those lands—an honour which was paid, I believe, only to persons who were royal or divine.  So she confessed that He was a king—perhaps a God come down on earth—and again she cried to Him.  “Lord, help me.”  And what was our Lord’s answer—seemingly more stern than ever?  “Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet to take the children’s bread and cast it unto the dogs.”  Hard words.  Yes: but all depends on how they were spoken.  All depends on our Lord’s look as He spoke them, and, even more, on the tone of His voice.  We all know that two men may use the very same words to us;—and the one shall speak sneeringly, brutally, and raise in us indignation or despair; another shall use the same words, but solemnly, tenderly, and raise in us confidence and hope.  And so it may have been—so, I fancy, it must have been—with the tone of our Lord’s voice, with the expression of His face.  Did He speak with a frown, or with something like a smile?  There must have been some tenderness, meaningness, pity in His voice which the quick woman’s wit caught instantly, and the quick mother’s heart interpreted as a sign of hope.

      Let Him call her a dog if He would.  What matter to a mother to be called a dog, if she could thereby save her child from a devil?  Perhaps she was little better than a dog.  They were a bad people these Syrians, quick-witted, highly civilised, but vicious, and teaching vice to other nations, till some of the wisest Romans cursed the day when the Syrians first spread into Rome, and debauched the sturdy Romans with their new-fangled, foreign sins.  They were a bad people, and, perhaps, she had been as bad as the rest.  But if she were a dog, at least she felt that the dog had found its Master, and must fawn on Him, if it were but for the hope of getting something from Him.

      And so, in the poor heathen mother’s heart, there rose up a whole heaven of perfect humility, faith, adoration.  If she were base and mean, yet our Lord was great, and wise, and good; and that was all the more reason why He should be magnanimous, generous, condescending, like a true King, to the basest and meanest of His subjects.  She asked not for money, or honour, or this world’s fine things: but simply for her child’s health, her child’s deliverance from some mysterious and degrading illness.  Surely there was no harm in asking for that.  It was simply a mother’s prayer, a simply human prayer, which our Lord must grant, if He were indeed a man of woman born, if He had a mother, and could feel for a mother, if He had human tenderness, human pity in Him.  And so, with her quick Syrian wit, she answers our Lord with those wonderful words—perhaps the most pathetic words in the whole Bible—so full of humility, of reverence, and yet with a certain archness, almost playfulness, in them, as it were, turning our Lord’s words against Him; and, by that very thing, shewing how utterly she trusted Him,—“Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table.”

      Those were the beautiful words—more beautiful to me than whole volumes of poetry—which our Lord had as it were crushed out of the woman’s heart.  Doubtless, He knew all the while that they were in her heart, though not as yet shaped into words.  Doubtless, He was trying her, to shew His disciples—and all Christians who should ever read the Bible—what was in her heart, what she was capable of saying when it came to the point.  So He tried her, and judged her, and acquitted her.  Out of the abundance of her heart her mouth had spoken.  By her words she was justified.  By those few words she proved her utter faith in our Lord’s power and goodness—perhaps her faith in His godhead.  By those words she proved the gentleness and humility, the graciousness and gracefulness of her own character.  By those words she proved, too,—and oh, you that are mothers, is that nothing?—the perfect disinterestedness of her mother’s love.  And so she conquered—as the blessed Lord loves to be conquered—as all noble souls who are like their blessed Lord, love to be conquered—by the prayer of faith, of humility, of confidence, of earnestness, and she had her reward.  “O woman,” said He, the Maker of all heaven and earth, “great is thy faith.  For this saying go thy way.  Be it unto thee even as thou wilt.  The devil is gone out of thy daughter.”  She went, full of faith; and when she was come to her house, she found the devil gone out, and her daughter laid upon the bed.

      One word more, and I have done.  I do not think that any one who really took in the full meaning of this beautiful story, would ever care to pray to Saints, or to the Blessed Virgin, for help; fancying that they, and specially the Blessed Virgin, being a woman, are more humane than our Lord, and can feel more quickly, if not more keenly, for poor creatures in distress.  We are not here to judge these people, or any people.  To their own master they stand or fall.  But for the honour of our Lord, we may say, Does not this story shew that the Lord is humane enough, tender enough, to satisfy all mankind?  Does not this story shew that even if He seem silent at first, and does not grant our prayers, yet still He may be keeping us waiting, as He kept this heathen woman, only that He may be gracious to us at last?  Does not this story shew us especially that our Lord can feel for mothers and with mothers; that He actually allowed Himself to be won over—if I may use such a word in all reverence—by the wit and grace of a mother pleading for her child?  Was it not so?  “O woman, great is thy faith.  For this saying go thy way.  Be it unto thee even as thou wilt.”  Ah! are not those gracious words a comfort to every mother, bidding her, in the Lord’s own name, to come boldly where mothers—of all human beings—have oftenest need to come, to the throne of Christ’s grace, to find mercy, and grace to help in time of need?

      Yes, my friends, such is our Lord, and such is our God.  Infinite in severity to the scornful, the proud, the disobedient: infinite in tenderness to the earnest, the humble, the obedient.  Let us come to Him, earnest, humble, obedient, and we shall find Him, indeed, a refuge of the soul and body in spirit and in truth.

      Thou, O Lord, art all I want.

      All and more in thee I find.  Amen.

      SERMON IX.  GOOD FRIDAY

      Eversley, 1856.

      St. Luke xxiv. 5, 6.  “Why seek ye the living among the dead?  He is not here, but is risen.”

      This is a very solemn day; for on this day the Lord Jesus Christ was crucified.  The question for us is, how ought we to keep it? that is, what sort of thoughts ought to be in our minds upon this day?  Now, many most excellent and pious persons, and most pious books, seem to think that we ought to-day to think as much as possible of the sufferings of our Blessed Lord; and because we cannot, of course, understand or imagine the sufferings of His Spirit, to think of what we can, that is, His bodily sufferings.  They, therefore, seem to wish to fill our minds with the most painful pictures of agony, and shame, and death, and sorrow; and not only with our Lord’s sorrows, but with those of His Blessed Mother, and of the disciples, and the holy women who stood by His cross; they wish to stir us up to pity and horror, and to bring before us the saddest parts of Holy Scripture, such as the Lamentations of Jeremiah; as well as dwell at great length upon very painful details, which may be all quite true, but of which Scripture says nothing; as so to make this day a day of darkness, and sorrow, and horror, just such as it would have been to us if we had stood by Christ’s cross, like these holy women, without expecting Him to rise again, and believing that all was over—that all hope of Israel’s being redeemed was gone, and that the wicked Jews had really conquered that perfectly good, and admirable Saviour, and put Him out of the world for ever.

      Now, I judge no man; to his own master he standeth or falleth; yea, and he shall stand, for God is able to make him stand.  But it does seem to me that these good people are seeking the living among the dead, and forgetting that Christ is neither on the cross nor in the tomb, but that He is risen; and it seems to me better to bid you follow to-day the Bible and the Church Service, and to think of what they tell you to think of.

      Now

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