Chapter II: Preface

Dear Reader: In the preface to Pauline Charity, did not the writer promise thee that volume should be his last? Some months later, however, at the bottom of the homiletical barrel, he found a few old acquaintances, in threadbare and tattered guise, smiling reproachfully out of the dust of an undeserved oblivion. He beckoned them forth, gave them new garments, and bade them go to the printer. And lo! here they are--twenty-two of them--in comely array, with fresh-anointed locks, knocking modestly at thy door.

If any of the former groups from the same family were deemed worthy of thy hospitality--if any of the twenty-two Evangelists gladdened thy soul with good tidings--if any of the twenty-two Knights-Banneret stimulated thy zeal in the holy conflict--if any of the twenty white-hooded sisters of Charity warmed thy heart with words of loving kindness--if any of the sixty seraphs, winged with sunbeams, laid upon thy lips a Coal from the Altar--if any of the twelve cherubs, fresh from the Edens of Italy, led thee through pleasant paths to goodly palaces and blooming arbors--turn not away unheard these twenty-two strangers, but welcome them graciously to the fellowship of thy house, and perchance the morrow's dawn may disclose the wings beneath their robes.

But if tempted to discard them as the vagrant offspring of a senile vanity thrust out to seek their fortune in the world of letters, know thou that such temptation is of the Father of lies. For not all of these are thy patriarch's Benjamins--sons of his old age. The leader of the band is his very Reuben--the beginning of his strength. Another is his lion-bannered Judah, washing his garments in the blood of grapes. In another may be recognized his long-lost Joseph, found at last in Pharaoh's chariot. And several others, peradventure, more ancient than thy father, though bearing neither gray beard nor wrinkled brow. And the consciousness of a better ambition than vanity ever inspired prompts their commission to the public, to speak a word in season to him that is weary--to comfort the mourners in Zion, giving them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for weeping, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness, and filling the vale of Bochim with songs in the night. Nay, if the mixture of metaphors be not offensive to thy fastidious rhetoric, these brethren are sent down into Egypt to procure corn for thee and thy little ones, O Reader! that ye perish not in the famine of the land.

"Go to! the tropical language is misleading. We open the door to thy children, and find nothing but a hamper of Wine--twenty-two bottles--some labelled Old, and others New."

As thou wilt, my gentle critic! Perhaps twenty-two jars of water only. Yet healthfully clear, and sweet to the taste, it is hoped thou wilt find the beverage; and if the Lord, present at the feast, but deign to look at it, thou mayest wonder that the good wine has been kept till now.

Of Edward Irving, when he died fifty years ago, a London editor wrote: "He was the one man of our time who more than all others preached his life and lived his sermons." To preach one's life were hardly apostolical, though to live one's sermons might be greatly Christian. At the former the author never aimed; of the latter there is little danger of his being suspected. Yet this book is in some sort the record of his personal history. For a farewell gift to the world, he long contemplated an autobiography--had actually begun the work, written more than a hundred pages, and sketched a promising outline of the whole; when, in an hour of indigestion, becoming disgusted, he dropped the enterprise, and made his manuscript a burnt offering to the "blues." As a substitute for the failure, these discourses represent him in the successive stages of his ministry, being arranged in the chronological order of production and delivery, with dates and occasions in footnotes--the only autobiography he could produce, the only one doubtless to be desired. Should grace divine make it in any measure effectual to the spiritual illumination of those who honor it with a perusal, he will sing his _Nunc Dimittis_ with thankful heart, and wait calmly for the day when every faithful worker "shall have praise of God." Farewell.

J. C.

Feast of All Saints, 1883.

CONTENTS.

Discourse.

I. Filial Hope. 1829
II. Rest for the Weary. 1830
III. My Beloved and Friend. 1833
IV. Refuge in God. 1838
V. Parental Discipline. 1840
VI. Joy of the Law. 1842
VII. Sojourning with God. 1858
VIII. Building for Immortality. 1859
IX. Wail of Bereavement. 1862
X. Wisdom and Weapons. 1863
XI. Love tested. 1866
XII. Manifold Temptations. 1866
XIII. Contest and Coronation. 1866
XIV. Calvary Token. 1866
XV. Heroism Triumphant. 1868
XVI. Fraternal Forgiveness. 1869
XVII. Christ with his Ministers. 1872
XVIII. Kept from Evil. 1873
XIX. Contending for the Faith. 1874
XX. The Fruitless Fig-Tree. 1876
XXI. Christian Contentment. 1883
XXII. "Ye know the Grace." 1883

OLD WINE AND NEW.