They began to have a
reverence for those who were weak in body, and simple in heart,--a
reverence for women, for children, for slaves, for all whom the world
despises, such as the old Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, had never had.
They began to see that God could make strong the weak things of this
world, and glorify himself in the courage and honesty of the poorest
and the meanest. They began to see that in Christ Jesus was neither
male nor female, Jew nor Greek, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free,
but that all were one in Christ Jesus, all alike capable of receiving
the Spirit of God, all alike children of the one Father, who was
above all, and in all, and with them all.
And so the endurance and the sufferings of the early martyrs was the
triumph of good over evil; the triumph of honesty and truth; of
purity and virtue; of gentleness and patience; of faith in a just and
loving God: because it was the triumph of the Spirit of Christ, by
which he died, and rose again, and conquered shame and pain, and
death and hell.
SERMON XXII.--TOLERATION
(Preached at Christ Church, Marylebone, 1867, for the Bishop of
London's Fund.)
MATTHEW xiii. 24-30.
The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in
his field: but while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among
the wheat, and went his way.
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