CHRIST OUR HEAD.

WHEN the Apostle Paul affirms that "the head of every man is Christ," his language implies an union between Christ and his followers, much more intimate and vital than has commonly been imagined. Among the members of the human body, the first rank must be assigned to the head. In that the chief functions of our animal nature originate. It is the seat of the senses; there are fixed those noble organs, the eye and the ear; thence all our sensations emanate, and to that they are confined with a single exception, and that but a partial one, since the other portions of the body only share with the head the exquisite capacity of feeling. It is the instrument of our intellectual faculties; there also is the human face, that distinctive endowment of man, which shows, as an epistle, read of all intelligences, our divine Original.

To say, then, that Jesus Christ is the head of every man, is to give him the supremacy over all our race, and that in a very peculiar sense. This position is distinctly assigned him by the New Testament.

Whether we take the opinions of his Apostles, as expressed in their abstract views of him, or go back to the

Gospels, and judge of him by their simple narratives, we see him everywhere placed immeasurably above comparison with any who have dwelt on earth.. Language is exhausted, its most glowing epithets fail, where he is the theme.

The Christian world have united in one mighty response to this strain. All denominations and all sects of the Church universal, differ as they may in the sense they attach to their creeds, agree in the expression, that no being has ever lived among men so great as Jesus Christ. From every land and from every age, let them differ as they might in regard to doctrine or duty, to ritual or ceremonies, to Scripture, inspiration, tradition, creeds, councils, or Ecclesiastical usages, in one sentiment their voices all harmonize, that "the head of every man is Christ."

But have these world-embracing eulogiums, after all, done justice to this exalted being? All have been emulous of the highest commendations, and have been jealous of one another in this respect. They have intended to glorify Jesus, but have they succeeded in this attempt? Judging either from their views, as expressed in formularies of belief, or from their deportment as professed members of that body whose head is Christ, does it appear that the Church in general has formed a true conception of the rank, the offices, the character of him whom they have thus extolled? Have they comprehended their own relationship to him?

It would seem, if we shut out all human opinions and look to the Scriptures alone for an answer to these ques tions, that the disciples in all ages, not excepting this, the last, and as we think the most advanced age of the

world, have made a wrong estimate of Christ. The sentence sounds harshly, but if it be just, it must be pronounced, that all Christendom - certainly with an exception the vast majority of them would scarcely admit-have, in effect, placed Jesus Christ too low. They have spoken and written, and thought and felt, not by design, but in reality, unworthily of him. They have degraded him from the position which the New Testament assigns him.

The aim has been to exalt Christ by giving him a particular outward rank. But can any attempt of this kind do anything in truth to elevate him? Is he, like one of us, to be esteemed more highly for being raised to a throne, or clothed with external honors? No being is in reality made any greater by a mere change of situation. A man may receive the highest office in the gift of his fellow-men, and be borne on the breeze of popular favor, but he is still a man; and if neither by nature, nor by education, nor by personal culture, he is any wiser, more intelligent, or more virtuous than the mass of men around him, then his office and popularity do nothing whatever to exalt him. He is, indeed, when compared with his position, a degraded man.

Let us apply this principle to the views commonly entertained of Christ. The endeavor has been to exalt him by placing him among three beings, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, he being the second of these, and they all pronounced "one God, the same in substance, equal in power and glory."

But Christ is not surely elevated by making him "the same in substance" with God. We can do nothing to exalt any being by applying to him terms we ourselves cannot even understand. Who will tell us the meaning of NO. 212.

VOL. XVIII.

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this word "substance," as here used? It evidently has no reference to any moral qualities, nor to anything else which is an intelligible foundation for homage. Its very obscurity, indeed, is sufficient to show that the being to whom it is applied cannot be honored by the epithet. It is a metaphysical term, invented in a dark age, and it serves only to darken and degrade our conceptions of that Christ who is revealed to us, that is, brought to light by God.

Do we exalt our Saviour by making him "equal with God in power." We ascribe to the Divine Being omnipotence, it is true; yet no one regards this as his highest perfection, that which most truly exalts him. We reverence and bow down before the powor of the Most High; but it is not until we contemplate his wisdom, that we admire his character. Nor is this the summit of his elevation. It is not until we regard him as a Good Being, as overflowing with love, mercy and tenderness, in one word, as our Father, that he rises in our esteem to his greatest exaltation. It is the wise and beneficent use of power which alone entitles it to honor. To prove Jesus, therefore, equal in power with God, does comparatively little to exalt him. Were his power exerted for evil, did he act only in caprice or passion, were he an omnipotent tyrant, to say that he had all power would but degrade him. A weak being doing good, is more to be honored than a mighty one doing evil.

Christ is not exalted either by our saying he is "equal with God in glory." Few words have been so sadly misapplied by theologians as this; they speak of the glory of God, as if it were some selfish principle or purpose of his, to which everything should be sacrificed. The new con

vert has been told that he must be willing to be damned for the glory of God. But is God a being to be glorified by the utter and everlasting torment of his own child, especially if that child be, as in the case here supposed, in a state of bitter penitence and of entire submission to God's will. Either the language means nothing at all, or it implies a monstrous imputation against the divine character. Let it no more be said that God is our Father, if such can be his glory.

There is but one thing which can enhance the true glory of God, and that is the good of his creatures, especially the virtue and the happiness, present and eternal, of his rational offspring. So far as Jesus coöperates with the Father in accomplishing these high objects, he is equal in glory with Him. But a personal glory, one beginning, centering and terminating in his own selfish aggrandizement, and such seems to us that usually ascribed to the Deity, cannot exalt him. The true glory of God and of Christ consists in a disregard of themselves, and a sole desire, and aim, and effort for the good of other beings. Jesus is honored by representing this as his glory; but he is degraded by that false estimate of him, which brings him down to the seeking of an exclusively personal glory.

That Christ is placed too low by most of his followers is evident from the fact, that they do not yet esteem his peculiar excellence as the greatest of all excellence. In our ordinary estimates of men, we postpone moral and spiritual elevation to other considerations. We select men of intellectual distinction for situations of honor and trust; their moral qualifications are made a subordinate concern. Instead of demanding, as we ought, first of all