"The The second motive stands more immediately in the text" And so fulfil the law of Christ." If the other motive was tender, this is noble. If the other was humanly persuasive, this is divinely inspiring. law of Christ the law which he gave; the law which he kept; the law of his birth, and life, and cross, and passion; the law of his eternal kingdom-that law, on the whole human side of it, will be "fulfilled," by obedience to the injunction of the text. We thus see that the law of sympathy is a branch of the universal law of love. Rather it is for this world the stem and body of that law. Christ requires of us nothing higher, nothing more. In requiring this, he contemplates our own infinite advancement and happiness, the fulfilment of every prophecy of our nature, and the rich, and full, and eternal attainment of the great purpose of God. This law of Christ, viewed thus as a law of fulfilment, how simple yet how grand is it! To fulfil this law is to fulfil all laws. It is "more than all whole burntofferings and sacrifices," more than all ceremonial and observance, more than all philosophy, more than all morality, more than all religion besides. The keeping of it is the completeness of duty, the substance of goodness, the secret of happiness, and the best preparation for the ineffable glories and joys of heaven. "Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ." Every Man Bearing his own For every man shall bear his own burden.-GALATIANS vi. 5. NDER the former text we considered some of the UN burdens which men bear, and which can be lightened for them by others-burdens which we bear mutually. But the apostle reminds us in this verse that there are some burdens which cannot be shared, which each must bear for himself alone. Some think, indeed, that the apostle is here still commending the exhortation of the second verse, and that he is now suggesting to them, as an additional inducement to mutual helpfulness in times of need, the consideration that each needs help himself, that each has a burden of his own, which another may help him to bear, that each has his own weaknesses, infirmities, and sins, and therefore that each needs that from others, which the apostle asks him (in the former text) to give to others in their necessity. It requires one to wrestle with the language to make this meaning out of it. And it is only a narrowing of the meaning when it is made out. 'Tis only blotting out one text that another may live. Let them both live. They are both true, just as they stand before us. We can, blessed be Christ who has taught us, bear one another's burdens, and so fulfil his law. And there are burdens which each man must bear for himself alone. I. The burden of Personality can be borne only by the man himself. That is "his own burden." Of course this truth is surrounded and connected with other truths, which limit and qualify it, and put it into harmonious relationship with God and man. We belong to the human race; we are "made of one blood for to dwell on the face of the earth." The first man, as the Bible tells us, as the whole Christian religion implies, represented all his successors. The race fell in Adam. The race rises in Christ. Parents have great power over children; the children seem almost a part of themselves. The family is in a sense an organic whole. And, in short, each individual is open to manifold influence may be impressed, drawn, turned, melted, inflamed, according to the powers that play on him. But he is himself in all. No part of his being is drawn away from him, however sensibly and powerfully its relations may be affected. He receives no essential part of the being of others into his own. He abides in the eye of God a separate, complete, indi vidual soul for ever. burden." 66 Every man shall bear his own A man often ceases to feel it for a while. He mingles in some great and gay assemblage, and for the time feels as though his personality were gone, or in suspense. He is not as a separate drop, he is lost in an ocean of life. But in a little while the great assemblage melts all away-only the individuals are left; that which they constituted when they were together has gone for ever; and the man whose life seemed to be almost absorbed and lost in an ocean of multitudinous existence -where is he now? He is going home there pensively under the shadow of the trees, and deeply conscious of himself; with his own joys and sorrows, with his own thoughts and plans, with his soul in all its powers and affections untouched. He is bearing his own burden. Or, in a time of sorrow, other souls come around with watchful yearning love. He has letters breathing the intensest sympathy. He has visits of sincere and sorrowing affection, or he has in the house with him those who feel so deeply and truly with himself that they hardly seem to be divided in the grief. But, the letters are read, the visits are paid, the tears are shed and then -he retires into his personality, and feels that his sorrow is his own, that none can tell the loss to him, that none can feel as he feels, that he possesses his sorrow because he possesses his soul, and that he, as "every man, shall bear his own burden." A man is born alone-has his being moulded with God's plastic hand, has all its powers implanted, and the awful image of God impressed, to be carried in glory or in ruin for ever. In all the stages really, and in all the critical and important times of his life consciously, he is alone, as distinct as a tree in the forest, separate as a star in the sky. And in death he leaveth all his friends, and goeth out along the darksome valley without a hand to help, without a voice to cheer-when the dying really comes. He goeth out bearing his own burden of life from one world into another-from the things which are seen to the things which are not seen, from those which are temporal to those which are eternal. II. The burden of Responsibility is borne always by the individual man. The responsibility arises of necessity out of the personality. Because the personality holds in it the elements of moral life. Man is moral, and therefore responsible. No doubt responsibility may be greatly diffused. A nation, for instance, has national existence, and the responsibility of its national acts must be shared, and the consequences of these acts enjoyed or suffered by the people. So, too, we sometimes hear of a joint responsi |