illed our love? Have we gathered pulpit powers,
or lost them, as the days have flown over our heads? There is
somewhere a story of a man who, on his fiftieth birthday, received a
call from his own beardless self of thirty years before, and, when he
gazed upon his strange guest, he wept for what his visitor must see.
Can it be true that in point of effectiveness and real success some of
us were better preachers in youth than we are now after years of study,
of experience, of opportunity to wax greater in every way?

There is still another test. Here are human sin, human sorrow. Here
are the perplexity of the perplexed, the fear of the fearful. Here
Rachel weeps for her children. Here the widow and the fatherless cry
aloud. Here are misery, crime, despair. The whole world is full of
hunger and thirst, of grief and wretchedness, of shame and remorse.
Let us bring our preaching into comparison with these!

Above all other means of coming to the truth, let us take our preaching
back to Him who sent us forth. Let us, in His company, walk once more
the roads of Judea; with Him let us stand on the shores of Galilee, the
slopes of Olivet, the pavements of Zion, the heights of Calvary. Let
us listen to _His_ preaching and in His presence let us think of _ours_.

So let us follow the matter to the end, painful though that end may be.
It is needful that we do indeed learn the very truth; needful for the
sake of _the Church_. She needs the Gospel for herself. She must eat
if she would live. The times are times of hardness for the flock of
God. It is necessary that a table be prepared in the wilderness. The
Church needs preaching, needs the inspiration of beholding the
preachers' victories. Nothing strengthens an army like a triumph. The
conquests of the preacher are the salvation of the Church.

For the _world's sake_ it is needful that we come at the truth. The
age may not _want_ preaching, but it _needs_ it. Possibly it also
wants it more than we suspect. It must be preaching of the right kind,
however. Preaching that lacks the qualities proper to itself is worse
than useless.

For our _own_ sake, we preachers must come at the facts as they are.
It lies before us all to give one day an account of our stewardship,
and the years are swiftly passing by. Now is the time for
investigation. Soon will come the hour when opportunity will be
succeeded by retrospect. Men have been known to make discoveries in
re