probably the first. Among the dumb animals he learnt experience
which he afterwards put into practice among human beings. The
shepherd of the sheep became the shepherd of men. He who had slain
the lion and the bear became the champion of his native land. He
who followed the ewes great with young, fed God's oppressed and
weary people with a faithful and true heart, till he raised them
into a great and strong nation. So both sides of the true kingly
character, the masculine and the feminine, are brought out in David.
For the greedy and tyrannous, he has indignant defiance: for the
weak and helpless, patient tenderness.

My motives for choosing this subject I will explain in a very few
words.

We have heard much of late about 'Muscular Christianity.' A clever
expression, spoken in jest by I know not whom, has been bandied
about the world, and supposed by many to represent some new ideal of
the Christian character.

For myself, I do not understand what it means. It may mean one of
two things. If it mean the first, it is a term somewhat
unnecessary, if not somewhat irreverent. If it mean the second, it
means something untrue and immoral.

Its first and better meaning may be simply a healthy and manful
Christianity, one which does not exalt the feminine virtues to the
exclusion of the masculine.

That certain forms of Christianity have committed this last fault
cannot be doubted. The tendency of Christianity, during the