hemmed in by human limitations. They each bear a burdened and thirsty
spirit, itself needing such supplies. And to the truest, happiest, most
soul-sufficing companionship, there comes at last that dread hour which
ends all sweet commerce of giving and receiving, and makes the rest of
life, for some of us, one monotonous ashen-grey wilderness where no
water is. These things make it impossible for us to find anywhere
amongst men our refuge and our fruition.

And yet how strange, how pathetic, is the fact that after all
disappointments, men still obstinately continue to look among their
fellows for guidance and for light, for consolation, for defence, and
for strength! After a thousand failures they still hope. Does not the
search at once confess that hitherto they have not found, else why be
seeking still?--and that they yet believe they will yet find, else why
not cease the vain quest? And surely He who made us, made us not in
vain, nor cursed us with immortal hopes which are only persistent lies.
Surely there is some living Person who will vindicate these unquenchable
hopes of humanity, and receive and requite our love and trust, and
satisfy our longings, and explain the riddle of our lives. If there be
not, nor ever has been, nor ever can be a man who shall satisfy us with
his love, and defend us with his power, and be our all-sufficient
satisfaction and our rest in weariness, then much of man's noblest
nature is a mistake, and many of his purest and profoundest hopes are an
illusion, a mockery, and a snare. The obstinate hope that, within the
limits of humanity, we shall find what we need is a mystery, except on
one hypothesis, that it, too, belongs to 'the unconscious prophecies'
that God has lodged in all men's hearts.

Nor need I remind you, I suppose, how such functions as those of which
my text speaks not only seem to be contradicted by all experience, but