all the clouds and mists of self and the darkness of sin. Self-
sacrifice at the bidding of Jesus Christ is the recipe for the
highest, the most exquisite, the most godlike gladnesses of which the
human heart is capable. Our joy will remain if His joy is ours. Then
our joy will be, up to the measure of its capacity, ennobled, and
filled, and progressive, advancing ever towards a fuller possession
of His joy, and a deeper calm of that pure and perennial rapture,
which makes the settled and celestial bliss of those who have
'entered into the joy of their Lord.'

Brother! there is only one gladness that is worth calling so--and
that is, that which comes to us, when we give ourselves utterly away
to Jesus Christ, and let Him do with us as He will. It is better to
have a joy that is central and perennial--though there may be, as
there will be, a surface of sorrow and care--than to have the
converse, a surface of joy, and a black, unsympathetic kernel of
aching unrest and sadness. In one or other of these two states we all
live. Either we have to say, 'as sorrowful yet always rejoicing' or
we have to feel that 'even in laughter the heart is sorrowful, and
the end of that mirth is heaviness.' Let us choose for ourselves, and
let us choose aright, the gladness which coils round the heart, and
endures for ever, and is found in submission to Jesus Christ, rather
than the superficial, fleeting joys which are rooted on earth and
perish with time.



THE ONENESS OF THE BRANCHES

'This is My commandment, That ye love one another, as I have