BY REV. THOMAS E. VERMILYE, D. D.,
Pastor of the Collegiate Church on Lafayette-Place, New York.

SPECIAL EVANGELICAL EFFORTS IN CITIES.

"Then the Master of the house being angry, said to his servants, Go out quickly into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in hither the poor, and the maimed, and the halt, and the blind."-LUKE xiv. 21.

OUR Lord's familiar illustration of the Gospel provision by the parable of a marriage feast suggests various distinct and profitable applications. As it was first intended to foretell the rejection of the Jews and the calling of the Gentiles, it teaches a solemn lesson respecting the goodness and severity of God: his long-suffering patience, and final wrath on them that fell, and the absolute sovereignty of his grace towards such as are brought into the fold.

It serves, likewise, very beautifully to set forth the abundance of the supply, and the unrestricted freeness of the offer. It is adapted to all; it is sufficient for all; it is offered to all. There is no individual of any class, or condition, or character, who may not participate of the gift. Again, the excuses of the invited guests show the very general disesteem in which the Gospel is held, and the kind of motives by which men are uniformly influenced in their rejection of it. "All begin to make excuse;" and all assign plausible, but selfish, worldly reasons for their conduct.

The danger, again, of their case, who from any cause, treat the call with neglect and disdain, is strikingly exhibited. The day of their merciful visitation passes by, and they perish, notwithstanding the amplitude of the provision. "None of those which were bidden shall taste of my supper." Finally, we may gather from the parable a lesson concerning the duty resting upon those who already enjoy the Gospel, to impart it to such as are yet destitute of its light and its hopes. We are not to mono polize it, but to send it to others needing it just as much as ourselves;to China, to enlighten the poor worshippers of dead ancestors; to India, to rescue the devotee from the wheels of Juggernaut ; the babe, which a mother's mistaken zeal consigns to the waters of the Ganges;-to the follower of the false prophet; to benighted Africa; to the islands of the sea, that it may at length demolish the vast fabric of superstition and idolatry which Satan has for ages been erecting in our world, and bless the ruined race with the glad tidings of great joy. Among ourselves, too, we must take care not merely that affluence, and elegance, and learning, shall have fitting accommodations to hear the message, but that for the poor, the degraded, the sorrowful, the oppressed, ample room shall likewise be furnished. We are not to wait until they come to us; we are to go to them. We must carry to the negligent the word they will not seek : we must search out the sufferer, pining upon his bed of sickness; the lone

widow; the orphan in the chambers of solitary wretchedness; the slaves of vice; the abandoned in their dens of infamy. We must breathe into the ear of that child of sorrow the sweet words of a Saviour's sympathy, and rouse the desponding heart. We must sit down beside the outcast, win his confidence by tones of kindness; tell him of "grace to help in every time of need," and so inspire courage and hope where evil habit had destroyed all self-control, and left only remorse and despair. We must point the wanderers to the gospel heavens, in which the sun of righteousness doth set his bow of promise. We must tell them how the evening of their stormy life may become serene and hopeful; how their setting sun may convert the clouds that have obscured its course into a pavilion of glory, the joyous harbinger of another and a brighter day. Moreover, we must not be easily repulsed nor discouraged on our godlike errand; but with self-denying perseverance, with the persuasion of lips upon which is the law of kindness, with the earnestness of a heart full of the love of souls and of Jesus, we must use a violence to bring them to the feast. "Go out into the streets and lanes of the city," and "compel them to come in."

But there is another train of thought very naturally suggested by the language of the text, which I intend to pursue in this discourse-viz., the necessity and adaptation of the Gospel to cities, and the importance of making them the fields of special evangelical efforts. Certainly the religion of the New Testament was not designed exclusively for any one place or set of circumstances, but forman as he exists at all times and in all modes of social life. This parable contains a direction to "go out into the highways and hedges" in search of guests; and so teaches that the scattered tribes of men, and even the wayfarer, are not to be overlooked. But there appears to me something significant in the fact that the Saviour not only made the compact villages and cities so often the sphere of his personal labours, but commanded his disciples to preach the Gospel, "beginning at Jerusalem;" and when persecuted in one city to flee into another; and also in the fact that the apostles, in strict observance of this injunction, almost uniformly selected populous cities as the seats of their ministrations. This was not simply to convince men that now, since the resurrection of Christ, the doctrine they had in charge was so well authenticated by evidence, that they could boldly court the greatest publicity, and challenge the strictest scrutiny;-but it was likewise because cities offered peculiar facilities for success in the mission they had been called to fulfil-to "preach the Gospel to every creature." For this reason it was that they began their aggressive warfare at points where their efforts would be most effective, even "where Satan's seat was." I proceed then to some suggestions which serve to illustrate this topic.

I. The first thought that occurs to the mind in this relation is, that their very populousness gives to cities great interest and importance as fields forevangelical efforts. This is a consideration that appeals strongly to the sympathies and also to the convenience of the laborer. Who that has ordinary sensibility can take his station at the confluence of some of the main avenues, or on some thoroughfare of a large city, and observe the tide of human beings that rolls along from morning to night without interruption, that does not entirely cease the livelong night, and not be deeply moved by what he beholds? How much life is there, and that not

merely the sensation of brutes; but how much intelligence, and emotion, and activity, and enterprise! What varieties of character and conditions! -what projects and plans!-what aspirations and disappointments!what hopes and what despair are represented in the scene that is passing before him! He does not look upon a herd of animals, but upon thinking man. And that multitudinous way may afford him a vivid panorama of our world and of the race of man upon it: of the ever-shifting scene, the changing actors, and the joys or woes that fill up the pageantry of time. To one given to reflection, such a spectacle may excite more absorbing interest, and easily teach lessons of far higher value than all those other objects of curiosity with which a city abounds. But the Christian remembers that of that endless mass every one has an immortal soul, and is passing on to a judgment bar. The crowds he sees form too but a portion of the entire population of that city. What vast numbers besides are occupied with various in-door callings! How many are the poor, the sick, the suffering, who never appear to the public eye! and how many other currents are flowing on in other directions besides that which is immediately in view!-All these are made in the image of God-all are immortal, accountable-all are candidates for heaven or hell. As preceding generations have occupied the same places, have been engrossed by the same pursuits, and have passed away after a short and fevered career, so all these are hasting on to the dread account. What Christian revolving such thoughts in his mind, can refrain from giving vent to his feelings in the touching language of the Saviour: "I have compassion on the multitude?" Who that notices their trivial, sensual occupations, the perfect worldliness of their chosen pursuits, will not, like Paul at Athens, feel "his spirit stirred within him when he sees the city wholly given to idolatry ?"-So far, then, as it is necessary to enkindle warm-hearted, Christian sympathy, the sight of the multitude is well adapted to that end. But there is another advantageous circumstance. Our object is to bring divine truth into contact with the greatest number of minds, and enforce its claims upon the conscience; to make men realize their relations to it, and its adaptation to them; its connection with their soul's peace, and its wide-reaching and ever-during consequences. In cities, large masses are collected within narrow limits: they live compactly, and are easily accessible; so that many more persons than in other circumstances can be reached in a short time, and with the same amount of well directed labour. For example: France is studded with towns and villages of various sizes: but you know Paris is France: and within the comparatively small compass of that city are collected over a million of human beings. The entire population of England, not including Scotland and Wales, is a little short of seventeen millions. The whole country is well peopled, and there are many large inland and sea-port towns: but of the entire aggregate of inhabitants,nearly two millions and a half are congregated upon the area covered by the city of London alone! Within half a century, its increase has been nearly a million and a half. And that single city contains a population equal to the entire kingdom of Denmark; half that of Sweden, and Norway, and Portugal, and Belgium, and Holland. Our own country, particularly in the Atlantic States, may be said to be thickly settled; and there are many towns of considerabie magnitude. But Baltimore, Boston, Philadelphia, New York, are the great points of attraction. Thither the current sets from all parts and the masses are found; and that population is made up of all characters and classes, presenting the material for all kinds of benevolent labour, and all modes of address. The extremes always meet there.

We see bloated wealth and haggard want; the highest refinement and vulgar display; the palace and the hovel in the closest proximity. Specimens of piety of the most intense and devoted kind; philanthrophy self-sacrificing and unwearied, inventing and enterprising to devise and execute plans of benevolence, and to bear succour to the needy; the highest forms of humanity, the most beautiful illustrations of the pure spirit and effective activity of Christ's Gospel are there; and there, too, heartless selfishness and hoarding avarice abound; and there the very worst characters herd, to contrive, and practice their villany, and man reaches the lowest point of personal and social degradation.-The spacious avenues are lined with store-houses, in which are gathered the rare and costly products of every clime; and commercial success furnishes to all classes the means of gratifying pride and luxury, the invariable attendants upon increasing riches. Splendid equipages glitter before the eye, and crowds of the fashionable and the gay expand their lustrous wings in the sun-beams of folly. The show proceeds until the sight is pained, and the imagination itself is bewildered with the varied and the gorgeous display. But hard by, what a different scene presents itself! Narrow, filthy lanes and ruined hovels literally swarm with life. The neglected outcasts of every color, and lineage, and tongue, hide themselves from the public gaze in remote corners up close alleys, in garrets and cellars; and the profligate find a congenial retreat and are at home. Misery, indeed, dwells there; but there also vice and crime hold their orgies, and moral corruption festers in its own rankness and becomes gangrened, and spreads its poison through the atmosphere around.

In another direction, again, are found objects that awaken a different interest-Christ's poor to be ministered to. I could recently have taken you to a remote spot, where, after mounting a trembling stairway, in a confined garret lay a father, passing away, in the prime of his years, the victim of consumption. His daily labour had been the soul dependence of an affectionate wife, and bright promising children. That provision was now at an end, and, strangers in a strange land, their entire support was from the precarious charity of those who might casually become acquainted with their destitution. It was a hard lot, for they had been accustomed to better things. For her and for her children, the prospect was dark indeed. But there was no murmur there. They had professed to be the Saviour's followers, and now was the time to trust him while he led them through a dreary way. They knew that God was a refuge, and a very present help in trouble, and to him they fled. The promise of covenant care, the doctrines of Bible truth, and the voice of prayer, inspired resignation and hope. The dying man could leave his loved ones to Him who is "a Father of the fatherless, and the widow's God," and depart in hope. And they remain Christ's legacy to his people on earth. But many instances of equal sadness exist among us-nor need you search far to find them out. Any Pastor, any Tract Missionary, or visitor of the Society for the Relief of the Poor, can tell you of such cases not a few. How true is it that "one-half of the world does not know how the other half lives," nor the superior mercies of their own lot! Hence, to ourselves as much as to them, the value of personal intercourse with the poor and forsaken. And remember that "to visit the fatherless and widow in their affliction," is one test of Christian character. That piety that luxuriates in religious sentimentalism, that does not evince and corroborate its life by beneficent action, certainly is not healthful in its tone-is not half so beautiful to man, nor so acceptable to God as that which blends the in

cense of daily prayer with the visits of mercy and the oblations of unostentatious charity.

Now, all these classes are found mainly in our cities. City populations are made up of just such varieties. Here is the material for our work. Here is the field ripe for the harvest, and Christians are called to enter it. These multitudes, so diverse in many respects, are in others upon a level. They have souls of incalculable worth; they have all gone out of the way of life; Christ came to seek and to save the lost; and these lost ones we must strive, with his blessing, to save, by bringing to them the knowledge of the truth. They are compact; at our doors. Many can be easily approached; for Providence has prepared the way by disappointments and sorrow. But if they neglect or repel all ordinary means of grace, still must we not abandon the work; for interests too momentous to them, society, their posterity, and the kingdom of Christ, are depending upon our labours.

II. I remark, again, that the EXCITABILITY of a city population, their curiosity, their Athenian love of novelty, although, in some points of view, indeed, disadvantageous, may yet in others be favorable to our purpose, if we are wise to adapt ourselves, and our instrumentality to meet the case. And this, I am persuaded, we can do, without derogating from the proprieties of the religious character, or losing sight of the dignity of the divine message. Now, the regular ministrations of the word and ordinances by settled pastors in organized churches, I feel to be so essential to the growth and perpetuity of Christ's kingdom, that no other ordinance or mode of operation can supply their place. These are the bulwark and defence of Christianity. In them is nurtured the spirit, and there are found the resources that support all your benevolent operations. Out of them, and from the teachings of the stated ministry, come the means and the men that make this age conspicuous beyond all others for evangelical enterprise. And any comparison between this and any other mode of religious action, to the disparagement of a thoroughly educated and settled ministry, is exceedingly unwise-for it overlooks the very source of our power-and unscriptural, for it dishonors the Saviour's special appointment for lasting good in the world. But then, there is no doubt in my mind that, in subordination to this, there is room for other modes of effort and address, and that the condition of our country, and especially of our cities, calls for their use. We are apt to connect with the missionary-work, the idea of a far-off field, destitute of all means of grace; a community where no Sabbath dawns; where there are no Bibles; and where no voice of the living preacher breaks upou the stillness of spir itual death with the tidings of salvation. Yet, in Christian lands, there are hundreds of thousands just as destitute. They live in the heart of Christian communities, and therefore experience a sort of reflex influence upon their sentiments and conduct, from the prevalence of Christian institutions around them. But as to any personal concern in the matter, they have no abiding religious convictions, and are as literally "without God in the World," as if they were buried in the depths of Gentilism. They will not voluntary seck our churches, for all their tastes and habits are averse from divine ordinances, and unless some means be devised to get hold of them, to engage their attention and excite their interest, this indifference will grow and ripen and bear deadly fruits of impiety. Yet, they are acute and inquisitive; fond of excitement; and, as often appears, their feelings may be easily enlisted on subjects of religious