Subject: Personal Identity.

"I am he."-JOHN ix. 9.

N extraordinary trial has been going on in London for many months. The question in dispute is one of identity—whether a certain man is, or is not, the person that he pretends to be. Multitudes of witnesses have been examined, but their evidence does not agree. The evidence of those on the one side is absolutely contradictory of that of those on the other. How strange, that all this time, and in the face of all this terrible conflict of testimony, the man himself knows the truth. It does not matter what men say, or how counsel may argue, or what the verdict of the court may be; it does not even matter what the man himself may wish or pretend. The fact cannot be altered. He is himself, and not another, and so he has been through all his strange, eventful, history.

Such is the awful endowment of personal identity. God has made us persons, like Himself (Gen. ii. 26; iii. 7), and every one feels that as a person he stands alone, separate and distinct from all besides in the universe. And not only so; but, as Bishop Butler says, "every person is conscious that he is now the same person or self he was as far back as his remembrance reaches; since, when any one reflects upon a past action of his own, he is just as certain of the person who did that action, namely himself, the person who now reflects upon it, as he is certain that the action was at all done."

The story with which the text is connected will help us to illustrate this subject still further. A man blind from his birth was restored to sight by our Lord. When he reappeared among his acquaintances his identity was disputed. His neighbours, who should have known him best, said, “Is not this he that sat and begged ?" But all did not agree in this. Some said, "This is he;" others said," He is like him." Whatever doubts others had, he himself had none. His testimony is clear and decisive, "I am he."

I. PERSONAL IDENTITY CONTINUES THROUGH ALL THE STAGES OF LIFE.

What a wonderful thing is a child! In it the old and the new meet. Its body is of the dust, and is made up of particles as old as creation; but its soul is from God, and is a new thing under the sun. There is a time when the child awakes to consciousness. He begins to talk. He asserts his will and individuality. He takes his place in the world, and is dealt with as a living person, free and responsible. So he passes from youth to age. During this time there have been countless changes as to his bodily condition; but amidst them all, and in spite of them all, he never loses his sense of identity. Ask this blind man, Are you the same person that we knew as a child? and he will answer, "I am he." Talk to some village patriarch of the days that are gone. "Where is A. ?" "He is dead." "What became of B. ?" long ago." "And C., whom I well remember, a bright clever boy, always at the top of his class, and able to beat me in everything; do you know anything of him?" The old man's eye gleams as he says, I am he." "Is it possible? I should never have known you." Cf. "Story of Luke Short in Life of John Flavel.

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"He left the country

Happy are they whose days are linked together by true piety, and who are able in old age, as in youth, to bless the Lord and to hope in His mercy (Ps. lxxi. 6-9, 17, 18).

II. PERSONAL IDENTITY CONTINUES THROUGH ALL THE VICISSITUDES OF LIFE.

A tree that has long been vigorous and fruitful begins to fade, but we still speak of it as the same tree. The city that has flourished for years may be laid waste, so that men ask, "Is this your joyous city?" But we still regard it as the same city. There is a certain continuity of existence which secures identity.

Much more is this true of man. Outward changes do not touch the soul. They are like the surface toss and flow of the waves, which leave the deep ocean beneath unaffected. There may be as wonderful alterations in a man's condition and circumstances, as when this beggar, blind from his birth, was restored to sight; but this does not affect his

identity. His situation may be so strange, so dreadful, so equivocal, that he is tempted to ask, "Can this be me, my very self?" But doubt he cannot. In dreams, in the ravings of delirium and insanity, the sense of identity may be lost; but never so long as mind and memory are unimpaired. Naomi is the same person when she left home full, as when she returned empty (Ruth i. 21).

"For happy wife, a most distressed widow,

For joyful mother, one that wails the name."

Job is the same person, sitting among the ashes, an object of derision, as he who received the homage of princes in the gate (Job ii. 8; xxix. 2-25). David is the same person seated on the throne, as he who tended his flock on the hills of Judah and sang sweetly of God-"The Lord is my Shepherd."

We must meet with trials.

They come sooner or later to all. But they have their uses. And here is one important purpose that they serve, they deepen our sense of personality. The world is ever trying to hide this from us. We lose ourselves in the crowd, in the whirl of business and of pleasure; but let pain come, let sickness strike us down, let bereavement leave us alone with our dead; and then we feel through our whole being that we are separate, responsible beings. And next to the sense of God, what thought more solemn, more chastening, more stimulating can fill the soul!

III. PERSONAL IDENTITY CONTINUES THROUGH ALL THE SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCES OF LIFE.

How strange were the experiences of this blind man! The change wrought upon his body was more than matched by the transformation wrought upon his soul. In one day he passes from darkness to light, and from ignorance and doubt to exulting faith in God's dear Son. At first he simply speaks of his Healer as a Man that is called Jesus" (ver. 11). his knowledge grows, he dares to proclaim Him a prophet (ver. 17). In the end, as His glory is more fully revealed to him, he gives Him the faith and homage of his heart as the

As

Son of God and the Saviour (ver. 38). But through all these experiences he is the same person. His opinions of Jesus have altered. The whole spirit of his mind is altered. He stands in a new relation to God, to truth, to immortality. All things have become new. And yet he is still the same person. "I am he." So it is in every Christian's life. There have been times of ignorance and of light, of doubt, of struggle, and of decision, of sorrow and of joy, of failure and of victory; but through all he is conscious of being the same person, the subject of the same gracious influences and teaching. Ask Peter, bold as a lion and firm as a rock in standing up for Jesus, "Art thou the disciple who denied his Lord? and he will say, "I am he." Ask Paul, the aged, who has finished his course and kept the faith, and is now ready to be offered up, Art thou he that stood by when Christ's faithful martyr, Stephen, was stoned to death? and he will answer I am he." So with the jailer of Philippi. So with Zaccheus. So with Nicodemus (John iii. 1; vii. 10; xix. 39). So with the Corinthians (1 Cor. vi. 11).

In conclusion, consider the bearing of this fact of personal identity upon 1. The Sense of Sin. 2. The Depth and Sincerity of Repentance. 3. The Enthusiasm and Glory of the Christian Life. It is our being persons that makes religion possible, progress in godliness attainable, variety in Christian character and work infinite. 4. Immortality. Death cannot touch our being. Cut off an arm, pluck out an eye, maim and mutilate the body as you please, the soul defies your power. So as to death. Jesus is the pattern and pledge. The continuity of our life is unbroken. Heaven will be the end and perfection of our life on earth.

Abernethy.

WILLIAM FORSYTH, M.A.

SERMONIC NOTES ON THE VISIONS OF EZEKIEL.

WH

No. XIII.

Subject: The True Watchman.

Chapter xxxiii.

(Erratum in Jan. number, Ezek. xxv.-xxxii., not xxxiii.)

HAT the prophet saw, as here recorded, shows us, in connection with what was local and temporary, (1) That Ezekiel's work continued notwithstanding great changes in the condition of the people. Much that he had predicted, both about the Jews and other nations, had already happened. The tide of time was carrying on to their destiny of retribution priests and people, professed monotheists and pagans. But in the midst of all that tide the prophet's work of predicting and warning and interpreting stood like a rock that no waves could cover and no storms could shake. Through the changing watches of the day and night the sentry's duty remained. This vision of his shows us, (2) That, notwithstanding their discipline, the character of many of the Jews remained very evil. Many of them would "not be warned," and they were "taken away in their iniquity." There was (a) The profligacy of some: they "worked abomination," and were adulterous. There was (3) The presumptuousness of others: they claimed their descent from Abraham as giving peculiar immunity from retribution (verse 24), and argued that they had a position superior to his, for "he was one, and they were many." There was (7) The hypocrisy of others. Mere profession, avowed delight in the message and messenger of truth whilst its spirit was really hated, is scathingly described in the end of this vision (ver. 31-34). The vision shows us, (3) The destiny of the individual Jews depended on the characters of the individuals themselves. Dean Stanley sums up some very eloquent remarks on the moral and spiritual doctrine of the prophet in this vision, in the forcible words, "On this narrow but solid plank of the doctrine of human responsibiity, Ezekiel crossed the chasm which divided the two parts of his