an analogue will readily find it. It is a circumstance of the extraordinary interest that there should be living upon the globe at this moment an animal representing the actual transition from Invertebrate to Vertebrate life. The acquisition of a vertebral column is one of the great marks of height which Nature has bestowed upon her creatures; and in the shallow waters of the Mediterranean she has preserved for us a creature which, whether a degenerate form or not, can only be likened to one of her first rude experiments in this direction. This animal is the Lancalet, or Amphioxus, and so rudimentary is the backbone that it does not contain any bone at all, but only a shadow or prophecy of it in cartilege. The cartilaginous notochord of the Amphioxus nevertheless is the progenitor of all vertebral columns, and in the first instance this structure appears in the human embryo exactly as it now exists in the Lancelet. But this is only a single example. In living Nature there are a hundred other animal characteristics which at one stage or another the biologist may discern in the ever-changing kaleidoscope of the human embryo.

THE CLIMAX.

We are not nearly half-way up the ascent yet, but the outline of the marvellous process will be seen. Up to this point man is but a first rough draft, an almost formless lump of clay. As yet there is no distinct head, no brain, no jaws, no limbs; the heart is imperfect, the higher visceral organs are feebly developed, everything is elementary. But gradually new organs loom in sight, old ones increase in complexity. By a magic which has never yet been fathomed the hidden potter shapes and reshapes the clay. The whole grows in size and symmetry. Resemblances this time to the

embryos of the lower vertebrate series, flash out as each new step is attained; first the semblance of the Fish, then of the Amphibian, then of the Reptile, last of the Mammal. Of these great groups the leading embryonic characters appear as in a moving panorama, some of them pronounced and unmistakable, others mere sketches, suggestions, likeness of infinite subtlety. At last the true Mammalian form emerges from the crowd. Far ahead of all at this stage stand out three species-the Tailed Catarrhine Ape, the Tailless Catarrhine, and last, differing physically from these mainly by the enlargement of the brain and a development of the larynx--Man.

"ALL BUT" PROVED.

Whatever views be held of the doctrine of Evolution, whatever theories of its cause, these facts of Embryology are all but proved. One says "all but" proved; for in perfect fairness one must record two facts on which anyone may hold an objection if he feels they have serious strength. The first is that the exact genealogy of the vertebrates is not yet traced in every minute detail. Embryology is one of the youngest of the sciences. Man at present has a choice of earthly relatives. Though his genealogical line is generally clear, yet so far as actual and specific identification are concerned, he is still "in search of a father." For another thing, part of this embryological argument is at present founded on analogy. Our ideas of the probable history of the human ovum for the first few days are mainly taken from our knowledge of the development of other mammals and of birds and reptiles. It is a general scientific fact, however, that over the graves of these myriad aspirants the Animal Man has risen. It was formerly held that the entire ani

THE TEMPLE OF THE BODY.

Those who know the Cathedral of St. Mark's will remember how this noblest of the Stones of Venice owes its greatness to the patient hands of centuries and centuries of workers, how every quarter of the globe has been spoiled of its treasures to dignify this single shrine. But he who ponders over the more ancient temple of the human body will find imagination fail him as he tries to think from what remote and mingled sources, from what lands, seas, climates, atmospheres, its various parts have been called together, and by what innumerable contributory creatures, swimming, creeping, flying, climbing, each of its several members was wrought and perfected. What ancient chisel first sculptured the rounded columns of the limbs? What dead hands built the cupola of the brain, and from what older ruins were the scattered pieces of its mosaic work brought? Who fixed the windows in its upper walls? What forgotten looms wove its tapestries and draperies? What winds and weathers wrought the strength into its buttresses? What ocean-beds and forest glades worked up the colors? What Love and Terror and Night called forth the Music? And what Life and Death and Pain and Struggle put all together in the noiseless workshop of the past and removed each worker silently when

The architects and builders of this mighty temple are not anonymous. Their names and the work they did are graven for ever on the walls and arches of the Human Embryo. For this is a volume of that Book in which Man's members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there were none of them.

DEGRADATION OR EXALTATION.

The descent of man from the animal kingdom is sometimes spoken of as a degradation. It is an unspeakable exaltation. Recall the vast antiquity of that primal cell from which the human embryo first sets forth. Compass the nature of the potentialities stored up in its plastic substance. Watch the busy processes, the multiplying energies, the mystifying transitions, the inexplicable chemistry of this living laboratory. Observe the variety and intricacy of its metamorphoses, the exquisite gradation of its ascent, the unerring aim with which the one type unfolds-never pausing, never uncertain of its direction, refusing arrest at intermediate forms, passing on to its flawless maturity with. out waste or effort or fatigue. See the sense of motion at every turn, of purpose and of aspiration. Discover how, with identity of process and loyalty to the type, a hair's breadth of deviation is yet secured to each, so that no two forms came out the same, but each arises an original creation, with features, characteristics and individualities of its own. Remember finally, that even to make the first cell possible, stellar space had to be swept of matter, suns had to be broken up, planets had to cool, the agents of geology had to labor for milleniums at the unfinished earth, and without mould or mortar fashion the pedestal

SOULS THAT SLEEP. A CHICAGO ADdress by Rev. Joun McNEILL, OF LONDON.

Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light. (Eph., v. 14.)

He said: "Awake, thou that sleep

est." We have this in substance and in different forms elsewhere, but in actual form here. Luther said, you remember, that certain texts were little Bibles. I think this is one; at any rate, this is a text which is a little sermon. "Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light." That is an evangelistic text; it is an evangelistic address; it is put in the very form that conveys it to the people to whom you are talking. Now here is a text that is a sermon.

REMEMBER THE TEXT.

You may forget what I say, but I want you to remember the text. There is the sinner described; there is the sinner addressed; there is the sinner pointed to the Saviour. What more would you have? "Awake, thou that sleepest." See how our life away from Christ. the life of unbelief, the life of worldliness, the life of sin that you are living, is described here as a life of sleep. The Bible often changes its figures. The man who is not converted, the soul here who is not walking in the light of Christ's grace is asleep; you are like one who at 12 o'clock in the day is still soundly snoring on his bed. It is not a complimentary description, is it? The Bible never was complimentary to a sinner; the Bible always speaks the

plain, bare truth. That is why folks don't like the Bible and don't like the preacher. And I can imagine a man saying, "Oh, this is overdone; we must draw the line at this.”

THE BIBLE AS A FOUNDATION.

But it is on the Bible; I stand on the Bible every time, and the Bible said it all to me first. I kicked against it just like my neighbors, but found it true, and I am not going to let you off. Not only does the Bible back me up, but my own experience does, and plenty of people also, who first of all were ruffled by God's Word and irritated; but by and by they found out that the Bible was a faithful friend. Because the Bible loved it dared their rebuke, and it told them the truth. You say to me: "If you only knew the people who know me ; they would tell you that I am rather wide awake." Well, I have not denied it; in the affairs of the. world I believe you are very wide awake. If there was anything to be got by it, you are on the right shift to make overtime. I be lieve you are all agog; you would turn night into day, and make Sunday into Saturday if it got you something as regards this present world.

You remember the story of the man who went to sleep, and when he waked up the generation meanwhile had passed away. He came to the village, and noticed how everything around him was mildewed and rusty, and nobody knew him. The only place where he felt familiar was in the headstones were the names of the the graveyard, where the names of people he had known before he fell on his sleep.

AFTER THE AWAKENING.

Now every unconverted man will, after his awakening, admit that he was sound asleep, and that the realities of life had never dawned upon him. Thus the text holds true, "Awake,

thou that sleepest." Suffer my blunt speech. If you want to rouse a man you have got to rouse him; you will never rouse a heavy sleeper, like some of you, by standing up and washing your hands in invisible soap and water and whispering polite nothings. I am not here to say hard things about your natural condition, simply for the sake of saying them, or simply to show that I have the best of the argument according to the Bible, or that I have the whip by the handle, and will make you feel the supple

end it.

I am speaking in the rousing way I am doing because I am right. I will go bail for it that you come to me to morrow night, if you take Christ tonight, and you will say: say: "Preacher, you were right. My past unconverted life was just as good as sleep, a dream unreal, and I only woke up to the realities of existence, to the realities of time and eternity, some time between 8 and 9 o'clock, in the First Congregational Church last night."

BELIEVE IN ETERNITY.

Let me come to you and be the means of wakening you to concern about conversion, about your own personal interest in Christ, to personal concern about the things which await you in eternity, which is always coming nearer. Believe in eternity, believe in God, believe in Christ, take the Bible view of things in regard to yourself and in regard to sin, and the Saviour and eternity, and the blessings which come through faith in Him. "Awake, thou that sleepest" to reality, to consciousness, to some dim understanding, at least, of existence, as represented by the eternal word of the eternal God. "Awake, thou that sleepest," and thank God that the message is so plain, a trumpet call, something rolling, resounding, and no mistake about it. It is

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no world for sleeping in, this. But, oh, outside of Christ, how dare you sleep outside of Christ, how dare you rest? I once caught a man lying asleep, a drunken sleep, between the four-foot, as it is called, of the railway, and the midnight express coming thundering down the bank.

WAIL OF THE UNCONVERTED.

soul. Awake and listen, and you will Such is thy state, oh, unconverted hear the far-off sound of that judgment which is coming. Get out from between the rails. Get out; shift your body. Get yourself clear. I could I pass him? And didn't I wake him rather roughly? Wouldn't I have been a fool if I had sat down and said polite things to him?

wakened that man, didn't I? How

"This is no time to trifle;

Life is brief and sin is here;
Courage is like the falling of a leaf,
The dropping of a tear.

This is no place to dream away the hours,
All should be earnest in a world like ours."

"Awake, thou that sleepest, and”— and what? "And arise from the dead." What does that mean? First of all "awake"; that's the first thing. Then the second thing is, of course, "get up, arise from the dead,” for every man who awakens is not a man who is up, is he? Oh no, no, no! Some of us make a big difference between awakening and getting up. It is not so hard to awaken some of you, but oh, it is a job to get you over on to your feet. You will awaken and you will get on your elbow, and you will crack away with anybody for an hour like a popgun; you will talk and talk, and drink a cup of coffee in your bedoh, how you like it!—yes, anything to postpone the actual having to get up and put on your clothes and go back again to the old treadmill of the world's work. Oh, some of us don't know how lazy we can be, for we have never been tried.

SHOULD FACE THE DUTY.

I awaken sometimes, I don't know whether it is the same with you? I take these homely illustrations that cause a smile, because they are true. Now I have wakened and not got up; this was the fatal spring. I fell over again and dreamed that I was up.

Haven't you done that? I dreamed that I was up and dressed, and then afterward woke up with a start and an awful disappointment, to find that it was all to do yet. I'm afraid there are a lot of people that way in religion. They only think.

Come, wake up, man; arise, take the step forward and outward away from sleep, away from your past, and be able to say: "I am up, bless God, I'm up; I know that I'm up, and I know that I have left my bed by the very shivers that are going through me in the cold." Spring to your feet like a man; it is high time, it is almost past time. "What meanest thou, oh sleeper? Arise and call upon thy God." "Arise from the dead." There is the truth, too, to describe what is round about you and the state you are in. Who would sleep in a graveyard? Who would live among bones and decay? And there is where you are living, unconverted sinner.

"There is a time, I know not when,
A point, I know not where,
That marks the destiny of men
For glory or despair."

Don't live among the dying and the the rotten. Live! Oh come. Arise.

THE SAVIOUR WILL GIVE LIGHT.

"Christ shall give thee light." A great offer for you, and the great danger to warn you from, the awful death, the awful danger of passing away in your sleep as we read of people doing every day, passing away in their sleep. God save us! There may be numbers of people who spiritually pass away in their sleep and

have never woke. They died as they lived! A man is not comfortabie when he awakens. He wakens with his face to Sinai, and there sweep through his soul these considerations: "God is holy, God is my Law-giver: I have broken His laws; I was made by Him and am accountable to Him, and my life has been a transgression, a trampling under foot of His Commandments and His grace and mercy." Steady your nerve a minute; you may take a wrong step now; and as you have obeyed the rest of the text, will you obey this: "Christ shall give thee light." First of all, you are sleeping in the midst of your danger and distress; then when you are awakened to it all, "Christ shall give thee light." Do you ask, "Where is He?" He is beside you; He has come in; He is the brave fireman : He has come into your burning building, and has wanted to fill His arms with you. It is like this: In Edinburgh one night-and if any of you know Edinburgh you know the Register house and you know the very high block of buildings behind the Register house-I think in West Register street yonder, just straight from the postoffice, there stands a very high towering building. Some friends of mine lived in one of the "flats," as they are called. A fire broke out in the night. The people heard the noise, they heard the crackling, they heard the shouts, and they awakened the sleepers. They arose, though, alass, they afterward went wrong. They arose, gathered themselves together, they came down-stairs till they came to the passage that leads out into the street. They were almost safe; but in that entry they were met by a blinding rush of smoke, and in the terror and alarm of the moment, instead of going straight out through the smoke, they turned into a door that was standing decidedly open, a