HE ELECT LADY.

LECTURE XVI.

THE ELECT LADY, THE MODEL MATRON..

THE

`HE origin of the Elect Lady is involved in as much mystery as that of "the blind, old bard of Scio's rocky isle." It is said that seven cities contended for the honor of being his birth-place, while not one city has put forward any claim for being the birth-place of the lady in question, who was destined to a still wider fame. That is a matter of small consequence. Many a noble life is like the mighty river, which flows along in majesty, refreshing and blessing everything with which it comes in contact, while its origin is hid

Deep in those solitary woods

Where oft the genii of the floods,

Dance round the cradle of their Nile

And hail the new-born giant's smile."

Not only the origin, but the very name and existence of this good woman have given rise to endless discussion. To what person or object was John's second Epistle addressed? has been the question of the ages.

What nonsense! (may I not be permitted to exclaim?) Is it any wonder that self-styled critics have arisen at this day, to prove that no such man as Shakespeare ever lived, or if he lived, that he was an ignoramus who never wrote the plays ascribed to him?

Only a few days ago I looked into a pretentious and costly volume, in which the author undertook to prove that "the greatest master of the human heart who ever swept its chords," was ignorant and uneducated; and that Lord Bacon and not Shakespeare wrote the greatest poems in our language. As I understand it (and the Bible was written by plain men for plain people, and is to be understood in the most common-sense way), the elect lady was a good woman, living, perhaps, in the vicinity of Ephesus, distinguished for her elevated Christian character, whom John thought worthy of the Epistle which he addressed to her. I am glad to have such good authority on my side as Canon Farrar, who says, "I take the letter in its natural sense, as having been addressed to a Christian lady and her children. Some of those children the Apostle seems to have met in one of his visits of supervision of the churches of Asia. They may have been on a visit to some of their cousins in a neighboring city."

There are several things for which this famous woman was remarkable. First she was called a lady. There are many persons who regard this as an unscriptural term. They do not know that it occurs anywhere in the Bible. The word woman has grown into such favor, that it is regarded as possessing far more dignity and appropriateness as applied to the gentler sex. The word lady has grown somewhat into disrepute, and yet it is a word of higher grade than woman, and is never used in a bad sense. We hear of a bad woman, but never of a bad lady. The word "lady" occurs four times, and "ladies" twice in the

Bible. A striking picture is that recorded in Judges, where it is said, "The mother of Sisera looked out at a window and cried through the lattice, Why is his chariot so long in coming? why tarry the wheels of his chariot? Her wise ladies answered her." And we read of "the ladies of Persia and Media" in Esther; while John in his second epistle emphasizes the word by using it twice.

The woman in question was not only a lady, but according to the use of the term in that day, a very noble lady. The term kuria, which is the very opposite of lord, implies this. Bengel says, "A title so lofty as kuria was rarely used even to queens." From all which we may suppose she was a very rich woman, for the term lady implies as much according to Shakespeare:

"Of all these bounds, even from this line to this,

With shadowy forests and with champagne riched,
With plenteous rivers and with spreading meads,
We make thee Lady."

She must have been rich to have extended such a bounteous hospitality. It is a mistaken notion that only poor people were connected with the early churches. There were rich men like Joseph of Arimathea, and rich and noble women like Joanna the wife of Herod's steward, and the elect lady, who ministered to the infant cause of their substance.

More than that, it has been said, she was an "elect " lady-elect in the sense of being chosen of God according to His eternal purpose, to the "inheritance that is incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away.”