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TENTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY 
There is a touching connection between the Epistle and Gospel of this day which seems as if it could hardly be accidental; or, if it is, offers an illustration of the manner in which all Holy Scripture gives evidence that it is drawn from one Fountain of truth.  The Gospel shows our Blessed Lord weeping over Jerusalem, because she had failed to recognize the things that belonged to her peace.  The Prince of Peace had come to her, offering the good gifts which are ever the fruits of His Presence, but her eyes had been blinded by her wilfulness, those gifts of peace had been rejected, and now they were hid from her.  Our Lord's last words of warning a few days afterwards were in the same strain, "Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you...While ye have light, believe in the light, that ye may be the children of light."  They were the last public words of the Light of the world before His Passion began; and when He had spoken them, He "departed, and did hide Himself from them" [John xii. 36].  With such an experience before the new Israel of God, the Apostle St. Paul exhorts them not to be ignorant of the spiritual gifts with which they have been blessed: those manifold operations of the Holy Ghost on the souls of men, by which they are fitted for the work of the ministry, or for that of ordinary Christian life.  And the association of these two portions of Holy Scripture comes as a perennial warning to Churches in their corporate capacity, and to individual Christians, calling them to remember that as Jesus had cause to weep over the neglect of His gifts when offered to the Jews, so is such a neglect cause of sorrow even now in Heaven, and may be followed by the judgement which fell upon her of old who knew not the time of her visitation.  The enemies of the Church are ever ready to dig their trenches and compass her around, and lay her even with the ground.  Her true strength is, that she should ever remember and use her spiritual gifts, and know the value of Christ's Presence in the time when He visits her with His salvation.