(4) _A supreme source of authority._--"As the Father gave Me commandment, even so I do." Every soul must have a supreme source of authority in its life, if it is to have peace. Its own whim, the suggestion of passion, the vagrant impulse of the moment, are inconsistent with tranquillity. There must be for each of us one voice which is imperative, one command which is indisputable, one authority which admits of no gainsaying. If you will search your heart you will see that this is so. Compare the restlessness of the Book of Judges with the tranquillity of the reign of Solomon, and you will have an apt illustration of your own experience before consecration put Christ on His throne, and afterward. When the true Melchizedek established his reign within you, at once your heart became Salem, the city of peace. When you put the government upon His shoulder, He set up His reign within you as the Prince of Peace. Happy for you, if to the increase of His government there is no end; for of the increase of your peace there will be no end either. Combine these four--the sense of God's presence and providence in the details of life; detachment from the world; a supreme love to God; the recognition in everything that you are His slave--and you will comply with the conditions of participating in the peace of Christ which He offers. Some persons have a marvellous faculty of imparting their own tranquillity in an accident, a storm, an illness; their aspect, tones, manner, are like the repose of a summer's evening after a sultry day: so shall Christ be to you, and you to others. III. CHRIST'S GIVING CONTRASTED WITH THE WORLD'S.--"Not as the world giveth, give I unto you." The world wishes peace, but lightly speaks the word; frequently wishing it when there is least warrant for it; wishing it without doing anything to produce it; wishing it whilst glorying over a wrong, healing slightly a wound, covering with the turf the crater of a volcano. Christ, on the other hand, lays the foundations of peace in suitable conditions of a holy and healthy life. With the world, peace is a passing emotion; with Christ, a settled principle of action--the perfect balance and equilibrium of the soul, out of which comes all that is fair, strong, wholesome. The world's peace consists in the absence of untoward circumstances; Christ's is altogether independent of circumstances, and consists in the state of the heart. It matters nothing to Him that in the world we have tribulation. He bids us be of good cheer, because in Him we shall have peace. The wildest conjunction of outward things cannot break the perfect peace which nestles to His heart, as Noah's dove to the hand which plucked it in from the weltering waters.