ART EXPENDITURE.

Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor?'-John xii. 5.

THERE were, once upon a time, two men who were friends, but whose characters and pursuits in life were different. The one was a lover of Beauty, the other a lover, as he said, of Use. The latter had given up his life to practical purposes;' he had built houses for the poor, he had arranged the sanitary measures of a city, he had visited the prisons and the hospitals, and had toiled to save disease and crime. And his character and strength were suited to this work, so that he did it well.

The other had spent his life in examining the Beautiful; he had studied its laws in nature and art, and he devoted himself in retirement to expressing what he had discovered in the most beautiful manner possible: his enthusiasm pushed him to think that men would be interested in his work, and his aim was to awaken in the world the love of Beauty by giving a high and noble pleasure. He did not care to teach morality as the first thing, but to make beautiful things familiar; and by bringing these beautiful things before men, to refine imaginations not as yet refined, till they could

see the more ideal beauty. This being his work, and his character and physical temper being suited to it, he did it well, and he did nothing else. He did not visit the poor, nor was he seen in hospitals. His money was spent on beautiful things such as he wanted for his work, not on sanitary improvements and model cottages.

With this life and with this expenditure his friend became angry. "What!' he said, will you make poems while famine is making death? The poor are perishing; God's children are being done to death; disease and crime are devouring the nation, and you sit still in your poetic and artistic leisure, producing only words. Throw away all this useless work, attack evil, expose oppression, cleanse the foul dwelling, see and realise what poverty and pain mean. To what purpose is this waste? These things which you call beautiful might be sold for much money, and given to the poor.' So he spoke in his dark anger; and the spirit of his friend was moved, and he went forth into the rude work of the world. It sickened and dismayed him; his poetical power went from him; his faculty for revealing the Beautiful passed away; his delicacy and sympathy caused him to break down in contact with crime and disease. He tried hard, but it was failure; his life was ruined, and no good was done. He could not do his friend's work, and trying to do it, he ceased to be able to do his own.

Now, I say that this sort of thing, so common now, is not only a pity, but that a great wrong is done to man

kind by this Judas cry. Each man has his own work, and it is a shameful thing, if any of us, imagining that our peculiar work is the only important one, take advantage of our greater violence of character and drag away our friend from his work to enlist him as our follower. It is then that we should hear the words of Christ: Let her alone: why trouble ye the woman? she hath wrought a good work for Me.' For they are the consecration of those labours which do not directly act upon the welfare of men, but indirectly on it through the awakening of feeling; they are the consecration of the expenditure of time and money upon things which kindle in the heart the sense of beauty, and bring with them the thoughts which exalt and adorn existence. This, with the thoughts bound up with it, is our subject this morning.

First. It is no wonder that there are many who have indignation at the apparent waste of time upon the arts, who demand that all our expenditure should be visibly reproductive. For the worst sin of our society is its waste of wealth. Night and day, while the commonest necessities of decent living are not placed in the power of those in want of them, Dives and his crew cast hundreds of pounds into the Thames, and excuse themselves on the plea, so often proved a false one, that expenditure on dress and luxuries encourages trade and adds to the wealth of the country. They cannot, and they will not understand that buying seeds and then burning them is a different thing from sowing seed in the earth which will spring-up in thirtyfold ears of corn. It is no wonder, I repeat, that there are many who, indignant

at this waste, should call upon all to make the directly useful the aim of expenditure.

And utility ought always to be the end of expenditure. But, is there only one utility in relation to the welfare of men? Must all expenditure increase the material happiness of man? are we never doing man good, except when we are providing for his outward wants or giving him an education which will enable him to get on in the world? Even in matters like food and dress are we forced to restrain our expenditure to that which is absolutely necessary? Expenditure beyond the necessary on these things is certainly unproductive, but is it always useless? I answer, that we are bound not only to assist the poor, but also to charm our society, to show that we have thought of others by our desire to delight them. Within certain limits, expenditure on dress is useful in producing a social ease and charm. Where it is entirely neglected-in a household, for example-it produces domestic quarrels, and it really means not only carelessness of person, but carelessness of pleasing.

Expenditure on it is not productive of material good to others-it is productive of another kind of good altogether.

Then there is also the question of food. Within certain limits some extra expenditure on providing a pleasant banquet for one's friends is not truly unproductive. It is a symbol of our willingness to please, of our desire to give of our best to those we love and honour, and as such it rises out of the common and material into the spiritual. In both cases persons may

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come to you and say, 'Why was not this dress, these wines, sold for money and given to the poor ?' In both cases we may reply on the same principle on which Christ replied. But observe the real aim in both these cases in which I have said that expenditure apparently unproductive is good, has been the desire to please, the desire to express affection, the desire to give-the same desires which filled the woman's heart in the Gospel.

Are those the desires which guide the unbridled expenditure of society on food and dress? Is that the aim with which vast sums-vast when one thinks of the misery they might help to remedy-are uselessly cast away upon luxurious dinners and costly clothing?

Not at all. Everyone is aware that the usual aim is to make a show; to have society talking of our splendour; to rival our neighbour, not in elegance but in expenditure; to hear the world talking of the great suins spent at our supper, or of the endless variety of our dress. And on the whole, is there a meaner or more contemptible ambition in the world than this? It is not the ambition to make the world more beautiful, it is self-display; it is not the ambition to please others, it is the desire to win an envious applause at the expense of others, for half the pleasure derived is in the thought that others are left behind in this race. of fashionable fame.

Expenditure on food and dress for the sake of display is vile expenditure. In itself it is coarse, for its aim is not beauty, and it is unintelligent, for it is blindly led by the fashion. It is, moreover, wicked, for it