heir morsel to
themselves. Like that mist that lies white and dull over the ground
on a winter's morning, which will be blown away with the least puff
of fresh air, there lie doleful dampnesses, in their sooty folds,
over many a Christian heart, shutting out the sun from the earth, and
a little whiff of wholesome activity in Christ's cause would clear
them all away, and the sun would shine down upon men again. If you
want to be a happy Christian, work for Jesus Christ. I do not lay
that down as a specific by itself. There are other things to be taken
in conjunction with it, but yet it remains true that the woe of a
languid Christianity attaches to the men who, being professing
Christians, are silent when they should speak, and idle when they
should work.

There is, further, the woe of the loss of sympathies, and the gain of
all the discomforts and miseries of a self-absorbed life. And there
is, further, the woe of the loss of one of the best ways of
confirming one's own faith in the truth--viz. that of seeking to
impart it to others. If you want to learn a thing, teach it. If you
want to grasp the principles of any science, try to explain it to
somebody who does not understand it. If you want to know where, in
these days of jangling and controversy, the true, vital centre of the
Gospel is, and what is the essential part of the revelation of God,
go and tell sinful men about Jesus Christ who died for them; and you
will find out that it is the Cross, and Him who died thereon, as
dying for the world, that is the power which can move men's hearts.
And so you will cleave with a closer grasp, in days of difficulty and
unsettlement, to that which is able to bring light into darkness and
to harmonise the discord of a troubled and sinful soul. And, further,
there is the woe of having none that can look to you and say, 'I owe
myself to thee.' Oh, brethren! there is no greater joy accessible to
a man than that of feeling that through his poor words Christ has
entered into a brother's heart. And you are throwing away all this
because you shut your mouths and neglect the plain commandment of
your Lord.

Ay! but that is not all. There is a future to be taken into account,
and I think that Christian people do far too little realise the
solemn truth that it is not all the same _then_ whether a man
has kept his Master's commandments or neglected them. I believe that
whilst a very imperfect faith saves a man, there is such a thing as