engines out of a railway station without drivers or
rails to run upon? It would be as reasonable as that course of life
which men pursue who say, 'Thus I wish; thus I command; let my desire
stand in the place of other argumentation and reason.' They take that
part of their nature that is meant to be under the guidance of reason
and conscience looking up to God, and put it in the supreme place, and
so, setting a beggar on horseback, ride where we know such equestrians
are said in the end to go! The desires are meant to be impelling powers.
It is absurdity and the destruction of true manhood to make them, as we
so often do, directing powers, and to put the reins into their hand.
They are the wind, not the helm; the steam, not the driver. Let us keep
things in their right places. Remember that the constitution of human
nature, as God has meant it, is this: down there, under hatches, under
control, the strong impulses; above them, the enlightened understanding;
above that, the conscience, which has a loftier region than that of
thought to move in, the moral region; and above that, the God, whose
face, shining down upon the apex of the nature thus constituted,
irradiates it with light which filters through all the darkness, down to
the very base of the being; and sanctifies the animal, and subdues the
impulses, and enlightens the understanding, and calms and quickens the
conscience, and makes ductile and pliable the will, and fills the heart
with fruition and tranquillity, and orders the life after the image of
Him that created it.

I cannot dwell any longer on this first point; but I hope that I have
said enough, not to show that the words are true--that is a very poor
thing to do, if that were all that I aimed at--but to bring them home to
some of our hearts and consciences. I pray God to impress the conviction
that, although there be in us all the voice of conscience, which all of
us more or less have tried at intervals to follow; yet in the main it
abides for ever true--and it is true, my dear brethren, about you--a
Christless life is a life under the dominion of tyrannous desires. Ask
yourself what I cannot ask for you, Is it I? My hand fumbles about the
hinges and handle of the door of the heart. You yourself must open it
and let conviction come in!

Still further, the words before us add another touch to this picture.
They not only represent the various passionate desires as being the real
guides of 'the old man' but