ce again his preference for the actual and the ordinary.
There are religions in which holiness involves unusual conditions
and special diet. Some forms of mysticism seem to be incompatible
with married life. But the type of holiness which Jesus teaches can
be achieved with an ordinary diet, and a wife and five children. He
had lived himself in a family of eight or nine. It is perhaps
harder, but it is a richer sanctity, if the real mark of a Saint is,
as we have been told, that he makes it easier for others to believe
in God. In any case the ordinary is always good enough with Jesus.
Only he would have men go deeper, always deeper. Why can you not
think for yourselves? he asks. Signs were what men demanded. He
pictures Dives' mind running on signs even in hell (Luke 16:27).
"What could you do with signs? Look at what you have already. You
read the weather for to-morrow by looking at the sky to-day. The
south wind means heat; the red sky fair weather. Study, look, think"
(Luke 12:55). His animals, as we saw, are all real animals; it is
real observation; real analogy. When he speaks of the lost sheep, it
is not a fictitious joy that he describes or an imaginary one; it is
real. The more we examine his sayings with any touch of his spirit,
the more we wonder. Of course it is possible to handle them in the
wrong way, to miss the real thought and make folly of everything.
Thus, when he says he is the door, the interpreter may stray into
silly detail and make faith the key, and--I don't know what the
panels and hinges could be. That is not the style of Jesus. The soul
of the thing, the great central meaning, the real analogy is his
concern. Seriousness in observation, seriousness in reflection, is
what he teaches. Men and women break down for want of thinking
things out. Many things become possible to those who think
seriously, as he did--and, so to speak, without watertight
compartments.

Jesus is always urging seriousness in reflection. Seriousness in
action, too, is one of his lessons--an emphasis on doing, but on
_doing_ with a clear sense of what one is about, and why. A part of
action is clear thought; always exactness, accuracy; you must think
the thing out, he says, and then act or let it alone. The artistic
temperament, we all know, is very much in evidence to-day. In "The
Comments of Bagshot" we are told that the drawback is that there is
so much temperament and so little art. Why? Because the artistic
temperament