der, do you always act justly with
your employers? When you are hired for a day's work, do you give good
work? And is the time just measure? Or is there much idling and
talking when you are unobserved?

Let there be honour and fairness all round. How would you like to be
paid in clipped coin, that was not full weight? And yet you have no
scruple in giving clipped time, and work in short weight. I speak
plainly about this, for it is a crying evil of the day. There is
everywhere apparent a lack of conscientiousness in the dealings of man
with man. We used to do a large trade with our manufactures in Europe
and the East, and now we have to a large extent lost it--because we
have sent out bad material and sold it as good. It is a common
complaint that men do not work now as well as of old in every
department of industry. They rob their masters of time and labour,
which they have contracted to give. Then the masters say, "What shall
we do?--we are resolved what we will do, we will make up the loss by
adulteration of our goods." Then purchasers discover this and refuse
to buy, so the trade of the country declines.

III. Remember, then, in all your transactions, how Abraham dealt with
the King of Sodom, and how God rewarded him for his honesty, and you
may be very sure that God will not overlook you if you deal with others
faithfully. The eye of God is over all, and He sees whether you fulfil
your obligations honestly or not, and He will certainly bless
abundantly those who recognise His presence. S. Paul bids all who
serve others--we all do that in one way or another--do their duty, not
with eye-service, as men-pleasers, but as though they were working for
Christ, not as if they were doing the will of man, but the will of God,
from the heart, "Knowing that whatsoever good thing any man doeth, the
same shall he receive of the Lord."

XLVII.

_THE CONSEQUENCES OF SIN._

10th Sunday after Trinity.

S. Luke xix, 42.

"If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things
which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes."

INTRODUCTION.--I spoke to you the other day about the measure of sin,
and showed you that there was a certain limit allotted to every man,
beyond which he could not go and still expect forgiveness, a point in
the downward course at which the Holy Spirit will cease to strive to
hold him back. We see in this day's Gospel that there is also a Day of