ss to make
good to Him our deficiencies.

"Be ye perfect as I am perfect."
"Be ye holy as I am holy."

If this were not attainable, He would not have set so high a goal. In
this, then, we are sinners--that we are not pure and lovely as God
Himself! This is a prodigious, an almost unthinkable height; yet He
wills us to attempt it, and all the powers of Heaven are with us as we
climb.

* * *

Fear curiosity. Fear it more than sin. Curiosity is the root, and sin
the flower. This is one of the reasons why we should never seek God
merely with the intelligence: to do so is to seek Him, in part at least,
with curiosity. God will not be peeped upon by a curious humanity.
The indulgence in curiosity would of itself explain the whole
downfall, so called, of man.

The Soul is the Prodigal. Curiosity _to know_ led her away from the
high heavens. Love is her only way of return.

Curiosity is the mother of all infidelity, whether of the spirit or of
the body.

* * *

Though on reading the Gospels carefully we may be unable to come
to any other conclusion than that Jesus Christ neither prayed for nor
died for all mankind, but only for the elect, yet we see equally
clearly that all mankind is _invited to be the elect._ We are, then,
not individually sure of heaven because Jesus died upon a cross for
men; but sure of heaven for ourselves, only if we individually will to
live and think and act in such a manner that _we become of the
elect._

"Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out," says the Voice
of the Beloved.

* * *

In our early stages, how we shrink from the mere word, or idea, of
perfection; and later, what we would give to be able to achieve it!
Yet though we shrink so from the thought of it, we know
instinctively that we must try to approach it; if we would stay near
Him, we must be wholly pleasing to Him. We think of saints--we
know nothing of saints, but think of them as most unusual persons
midway between men and angels, and know ourselves not fashioned
for any such position: and how change ourselves, how alter our
character, as grown men and women?

It is Christ who can show us the way.

The Water of Life is the Mind of Christ, and the true object of life is
to learn how to receive this Mind of Christ: for by it and with it we
enter the Kingdom of God. And how shall we receive the Mind of
Christ? Here is our difficulty. Firstly, we may do it through
sympathy with, and a drawing near