ng
her companions or at home, should grieve that blessed heavenly
inhabitant.

Even Bertie Sanderson had been struck with the sermon. If her heart was
indeed a temple of the Holy Ghost, how was she defiling it? Envy,
hatred, and malice were allowed to run riot there; love of dress and
vanity were the idols enthroned on the altar; pride, disobedience,
irreverence, contempt of rightful authority, idleness, and
unfaithfulness were barring the door and keeping the loving Saviour,
who stood knocking there, from coming into his own.

Bertie felt uncomfortable; the Holy Spirit was speaking to her, and she
could not help but hear. But to hear and to obey are two very different
things. The girl knew that she could unbar the closed door of her heart
if she chose. One earnest, sincere prayer would bring the omnipotent aid
of the Spirit to cast out the evil things and cleanse the defilement.
But she did not _want_ them cast out; she loved them too well. It would
be all very well to have Christ's love, pity, forgiveness, and
protection, and to be sure of heaven when she died; but to be a
Christian--a saint she would have called it--now, to give up the things
that most interested her, and live a life of self-denial and
obedience,--she had no idea of doing any such thing. So, to drown the
voice that she could not help hearing but did not mean to obey, she went
off on a Sunday afternoon's excursion with some of the boys and girls,
received a sharp reprimand from her father for so doing, and went back
to her work on Monday morning more rebellious, more hardened, more idle,
more malicious than before.

The blessed Holy Spirit is always longing to have us come to Christ and
walk in his holy and happy ways. He watches for an opportunity to speak
to us, and does speak, again and again, inclining us to give up sin and
choose holiness, offering us, if we will do so, all the help we need.
But he will not _force_ us to obey his gentle call. If we _will_ not
listen and obey, he lets us go off on our self-chosen path, ceases to
speak audibly to us, and patiently waits for another and more propitious
season. Bertie Sanderson, that June Sunday, greatly "grieved the
Spirit."

But not so did Etta Mountjoy. This young lady, ever since that first
Wednesday when she attended her sister's tea-party, had thought more
seriously than she had ever thought before. The duty of being a
Christian had come home to her during Eunice's talk and prayer, and at