passed people in the
street, enforced by the biblical precept, 'Remember Lot's wife.' I
know what a fascination I had to look behind, accompanied by a terrible
dread of the consequences.

I have always felt that Faber's 'God of my Childhood' describes the
normal and true development of a child's life. I am sure that,
although the gravity of sin should be early recognised, greater stress
should be laid upon the Fatherhood and kindness of God. I was noticing
to-day, when reading the second lesson, how Westcott and Hort have
placed the clause in the Lord's Prayer which speaks of the Fatherhood
of God in a line by itself as a heading to the whole prayer, putting a
colon after the clause, and beginning the first petition with a capital
letter. The prayer begins with 'Fatherhood' and ends with a reference
to 'Sinfulness.' I think this fact is significant. We may not all be
intended to come to {119} know religious truth in that order. But I
think we are intended, when we do know it, to lay even more stress on
the Fatherhood of God than on our own imperfections. It is a wonderful
and terrible thing to watch the development of a human spirit. We can
understand so little about any life, even when it is near and dear to
us. But I am not sure that we cannot learn more about others than we
can about ourselves. I never think it is profitable to study oneself
too closely! I never could meditate with any profit on my sins. But
there, I dare say, I differ from many others.

Well, I hope that the hair of my godchild is growing, and that she has
now more than her god-father. His is coming to an untimely end.

_To F. S. H; who had recently become a chaplain in the Navy._

St. Leonards: January 11, 1900.

I am thinking of you in your new, difficult, and interesting life, and
wondering how you like it. Or, rather, I am sure that you like it in
its main features. There are in every life drawbacks and
discouragements, for we live by faith and not by sight, and faith must
be perfected in the midst of perplexities and contradictions. The
mists are useful. It would not do to have brilliant sunshine all the
time. For in that case, where would faith come in? Steering towards
our port in the fog means trusting the Pilot. 'Mercifully grant that
we, which know Thee now by faith, may after this life have the fruition
of Thy glorious Godhead.' I suppose that none of us fully {120} knows
what this prayer means. I think th