poverty. For sin has
played many evil tricks upon us, and one has been the infusing into us a
false sense of shame. There is hardly a man or woman who dares to be
just what he or she is without doctoring up the impression. The fear of
being found out gnaws like rodents within their hearts. The man of
culture is haunted by the fear that he will some day come upon a man
more cultured than himself. The learned man fears to meet a man more
learned than he. The rich man sweats under the fear that his clothes or
his car or his house will sometime be made to look cheap by comparison
with those of another rich man. So-called "society" runs by a motivation
not higher than this, and the poorer classes on their level are little
better.

Let no one smile this off. These burdens are real, and little by little
they kill the victims of this evil and unnatural way of life. And the
psychology created by years of this kind of thing makes true meekness
seem as unreal as a dream, as aloof as a star. To all the victims of the
gnawing disease Jesus says, "Ye must become as little children." For
little children do not compare; they receive direct enjoyment from what
they have without relating it to something else or someone else. Only
as they get older and sin begins to stir within their hearts do jealousy
and envy appear. Then they are unable to enjoy what they have if someone
else has something larger or better. At that early age does the galling
burden come down upon their tender souls, and it never leaves them till
Jesus sets them free.

Another source of burden is _artificiality_. I am sure that most people
live in secret fear that some day they will be careless and by chance an
enemy or friend will be allowed to peep into their poor empty souls. So
they are never relaxed. Bright people are tense and alert in fear that
they may be trapped into saying something common or stupid. Traveled
people are afraid that they may meet some Marco Polo who is able to
describe some remote place where they have never been.

This unnatural condition is part of our sad heritage of sin, but in our
day it is aggravated by our whole way of life. Advertising is largely
based upon this habit of pretense. "Courses" are offered in this or that
field of human learning frankly appealing to the victim's desire to
shine at a party. Books are sold, clothes and cosmetics are peddled, by
playing continually upon this desire to appear what we are not.
Artificiality i