CHAPTER XXXII.

MORAL PROGRESS.

Importance of progress. Physical improvement a means rather than an end. The same true of intellectual improvement. The general homage which is paid to inoffensiveness. Picture of a modern Christian family. Measuring ourselves by others. Our Saviour the only true standard of comparison. Importance of self-denial and self-sacrifice. Blessedness of communicating. Young women urged to emancipate themselves from the bondage of fashion, and custom, and selfishness.

AFTER all I have said of the importance of physical, intellectual and social improvement and progress, it is moral progress for which we were, pre-eminently, created. The great end of Christianity itself to use the words of a learned and eloquent divine-is, to make men better than they were before: but whether or not this expresses the entire truth, one thing is certain that wherever Christianity fails to make man better, it fails of accomplishing its whole intention respecting him. Perhaps the

apostle expressed the idea I would inculcate, in the fewest words and in the clearest manner, when he required his converts to grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ."

Mere physical improvement-or even physical perfection, were it attainable-would hardly be worth the pains, if it were any thing more than a means to an end. We might study the subject of health, and practice its excellent rules with the utmost zeal and faithful conscientiousness; and yet it would hardly prove a blessing to us, if it only gave us the more efficiency in the service of the world, the flesh and the devil. And the same, or nearly the same, may be said of intellectual improvement and progress. Though the general tendency of both-when conscience is properly trained and the heart set right-is beneficial, yet it is not necessarily so, without a right heart and correct conscience. Satan is not wanting-so to speak-in intelligence or physical energy.

Physical and intellectual development and progress, therefore, are little more than means to secure an end. If they prove to be what it was the original intention of the Creator they should be, they are eminently conducive to our

highest interests, both as respects this world and the world which is to come. If otherwise, they do but accelerate, and in the end aggravate, our doom. They tend but to make our condemnation the more sure, and the more dreadful.

I have urged, elsewhere, the importance of conscientiousness in every thing we do: let me especially recommend you to make continual progress in excellence or holiness, a matter of conscience. Do not be continually measuring yourself-above all, your spiritual self-by your neighbors. If you are the true disciple of Christ, and if you are what a Christian should be in this land of Christianity, you will not indulge yourself in comparisons with any but the Saviour himself. You will be daily and hourly striving to possess more and more of his spirit; in the belief that without the spirit of Christ, you neither are nor can be his.

It is painful to think of the great number of individuals who go through life-often through a long life-and yet accomplish so little for themselves and others. That they are free from outward immorality or blame-as much so at least as their neighbors—seems to satisfy them. Some of the best families I know, are trained in this way. They are excellent people; they

are disciples of Christ, if there are any such in the world we cannot say aught against them, if we would. They seem to discharge all the external duties of our holy religion with a most scrupulous exactness; and they seemthe whole family-to bear the image of Christ. Whatever is true or lovely, is theirs; or appears to be so.

And yet, if you examine closely the matter, you will find that much of all this is the result of circumstances. They possess, by inheritance, a happy temper-or they are in circumstances which make virtue easy to them.

But the spirit and genius of Christianity require a great deal more than mere inoffensiveness-though that is, of itself, certainly, a great deal. They require continual progress from glory to glory. But this progress can only be made amid self-denial and cross-taking. "Whoso taketh not up his cross," daily and hourly, is not a true disciple of the great Teacher. It is even through "much tribulation" only, that we can enter into the kingdom of our Lord and Saviour.

Now, to what self-denials, what tribulations, what taking up of the cross, do these easy, lovely families of which I am speaking, ever

subject themselves? Trained happily, they are generally healthy-and therefore they have few trials from sickness. They live in the midst of abundance, and always have done so-abundance of food, clothing, &c., and of what they regard as of the best quality. They have more than heart can wish: their eyes, as it were, stand out with fatness. They know nothing of want: they know nothing even of inconvenience-except for some hapless moment, when a neighbor gets a little ahead of them in the fashion of their dress, their equipage, or their tables. Then a feeling of envy-peradventure a half expressed feeling of detraction—appears to mar, for a short time, their peace.

I have said that these inoffensive peoplethese do-no-harm Christians-know nothing of want. When and where have they cut themselves short of any thing to which they were lawfully entitled, for the sake of doing good to others? They have, indeed, performed works of charity and mercy, as much as other people of their own property and standing in society. But they have given, always, of their abundance. They have never so given as to impoverish the giver-so as to make themselves feel the least privation. They have visited the sick: