The Christian Life Part 2

For the truth is, that to the knowledge of good and evil we are born; and it must come upon us sooner or later. In the common course of things, it comes about that age with which we are here most concerned. I do not mean that there are not faults in early childhood--we know that there are;--but we know also that with the strength and rapid growth of boyhood there is a far greater development of these faults, and particularly far less of that submissiveness which belonged naturally to the helplessness of mere childhood. I suppose that, by an extreme care, the period of childhood might be prolonged considerably; but still it must end; and the knowledge of good and evil, in its full force, must come. I believe that this must be; I believe that no care can prevent it, and that an extreme attempt at carefulness, whilst it could not keep off the disorder, would weaken the strength, of the const.i.tution to bear it. But yet you should never forget, and I should never forget, that although the evils of schools in some respects must be, yet, in proportion as they exceed what must be, they do become at once mischievous and guilty. And such, or even worse, is the mischief when, with the evil which must be, there is not the good which ought to be; for, remember, our condition is to know good and evil. If we know only evil, it is the condition of h.e.l.l; and therefore, if schools present an unmixed experience, if there is temptation in abundance, but no support against temptation, and no examples of overcoming it; if some are losing their child's innocence, but none, or very few, are gaining a man's virtue; are we in a wholesome state then? or can we shelter ourselves under the excuse that our evil is unavoidable, that we do but afford, in a mild form, the experience which must be learned sooner or later? It is here that we must be acquitted or condemned. I can bear to see the overclouding of childish simplicity, if there is a reasonable hope that the character so clouded for a time will brighten again into Christian holiness. But if we do not see this, if innocence is exchanged only for vice, then we have not done our part, then the evil is not unavoidable, but our sin: and we may be a.s.sured, that for the souls so lost, there will be an account demanded hereafter both of us and you.

LECTURE II.

1 CORINTHIANS xiii. 11.

_When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things_.

Taking the Apostle's words literally, it might appear that no words in the whole range of Scripture were less applicable to the circ.u.mstances of this particular congregation: for they speak of childhood and of manhood; and as all of us have pa.s.sed the one, so a very large proportion of us have not yet arrived at the other. But when we consider the pa.s.sage a little more carefully, we shall see that this would be a very narrow and absurd objection. Neither the Apostle, nor any one else, has ever stepped directly from childhood into manhood; it was his purpose here only to notice the two extreme points of the change which had taken place in him, pa.s.sing over its intermediate stages; but he, like all other men, must have gone through those stages. There must have been a time in his life, as in all ours, when his words, his thoughts, and his understanding were neither all childish, nor all manly: there must have been a period, extending over some years, in which they were gradually becoming the one less and less, and the other more and more.

And as it suited the purposes of his comparison to look at the change in himself only when it was completed, so it will suit our object here to regard it while in progress, to consider what it is, to ask the two great questions, how far it can be hastened, and how far it ought to be hastened.

"When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things." It will be seen at once, that when the Apostle speaks of thought and understanding, ([Greek: erronoun elogizomeaen],) he does not mean the mere intellect but all the notions, feelings, and desires of our minds, which partake of an intellectual and of a moral character together. He is comparing what we should call the whole nature and character of childhood with those of manhood. Let us see, for a moment, in what they most strikingly differ.

Our Lord's well-known words suggest a difference in the first place, which is in favour of childhood. When he says, "Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye can in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven," he must certainly ascribe some one quality to childhood, in which manhood is generally deficient. And the quality which he means is clearly humility; or to speak perhaps more correctly, teachableness. It is impossible that a child can have that confidence in himself, which disposes him to be his own guide. He must of necessity lean on others, he must follow others, and therefore he must believe others. There is in his mind, properly speaking, nothing which can be called prejudice; he will not as yet refuse to listen, as thinking that he knows better than his adviser. One feeling, therefore, essential to the perfection of every created and reasonable being, childhood has by the very law of its nature; a child cannot help believing that there are some who are greater, wiser, better than himself, and he is disposed to follow their guidance.

This sense of comparative weakness is founded upon truth, for a child is of course unfit to guide himself. Without noticing mere bodily helplessness, a child knows scarcely what is good and what is evil; his desires for the highest good are not yet in existence; his moral sense altogether is exceedingly weak, and would yield readily to the first temptation. And, because those higher feelings, which are the great check to selfishness, have not yet arisen within him, the selfish instinct, connected apparently with all animal life, is exceedingly predominant in him. If a child then on the one hand be teachable, yet he is at the same time morally weak and ignorant, and therefore extremely selfish.

It is also a part of the nature of childhood to be the slave of present impulses. A child is not apt to look backwards or forwards, to reflect or to calculate. In this also he differs entirely from the great quality which befits man as an eternal being, the being able to look before and after.

Not to embarra.s.s ourselves with too many points, we may be content with these four characteristics of childhood, teachableness, ignorance, selfishness, and living only for the present. In the last three of these, the perfect man should put away childish things; in the first point, or teachableness, while he retained it in principle, he should modify it in its application. For while modesty, humility, and a readiness to learn, are becoming to men no less than to children; yet it should be not a simple readiness to follow others, but only to follow the wise and good; not a sense of utter helplessness which catches at the first stay, whether sound or brittle; but such a consciousness of weakness and imperfection, as makes us long to be strengthened by Him who is almighty, to be purified by Him who is all pure.

I said, and it is an obvious truth, that the change from childhood to manhood is gradual; there is a period in our lives, of several years, in which we are, or should be, slowly exchanging the qualities of one state for those of the other. During this intermediate state, then, we should expect to find persons become less teachable, less ignorant, less selfish, less thoughtless. "Less teachable," I would wish to mean, in the sense of being "less indiscriminately teachable;" but as the evil and the good are, in human things, ever mixed up together, we may be obliged to mean "less teachable" simply. And, to say the very truth, if I saw in a young man the changes from childhood in the three other points, if I found him becoming wiser, and less selfish, and more thoughtful, I should not be very much disturbed if I found him for a time less teachable also. For whilst he was really becoming wiser and better, I should not much wonder if the sense of improvement rather than of imperfection possessed him too strongly; if his confidence in himself was a little too over-weening. Let him go on a little farther in life, and if he really does go on improving in wisdom and goodness, this over-confidence will find its proper level. He will perceive not only how much he is doing, or can do, but how much there is which he does not do, and cannot. To a thoughtful mind added years can scarcely fail to teach, humility. And in this the highest wisdom of manhood may be resembling more and more the state of what would be perfect childhood, that is, not simply teachableness, but tractableness with respect to what was good and true, and to that only.

But the danger of the intermediate state between childhood and manhood is too often this, that whilst in the one point of teachableness, the change runs on too fast, in the other three, of wisdom, of unselfishness, and of thoughtfulness, it proceeds much too slowly: that the faults of childhood thus remain in the character, whilst that quality by means of which these faults are meant to be corrected,--namely, teachableness,--is at the same time diminis.h.i.+ng.

Now, teachableness as an instinct, if I may call it so, diminishes naturally with the consciousness of growing strength. By strength, I mean strength of body, no less than strength of mind, so closely are our body and mind connected with, each other. The helplessness of childhood, which presses upon it every moment, the sense of inability to avoid or resist danger, which makes the child run continually to his nurse or to his mother for protection, cannot but diminish, by the mere growth of the bodily powers. The boy feels himself to be less helpless than the child, and in that very proportion he is apt to become less teachable.

As this feeling of decreased helplessness changes into a sense of positive vigour and power, and as this vigour and power confer an importance on their possessor, which is the case especially at schools, so self-confidence must in one point at least, arise in the place of conscious weakness; and as this point is felt to be more important, so will the self-confidence be likely to extend itself more and more over the whole character.

And yet, I am bound to say, that, in general, the teachableness of youth is, after all, much greater than we might at first sight fancy. Along with much self-confidence in many things, it is rare, I think, to find in a young man a deliberate pride that rejects advice and instruction, on the strength of having no need for them. And therefore, the faults of boyhood and youth are more owing, to my mind, to the want of change in the other points of the childish character, than to the too great change in this. The besetting faults of youth appear to me to arise mainly from its retaining too often the ignorance, selfishness, and thoughtlessness of a child, and having arrived at the same time at a degree of bodily vigour and power, equal, or only a very little inferior, to those of manhood.

And in this state of things, the questions become of exceeding interest, whether the change from childhood to manhood can be hastened. That it ought to be hastened, appears to me to be clear; hastened, I mean, from what it is actually, because in this respect, we do not grow in general fast enough; and the danger of over-growth is, therefore, small.

Besides, where change of one sort is going on very rapidly; where the limbs are growing and the bones knitting more firmly, where the strength of bodily endurance, as well as of bodily activity, is daily becoming greater; it is self-evident that, if the inward changes which ought to accompany these outward ones are making no progress, there cannot but be derangement and deformity in the system. And, therefore, when I look around, I cannot but wish generally that the change from childhood to manhood in the three great points of wisdom, of unselfishness, and of thoughtfulness, might be hastened from its actual rate of progress in most instances.

But then comes the other great question, "Can it be hastened, and if it can, how is it to be done?" "Can it be hastened" means, of course, can it be hastened healthfully and beneficially, consistently with the due development of our nature in its after stages, from life temporal to life eternal? For as the child should grow up into the man, so also there is a term of years given in which, according to G.o.d's will, the natural man should grow up into the spiritual man; and we must not so press the first change as to make it interfere with the wholesome working of the second. The question then is, really, can the change from childhood to manhood be hastened in the case of boys and young men in general from its actual rate of progress in ordinary cases, without injury to the future excellence and full development of the man? that is, without exhausting prematurely the faculties either of body or mind.

And this is a very grave question, one of the deepest interest for us and for you. For us, as, according to the answer to be given to it, should depend our whole conduct and feelings towards you in the matter of your education; for you, inasmuch as it is quite clear, that if the change from childhood to manhood can be hastened safely, it ought to be hastened; and that it is a sin in every one not to try to hasten it: because, to retain the imperfections of childhood when you can get rid of them, is in itself to forfeit the innocence of childhood; to exchange the condition of the innocent infant whom Christ blessed, for that of the unprofitable servant whom Christ condemned. For with the growth of our bodies evil will grow in us unavoidably; and then, if we are not positively good, we are, of necessity, positively sinners.

We will consider, then, what can be done to hasten this change in us healthfully; whether we can grow in wisdom, in love, and in thoughtfulness, faster in youth, than we now commonly do grow: and whether any possible danger can be connected with such increased exertion. This shall be our subject for consideration next Sunday.

Meantime, let it be understood, that however extravagant it might be to hope for any general change in any moral point, as the direct result of setting truth before the mind; yet, that it never can be extravagant to hope for a practical result in some one or two particular cases; and that, if one or two even be impressed practically with what they hear, the good achieved, or, rather, the good granted us by G.o.d, is really beyond our calculation. It is so strictly; for who can worthily calculate the value of a single human soul? but it is so in this sense also, that the amount of general good which may be done in the end by doing good first in particular cases is really more than we can estimate. It was thus that Christ's original eleven apostles became, in the end, the instruments of the salvation of millions: and it is on this consideration that we never need despair of the most extensive improvements in society, if we are content to wait G.o.d's appointed time and order, and look for the salvation of the many as the gradual fruit of the salvation of a few.

LECTURE III.

1 CORINTHIANS xiii. 11.

_When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things_.

After having noticed last Sunday what were those particular points in childhood, which in manhood should be put away, and having observed that this change cannot take place all at once, but gradually, during a period of several years, I proposed to consider, as on this day, whether it were possible to hasten this change, that is, whether it could be hastened without injury to the future development of the character; for undoubtedly, there is such, a thing in minds, as well as in bodies, as precocious growth; and although it is not so frequent as precocious growth in the body, nor by any means so generally regarded as an evil, yet it is really a thing to be deprecated; and we ought not to adopt such measures as might be likely to occasion it.

Now I believe the only reason which could make it supposed to be possible that there could be danger in hastening this change, is drawn from the observation of what takes place sometimes with regard to intellectual advancement. It is seen that some young men of great ambition, or remarkable love of knowledge, do really injure their health, and exhaust their minds, by an excess of early study. I always grieve over such cases exceedingly; not only for the individual's sake who is the sufferer, but also for the mischievous effect of his example.

It affords a pretence to others to justify their own want of exertion; and those to whom it is in reality the least dangerous, are always the very persons who seem to dread it the most. But we should clearly understand, that this excess of intellectual exertion at an early age, is by no means the same thing with hastening the change from childishness to manliness. We are all enough aware, in common life, that a very clever and forward boy may be, in his conduct, exceeding childish; that those whose talents and book-knowledge are by no means remarkable, may be, in their conduct, exceedingly manly. Examples of both these truths instantly present themselves to my memory, and perhaps may do so to some of yours. I may say farther, that some whose change from childhood to manhood had been, in St. Paul's sense of the terms, the most remarkably advanced, were so far from being distinguished for their cleverness or proficiency in their school-work, that it would almost seem as if their only remaining childishness had been displayed there. What I mean, therefore, by the change from childhood to manhood, is altogether distinct from a premature advance in book-knowledge, and involves in it nothing of that over-study which is dreaded as so injurious.

Yet it is true that I described the change from childhood to manhood, as a change from ignorance to wisdom. I did so, certainly; but yet, rare as knowledge is, wisdom is rarer; and knowledge, unhappily, can exist without wisdom, as wisdom can exist with a very inferior degree of knowledge. We shall see this, if we consider what we mean by knowledge; and, without going into a more general definition of it, let us see what we mean by it here. We mean by it, either a knowledge of points of scholars.h.i.+p, of grammar, and matters connected with grammar; or a knowledge of history and geography; or a knowledge of mathematics: or, it may be, of natural history; or, if we use the term, "knowledge of the world," then we mean, I think, a knowledge of points of manner and fas.h.i.+on; such a knowledge as may save us from exposing ourselves in trifling things, by awkwardness or inexperience. Now the knowledge of none of these things brings us of necessity any nearer to real thoughtfulness, such as alone gives wisdom, than the knowledge of a well-contrived game. Some of you, probably, well know that there are games from which chance is wholly excluded, and skill in which is only the result of much thought and calculation. There is no doubt that the game of chess may properly be called an intellectual study; but why does it not, and cannot, make any man wise? Because, in the first place, the calculations do but respect the movements of little pieces of wood or ivory, and not those of our own minds and hearts; and, again, they are calculations which have nothing to do whatever with our being better men, or worse, with our pleasing G.o.d or displeasing him. And what is true of this game, is true no less of the highest calculations of Astronomy, of the profoundest researches into language; nay, what may seem stranger still, it is often true no less of the deepest study even of the actions and principles of man's nature; and, strangest of all, it may be, and is often true, also, of the study of the very Scripture itself; and that, not only of the incidental points of Scripture, its antiquities, chronology, and history, but of its very most divine truths, of man's justification and of G.o.d's nature. Here, indeed, we are considering about things where wisdom, so to speak, sits enshrined. We are very near her, we see the place where she abides; but her very self we obtain not. And why?--but because, in the most solemn study, no less than in the lightest, our own moral state may be set apart from our consideration; we may be unconscious all the while of our great want; and forgetting our great business, to be reconciled to G.o.d, and to do his will: for wisdom, to speak properly, is to us nothing else than the true answer to the Philippian jailor's question, "What must I do to be saved?"

Now then, as knowledge of all kinds may be gained without being received, or meant at all to be applied, as the answer to this question, so it may be quite distinct from wisdom. And when I use the term thoughtfulness, as opposed to a child's carelessness, I mean it to express an anxiety for the obtaining of this wisdom. And farther, I do not see how this wisdom, or this thoughtfulness, can be premature in any one; or how it can exhaust before their time any faculties, whether of body or mind. This requires no sitting up late at night, no giving up of healthful exercise; it brings no headaches, no feverishness, no strong excitement at first, to be followed by exhaustion afterwards. Hear how it is described by one who spoke of it from experience. "The wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy." There is surely nothing of premature exhaustion connected-with any one of these things.

Or, if we turn to the third point of change from childhood to a Christian manhood, the change from selfishness to unselfishness, neither can we find any possible danger in hastening this. This cannot hurt our health or strain our faculties; it can but make life at every age more peaceful and more happy. Nor indeed do I suppose that any one could fancy that such a change was otherwise than wholesome at the earliest possible period.

There may remain, however, a vague notion, that generally, if what we mean by an early change from childishness to manliness be that we should become religious, then, although it may not exhaust the powers, or injure the health, yet it would destroy the natural liveliness and gaiety of youth, and by bringing on a premature seriousness of manner and language, would be unbecoming and ridiculous. Now, in the first place, there is a great deal of confusion and a great deal of folly in the common notions of the gaiety of youth. If gaiety mean real happiness of mind, I do not believe that there is more of it in youth than in manhood; if for this reason only, that the temper in youth being commonly not yet brought into good order, irritation and pa.s.sion are felt, probably, oftener than in after life, and these are sad drawbacks, as we all know, to a real cheerfulness of mind. And of the outward gaiety of youth, there is a part also which is like the gaiety of a drunken man; which is riotous, insolent, and annoying to others; which, in short, is a folly and a sin. There remains that which strictly belongs to youth, partly physically--the lighter step and the livelier movement of the growing and vigorous body; partly from circ.u.mstances, because a young person's parents or friends stand between him and many of the cares of life, and protect him from feeling them altogether; partly from the abundance of hope which belongs to the beginning of every thing, and which continually hinders the mind from dwelling on past pain. And I know not which of these causes of gaiety would be taken away or lessened by the earlier change from childhood to manhood. True it is, that the question, "What must I do to be saved?" is a grave one, and must be considered seriously; but I do not suppose that any one proposes that a young person should never be serious at all. True it is, again, that if we are living in folly and sin, this question may be a painful one; we might be gayer for a time without it. But, then, the matter is, what is to become of us if we do not think of being saved?--shall we be saved without thinking of it? And what is it to be not saved but lost? I cannot pretend to say that the thought of G.o.d would not very much disturb the peace and gaiety of an unG.o.dly and sinful mind; that it would not interfere with the mirth of the bully, or the drunkard, or the reveller, or the glutton, or the idler, or the fool. It would, no doubt; just as the hand that was seen to write on the wall threw a gloom over the guests at Belshazzar's festival. I never meant or mean to say, that the thought of G.o.d, or that G.o.d himself, can be other than a plague to those who do not love Him. The thought of Him is their plague here; the sight of Him will be their judgment for ever.

But I suppose the point is, whether the thought of Him would cloud the gaiety of those who were striving to please Him. It would cloud it as much, and be just as unwelcome and no more, as will be the very actual presence of our Lord to the righteous, when they shall see Him as He is.

Can that which we know to be able to make old age, and sickness, and poverty, many times full of comfort,--can that make youth and health gloomy? When to natural cheerfulness and sanguineness, are added a consciousness of G.o.d's ever present care, and a knowledge of his rich promises, are we likely to be the more sad or the more unhappy?

What reason, then, is there for any one's not antic.i.p.ating the common progress of Christian manliness, and hastening; to exchange, as I said before, ignorance for wisdom, selfishness for unselfishness, carelessness for thoughtfulness? I see no reason why we should not; but is there no reason why we should? You are young, and for the most part strong and healthy; I grant that, humanly speaking, the chances of early death to any particular person among you are small. But still, considering what life is, even to the youngest and strongest, it does seem a fearful risk to be living unredeemed; to be living in that state, that if we should happen to die, (it may be very unlikely, but still it is clearly possible,)--that if we should happen to die, we should be most certainly lost for ever. Risks, however, we do not mind; the chances, we think, are in our favour, and we will run the hazard. It may be so; but he who delays to turn to G.o.d when the thought has been once put before him, is incurring something more than a risk. He may not die these fifty or sixty years; we cannot tell how that may be; but he is certainly at this very present time hardening his heart, and doing despite unto the Spirit of Grace. By the very wickedness of putting off turning to G.o.d till a future time, he lessens his power of turning to Him ever. This is certain; no one can reject G.o.d's call without becoming less likely to hear it when it is made to him again. And thus the lingering wilfully in the evil things of childhood, when we might be at work in putting them off, and when G.o.d calls us to do so, is an infinite risk, and a certain evil;--an infinite risk, for it is living in such a state that death at any moment would be certain condemnation;--and a certain evil, because, whether we live or not, we are actually raising up barriers between ourselves and our salvation; we not only do not draw nigh to G.o.d, but we are going farther from Him, and lessening our power of drawing nigh to Him hereafter.

LECTURE IV.

COLOSSIANS i. 9.

_We do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding_.

This is the first of three verses, all of them forming a part of the Epistle which was read this morning, and containing St. Paul's prayer for the Colossians in all the several points of Christian excellence.

And the first thing which he desires for them, as we have heard, is, that they should be filled with the knowledge of G.o.d's will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; or, as he expresses the same thing to the Ephesians, that they should be not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is. He prays for the Colossians that they should not be spiritually foolish, but that they should be spiritually wise.

The state of spiritual folly is, I suppose, one of the most universal evils in the world. For the number of those who are naturally foolish is exceedingly great; of those, I mean, who understand no worldly thing well; of those who are careless about everything, carried about by every breath of opinion, without knowledge, and without principle. But the term spiritual folly includes, unhappily, a great many more than these; it takes in not those only who are in the common sense of the term foolish, but a great many who are in the common sense of the term clever, and many who are even in the common sense of the terms, prudent, sensible, thoughtful, and wise. It is but too evident that some of the ablest men who have ever lived upon earth, have been in no less a degree spiritually fools. And thus, it is not without much truth that Christian writers have dwelt upon the insufficiency of worldly wisdom, and have warned their readers to beware, lest, while professing themselves to be wise, they should be accounted as fools in the sight of G.o.d.

But the opposite to this notion, that those who are, as it were, fools in worldly matters are wise before G.o.d; although this also is true in a certain sense, and under certain peculiar circ.u.mstances, yet taken generally, it is the very reverse of truth; and the careless and incautious language which has been often used on this subject, has been extremely mischievous. On the contrary, he who is foolish in worldly matters is likely also to be, and most commonly is, no less foolish in the things of G.o.d. And the opposite belief has arisen mainly from that strange confusion between ignorance and innocence, with which many ignorant persons seem to solace themselves. Whereas, if you take away a man's knowledge, you do not bring him to the state of an infant, but to that of a brute; and of one of the most mischievous and malignant of the brute creation. For you do not lessen or weaken the man's body by lowering his mind; he still retains his strength and his pa.s.sions, the pa.s.sions leading to self-indulgence, the strength which enables him to feed them by continued gratification. He will not think it is true to any good purpose; it is very possible to destroy in him the power of reflection, whether as exercised upon outward things, or upon himself and his own nature, or upon G.o.d. But you cannot destroy the power of adapting means to ends, nor that of concealing his purposes by fraud or falsehood; you take only his wisdom, and leave that cunning which marks so notoriously both the savage and the madman. He, then, who is a fool as far as regards earthly things, is much more a fool with regard to heavenly things; he who cannot raise himself even to the lower height, how is he to attain to the higher? he who is without reason and conscience, how shall he be endowed with the spirit of G.o.d?

It is my deep conviction and long experience of this truth, which makes me so grieve over a want of interest in your own improvement in human learning, whenever I observe it, over the prevalence of a thoughtless and childish spirit amongst you. I grant that as to the first point there are sometimes exceptions to be met with; that is to say, I have known persons certainly whose interest in their work here was not great, and their proficiency consequently was small; but who, I do not doubt, were wise unto G.o.d. But then these persons, whilst they were indifferent perhaps about their common school-work, were anything but indifferent as to the knowledge of the Bible: there was no carelessness there; but they read, and read frequently, books of practical improvement, or relating otherwise to religious matters, such as many, I believe, would find even less inviting than the books of their common business. So that although there was a neglect undoubtedly of many parts of the school-work, yet there was no spirit of thoughtlessness or childishness in them, nor of general idleness; and therefore, although I know that their minds did suffer and have suffered from their unwise neglect of a part of their duty, yet there was so much attention bestowed on other parts, and so manifest and earnest a care for the things of G.o.d, that it was impossible not to entertain for them the greatest respect and regard.

These, however, are such rare cases, that it cannot be necessary to do more than thus notice them. But the idleness and want of interest which I grieve for, is one which extends itself but too impartially to knowledge of every kind: to divine knowledge, as might be expected, even more than to human. Those whom we commonly find careless about their general lessons, are quite as ignorant and as careless about their Bibles; those who have no interest in general literature, in poetry, or in history, or in philosophy, have certainly no greater interest, I do not say in works of theology, but in works of practical devotion, in the lives of holy men, in meditations, or in prayers. Alas, the interest of their minds is bestowed on things far lower than the very lowest of all which I have named; and therefore, to see them desiring something only a little higher than their present pursuits, could not but be encouraging; it would, at least, show that the mind was rising upwards. It may, indeed, stop at a point short of the highest, it may learn to love earthly excellence, and rest there contented, and seek for nothing more perfect; but that, at any rate, is a future and merely contingent evil.

It is better to love earthly excellence than earthly folly; it is far better in itself, and it is, by many degrees, nearer to the kingdom of G.o.d.

There is another case, however, which I cannot but think is more frequent now than formerly; and if it is so, it may be worth while to direct our attention to it. Common idleness and absolute ignorance are not what I wish to speak of now, but a character advanced above these; a character which does not neglect its school-lessons, but really attains to considerable proficiency in them; a character at once regular and amiable, abstaining from evil, and for evil in its low and grosser forms, having a real abhorrence. What, then, you will say, is wanting here? I will tell you what seems to be wanting--a spirit of manly, and much more of Christian, thoughtfulness. There is quickness and cleverness; much pleasure, perhaps, in distinction, but little in improvement; there is no desire of knowledge for its own sake, whether human or divine. There is, therefore, but little power of combining and digesting what is read; and, consequently, what is read pa.s.ses away, and takes no root in the mind. This same character shows itself in matters of conduct; it will adopt, without scruple, the most foolish, commonplace notions of boys, about what is right and wrong; it will not, and cannot, from the lightness of its mind, concern itself seriously about what is evil in the conduct of others, because it takes no regular care of its own, with reference to pleasing G.o.d; it will not do anything low or wicked, but it will sometimes laugh at those who do; and it will by no means take pains to encourage, nay, it will sometimes thwart and oppose any thing that breathes a higher spirit, and a.s.serts a more manly and Christian standard of duty.

I have thought that this character, with its features more or less strongly marked, has shown itself sometimes amongst us, marring the good and amiable qualities of those in whom we can least bear to see such a defect, because there is in them really so much to interest in their favour. Now the number of persons of extraordinary abilities who may be here at any one time can depend on no calculable causes: nor, again, can we give any reason more than what we call accident, if there were to be amongst us at any one time a number of persons whose whole tendency was decidedly to evil. But if, in these respects, the usual average has continued, if there is no lack of ability, and nothing like a prevalence of vice, then we begin anxiously to inquire into the causes, which, while other things remain the same, have led to a different result. And one cause I do find, which, is certainly capable of producing such a result: a cause undoubtedly in existence now, and as certainly not in existence a few years back; nor can I trace any other besides this which appears likely to have produced the same effect. This cause consists in the number and character and cheapness, and peculiar mode of publication, of the works of amus.e.m.e.nt of the present day. In all these respects the change is great, and extremely recent. The works of amus.e.m.e.nt published only a very few years since were comparatively few in number; they were less exciting, and therefore less attractive; they were dearer, and therefore less accessible; and, not being published periodically, they did not occupy the mind for so long a time, nor keep alive so constant an expectation; nor, by thus dwelling upon the mind, and distilling themselves into it as it were drop by drop, did they possess it so largely, colouring even, in many instances, its very language, and affording frequent matter for conversation.