of the world, but that Thou shouldest keep them from the evil." So that the worldliness which is to be avoided by the Christian, is only another name for evil. Much mischief has arisen from supposing that it was something else. Classing together things which differ, always leads to great confusion, and in moral matters often ends in great sins. If the young are taught that it is wrong to break the Commandments, and also that it is wrong to play at certain harmless games, what is the result? Why, this: when they come to discover that the games are harmless, and cannot therefore be sinful, they begin to doubt whether the importance of the Commandments has not been equally overrated. Their notions about right and wrong become hopelessly disturbed, and not unfrequently they end in believing that there is nothing wrong in anything. I have known cases-you have known cases- -where young lives have been shipwrecked by the severity of their puritanical training. The parents thought they were driving their children to heaven, when all the time they were really driving them in the opposite direction. And to the parents themselves, to those who have brought themselves to believe in the sinfulness of sinless acts, the result is often equally fatal. Their en

thusiasm is exhausted in hating what is not wrong; they have little, if any, left for hating what is. There are persons who would be more horrified at the idea of playing a game of chance than they would at the thought of doing a mean or ungenerous action. Such persons must not be surprised at the accusation urged against them by Butler in his 'Hudibras:'—

"They compound for sins they are inclined to

By damning those they have no mind to."

The

Then, secondly, there is what may be called the Theological waste of enthusiasm―manifested by persons who bestow on theology an amount of ardour which ought only to be given to religion. Theology and religion are sometimes supposed to be one and the same thing; but there are no two things in the universe more different. ology is a collection of facts or supposed facts. Religion is a state of heart and a mode of life. A theologian is not necessarily religious, any more than a physiologist or an astronomer. The best theologians might quite conceivably be, in all respects, the most irreligious of men, as they have not unfrequently been the most bad-tempered. In Christendom the facts of theology are all professedly drawn from the Bible, but different theologians have extracted from it dif

ferent facts; and terrible has been the hatred, grievous has been the bloodshed, that have followed from their want of agreement. Instead of letting their enthusiasm go forth in the direction of doing all possible good to all men, they have too often wasted it in seeking to do all possible harm to those holding different opinions from themselves. You remember the scene in 'Bleak House,' where poor Jo is dying. He is asked if he ever knew a prayer, to which he gives his usual answer that he "never knowed nothink." And then he goes on to explain that city missionaries had often come into the wretched alley where he lodged, but that they had been mostly occupied in pointing out each other's errors to their benighted congregations. "Different times," he said, "there was genelmen come down TomAll-Alone's a-prayin', but they all mostly said as t'other ones prayed wrong." Alas! alas! how often the devil's purposes are effected in the Saviour's name! Men are so busy shouting their party shibboleths, which Christ once and for ever condemned, that they have neither time nor heart to do the one sole work which He intrusted to their hands.

And once more, there is, as it seems to me, a Ritualistic waste of enthusiasm. I have nothing

to say against ceremonies and vestments as such. Personally, I do not care to see them multiplied; but that of course is no argument against them. What I do very strongly deprecate, however, is that so much enthusiasm should be expended on these matters. They surely are not essential to Christianity as Christ understood it. There is a pious sound about the word "vestment;" but, after all, it is only the Latin equivalent for what, in common speech, we call clothes. Just try and imagine, if you can, Christ delivering a discourse, or the apostles engaged in a discussion, as to the garments in which they should proceed to convert the world. I shall be told, of course, that the Ritualists are not fighting merely for vestments, but for principles. It was ingeniously suggested, some time ago, that they were in reality carrying on the designs of the Reformation, inasmuch as they were fighting for freedom-freedom against the tyranny of the bishops and the State. Very well. Very well. But even so, I ask, is it worth while? This alleged tyranny is only exercised in regard to minor matters―minor matters, that is to say, if Christ's view of Christianity be accepted. Suppose the State has misunderstood the ornaments rubric, and directs me to discard vestments which that

rubric intended me to wear-why, in the name

of peace and quietness, can I not be content to discard them? If the wearing of a particular robe be distasteful to my parishioners, why must I persist in wearing it? "If it make my brother to offend," I will not wear it "while the world standeth, lest I make my brother to offend." It appears to me, moreover, that the resistance of a State Church clergyman to the State is only warrantable if the State orders something to be done or taught which would alter the essential character of the religion which he has undertaken to teach. But who will say that a particular interpretation of the ornaments rubric belongs to the fundamentals of Christianity, or that particular vestments are essential to salvation? Much as I admire the amount of Mr Green's enthusiasm, which can lead him to suffer so bravely-much as I regret that fidelity to his convictions should have caused him to suffer so much-I must say that it seems to me a terrible waste of suffering. Even if his imprisonment should induce the State to abandon what he would call its tyranny, I cannot see how the cause of Christ would be thereby one iota advanced.

There is, however, another side to this ques