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with contributions from Charles A. Allen

So it is with many excellent people; they are blind to higher ideals and are perfectly happy. "Better let well enough alone,"—this is exactly what our good habits are continually saying to us, making us feel, as Paul felt when he was a Pharisee, that we are already quite as good as we can be. We nestle down in our cosy corner of good habits and let these shut out the vision of something nobler, just as the little hills round about a pleasant country home may shut off the view of a great mountain, and the people nestling among those hills may think that nowhere in the world is there anything grander than those hills; and they never take the trouble to go beyond the little hills and climb the great mountain. So it is that our real virtues may be like those little hills, hiding from us something nobler and making us self-righteous.

And when we are blinded in this way by our good habits and cherish no generous aspiration, but are perfectly content to stay where we are and applaud ourselves for our virtues, what greater blessing can God send us in His infinite wisdom than to let us be suddenly tripped up by some cunning temptation, and thus have an experience of our moral weakness and know what it is to feel shame and repentance and a longing for a better life! Jesus saw far more to hope for in the publicans and sinners than in the respectable and self-righteous people of his day.

Rev. Charles A. Allen.
The Christian Register.

When the Lord cometh, not at the end of the world in a chariot, upon the clouds, but like a thief in the night, upon the wings of his spirit, "two men shall be in the field: one is taken, and one is left; two women shall be grinding at the mill: one is taken and one is left." That is, when the spirit passes through the world, selecting those who are to be the servants of the Master and the citizens of his kingdom, two men or two women will be working side by side at some humble task. The voice that speaks of truth and love and devotion, above the din of the world or the noise of the grinding, shall find response in one and no echo in the other. The line of classification will not be between those who happen to be at the prayer meeting when he comes and those who are not. It will be between those who are children of the spirit and those who are not, wherever they may labor or rest or pray.—The Universalist Leader.

Any one who is leading a life on earth that embodies divine truth, is by such a life showing that truth, though no one beholds it, is like a lighted candle which shines whether seen or not. Spiritually, to show one's principles is simply to live them outwardly; that is, to have them wrought into the deeds of the body. To show how great things God has done unto us is to make that acknowledgment a practical thing in life, without reference to outer witnesses.

New-Church Messenger.

THE WEDDING SUPPER.—They heard the message, but they would not come. Some made light of it and went about their business quietly; others vented hate and cruelty upon the messengers. The outlook is still upon the Jewish world as Jesus found it. God was ready, men were unready—and for the spiritually unwilling then and now the kingdom of God waits, the opportunity passes by.

The Congregationalist.

The Church of God needs nothing so much as the baptism of the Holy Ghost. This Spirit is in the Church at all times, even when its members are cold and lukewarm. But His power is not always manifest.—The Christian Advocate.

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