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oroughly done.

To these thoughts on the use of time we may fitly add the great words of Scripture, "So teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom," Ps. xc. 12. "Redeeming the time, because the days are evil," Ephes. v. 16. We transform time into eternity by using it aright.

COURAGE.

We all know what is meant by courage, though it is not easy to define it. It is the determination to hold our own, to face danger without flinching, to go straight on our way against opposing forces, neither turning to the right hand nor the left.

It is the very glory of youth to be courageous.--The "sneak" and the "coward" are the abhorrence of youth. It is youth which climbs "the imminent deadly breach" and faces the deadly hail of battle, which defies the tyranny of custom and the hatred of the world. One may have compassion for age, which is naturally timid and sees fears in the way, but youth which is cowardly is contemptible.

There are three chief forms which this moral courage takes in ordinary life.

They are slaves who will not choose Hatred, scoffing, and abuse, Rather than in silence shrink From the truth they needs must think. They are slaves who dare not be In the right with two or three.

These are the chief forms of moral courage in ordinary life. We have now to point out what are the sources of such courage.

The second source of courage is faith.--We use the word in the Christian sense of trust in God. When a man feels that God is with him he can stand up against all the powers of earth and hell. "If God be for us, who can be against us?" The heroes of the past, who subdued kingdoms and wrought righteousness, have all been men of faith. Recall Hebrews xi., the Covenanters, the Ironsides of Cromwell, the Huguenots, Luther, Knox. Their faith may not have been so enlightened as it might have been had their knowledge been wider. Their religious creeds may have contained propositions that are no longer accepted, but they were strong because of their undoubted faith in God. When His presence is an abiding presence with us and in us, our

Strength is as the strength of ten, Because our hearts are pure.

He who fears God will know no other fear.

The third source of courage is sympathy.--A man who has God with him will be brave if he stand alone, but he will be greatly helped if he is in company with others like himself and knows that he has the sympathy of good men. You remember St. Paul on his journey to Rome reaching a little village about thirty miles from the great city. The look-out for him was very depressing. He had appealed to Caesar, but what likelihood was there of his obtaining justice in Caesar's capital. He might be thrown to the lions, or made to fight for his life in the Coliseum, a spectacle to the Roman multitude. Then it was that a few Roman Christians who had heard of his approach came out to meet him, and, it is said, "he thanked God and took courage." Such was the power of sympathy. If we would be encouraged we will seek it. If we would encourage others we will give it.

We will only say in closing this chapter that its subject is most truly illustrated by the life of our Lord himself. The mediaeval conception of Christ was that He exhibited only the passive virtues of meekness, patience, and submission to wrong. From the gospels we form a different idea. He vanquished the devil in the wilderness; He faced human opposition boldly and without fear; He denounced the hypocrisy of the Pharisees, and encountered their rage and violence. He went calmly along His appointed path, neither turning to the right hand nor to the left. Scribes, Pharisees, Sadducees, could not deter Him from doing His Father's work. Amid a tumultuous tempest of ill-will He moved straight forward, foreseeing His death, "setting His face toward Jerusalem," knowing all that awaited Him there. He went through Gethsemane to Calvary with the step of a conqueror. Never was He more truly a king than on the cross, and the grandest crown ever worn was "the crown of thorns." In Him we have the highest example of courage, as of all other virtues.

HEALTH.

Health means soundness of body and of mind; the keeping of our physical system in such a condition that it is able to do its work easily, without disturbance, and without pain; the exercise of the mind so as not to harm the body. There are certain preliminary considerations that we should bear in mind in connection with this subject.

To discuss fully the subject and laws of health would require a whole treatise, and would be beyond the scope of this text-book. There are, however, some outstanding conditions for the preservation of health which are plain to everyone, and which may be summed up in the three words Temperance, Exercise, and Rest. These have been well termed the three great physicians, whose prescriptions are painless and cost nothing.

Sleep that knits up the ravelled sleeve of care, The death of each day's life, sore labor's bath, Balm of hurt minds, great Nature's second course, Chief nourisher in life's feast.

We close this chapter with the powerful words of Thomas Carlyle, addressed to the students of the University of Edinburgh: "Finally, I have one advice to give you which is practically of very great importance. You are to consider throughout much more than is done at present, and what would have been a very great thing for me if I had been able to consider, that health is a thing to be attended to continually; that you are to regard it as the very highest of all temporal things. There is no kind of achievement you could make in the world that is equal to perfect health. What to it are nuggets or millions?"

These rules are given by J. Freeman Clarke in his work on Self-Culture.

EARNESTNESS.

Another word for earnestness is enthusiasm. The Scriptural equivalent is zeal. It means putting our whole heart into whatever we are doing. It is a sweeping, resistless energy, which carries everything before it, like a river in full flood. Its nature is well expressed in the saying of the old huntsman, "Throw over your heart, and your horse will soon follow."

Earnestness is often regarded with suspicion and condemned.--It is the fashion with many to sneer at it. It is often alone, and then it is not respectable. It is often in excess, and is therefore ineffective. It is often disturbing to the sleepiness of others, and is therefore hated by them. Our Lord was an enthusiast in the eyes of the Pharisees. St. Paul was an enthusiast to Festus. The early Christians were enthusiasts to the pagan world because they turned it upside down. The martyrs and confessors of all times have been regarded as enthusiasts by those of their own time who were not in sympathy with them. An enthusiast is called by many a fanatic, and a fanatic in the eyes of some is a most dangerous member of society.

All the great leaders of the world have been men in earnest.--Emerson says truly that "every great and commanding movement in the annals of the world is the triumph of enthusiasm." Our civil and religious liberties we owe to enthusiasts for freedom. The enthusiasm of Columbus gave us America; the enthusiasm of Knox reformed Scotland; the enthusiasm of Wesley regenerated English religious life; the enthusiasm of men like Garibaldi and Cavour and Mazzini has made in our own time a new Italy. These men were all denounced in their day, cold water was thrown on all their projects, but their burning earnestness carried them on to triumph. The scorned enthusiast of one generation is the hero of the next.

Earnestness is a great element in securing success in life.--A well-known writer and preacher, Dr. Arnot, tells that he once heard the following conversation at a railway station between a farmer and the engineer of a train: "What are you waiting for so long? Have you no water?" "Oh, yes, we have plenty of water, but it is not boiling." So there may be abundance of intelligence and splendid machinery, and all the appliances that help to success, but what is wanted is intense boiling earnestness. We have a good illustration of the power of earnestness in speaking. One man may say the right thing, and say it in a pleasing and cultured manner; every phrase may be well placed, every sentence polished, every argument in its proper place. Another man may have no elegance of diction, his words may be unpolished, his sentences even ungrammatical, and yet he may move a great multitude, as the leaves of the trees are moved by the wind, through the intense earnestness and enthusiasm by which he is possessed. We see the same thing in Christian effort. The organization of a church may be perfect, its resources may be large, and it may have in its service an army of able and well-disciplined men; but without enthusiasm and burning zeal its efforts are powerless and come to nothing. When, as at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit descends upon a church in tongues of fire, then there is quickening, and souls are gathered in. No man has ever had a supreme influence over others without more or less enthusiasm in his nature.

There are three directions we may give in regard to earnestness or enthusiasm.

O ever earnest sun! Unwearied in thy work, Unhalting in thy course, Unlingering in thy path, Teach me thy earnest ways, That mine may be a life of steadfast work and praise.

O ever earnest stars! Unchanging in your light, Unfaltering in your race, Unswerving in your round, Teach me your earnest ways, That mine may be a life of steadfast work and praise.

O ever earnest flowers! That with untiring growth Shoot up and spread abroad Your fragrance and your joy, Teach me your earnest ways, That mine may be a life of steadfast work and praise.

O ever earnest sea! Constant in flow and ebb, Heaving to moon and sun, Unchanging in thy change, Teach me thy earnest ways, That mine may be a life of steadfast work and praise. HORATIUS BONAR.

There are three spheres of religious life in which earnestness should be specially shown.

MANNERS.

Good manners are the result of two things.-- Self-respect and consideration for the feelings of others. The man who respects himself will be careful to say or do nothing that may seem to others degrading or unworthy. The man who has consideration for the feelings of others will be equally careful to do or say nothing that may give them pain, or be offensive to them.

Manners are not idle, but the fruit Of noble nature and of loyal mind.

Good manners tend greatly to success in life.--Coarseness and gruffness lock doors, gentleness and refinement open them, while the rude, boorish man is shunned by all. Take the case of a speaker addressing a public meeting. What he says is weighty and important. His arguments are powerful and well marshalled, but his speech is uncouth and disagreeable. He says things that are coarse and vulgar. His bad manner vastly takes away from the impression which he desires to make, and which, if his manner had been different, he would have made. Again, two young men serve in a place of business. The one is gentle in his demeanor, meets his customers with a pleasant smile, is always polite. The other is rough in his deportment, apparently does not care whether those he deals with are pleased or not. The one is a favorite with everybody; the other, who may be equally worthy as far as character is concerned, is disliked.

The first true gentleman that ever breathed.

To be a gentleman in all circumstances is the highest idea we can form of good manners. It is what, in our intercourse with others, we should strive to be--to have "high thoughts," as Sir Philip Sidney expresses it, "seated in a heart of courtesy." In Bishop Patteson's life is given the estimate of him, as a true gentleman, by a New Zealand native: "Gentleman-gentleman thought nothing that ought to be done too mean for him. Pig-gentleman never worked." The savage knew by instinct that the good Bishop who came to live among them that he might teach them to be better, who treated them with invariable courtesy and consideration, was a true gentleman, though he had to clean his own hut, to cook his own food, and to mend his own kettles. And he knew also that the man who made others work for him without doing them any good in return, who swore at them and abused them, was only a pig-gentleman, however rich or high in station he might be.

A few advices on the subject of this chapter may be given.

"Good words," says holy George Herbert, "are worth much, and cost little." The same may be said of good manners.

TEMPER.

Temper is the harmonious and well-balanced working of the different powers of the mind. Good temper is when harmony is maintained; bad temper when it is violated. "Temper," it was said by an English bishop, "is nine-tenths of Christianity." We may think this an exaggerated statement, but there is much to commend it. The fruit of the Spirit of God is peace, and peace is the condition of a heart which is at rest--in harmony with God and man. Peace may be taken as the Scriptural word for temper.

Good temper is a sign that the different powers of the soul are working in harmony.--For instance, the atmosphere is well tempered when it is neither too hot nor too cold, neither too dry nor too moist, having neither too much electricity nor too little. Then the weather is called fine. It is a pleasure to live. When the weather is bad, the balance of the elements is broken, and life is disagreeable and unpleasant. The body is well tempered when the nervous system and the blood and the nutritive system all work in due harmony. When these three great constituents of the body are well balanced against each other, the result is health. The body is not well tempered in a student who takes no exercise, and where everything goes to feed the brain; nor in a pugilist in training, where everything goes to feed the muscles. The result is disease. We all know the musical instrument called the harp. All the strings are tuned into perfect harmony. If there is a false note struck, that is a sign to the musician that there is something wrong, and that the instrument needs to be tuned. The discord is a symptom, that some cords are out of order. So, bad temper is a sign that some string in our moral constitution is out of harmony and needs to be tuned.

Good temper can be acquired.--It is the result of culture. There are two things often confounded with it-- good nature and good humor. Good nature is something born with us--an easy, contented disposition, and a tendency to take things quietly and pleasantly. We inherit it. There is little merit in possessing it. Good humor is the result of pleasant surroundings and agreeable circumstances. A good-humored man is so when everything goes right; when things go wrong, his good humor departs and bad humor takes its place. But good temper results from training and self-control--keeping constant watch over our passions and feelings, and above all being in constant harmony with God; for he who is at peace with God is at peace with man, and will keep the "even tenor of his way."

There are various signs or forms of ill-temper that may be adverted to.

One form of ill-temper is irritability.--We perhaps know what it is to have a tooth where the nerve is exposed. Everything that touches it sends a thrill of pain through us. Some people get into a moral state corresponding to that. The least thing puts them out, vexes them, throws them into a disagreeable frame of mind. When one gets into that state, he should feel that there is something wrong with him--something is off the balance, some nerve is exposed. He had better look to it and go off to the dentist.

Another form of ill-temper is readiness to find fault.--This is a sure sign of a screw being loose somewhere. An ill-tempered person is always making grievances, imagining himself ill-used, discontented with his position, dissatisfied with his circumstances. He never blames himself for anything wrong; it is always someone else. He is like a workman who is always excusing himself by throwing the blame on his tools; like a bad driver who is always finding fault with his horses.

Some fretful tempers wince at every touch, You always do too little or too much; He shakes with cold; you stir the fire and strive To make a blaze; that's roasting him alive. Serve him with venison, and he chooses fish; With sole; that's just the sort he would not wish. Alas! his efforts double his distress, He likes yours little, and his own still less. Thus, always teasing others, always teased, His only pleasure is--to be displeased.

If we find ourselves getting into this state of mind, it is high time to inquire what is wrong with us.

Another form of ill-temper is passion.--Some people are very subject to this development. They are "gunpowdery," and when a small spark touches them they fly out, and there is a blaze. It is a very unlovely feature of a man's character, and if people in a passion could only see themselves in a glass, their eyes flashing, their brow contracted and their features distorted, they would feel that they have cause to be ashamed of themselves. After having been in what is called "a towering rage," there often comes to a man the feeling expressed in the words, "I have made a great ass of myself." If we have done so, we should resolve never to make ourselves ridiculous again.

Perhaps the worst form of ill-temper is sulkiness.--This is passion not dying out, but continuing to smoulder like the embers of a fire where there is no flame. A sullen disposition is as bad a sign of something being wrong as there could well be. It is like what the doctors call "suppressed gout." The disease has got driven into the system, and has taken so firm a hold that it cannot easily be dislodged. Better a man whose temper bubbles over and is gone, than the man who cherishes it in his bosom and allows, not the sun of one day, but of many days, to go down on his wrath.

A word or two is perhaps necessary, in addition to what has been said, as to the means by which good temper is to be preserved and bad temper avoided.

I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness for some hints in this chapter to an interesting work on "Self-Culture," by James Freeman Clarke.

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