there, in a man's soul, it _is_ there. How could it be reflected from
there if it were not there? All things that he has ever seen, known,
felt, believed of the surrounding world are now within him, have
become part of him, in part are him--he has been changed into their
image. He may deny it, he may resent it, but they are there. They do
not adhere to him, they are transfused through him. He cannot alter or
rub them out. They are not in his memory, they are in _him_. His soul
is as they have filled it, made it, left it. These things, these
books, these events, these influences are his makers. In their hands
are life and death, beauty and deformity. When once the image or
likeness of any of these is fairly presented to the soul, no power on
earth can hinder two things happening--it must be absorbed into the
soul and forever reflected back again from character.

Upon these astounding yet perfectly obvious psychological facts, Paul
bases his doctrine of sanctification. He sees that character is a
thing built up by slow degrees, that it is hourly changing for better
or for worse according to the images which flit across it. One step
further and the whole length and breadth of the application of these
ideas to the central problem of religion will stand before us.


II. THE ALCHEMY OF INFLUENCE.

If events change men, much more persons. No man can meet another on
the street without making some mark upon him. We say we exchange words
when we meet; what we exchange is souls. And when intercourse is very
close and very frequent, so complete is this exchange that
recognizable bits of the one soul begin to show in the other's
nature, and the second is conscious of a similar and growing debt to