efforts of the will and of the understanding, if we are to make real
to ourselves that which is real, the presence of our God.

Besides this vigorous exercise of the faculty of faith, there is
another requisite for a walk with God, closely connected with it,
and yet capable of being looked at separately, and that is, that we
shall keep up the habit of continual occupation of thought with Him.
That is very much an affair of habit with Christian people, and I am
afraid that the neglect of it is the habitual practice of the bulk
of professing Christians nowadays. It is hard, amidst all our work
and thought and joys and sorrows, to keep fresh our consciousness of
His presence, and to talk with Him in the midst of the rush of
business. But what do we do about our dear ones when we are away
from them? The measure of our love of them is accurately represented
by the frequency of our remembrances of them. The mother parted from
her child, the husband and the wife separated from one another, the
lover and the friend, think of each other a thousand times a day.
Whenever the spring is taken off, then the natural bent of the
inclination and heart assert themselves, and the mind goes back
again, as into a sanctuary, into the sweet thought. Is that how we
do with God? Do we so walk with Him, as that thought, when released,
instinctively sets in that direction? When I take off the break,
does my spirit turn to God? If there is no hand at the helm, does
the bow always point that way? When the magnet is withdrawn for a
moment, does the needle tremble back and settle itself northwards?
If we are walking with God, we shall, more times a day than we can
count when the evening comes on, have had the thought of Him coming
into our hearts 'like some sweet beguiling melody, so sweet we know
not we are listening to it.' Thus we shall 'walk with God.'