I. A misplaced question.

I call it misplaced because Amaziah's fault, and the fault of a great
many of us, was, not that he took consequences into account, but that
he took them into account at the wrong time. The question should have
come second, not first. Amaziah's first business should have been to
see clearly what was duty; and then, and not till then, the next
business should have been to consider consequences.

Consider the right place and way of putting this question. Many of us
make shipwreck of our lives because, with our eyes shut, we determine
upon some grand design, and fall under the condemnation of the man
that 'began to build, and was not able to finish.' He drew a great
plan of a stately mansion; and then found that he had neither money in
the bank, nor stones in his quarry, to finish it, and so it stood--a
ruin. All through our Lord's life He was engaged rather in repressing
volunteers than in soliciting recruits, and He from time to time
poured a douche of cold water upon swiftly effervescing desires to go
after Him. When the multitudes followed Him, He turned and said to
them, 'If you are counting on being My disciples, understand what it
means: take up the cross and follow Me.' When an enthusiastic man, who
had not looked consequences in the face, came rushing to Him and said:
'Lord, I will follow Thee whithersoever Thou goest,' His answer to him
was another pull at the string of the shower bath: 'The Son of Man
hath not where to lay His head.' When the two disciples came to him
and said: 'Grant that we may sit, the one on Thy right hand and the
other on Thy left, when Thou comest into Thy kingdom,' He said: 'Are
ye able to drink of the cup that I drink of, and to be baptized with
the baptism that I am baptized withal?' Look the facts in the face
before you make your election. Jesus Christ will enlist no man under