rebuke are damning to a Christian character, still more perilous,
because unseen, and permitted to grow without check or restraint, are
these unconscious sins. 'Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that
thing which he alloweth.'

III. Notice the discipline, or practical issues, to which such
considerations should lead.

To begin with, they ought to take down our self-complacency, if we have
any, and to make us feel that, after all, our characters are very poor
things. If men praise us, let us try to remember what it will be good
for us to remember, too, when we are tempted to praise ourselves--the
underworld of darkness which each of us carries about within us.

Further, let me press upon you two practical points. This whole set of
contemplations should make us practise a very rigid and close
self-inspection. There will always be much that will escape our
observation--we shall gradually grow to know more and more of it--but
there can be no excuse for that which I fear is a terribly common
characteristic of the professing Christianity of this day--the all but
entire absence of close inspection of one's own character and conduct. I
know very well that it is not a wholesome thing for a man to be always
poking in his own feelings and emotions. I know also that, in a former
generation, there was far too much introspection, instead of looking to
Jesus Christ and forgetting self. I do not believe that
self-examination, directed to the discovery of reasons for trusting the
sincerity of my own faith, is a good thing. But I do believe that,
without the practice of careful weighing of ourselves, there will be
very little growth in anything that is noble and good.