justly after that which is just." (Deut. xvi., 20.) Thus I am building
a church to the glory of God; money runs short: I perceive that by
signing a certain contract that must mean grievous oppression of the
poor, I shall save considerable expense, whereas, if I refuse, the
works will have to be abandoned for want of funds. If I have purely
the glory of God before my eyes, I certainly shall not sign that
contract: for injustice I know can bear no fruit of Divine glory. But
if I am bent upon having the building up in any case, of course I
shall sign: but then my love for the end in view is no longer pure and
regulated by reason: it is not God but myself that I am seeking in the
work. Thus an end entirely just, holy, and pure, purifies and
sanctifies the means, not formally, by investing with a character of
justice means in themselves unjust, for that is impossible,--the
leopard cannot change his spots,--but by way of elimination, removing
unjust means as ineligible to my purpose, and leaving me only those
means to choose from which are in themselves just.

14. With means in themselves indifferent, the case is otherwise. A
holy and pious end does formally sanctify those means, while a wicked
end vitiates them. I beg the reader to observe what sort of means are
here in question. There is no question of means in themselves or in
their circumstances unjust, as theft, lying, murder, but of such
indifferent things as reading, writing, painting, singing, travelling.
Whoever travels to commit sin at the end of his journey, his very
travelling, so far as it is referred to that end, is part of his sin:
it is a wicked journey that he takes. And he who travels to worship at
some shrine or place of pilgrimage, includes his journey in his
devotion. The end in view there sanctifies means in themselves
indifferent.