therefore, you cannot love anyone for a bad reason. Justice is good
in itself, pity is good in itself, and, therefore, you can never be
wrong in being just or pitiful.

But abstinence is not a good thing in itself. If it were, we should
all be bound to abstain always from everything pleasant, and make
ourselves as miserable and uncomfortable as possible, as some
superstitious persons used to do in old times. Abstinence is only
good when it is used for a good reason. If a man abstains from
pleasure himself, to save up for his children; if he abstains from
over eating and over drinking, to keep his mind clear and quiet; if
he abstains from sleep and ease, in order to have time to see his
business properly done; if he abstains from spending money on
himself, in order to spend it for others; if he abstains from any
habit, however harmless or pleasant, because he finds it lead him
towards what is wrong, and put him into temptation; then he does
right; then he is doing God's work; then he may expect God's
blessing; then he is trying to do what we all prayed God to help us
to do, when we said, "Give us grace to use such abstinence;" then he
is doing, more or less, what St. Paul says he did, "Keeping his body
under, and bringing it into subjection."

For, see, the Collect does not say, "Give us grace to use
abstinence," as if abstinence were a good thing in itself, but "to
use such abstinence, that"--to use a certain kind of abstinence, and
that for a certain purpose, and that purpose a good one; such
abstinence that our flesh may be subdued to our spirit; that our
flesh, the animal, bodily nature which is in us, loving ease and
pleasure, may not be our master, but our servant; so that we may not
follow blindly our own appetites, and do just what we like, as brute