almost said, sickens, a thoughtful man, till he turns away from this
noisy sham improvement of mankind--the wages of sin, which are death, to
St John's account of the true improvement of mankind, the true progress
of the species,--the gift of God which is eternal life. "And I saw a new
heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were
passed away. And I saw the Holy City--New Jerusalem, coming down from
God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I
heard a great voice out of heaven, saying, Behold the tabernacle of God
is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people,
and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe
away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither
sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former
things are passed away."

Does that sound much like a general increase of armaments? or like bills
for the prevention of pestilence, or of drunkenness,--which, even if they
pass, will both probably fail to do the good which they propose? No.
And if this wicked world is to be mended, then God must stir up the wills
of His faithful people, and we must pray without ceasing for ourselves,
and for all for whom we are bound to pray, that He would stir them up.
For what we want is not knowledge; we have enough of that, and too much.
Too much; for knowing so much and doing so little, what an account will
be required of us at the last day!

No. It is the will which we want, in a hundred cases. Take that of
pestilential dwelling-houses in our great towns. Every one knows that
they ought to be made healthy; every one knows that they can be made
healthy. But the will to make them healthy is not here, and they are
left to breed disease and death. And so, as in a hundred instances,
shallow philosophers are proved, by facts, to be mistaken, when they tell