will do the duty which lies nearest us, and try to draw our lesson
out of it.

For practice--and, I believe, practice alone--will teach us to
restrain ourselves, and conquer ourselves. Experience--and, I
believe, experience alone--will show us our own faults and
weaknesses.

Every man--every human spirit on God's earth has spiritual enemies--
habits and principles within him--if not other spirits without him,
which hinder him, more or less, from being all that God meant him to
be. And we must find out those enemies, and measure their strength,
not merely by reading of them in books; not merely by fancying them
in our own minds; but by the hard blows, and sudden falls, which
they too often give us in the actual battle of daily life.

And how can we find them out?

This at least we can do.

We can ask ourselves at every turn,--For what end am I doing this,
and this? For what end am I living at all? For myself, or for
others?

Am I living for ambition? for fame? for show? for money? for
pleasure? If so, I have not the mind of Christ. I have not found
out the golden secret. I have not seen what true glory is; what the
glory of Christ is--to live for the sake of doing my duty--for the
sake of doing good.