known unto thee that we will not serve thy gods nor worship the golden
image which thou hast set up_."

The history of Asa should inspire us to a renewal of war against the
evils which Jesus Christ died to put away. Victory will not come
without conflict. In respect to anxiety we are to be quiescent as the
lilies, which neither toil nor spin, but in respect of moral evil,
within or without, we must be vigilant and strenuous.

"Lilies have no sin
Leading them astray,
No false heart within
That would them bewray,
Nought to tempt them in
An evil way;
And if canker come and blight,
Nought will ever put them right.

"But good and ill, I know,
Are in my being blent,
And good or ill may flow
From mine environment;
And yet the ill, laid low,
May better the event;
Careless lilies, happy ye!
But careless life were death to me."


II.