Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-03-03

$fNIIFH he shall have abund
ance, while from hin
that hath not shall be taken away, ever
that he hath.
Men go from strength to strength slowly
They advance not so much by sudden leap
ing as by gradual growing. So men &c
from weakness to weakness-not quite SC
slowly and yet not at a bound-gradually.
The opposite of growth is decay, and that
progresses little by little. No one ever
got to the heights of saintlinsss without
climbing up step after step. And no one
ever fell to the abysses of sin as q
man falls from the roof of house, straight
down, q descent without pause or inter-
-uption, from high to low. All holiness is
won by slight acts of self-denial, resolution,
aspiration, going on from strength to
strength. And all slavery to evil is at
tained only by small acts of self-indulgence,
committed now and then, as one might sell
himself into servitude for a dollar a week,
Every week getting nearer to the shaekles
of the master, belonging less to himself and
more to his purchaser. Every sinful thought
is part of the price which Satan is paying
for your soul. You taketh from him, and
that By and by men belong not SO much to
themselves as to the devil. They have sold
themselves into slavery. But that always
go on little by little, growing from weak
ness to weakness.
That element of our nature which makes us
60 from strength to strength, or from weak
ness to weakness, we call the power of habit
The fact that we give it name don't mean
that we understand it. We do not under
stand it any more than we understand the
law OF gravitation. We simply know that
1t is. We know that between strength and
strength, between good and better, and be-
tween better and worse is bridge which we
call habit. We know, as 1 said, that no
man makes great leap over the gulf which
parts virtue from sin. Not that; he begins on
the side Of goodness and walks along over
toward badness upon the bridge of habit.
AN ENCHANTED BRIDGE.
There is a kind of magic about this bridge
of habit 1t is an enchanted bridge. No
matter which side you start from, every
time you put your foot down it becomes
easier to keep going on in that direction,
and harder to turn back. There is some
sort of spiritual magnet at each end of this
bridge, drawing, drawing, drawing q man
on. And there is this strange thing about
it-that when one turns his face toward
either of these terminal magnets, that
becomes Cor the moment the stronger. When
you turn your back upon the magnet you
break this current of spiritual magnetism.
And so whoever has his face turned toward
the right, and keeps it turned steadily in
that direction, keeps diligently walking
in that way, will presently find that the
magnet at his back has wholly lost its power
OF attraction. 1t has been easier for that
10 fnvr~ nd r,rrl,f 81
toward wrong. He will go on from strength
to strength.
The whole world is passing and repassing
over this bridge of habit. 1t is like the
bridge Chinevat, which stretches, so
they believed in Persia, from earth to
heaven. Only it reaches farther than that.
One end is in hell. Over this bridge of
habit journeys the race. We are every one
of us upon it, having our faces turned one
way or the other. We are daily growing
better or growing worse. And if we are
growing better, it is daily getting easier for
US 70 be better. And if we are growing
worse the magnet of habit on that side is
tugging at US with stronger grip.
1t is fact worth thinking about that the
direction of our lives, our character, and our
destiny is daily being determined by habit
Whether we go from strength TO strength, or
from weakness to weakness, depends very
greatly upon habit.
1t is for this reason that ask Won to
think this morning about habit; and now
especially because Lent begins this week,
and Lent is time for the formation of good
habits This idea of Lent as time for the
formation of habits is not so common as it
ought to be. There are too many who re-
gard Lent as a space of 40 days divided off
from the rest of the year, bounded upon one
side by Ash Wednesday and upon the other
side by Easter Even, during which certain
duties shall be done, certain pleasant things
left undone, the duties and the pleasures be-
ginning when this space is over. We hear
of people who make solemn resolution that
during 40 days they will not talk unkindly
about anybody-that is a good resolution to
make; but, if it is good for 40 days, why
not for seventy; why not for seventy times
seventy? Isn't this better formula for
Lenten resolutions: Not for 40 days I
will do, or I won't do, this or that: but
during these 40 days will try to get into
this or that good habit, or out of this or
that bad habit. Isn't that more reasona-
bic and more religious resolution.
THE TEST OF LENT
is not the sort of person you are between
Shrove Tuesday and Easter, but the sort of
person you are after that. Lent is not q
journey which you get to the end of and
then rest. It IS preparation for journey.
Lent is time for getting ready. And if
at the end of 1t there is an end also of the
spiritual meaning of it; if it is done only as
a sermon is done when the voice of the
preacher stops; if that is all that Lent
means to you, you are like foolish man
who should regularly every summer care
fully pack his trunk to 60 somewhere and
never go. Such a Lent is like book
which is all preface-the introduction in
Producing nothing. Like a road which
leads nowhere.
Lent is time for the formation of good
religious habits. If we are to bestow this
time fruitfully we will settle candldly with
ourselves now at the beginning Just what
irreligious habits we have and what better
habits We ought to have, and then endeavor
during these 40 days. God helping US, to get
those better habits fixed.
The advantage of such an employment of
this Christian season appears more clearly
when we consider what habit is, and under
what laws it acts.
Habit is that faculty Of our nature by
which after we have done a thing over we
can do it more easily the next time, and
stili more easily the third time This ap-
plies to the actions OF the body, of the mind,
and of the soul alike.
Compare the act Of walking in baby and
a man. The baby walks slowly, hesitat-
ingly, and with great deliberation. He
stops to think at every step which foot he
shall put forward next and just how he
shall manage to get that foot forward. The
man doesn't give that matter thought. He
did when he was baby, but the more he
walked the more he got the habit of walk
ing; and now it is ali habit; he isn't con-
sclous OF the movements Of his feet.
Compare beginner in music with prae-
teal player. The beginner plods along
slowly and biunderingly. There has to be
an art of deliberate charm about each sep-