This is not altogether a matter of blame, because it is a matter of nature. Our breathing and our digestion go on without much attention on our part. We only have to fill our lungs sometimes with deeper breaths and aid digestion with certain exercises. In the same way a large part of our religion is persisted in half consciously, in mental and moral habits that call for no choice or decision. It is natural} and inevitable, and surely something to be thankful for, because "we cannot kindle when we will the fire that in the heart resides."
And we afe kept from many an evil, many a lapse, by the momentum of religious habit and custom.
But we must beware lest the part be taken for the whole, lest all our religion should come to be forma] and mechanical. Some years back a religious survey of London was undertaken by Dr. Charles Booth, and he allotted the study of a few typical sub-river to Mr.
C. G. F. Masterman, whose words in. this connex~- ion are worth recalling, Hap piness is there," he wrote, "family affections, the play of children, and a high mora] standard. But it is a day with a narrowed outlook. There is light to work by, but no clear glory of dawn or sunset. At the end there is the nightfall with no vision beyond."
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.