to speak more Christianly, with a conscience.  And yet that will tell us but very little distinctly.  It tells us broadly that which is right and that which is wrong, so that every child can understand this.  That charity and self-denial are right—­this we see recognised in almost every nation.  But the boundaries of these two—­when and how far self-denial is right—­what are the bounds of charity—­this it is for different circumstances yet to bring out and determine.

And so, it will be found that there is a different standard among different nations and in different ages.  That for example, which was the standard among the Israelites in the earlier ages, and before their settlement in Canaan, was very different from the higher and truer standard of right and wrong recognised by the later prophets.  And the standard in the third and fourth centuries after Christ, was truly and unquestionably an entirely different one from that recognised in the nineteenth century among ourselves.

Let me not be mistaken.  I do not say that right and wrong are merely conventional, or merely chronological or geographical, or that they vary with latitude and longitude.  I do not say that there ever was or ever can be a nation so utterly blinded and perverted in its moral sense as to acknowledge that which is wrong—­seen and known to be wrong—­as right; or on the other hand, to profess that which is seen and understood as right, to be wrong.  But what I do say is this:  that the form and aspect in which different deeds appear, so vary, that there will be for ever a change and alteration in men’s opinions, and that which is really most generous may seem most base, and that which is really most base may appear most generous.  So for example, as I have already said, there are two things universally recognised—­recognised as right by every man whose conscience is not absolutely perverted—­charity and self-denial.  The charity of God, the sacrifice of Christ—­these are the two grand, leading principles of the Gospel; and in some form or other you will find these lying at the roots of every profession and state of feeling in almost every age.  But the form in which these appear, will vary with all the gradations which are to be found between the lowest savage state and the highest and most enlightened Christianity.

For example, in ancient Israel the law of love was expounded thus:—­“Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.”  Among the American Indians and at the Cape, the only homage perchance given to self-denial, was the strange admiration given to that prisoner of war who bore with unflinching fortitude the torture of his country’s enemies.  In ancient India the same principle was exhibited, but in a more strange and perverted manner.  The homage there given to self-denial, self-sacrifice, was this—­that the highest form of religion was considered to be that exhibited by the devotee who sat in a tree until the birds