deeds, what could be added to that reward by having?  This same apparent contradiction, which was found in Judaism, subsists too in Christianity; we will state it in the words of an apostle:  “Godliness is profitable for all things; having the promise of the life that now is, as well as of that which is to come.”  Now for the fulfilment:  “If in this life only we have hope in Christ, then are we of all men most miserable.”

Godliness is profitable; but its profit it appears, consists in finding that all is loss:  yet in this way you teach your son.  You will tell him that if he will be good all men will love him.  You say that “Honesty is the best policy.” yet in your heart of hearts you know that you are leading him on by a delusion.  Christ was good.  Was he loved by all?  In proportion as he—­your son—­is like Christ, he will be loved, not by the many, but by the few.  Honesty is not the best policy; the commonplace honesty of the market-place may be—­the vulgar honesty which goes no further than paying debts accurately; but that transparent Christian honesty of a life which in every act is bearing witness to the truth, that is not the way to get on in life—­the reward of such a life is the Cross.  Yet you were right in teaching your son this:  you told him what was true; truer than he could comprehend.  It is better to be honest and good; better than he can know or dream:  better even in this life; better by so much as being good is better than having good.  But, in a rude coarse way, you must express the blessedness on a level with his capacity; you must state the truth in a way which he will inevitably interpret falsely.  The true interpretation nothing but experience can teach.

And this is what God does.  His promises are true, though illusive; far truer than we at first take them to be.  We work for a mean, low, sensual happiness, all the while He is leading us on to a spiritual blessedness—­unfathomably deep.  This is the life of faith.  We live by faith, and not by sight.  We do not preach that all is disappointment—­the dreary creed of sentimentalism; but we preach that nothing here is disappointment, if rightly understood.  We do not comfort the poor man, by saying that the riches that he has not now he will have hereafter—­the difference between himself and the man of wealth being only this, that the one has for time what the other will have for eternity; but what we say is, that that which you have failed in reaping here, you never will reap, if you expected the harvest of Canaan.  God has no Canaan for His own; no milk and honey for the luxury of the senses:  for the city which hath foundations is built in the soul of man.  He in whom Godlike character dwells, has all the universe for his own—­“All things,” saith the apostle, “are yours; whether life or death, or things present, or things to come; if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.”

 VII.