SECRET SINS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIV, Issue 8020, 6 August 1887, Page 4 (Supplement)

SECRET SINS.

Have you ever noticed a large fungus growing on the trunk of eome magnificent tree ? Perhaps you have little suspected tho mischief of which the excrescence waa the silent witness. " Oftentimee a largo fungus will start from a tree, and in some mysterious manner will sap the life-power of the spot on which it growa. . When the fungus falls in the autumn.- it leaves scarcely a trace of its presence, the tree being apparently ae healthy before the advent of the parasite. Bat the whole character of the wood has been changed by the etrange power of the fungus, being soft and cork-like to tho touch. " Perhaps the parasite may fall in the autumn, and the tree mayshownoEymptoma ot decay ; but at the first tempest it may have to encounter the trunk snaps o5 at the spot where the fungus has been, and tho extent of the injury i. at ouca disclosed, '' Aa long ae any portion of the tree retains life, it will continue to throw out these destructive fungi; and even when a mere stump is left in the ground the fungi will posh themselves out in profusion." What that fungus is to the tree secret sin, whioh is working insiduously within your heart, is to your life and character. Let it have its way, permit it to occupy but a corner of yonr being, and it will surely, though siJently, do its deadly work. Aβ the tree retains the form and bo&uty of health even after it has become rotten at the core, so there may be the form of godliness even after tho power h&8 departed. Beware of hidden sine. "Cleanse Thou ma from secret faults," —Life of Faith. WORKS AND FAITH. "I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may be one." The social life of the disciples hid with Christ in God : This life, therefore . . . solves the old theolcgie.il contradiction between works and faith. For it gets down below the roots of that barren quarrel, and shows that all rich and nobio works must spring out of a faithfuj heart. So true, strong Christian character was ever fashioned by disconnected impulse. There must be an organising force. Christian character is not a mosaic of moralities, nor a compilation of merits, nor a succession of acts, nor an aggregate of amiabilities. It is growth. And that principle of interior vitality out of which it unfolds branches and foliage and flowere is the life of God planted through Chriet In the soul. We confound the whole philosophy of our being when we think to attain goodness, which is salvation, by beginning ou the surface and working down. What we have to do is to receive Christ inwardly, and then the fruits of daily righteousness will spring forth aa naturally aa leaves on n tree or streams from a fountain. We cannot keep them back, except we crush and crucify the Christ within. They need no forcing. Believing and doing will not bo separata processes, of which you may take one away and leave the other. That mistake grew up in the creeds only when faith degenerated from this living and spiritual power Into a dogmatic and eoolesiastical letter. But in whatever heart Christ really dwelh by faith, there holiness in all forms of manly uprightness, womanlv eerenity, conscientious citizenehip, intellectual sincerity, truthful talk, honest trade, beneficent industry, will be the inevitable harvest, and the reapers of a noble civilisation shall come singing, bringing these sheaves with them.—Bishop Huntingdon.