h curious inconsistency, you
are urging them as reasons why you cannot serve God. You are using the
sinful things which you have done in the past as an excuse for not
doing the right and noble thing now.

There are hundreds of people who, if they could begin again, would join
the ranks of the religious--at least they think they would, and perhaps
say it. If we could just start with a clean sheet, we would be
Christians, we would walk in the noble and faithful way. But then, you
see, we cannot undo the years that have been lived in the other way.
We have committed ourselves to the irreligious side. We have made all
who know us understand that we do not care about religious things. We
have talked about them carelessly, perhaps contemptuously, as if we put
no value upon them at all. We have made a reputation of that sort, and
now it stands in the way. We cannot go back of all our old
professions; the inconsistency would be manifest. No one expects it of
us. No one would believe if we did it. There you have the self-made
difficulties again. Because you did wrong all those years, you must
needs go on doing wrong. Because you talked and acted in an
unbelieving way, you must not now change into the higher and prayerful
way. Because you have robbed God and your own souls so long, there is
nothing for you but to continue repeating the offence. Yet these, when
you name them, are so absurd, that one could almost laugh at them. The
conviction that you have hitherto been on the wrong side is the one
thing that ought to force you now to the right side. Why should you
perpetuate blunders, follies, and misdoings? Why should the evil past
chain you? Let the dead bury its dead--forget the things which are
behind. You have paid the hundred talents to the wrong master. Why
should you go on paying because you have done it once? Let God's mercy
cover and forgive that. And now pay your vows and give your lives to
Him henceforth.

II.

We are held back from the right thing by the fear of the loss which it
will involve.

We say with poor, frightened Amaziah, But what about the hundred
talents? They will be clean gone if I obey the voice of God. The
hundred talents take many forms, but the principle is always the same.
We shall lose a little in the way of business, if we make up our minds
to be scrupulously honest, and to speak the simple truth. We shall
forfeit a little of our present popularity, if we take t