ts His servants' work. Whether the servant be a cup-bearer or a
counsellor is of little moment. 'He that is faithful in that which is
least, is faithful also in much.'

The positive aspect of this right estimate of one's gifts is, if we
fully render the Apostle's words, as the Revised Version does, 'so to
think as to think soberly.' There is to be self-knowledge in order to
'sobriety,' which includes not only what we mean by sober-mindedness,
but self-government; and this aspect of the apostolic exhortation
opens out into the thought that the gifts, which a just estimate of
ourselves pronounces us to possess, need to be kept bright by the
continual suppression of the mind of the flesh, by putting down
earthly desires, by guarding against a selfish use of them, by
preventing them by rigid control from becoming disproportioned and
our masters. All the gifts which Christ bestows upon His people He
bestows on condition that they bind them together by the golden chain
of self-control.

MANY AND ONE

'For we have many members in one body, and all members have
not the same office: 5. So we, being many, are one body in
Christ, and every one members one of another.'--ROMANS xii. 4, 5.

To Paul there was the closest and most vital connection between the
profoundest experiences of the Christian life and its plainest and
most superficial duties. Here he lays one of his most mystical
conceptions as the very foundation on which to rear the great
structure of Christian conduct, and links on to one of his
profoundest thoughts, the unity of all Christians in Christ, a
comprehensive series of practical exhortations. We are accustomed to
hear from many lips: 'I have no use for these dogmas that Paul
delights in. Give me his practical teaching. You may keep the Epistle
to the Romans, I hold by the thirteenth of First Corinthians.' But
such an unnatural severance between the doctrine and the ethics of
the Epistle cannot be effected without the destruction of both. The
very principle of this Epistle to the Romans is that the difference
between the law and the Gospel is, that the one preaches conduct
without a basis for it, and that the other says, First believe in
Christ, and in the strength of that belief, do the right and be like
Him. Here, then, in the very laying of the foundation for conduct in
these verses we have in concrete example the secret of the Christian
way of making good men.

I. The first point to noti