uld do. But Judas and those who sin with him in
making continually little gains to which they have no right are wrong in
supposing their sin is less dangerous; and for this reason--that
covetousness is more a sin of the _will_ than sins of the flesh or of a
passionate nature; there is more choice in it; it is more the sin of the
whole man unresisting; and therefore it, above all others, is called
idolatry--it, above all others, proves that the man is in his heart
choosing the world and not God. Therefore it is that even our Lord
Himself spoke almost despairingly, certainly quite differently, of
covetous men in comparison with other sinners.

Disappointment in Christ is not an unknown thing among ourselves. Men
still profess to be Christians who are so only in the degree in which
Judas was. They expect _some_ good from Christ, but not all. They attach
themselves to Christ in a loose, conventional way, expecting that,
though they are Christians, they need not lose anything by their
Christianity, nor make any great efforts or sacrifices. They retain
command of their own life, and are prepared to go with Christ only so
far as they find it agreeable or inviting. The eye of an observer may
not be able to distinguish them from Christ's true followers; but the
distinction is present and is radical. They are seeking to use Christ,
and are not willing to be used by Him. They are not wholly and heartily
His, but merely seek to derive some influences from Him. The result is
that they one day find that, through all their religious profession and
apparent Christian life, their characteristic sin has actually been
gaining strength. And finding this, they turn upon Christ with
disappointment and rage in their hearts, because they become aware that
they have lost both this world and the next--have lost many pleasures
and gains they might have enjoyed, and yet have gained no spiritual
attainment. They find that the reward of double-mindedness is the most
absolute perdition, that both Christ and the world, to be made anything
of, require the whole man, and that he who tries to get the good of both
gets the good of neither. And when a man awakes to see that this is the
result of his Christian profession, there is no deadliness of hatred to
which the bitter disappointment of his soul will not carry him. He has
himself been a dupe, and he calls Christ an impostor. He know himself to
be damned, and he says there is no salvation in Christ.

B