that they had passed under a new
allegiance; that like the just-converted Frankish {215} idolater, they
must 'burn what they had adored, and adore what they had burned[10].'

We in our generation, and in a country where Christianity has become
traditional, realize this much less easily. It is not only that we
have, in our Church and country, almost wholly lost the symbolism which
belongs to baptism by immersion[11]; though that is as great a loss as
any symbolic action, not necessary to the administration of a
sacrament, can be. It is not only that we are as a general rule
baptized in infancy, for that under right conditions[12] embodies a
fundamental Christian principle and comes down from the origin of
Christianity. It is much more that Christianity has been allowed to
become conventional and cheap. It requires no effort or moral courage
to own, in a formal sense, the name of Christ. The result is that
masses of {216} men belong to the Church who are in practice living
purely worldly lives, and that the Church and the world are fused
together. Hence it follows again that what the majority of Christians
do is supposed to represent a tolerable manner of life for an ordinary
Christian, who does not profess to be better than his neighbours.
Under these circumstances there is nothing which is more important than
to reassert the law of life through death as the only Christian law of
living. The 'old man' is as vigorous as ever. The world is still
gratifying its sensual appetites and grasping after wealth without
regard to the law of God. Malice, jealousy, and hatred are alive and
flourishing. God is still being ignored, refused, blasphemed. That is
to say, the world of sin is still what it always was. It is still
under the same unchangeable wrath of God; and still therefore to live
to God is only possible for one who will, and that deliberately and
persistently, die to the world. The renunciation must be conscious and
deliberate. The mortification and crucifixion of the 'old man' and
'the body of sin' must be painful, at times even agonizing. A
reasonable Christian will be indeed surprised if something painful is
not being continually required of him. And a reasonable Christian
{217} rejoices to purchase, even by great sacrifices, the pearl of
great price, which is fellowship with Christ:--'that he may know him
and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his
sufferings, being made conformable un