t of 'the day of the Lord' to that of
day in general. That is obvious, I think, from the contrast he draws
between the 'day' and the 'night,' the darkness and the light. If so,
then, when he says 'the children of the day' he does not so much
mean--though that is quite true--that we are, as it were, akin to that
day of judgment, and may therefore look forward to it without fear, and
in quiet confidence, lifting up our heads because our redemption draws
nigh; but rather he means that Christians are the children of that which
expresses knowledge, and joy, and activity. Of these things the day is
the emblem, in every language and in every poetry. The day is the time
when men see and hear, the symbol of gladness and cheer all the world
over.

And so, says Paul, you Christian men and women belong to a joyous realm,
a realm of light and knowledge, a realm of purity and righteousness. You
are children of the light; a glad condition which involves many glad and
noble issues. Children of the light should be brave, children of the
light should not be afraid of the light, children of the light should be
cheerful, children of the light should be buoyant, children of the
light should be transparent, children of the light should be hopeful,
children of the light should be pure, and children of the light should
walk in this darkened world, bearing their radiance with them; and
making things, else unseen, visible to many a dim eye.

But while these emblems of cheerfulness, hope, purity, and illumination
are gathered together in that grand name--'Ye are the children of the
day,' there is one direction especially in which the Apostle thinks that
that consideration ought to tell, and that is the direction of
self-restraint. '_Noblesse oblige!_'--the aristocracy are bound to do
nothing low or dishonourable. The children of the light are not to stain
their hands with anything foul. Chambering and wantonness, slumber and
drunkenness, the indulgence in the appetites of the flesh,--all that may
be fitting for the night, it is clean incongruous with the day.

Well, if you want that turned into pedestrian prose--which is no more
clear, but a little less emotional--it is just this: You Christian men
and women belong--if you are Christians--to another state of things from
that which is lying round about you; and, therefore, you ought to live
in rigid abstinence from these things that are round about you.

That is plain enough surely, nor do I su