inconsistently, am I therefore to condemn Christianity itself? Am I
therefore to cut off my own soul from all hope of safety?

But, remembering this, bearing in mind that many eyes are on us, that
our conduct is being read, our ways watched, our actions weighed, our
motives sifted, Christian friends, let us walk carefully. Do not let us
bring disgrace on our Master, do not let us hinder others and be a
stumbling-block[1] in their way; do not let us give the world a wrong idea
of Christ.

We are not half awake, we are not half careful enough; let us walk
circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise. Let us, whenever we have been
tempted to any inconsistency, be able to take up Nehemiah's brave noble
words,

'So did not I, because of the fear of God.'

I could not get into a temper, I could not be hard or grasping, I could
not do that piece of sharp practice, I could not stoop to that deceit, I
could not disgrace my Master, because in my heart was a principle
holding me back from sin, the fear of the Lord. I feared to grieve the
One who loved me, and that fear kept me safe. 'So did not I, because of
the fear of God.'

[Transcribers note 1: stumbling-black corrected to stumbling-block.]

CHAPTER VII.

True to his Post.

Lot's wife was changed into a pillar of salt; and if that pillar still
remained, we should see her to-day standing in exactly the same attitude
in which she was standing when death suddenly came upon her.

About a hundred years ago, a baker in the south of Italy sunk a well in
his garden; and whilst doing so he suddenly came upon a buried city, a
city which had been lost to the world for 1800 years. The underground
city was no empty place; it was peopled with the dead, and these were
found in the very attitude and position in which death had overtaken
them, standing, sitting, lying, just as they had been on that awful day
when Mount Vesuvius sent out terrible showers of ashes, destroying them
all.

Very various were the positions of the dead in that buried city. Many
were in the streets, in the attitude of running, trying to make their
escape from the city gate; others were in deep vaults whither they had
gone for safety, crouching, in their fear of what might fall upon them;
others were on staircases and flights of stone steps leading to the
roof, in the attitude of climbing to a place where they hoped the lava
might not bury them. Two men were found by the garden gate of a large
and beau