the influences to which he yields himself.

One of our chief dangers, however, is that many influences flow out
from our daily environment of which we are quite unconscious. We are
not always in a position to realize our surroundings and their effect,
and even when we can realize them, it is often beyond our power to
control them. But before an external influence can work any hurt to
us, there must be something {91} within that answers to it. A child
may pass unscathed through an environment of vice, because there is
nothing in the child-heart that responds to the call of sin.

Our Lord had this in mind, perhaps, when He laid it down as a condition
necessary to entrance into the Kingdom of God that we should become as
little children,[1] and He was able to make this condition quite
absolute, because while no man can control his external environment and
the consequent influences, he can, by the deliberate use of his will,
acting in the power of the Holy Ghost, create, in very large measure,
whatever interior condition he wishes. By his daily course he can
develop a moral and spiritual interior that will habitually respond
with alacrity to the evil and be deaf to the good; or, on the other
hand, one that will not only rise up quickly to entertain every good
influence and suggestion, but will in a large measure (though never
wholly in this life) be even unconscious like little children of the
presence of evil influences.[2]

{92}

So let us learn how to create an interior environment in which the Holy
Ghost will be the dominant force. Otherwise Satan will surely surround
us with so much of sin, that becoming accustomed to it, and to the
thought of it, we shall be unable to resist the effort he will make to
use our faculties as instruments for his work.

Nor must we wait until conscious of his approach before seeking to
create the proper interior environment. In most cases it will then be
too late. It is not easy to surround ourselves with an atmosphere of
good and pious thought in the moment of assault. We must be beforehand
with him. In times of peace we must prepare for war.

We may be quite sure that it is with the intention of affording us the
opportunity to do this that God often gives us rest from the attacks of
the enemy. He does not mean us to lie idle at such times, but to seize
the opportunity to train for future battles, just as soldiers in
barracks engage in daily drill that they may be more ef