else to be done. The mechanical way in which the transaction is
effected, leaves the soul without stimulus, and the character remains
untouched by the moral aspects of the sacrifice of Christ. He who is
unjust is unjust still; he who is unholy is unholy still. Thus the whole
scheme ministers to the Degeneration of Organs. For here, again, by just
as much as the organism borrows mechanically from an external source, by
so much exactly does it lose in its own organization. Whatever rest is
provided by Christianity for the children of God, it is certainly never
contemplated that it should supersede personal effort. And any rest
which ministers to indifference is immoral and unreal--it makes
parasites and not men. Just because God worketh in him, as the evidence
and triumph of it, the true child of God works out his own
salvation--works it out having really received it--not as a light thing,
a superfluous labor, but with fear and trembling as a reasonable and
indispensable service.

If it be asked, then, shall the parasite be saved or shall he not, the
answer is that the idea of salvation conveyed by the question makes a
reply all but hopeless. But if by salvation is meant, a trusting in
Christ _in order to likeness to Christ_, in order to that _holiness_
without which no man shall see the Lord, the reply is that the
parasite's hope is absolutely vain. So far from ministering to growth,
parasitism ministers to decay. So far from ministering to holiness, that
is to _wholeness_, parasitism ministers to exactly the opposite. One by
one the spiritual faculties droop and die, one by one from lack of
exercise the muscles of the soul grow weak and flaccid, one by one the
moral activities cease. So from him that hath not, is taken away that
which he hath, and after a few years of parasitism there is nothing left
to save.

If our meaning up to this point has been sufficiently obscure to make
the objection now possible that this protest against Parasitism is
opposed to the doctrines of Free Grace, we cannot hope in a closing
sentence to free the argument from a suspicion so ill-judged. The
adjustment between Faith and Works does not fall within our province
now. Salvation truly is the free gift of God, but he who really knows
how much this means knows--and just because it means so much--how much
of consequent action it involves. With the central doctrines of grace
the whole scientific argument is in too wonderful harmony to be foun