'
'Forbid him not,' said Jesus himself. He that hath ears to hear his
Saviour's words, let him hear.
'Therefore,' St. Paul says, 'let nothing be done through strife or
vain-glory.' It is a very sad thing to think that the human heart is
so corrupt, that we should be tempted to do good, and to show our
piety, through strife or vain-glory. But so it is. Party spirit,
pride, the wish to show the world how pious we are, the wish to make
ourselves out better and more reverent than our neighbours, too often
creep into our prayers and our worship, and turn our feasts of
charity into feasts of uncharitableness, vanity, ambition.
So it was in St. Paul's time. Some, he says, preached Christ out of
contention, hoping to add affliction to his bonds. Not that he hated
them for it, or tried to stop them. Any way, he said, Christ was
preached, whether out of party-spirit against him, or out of love to
Christ; any way Christ was preached: and he would and did rejoice in
that thought. Again I say, 'He that hath ears to hear, let him
hear.
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