February 9

"O glorious hour, O blest abode! I shall be near, and like my God; And flesh and sin no more control The sacred pleasures of the soul."

FEBRUARY 9.—"So fight I, not as one that beateth the air."—1 Corinthians 9:26.

BEHOLD the boxer in the Grecian games. First, he often practised in feigned combat, exercising and extending his arms and hands with his gloves on, to acquire greater agility and skill. This was comparatively easy: this required no fortitude, and produced little exhaustion. But see him afterwards when actually engaged with his antagonist—How he agonizes! How he stretches every muscle, and strains every nerve! Here was the trial. Who does not perceive what a difference there was between these? Between the feigned and the real combat? Between beating the air, and beating the adversary? But, says the Apostle, I resemble the combatant not in the former, but in the latter of these—"So fight I, not as one that beateth the air."

So it is with every Christian. He has to fight; and whatever erroneous or defective notions may obtain concerning it, he finds it to be, not an imaginary, but an actual conflict; the most serious and trying in which he can ever be engaged. The enemy he encounters has every quality that can render him formidable. The struggle is constant, and admits of no interval of repose or relaxation. The consequences are inexpressibly momentous and interesting. Salvation or damnation, hell or heaven, everlasting happiness or wo, depend on his success or failure.

It is no easy thing, therefore, to be a Christian indeed. Those who think otherwise, prove that they never made the trial in earnest; and are strangers to the language of the Scripture. There we read of striving to enter in at the strait gate; of pressing into the kingdom of God; of the violent who take it by force; of running the race that is set before us; of enduring hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. It is admitted that these are metaphorical expressions; but they must be founded in truth; and what is the truth intended by them? If it be taken from the lowest interpretation, it is enough to condemn many: for surely they must fall short of the requirement who have a name that they live, but are dead; who wear the form of godliness, but deny the power; whose religion allows them to be at ease in Zion, retaining every evil passion, every worldly indulgence; and is distinguished by nothing like exertion or sacrifice. "But then real Christians are few." And says not the Saviour the same? "Strait is the gate and narrow is the way that leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it." Men would be happy without being holy; without diligence; without contention. But no sluggard, no coward, ever entered heaven. "Win and wear it," says Latimer, "is the motto inscribed on the crown for which we strive." And says the Amen, the faithful Witness, "If any man will be my disciple, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow me."

And, therefore, a religious course should be entered upon with solemn thought and deliberation. We should sit down and consider the difficulties, dangers, and exertions that will attend it. For if we begin under a mistaken notion, and reckoning only upon what is