February 4

"Fret not thyself because of evil-doers."—Psalms 37:1.

IT is better being good than bad.

It brings a truer profit. How can I doubt it? The wealth which has no canker staining it and which is more precious than money: the quiet conscience, the restful spirit, the imagination cleansed, the will renewed, the life taught to love and serve and bear fruit in God's behalf and man's—these are the most desirable treasures. And they are my property, when I am a child in the household of the saints.

It brings a richer pleasure, too. There is a "sweetness never failing, sweetness happy and secure," in the love of the Father and the grace of the Son and the communion of the Holy Ghost. The world's joys do not satisfy, but heaven's joys fill and content my soul. They leave me no more that I can crave. My heart has attained its uttermost, and the psalm which it sings week in and week out is a Hallelujah psalm.

It brings a nobler permanence. Yet a little while, and the wicked shall not be; but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever. "Open the door, and let in more of that music," Jacob Böhme said when he was dying; "and now," he went on, "I go to be with my Redeemer and my King in paradise." For every disciple the best is yet to be—"the new wine's foaming flow, the Master's lips aglow."

Therefore I shall commit my way unto the Lord; I shall trust also in Him, and He will bring it to pass. From all discontentment, from all miscalculation, from all envy and fret, may He set me wholly free. The poorest of His saints is loftier in rank and richer in treasure than the world's millionaires and princes.