It is not in contemplation but in action that man finds the true and proper end of his being. All progress, all

66

It is

devotion are most unquestionably sweet and ravishing to them that feel them; but are certainly no further useful than as they contribute to the bettering and amending of our lives, and to the improvement of some grace or virtue; and a constant tenor of good practice is a more secure and more desirable state than any unequal visionary one, and being caught sometimes into the third heavens.' -(FLEETWOOD: Method of Devotion.) "These are happy instruments for enabling us to work out our salvation; but except we bring forth the fruits of the spirit, love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance we shall not merit the kingdom of heaven."-(NELSON: True Devotion.) Hearing of sermons and professing of love to and zeal for Christ may pass for piety a while, but in the end it will not be so. true Christian practice that will hold out in time of trial, and that hope of ours which is thus grounded will stand firm and stable in time of affliction and temptation, at the hour of death and in the day of judgment.”—(Dr. HAMMOND: Practical Catechism.) Waiting upon God in the public and private ordinances is designed not to excuse us from a discharge of the duties of civil life, but to instruct, strengthen, and qualify us for their performance." (Rev. JOHN NEWTON: Letters.) "True religion is practical; everything in it tends towards action. Speculation only comes in occasionally and occupies the second place."-(VINET.) "God has made it necessary that the spiritual life, in order to its perfecting and blessedness, should put itself forth in activities." (PAXTON HOOD.)

1 66

66

That man was destined by nature for action plainly appears from that multitude of active instincts and desires natural to him; which is further confirmed by that deeply implanted sense approving or condemning certain actions. The soul naturally desires action.”—(Dr. F. HUTCHESON: Moral Philosophy.) "It is evidently the intention of nature that man should be laborious, and that he should exert his powers of body and mind for his own and for the common good."-(Dr. Tíos. REID: Active Powers.)

". . . Were it virtue's only meed to dwell
In a celestial palace, all resigned

To pleasurable impulses, immured
Within the prison of itself, the will

Of changeless nature would be unfulfilled.
Learn to make others happy."-(SHELLEY.)

Enjoyment and activity in our constitution "are so connected by the wisdom of nature that they must go hand in hand: and the first must be led and supported by the last." Man's "enjoyments seem to be given by nature, not so much for their own sake as to encourage the exercise of his various powers."-(Dr. THOS. REID.) "All pleasure is the concomitant of activity, its degree being in proportion as that activity is spontaneously intense, its prolongation in proportion as that activity is spontaneously continued." — (Sir W. HAMILTON.) "The state of

pleasure, strange as the assertion may seem, is a state of transition and unrest; it is always coming or going, there is no complete repose except under indifference." (Prof. BAIN.) "To be happy it is necessary that we be occupied. . . . The languor which we feel when we

2

growth springs out of action.1 It is not the man of ease, who has all his wants supplied, all his necessities ministered to, and who is never called upon to exert his energies, that is the man of might or power. On the contrary, it is he whose path is beset with hardships, who is frequently called upon to encounter difficulties, and who has to exert his powers and faculties to the utmost in order to overcome

cease from exertion reminds us at every moment that we are not formed for inactivity."-(Dr. T. BROWN: Human Mind.) "The end of man, it was written long ago, is an action, not a thought.' In the perfect state all thought were but the picture and inspiring symbol of action."-(T. CARLYLE.) "The necessity of action is not only demonstrated from the fabric of the body, but evident from observation of the universal practice of mankind.” -(ZIMMERMAN.)

1"All nature is upheld in its being, order, and state by constant agitation; every creature is incessantly employed in action conformable to its designed end and use; in like manner the preservation and improvement of our faculties depends on their constant exercise."-(Dr. ISAAC BARROW: On Industry.) "Life could not be maintained in organs remaining in perfect repose; all is agitation, all is movement in organized bodies." (Dr. RIOFREY.) "To the well-being of the higher classes of animals a certain amount of exercise of their various parts is not less necessary than their nourishment; and if, during the period of growth, such exercise be withheld by any cause, the body never acquires its due proportions and strength."-(Dr. NEIL ARNOTT.) "It is necessary to that perfection of which our present state is capable that the mind and body should both be kept in action; that neither the faculties of the one nor the other should be suffered to grow lax or torpid for want of use."(ZIMMERMAN.) Man "is made for action and progress, and cannot be happy without it." "His good consists in the vigorous exertion of his active and intellectual powers upon their proper objects." (Dr. THOS. REID: Active Powers.) "A man perfects himself by working." "Destiny has, on the whole, no other way of perfecting us."-(T. CARLYLE.) "Humanly speaking, to what do we owe the wonderful advancement made for the welfare and improvement of this country in almost every point of view, but to steady, unwearied labour and spirited industry."-(Rev. E. C. TOPHAM.)

2 "The child of luxury doomed to a slothful life may yet have a manly form, but in each muscle and limb there is a mightier energy which labour alone can develop. When compared with the husbandman long inured to toil, or the wrestler who has toughened his sinews by their most vigorous use, he is weak and helpless." (Dr. H. DARLING.) "Selfdeprived of one of the highest sources of enjoyment, they lose that elasticity of health and strength, together with that buoyancy and evenflow of spirits, which the full exercise of the body never fails to impart."(Rev. E. C. TOPHAM.) "The warrior is not reared in the lap of luxury and indulgence, but learns his art in the labours, the fatigues, and the dangers of the campaign, and feels his courage swell amid the conflict of contending armies, 'amid the shout of battle, and the shock of arms. (Dr. R. BURNS.) "A life of ease is not for any man or any god."-(T. CARLYLE.)

999

them, that rises to the full stature of a man.1 The muscles shrink for want of exercise, the mental faculties decay for want of use, and the moral nature becomes dead if not frequently called into action.2 "Alike in the realm of the hand, and brain, and heart, God has made the health and

66

1 "Man being intended for a life of activity, all his functions are constituted by nature to fit him for this object, and they never go so successfully as when his external situation is such as to demand this regular exercise of all his organs."-(Dr. A. COMBE: Physiology.) "We are born with faculties and powers capable almost of anything... but it is only the exercise of those powers which gives us ability and skill in anything, and leads us towards perfection." (LOCKE.) "It gives health to the body, strength to the muscles, and firmness to the nerves." It "invigorates the digestive organs, promotes healthy secretions, and drives away what would otherwise breed disease."-(H. SMITH: Mental and Moral Training.) "Labour is not only requisite to preserve the coarser organs in a state fit for their functions, but it is equally necessary to those finer and more delicate organs on which and by which the imagination and perhaps the other mental powers act."-(EDMUND BURKE.) Industry doth preserve and perfect our nature, keeping it in good tune and temper, improving and advancing it towards its best estate. The labour of our mind in attentive meditation and study doth renderit capable and patient of thinking upon any object or occasion, doth polish and refine it by use, doth enlarge it by accession of habits, doth quicken and rouse our spirits, dilating and diffusing them into their proper channels. The very labour of our bodies doth keep the organs of action sound and clean, discussing fogs and superfluous humours, opening passages, distributing nourishment, exciting vital heat."—(Dr. ISAAC BARROW.) Work is the grand cure of all the maladies and miseries that ever beset mankind; honest work which you intend getting done."-(T. CARLYLE.) A hard life is a macadamized road which always remains firm and never becomes muddy."-(VINET.) "Difficulty, abnegation, martyrdom, death are the allurements that act on the heart of man."-(T. CARLYLE.) "It is after all the real unhappiness of a man that cannot work, that he cannot get his destiny as a man fulfilled."-(Ditto.)

66

Life is not an idle ore,

But iron dug from central gloom,
And heated hot with burning fears,
And dipt in baths of hissing tears,

And battered with the shocks of doom,

To shape and use."-(TENNYSON: In Memoriam.)

2 "I have known several instances in which the muscles of a limb have been rendered weak and powerless for months in consequence of their incautious disuse. The same law pervades the whole organism; the mind, like the body, is strengthened by exertion." (H. MAYO: Philosophy of Living.) "To cease to strive is to begin to die, physically, morally, and intellectually."-(Dr. H. MAUDSLEY.) "If we neglect our faculties, or deprive them of their objects, we weaken the organization, give rise to distressing diseases, and at the same time experience the bitterest feelings that can afflict humanity, ennui and melancholy." (G. COMBE: Constitution of Man.) "It is with us as with other things

vigour of the faculties contingent upon their exercise, stamping activity as an irreversible law upon man."

in nature which by motion are preserved in their native purity and perfection, in their sweetness, in their lustre,-rest corrupting and defiling them." Without activity "no good constitution of soul or body can subsist; but a foul rust, a dull numbness and resty listlessness, a heavy unwieldiness must seize on us; our spirits will be stifled and choaked, our hearts will grow faint and languid, our parts will flag and decay, the vigour of our mind and the health of our body will be much impaired."(Dr. ISAAC BARROW.)

66

1"Human bodies are framed after such a manner as to stand in constant need of exercise. And no doubt this was contrived so by Providence on purpose to keep them in employment." (Rev. J. BALGUY: Sermons.) The law of our constitution, whereby the regulated activity of both intellect and feeling is made essential to sound bodily health, seems to me one of the most beautiful arrangements of an all wise and beneficent Creator."-(G. COMBE.) 'It is a fundamental law of nature that all the capacities of man are enlarged and strengthened by being used. From the energy of a muscle up to the highest faculty intellectual or moral, repeated exercise of the function increases its intensity. . . . . The bodily force, the senses, the observing and reasoning faculties, the moral feelings, can only be improved by habitual exercise." (JAS. SIMPSON: Philosophy of Education.) "The mental and moral, like the muscular powers, are improved only by being used."-(J. S. MILL.) "The mind, like the body, gains robustness and activity by the habitual exercise of its powers." (HANNAH MORE: Christian Morals.) "Industry doth befit the constitution and frame of our nature; all the faculties of our soul and the organs of our body being adapted in a congruity and tendency thereto; our hands are suited for work, our feet for travel, or senses to watch for occasion of pursuing good and eschewing evil, our reason to plot and contrive ways of employing the other parts and powers; all these, I say, are formed for action."-(Dr. ISAAC BARROW.) "It is very plain, both in common experience declaring the course of Providence, and in Holy Scripture expressing God's intention, that Almighty God doth hold forth all good things as prizes and recompenses of our vigilant care and painful endeavour." (Ditto.) "It appears as if Providence designed men the true enjoyment of no blessings whatever, without the price of labour."-(Rev. J. BALGUY.) "By engaging in the business of life, and taking an active interest in the advancement of society, we duly exercise our various powers of perception, thought, and feeling, we promote the health of the whole corporeal system, invigorate the mind itself, and, at the same time, experience the highest mental gratification of which a human being is susceptible."-(G. COMBE: Constitution of Man.) "In this necessity of occupation we may trace "the evident marks of the intention of heaven that man, who is to exist among men, and who has powers of mind and of body capable of benefitting them in innumerable ways, is not to suffer those powers to be idle.” -(Dr. THOMAS BROWN: Human Mind.) "Worldly industry under proper restraints and regulations is a great friend to religion and virtue." long as idleness is quite shut out froin our lives, all the sins of wantonness, softness, and effeminacy are prevented."-(JEREMY TAYLOR.) "God did not intend that man should live idly even in his best state, or should enjoy happiness without taking pains; but did provide work enough, even in Paradise itself."-(Dr. BARROW.) "Our present state is one of

So

Action, however, does not naturally and as a consequence follow feeling.1 The two are separate and distinct in their nature, are subject to different laws, and the one by no means implies or is the measure of the other; least of all does correct thought or feeling imply correct action.3

2

alternation between the active and passive faculties, the latter chiefly prevailing; but the future being will, we suppose, be active only and always so." (ISAAC TAYLOR.) "It is not by being in heaven that men are constituted happy, but by vigorously exerting their faculties upon heavenly objects. The happiness of heaven, therefore, consists in a state of heavenly action; in being so attempered and connaturalized to the objects of heaven as to be always acting upon and cheerfully employing our faculties about them."-(Dr. SCOTT.)

1 "Whatever a man may inwardly think and (with perfect sincerity) say, you cannot fully depend upon his conduct till you know how he has been accustomed to act. For continued action is like a continued stream of water, which wears for itself a channel that it will not be easily turned from." (Archbishop WHATELY.) "It is curious to observe the inadequate effect of lofty ideas upon the daily conduct of life. Few persons, with any pretension to culture, are without standards, both æsthetic and moral, which they cherish with devotion and defend with eloquence. If we look closely into individual action, however, which is the only test of individual thought, we find a marvellous disproportion between the thing dreamed of and the thing done."—(ANON.) "To see distinctly the right way, and to pursue it, are not precisely the same thing."-(Rev. R. HALL.) 2" Cogitamus secundum naturam, loquimur secundum precepta, sed agimus secundum consuetudinem.". - (BACON.) "There is a wrong philosophy in supposing that a habit which has fixed'itself in the fleshly nature can be overcome by the mere exertion of the will. It is not enough to resolve against it. You cannot vanquish it by the power of a resolution. To that must be added continuous training.”—(H. W. Beecher.) "Every one knows that the theory of a particular skill of movement is a very different matter from the practice of it; and that the complete capacity of accomplishing the act is gained, not simply by desiring and willing it, but by patient exercise and cultivation."-(Dr. H. MAUDSLEY.) "Every art, from reasoning to riding and rowing, is learned by assiduous practice." (Archbp. THOMSON.). "Those things which they that learn ought to do, they learn by doing them."-(ARISTOTLE.) "Speaking truth is like writing fair, and comes only by practice, it is less a matter of will than of habit."-(JOHN RUSKIN.)

3 "A person we suppose has a great admiration of the capabilities of the pictorial art. . . He feels that he has conceptions of something far more perfect or beautiful than he has yet seen executed in the works of any human artist, . . . and, giving way to his conceptions of ideal beauty, he thinks his best plan is to wait till his aspiration or his power of forming notions of ideal excellence has completely taken possession of all the faculties of his soul, and then he thinks he shall be able at once, and without further preparation, to embody in actual exhibition the living images he has previously conceived. But, meanwhile, his powers of execution remain without improvement, and even his notions of ideal excellence

serve but as a vague delusion to torment his own spirit, and he dies without having done anything towards the attainment of the purpose