communes and walks with him daily as a tender, loving, and wise father. But I hasten to a third class of differences, with which I shall deal more at length: I mean those which appear in the Christian’s conduct respecting those things which he uses in common with the world. Under this head falls that large class of actions, which, _in themselves considered_, have no moral value, but acquire one from the end they are made to serve, the manner in which they are pursued, or the motive in which they originate. On these arise the most perplexing of all moral questions, the most subtle cases of conscience, and too often, I grieve to say, the most acrimonious discussions. Under this head are included most of those vexed questions as to amusements, dress, meat and drink, and the like. And this text, I am sorry to say, has been made the basis for inculcating some most false and pernicious doctrines concerning these things. Now it seems to me that very many of the difficulties which arise on these subjects are quite unnecessary, and would be in great part destroyed by resting upon the simple, unequivocal testimony of the Bible. I do not think that God’s Word is at all wanting in explicitness on these points. Here is this text for instance. Nothing can be plainer. It tells us our first great duty is to submit our wills to God’s will; to commit ourselves to his guidance without reserve, a living sacrifice; to be transformed; and that when this shall have been done, we shall know what the will of God is; we shall practically prove what is good and acceptable and perfect, and, as a matter of course, shall not be conformed to the sinful principles and practices of the world. Now it follows from this that whatever is good and acceptable and perfect, not opposed to the new principle of life in us, is ours, given us by God to use and enjoy; and that in the use and enjoyment of it within the limits he prescribes, we _are not conformed to the world_ in any bad sense. I say this, well aware that every one of these things contains capabilities for abuse, and that the world does most sadly abuse them; and this brings me directly to my point that the difference between Christians and the world as respects these things is to be developed _in the proper use and regulation by Christians of what the world abuses_. Christians are not to be driven from every point which the world sees fit to occupy by the hue and cry of nonconformity. They are to remember that in these things there is a duty to be done as well as a pleasure to be enjoyed, and that they are to show their nonconformity, not by abandoning, but by refusing to conform to the world’s excesses, and by insisting on the restraining principles of God’s Word. Let us here hold closely by the opening thought of our discussion, that conformity to the world _in itself_ is no sin, and nonconformity _in itself_ no virtue. Conformity to the world is sinful when the world’s practice is sinful and not otherwise.