The materials for retribution are laid up in a man's nature by wrong-doing. The conspirators store the dynamite in a dark cellar. Conscience and memory are charged with explosives. If tendencies, habits, and desires become tyrannous by long indulgence and cannot be indulged, what a fierce fire would rage then! We have only to suppose a man made to know what is the real moral character of his actions, and to be unable to give them up, to have hell. All this is confirmed by occasional glimpses which men get of themselves. Our own characters are the true Medusa-head which turns a man into stone when he sees it. What, then, are we really doing by our sins? Piling together fuel for burning. III. Sin burns up. 'Work as a spark.' The evil deeds brought into contact with the doer work destruction. That is, if, in a future life or at any time, a man is brought face to face with his acts, then retribution begins. We shake off the burden of our actions by want of remembrance. But that power of ignoring the past may be broken down at any time. Suppose it happens that in another world it can no longer be exercised, what then? Evil deeds are the occasion of the divine retribution. They are 'a spark.' It is they who light the pyre, not God. The prophet here protests in God's name against the notion that He is to be blamed for punishing. Men are their own self-tormentors. The sinful man immolates himself. Like Isaac, he carries the wood and lays the pile for his own burning. Christ severs the connection between us and our evil. He restores beauty and freshness to the blighted tree, planting it as 'by the river of water,' so that it 'bringeth forth its fruit in its season,' and its 'leaf also doth not wither.' THE PERPETUAL PILLAR OF CLOUD AND FIRE 'And the Lord will create over the whole habitation of Mount Zion, and over her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night.'--ISAIAH iv. 5. The pillar of cloud and fire in the Exodus was one: there are to be as many pillars as there are 'assemblies' in the new era. Is it straining the language too much to find significance in that difference? Instead of the formal unity of the Old Covenant, there is a variety which yet is a more vital unity. Is there not a hint here of the same lesson that is taught by the change of the one golden lamp-stand into the seven, which are a better unity because Jesus Christ walks among them? The heart of this promise, thus cast into the form of ancient experiences, but with significant variations, is that of true communion with God. That communion makes those who have it glorious. That communion supplies unfailing guidance.