And, moreover, of these penitents of whom I speak--and whom, when they become penitents, we cannot love too dearly (after our Saviour's pattern), nay, or reverence too highly, and whom the Apostles, after Christ's departure, brought into the Church in such vast multitudes--none, as far as we know, had any sudden change of mind from bad to good wrought in them; nor do we hear of any of them honoured with any important station in the Church. Great as St. Paul's sin was in persecuting Christ's followers, before his conversion, that sin was of a different kind; he was not transgressing, but obeying his conscience (however blinded it was); he was doing what he thought his duty, when he was arrested by the heavenly vision, which, when presented to him, he at once "obeyed;" he was not sinning _against light_, but _in_, darkness. We know nothing of the precise state of his mind immediately before his conversion; but we do know thus much, that years elapsed after his conversion before he was employed as an Apostle in the Church of God. I have confined myself to the time of Christ's coming, but not only then, but at all times and under all circumstances, as all parts of the Bible inform us, obedience to the light we possess is the way to gain more light. In the words of Wisdom, in the book of Proverbs, "I love them that love Me, and those that seek Me early shall find Me. . . . I lead in the way of righteousness, in the midst of the paths of judgment[28]." Or, in the still more authoritative words of Christ Himself, "He that is faithful in that which is least, is faithful also in much[29];" and, "He that hath, to him shall be given[30]." Now let us see some of the consequences which follow from this great Scripture truth.