*HOLY COMMUNION. PART II.* "O agony of wavering thought, When sinners first so near are brought! ’It is my Maker--dare I stay? My Saviour--dare I turn away?’" _Keble._ I felt that in one short chapter it was quite impossible to grasp all, or nearly all the objections to coming to Holy Communion; and so I propose in this chapter to speak of one more objection, commonly brought forward, before closing this subject. You will remember that in the last chapter we considered the objection of not being good enough. Now another very common objection, and one very often heard, is, "I am afraid of being laughed at!" Perhaps you will say, "I never have said that." No, reader, you may never have _said_ it with your lips, but have you never _thought_ it in your heart? This power of laughter, or ridicule as it is called, is a terrible one indeed. There is hardly a weapon in Satan’s armoury which he uses with such deadly effect upon the souls of men. Very many a young man goes up to the Bishop for Confirmation, and the Bishop lays his hands upon his head, and then as those grand old words, which have been spoken over the heads of so many, are said over him, "Defend, O Lord, this Thy child with Thy heavenly grace," the Holy Ghost enters into his soul, and for the moment he feels that he can go out and conquer. But his good resolves--and they are really good--are too often like the seeds which fell in stony places, which "had no deepness of earth: and when the sun was up, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away." And then the young man leaves the church, with his good resolves fresh made; and from that moment there begins within him the struggle, which is to end in Heaven or in Hell. He goes and joins his companions, and if he says anything about religion he gets laughed at, and in too many cases he forgets his Confirmation vows, and the good in him quickly dies. I cannot help thinking that the reason why so many young men fall away after Confirmation, is because they neglect to go _at once_ to the Holy Communion of Christ’s Body and Blood. Oh! yes, ridicule is indeed hard to bear, even for the best amongst us. "Almost any man," says Canon Farrar, "will confront peril with a multitude; scarcely one in a thousand will stand alone against a multitude when they are bent on wrong ... for martyrdom (or bearing witness for Christ) is not one, but manifold; it is often a battle-field where no clash of earthly combatants is heard; it is often a theatre no wider than a single, nameless home." But just think for a moment of this laughter of your friends. How long is it likely to last? and when it is over (for it must end some day), what is there to follow? Think of that when you are tempted by ridicule to turn aside from doing what is right. It would be hard indeed if you could not bear a laugh for Christ, Who could bear death for you!