"_God is near you, is with you, is within you_," writes Seneca to his friend Lucilius, in the 41st of those _Letters_ which abound in his most valuable moral reflections; "_a sacred Spirit dwells within us, the observer and guardian of all our evil and our good ... there is no good man without God_." And again (_Ep._ 73): "_Do you wonder that man goes to the gods? God comes to men: nay, what is yet nearer; He comes into men. No good mind is holy without God_." 2. _The Eye of God_. "All things are naked and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." (Heb. iv. 13.) "Pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly." (Matt. vi. 6.) Seneca (_On Providence_, 1): "_It is no advantage that conscience is shut within us; we lie open to God_." _Letter_ 83: "_What advantage is it that anything is hidden from man? Nothing is closed to God: He is present to our minds, and enters into our central thoughts_." _Letter_ 83: "_We must live as if we were living in sight of all men; we must think as though some one could and can gaze into our inmost breast_." 3. _God is a Spirit_. St. Paul, "We ought not to think that the God-head is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device." (Acts xvii. 29.) Seneca (_Letter_ 31): "_Even from a corner it is possible to spring up into heaven: rise, therefore, and form thyself into a fashion worthy of God; thou canst not do this, however, with gold and silver: an image like to God cannot be formed out of such materials as these_." 4. _Imitating God_. "Be ye therefore followers ([Greek: _mimaetai_], imitators) of God, as dear children." (Eph. v. 1.) "He that in these things [righteousness, peace, joy in the Holy Ghost] serveth Christ is acceptable to God." (Rom. xiv. 18.) Seneca _(Letter_ 95): "_Do you wish to render the gods propitious? Be virtuous. To honour them it is enough to imitate them_." _Letter_ 124: "_Let man aim at the good which belongs to him. What is this good? A mind reformed and pure, the imitator of God, raising itself above things human, confining all its desires within itself_." 5. _Hypocrites like whited Sepulchres_. "Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness." (Matt, xxiii. 27.) Seneca: "_Those whom you regard as happy, if you saw them, not in their externals, but in their hidden aspect, are wretched, sordid, base; like their own walls adorned outwardly. It is no solid and genuine felicity; it is a plaster, and that a thin one; and so, as long as they can stand and be seen at their pleasure, they shine and impose on us: when anything has fallen which disturbs and uncovers them, it is evident how much deep and real foulness an extraneous splendour has concealed_." 6. _Teaching compared to Seed_.