Engraft, now, on that “wild olive” stock, the sweet juices of Christian love, drawn from their original stock in Bethlehem, “of the seed of David and the root of Jesse;” soften that hard integrity by Christian charity; in place of duty done from sheer compulsion, put duty done from a willing, eager, and believing heart. Do this, and thou shalt live. Abraham, Moses, Christ; impulse, discipline, faith; nature, law, gospel; instinct, obedience, grace; Mamre, Sinai, Calvary; this is that divine order—not bound by rigid rules of chronological succession, but having the free play and various intershadings of a moral growth—to which we are to conform our lives. When the “_Thus saith the Lord_” shall have controlled our impatient will, our hearts will be ready to say, “Our Father, who art in heaven!” Seek, first, after that indwelling goodness that has its fountain in the center of the soul, and good works will be the constant stream. Be children of light. Live by the spirit, not the letter; by faith, not by fear. For you are called to be disciples of Jesus. Henceforth the Christian is to be known, and to be saved, not by the hand so much as by the heart; not by a righteousness that is legal, but spiritual. Let not your piety be the occasional piety of Rabbinical Sabbaths, with ghastly intervals of worldliness between, like isolated springs in a desert of sand; but a piety, whose perennial influence, like the river that keeps the meadows always green, shall penetrate and fertilize the whole soil and open field of your being, and thus make glad the city of your God. No rich, or beautiful, or excepted life can be had by us, except Christ be its inspiration. Hope will not reach up to immortality, except it climb by the cross. Let not your lives be dead shapes of outward decency—the carved and gilded wood of an ark and a tabernacle deserted by the Spirit—but vital branches, filled with leaping and vigorous currents of holy feeling, on the living vine! “For if any man have not the spirit of Christ, he is none of his.” FOOTNOTE: [G] “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness. The law was given by Moses; but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.”—Gal., iii:6; John, i:17. PRACTICE AND HABIT. By JOHN LOCKE. John Locke, the author from whose writings we quote the article below, made his reputation chiefly by his famous essay on the “Human Understanding.” The article on “Practice and Habit,” together with “Thoughts and Aphorisms,” by Jonathan Swift, constitute the “Required Readings” from English History for the month of March. Swift was famous alike for his wit, his genius, his love affairs, his political warfare, “Tale of a Tub,” and other works. PRACTICE AND HABIT. We are born with faculties and powers capable almost of anything, such at least as would carry us farther than can be easily imagined: but it is only the exercise of those powers which gives us ability and skill in anything, and leads us toward perfection.