I say to increased exertion; for what would stop exertion is pride. It is the turning back, and pausing to look with satisfaction on what is below us, rather than the looking upward to the summit, and thinking how much our actual elevation has brought us on the way towards it. And, further, there is coupled with every consideration of Christian privileges, the thought of what it must be to leave such privileges unimproved. In this respect, how well does the language of the two lessons from Deuteronomy suit the lesson from the Epistle to the Corinthians. We heard the description of the beauty and richness of the land which God gave to his people,--there were their advantages and privileges,--we heard also, the declaration of their unworthiness, and the solemn threatening of vengeance if, after having received good, they did evil. And as the vengeance has fallen upon them to the utmost, so we are taught expressly to apply their example to ourselves. "If God spared not the natural branches," such was St. Paul's language to the church at Rome, "take heed lest he also spare not thee." Let us not fear, then, to consider more nearly the high privileges which, as Christians, we enjoy: let us endeavour to understand, not merely generally, but in detail, the exalted language of the text, where it is said, that all things are ours; Paul, Apollos, and Cephas, the world, and life, and death, the things of time, and the things of eternity. These are ours because we are Christ's, and Christ is God's; they are ours so long as we are Christ's, and so far as we are his truly. They are not ours so far as we are not his: they are ours in no degree whatever the moment that he shall declare that we are his no longer.