+I. Strife is unlawful when no good can come from striving.+ The purpose or end of the strife must be the test as to whether it is right or wrong. Mere assertion of our rights or material gain is not the highest good. If Abraham had pushed the quarrel between his herdsmen and those of Lot there can be no doubt that Abraham could have established a lawful claim to a choice of the land. But the good to be gained by striving was not worthy to be compared with the harm that would have been done, and therefore Abraham nobly forbore to insist on his rights. +II. Causeless strife is a self-infliction.+ A man can hardly be involved in lawful strife without mental agitation, how much more when he strives without cause. When the four winds of heaven seem to meet upon the sea, the waters foam and toss in ceaseless agitation. The winds must cease to strive before the calm can come. A man involved in an unlawful quarrel is like such a troubled sea. Reason and passion, heaven and hell, contend within him for the mastery, and while the battle lasts he must be miserable. +III. Strife rarely ends with those who begin it.+ Man's relationship to his fellow renders it impossible for the results of his good or evil deeds to remain with himself alone. If the head of a family enters into a quarrel, the children will probably imbibe the spirit and suffer from the consequences. If kings and rulers involve a nation in unnecessary war, they bring needless suffering upon thousands of innocent people. This consideration alone ought to make men beware of entering into a quarrel. +IV. Causeless strife in the children of God gives a false representation of their Father's character.+ They are God's representatives upon earth, they are expected to fashion their lives upon the Divine model (Matt. v. 48). God is a God of peace (1 Thess. v. 23). His contention is only with sin, and its end is the establishment of peace upon earth by righteousness. _MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.--Verses_ 31-35. THE OPPRESSOR NOT TO BE ENVIED. The children of Wisdom are strongly tempted sometimes to do this. Like Asaph (Psalm lxxiii.), they see the prosperity of the wicked encompassed with pride, and clothed, as it were, with violence (verse 6), and they are tempted to say: "Verily I have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in innocency." Such a state of mind is--+I. Dangerous.+ It is the first step to becoming like him. Envy of the oppressor may result in "choosing his ways." A conviction that there is anything belonging to the oppressor that can be envied may lead to becoming oppressors ourselves.