Probably, most religious men argue a diminishing sense of sin, because they feel that less is made of those consequences of sin which have been usually connected with the future life. There may be real danger here from shallow thinking; but here, too, the social consciousness has only to be true to itself to be saved from any shallow estimate of the consequences of sin here or hereafter. As the sin itself is always, finally, in personal relations, so the most terrible results of sin, in this life and in all lives, are in personal relations. What it costs the man himself in cutting him off from the relations in which all largeness of life consists, what it costs those who love him, what it costs God,--this alone is the true measure of sin. So judged, sin itself is feared as never before. Surely, Principal Fairbairn is right in saying: "And so even within Christendom, sin is never so little feared as when hell most dominates the imagination; it needs to be looked at as it affects God, to be understood and feared."[81] But it is the inevitable result of the social consciousness to bring us to the deepest conviction of all these personal relations, and so to the deepest conviction of sin. Another consideration deserves attention. We have a growing conviction that our social ideal is personally realized only in Christ, and we have given unequaled attention to that life and have such knowledge of it, in its detailed applications, as no preceding generation has ever had. This simply means that we have both such a sense of our moral calling, and are face to face with such a living standard, as must steadily deepen in us a genuine sense of real sin, in our falling so far short of the spirit of Christ. Theology needs, further, to make unmistakably clear, and to use the fact, that _this mutual influence of men holds for good_ as well as for evil; that few greater lies have ever been told, than the insinuation that only evil is contagious, the good not. And this conviction of the contagion of the good, of mutual influence for good, concerns theology particularly in three ways, all of which may be regarded simply as illustrations or aspects of the one kingdom of God. We are members one of another (1) in attainment of character, (2) in personal relation to God, and (3) in confession of faith. And each of these forms of mutual influence will need careful attention. In considering separately here attainment of character and relation to God, it is not meant for a moment to admit that separation of ethics and religion which has been already denied, but only to single out for distinct treatment the one most important and fundamental relation of life--relation to God. We are certainly never to forget that the indispensable condition of right relations to God, is that a man should have been won into willingness to share God's own righteous purpose concerning men. III. MUTUAL INFLUENCE FOR GOOD IN THE ATTAINMENT OF CHARACTER