This point is thus forcibly expressed by St. Paul (I Cor. vii: 32-34): "He who is unmarried is solicitous for the things of the Lord, how he may please God. But he who is married is solicitous for the things of the world, how he may please his wife; and he is divided. And the woman, unmarried and a virgin, thinketh on the things of the Lord, that she may be holy in body and soul. But she who is married, thinketh on the things of the world, how she may please her husband." The works of the religious orders are varied and numerous. Some care for the outcasts of society, some for the sick or the old, the orphan and the homeless; others, leaving the comforts and conveniences of modern life, cheerfully face the danger and hardships of remotest lands to bring the light of the Gospel to pagan nations. More than a million Chinese to-day are fervent Christians, and to whom do they owe their faith under God? To religious missionaries. The Benedictines of old spent their lives in the pursuit of learning, and in teaching barbarous tribes the art of husbandry. The glorious Knights Templar were a militant order; and the members of the Order of the Blessed Trinity for the redemption of captives, the first to wear our national colors of freedom, the red, white and blue, sold themselves into slavery for the release of others. Scarcely a want or need of the human race has not been provided for by some religious body. But probably the most common pursuit of religious bodies in our day is teaching. Hundreds of thousands of religious men and women, in all lands whence they are not banished, spend their lives in the class-room. And the reason for this preference is the extraordinary demand for schools in every direction. The young must be taught, and Holy Mother Church knows only too well that religious training must be woven into the fibre of secular learning if we would not have a conscienceless and irreligious generation. So she issues her stirring appeal for volunteer teachers, and a vast multitude of religious have responded in solid phalanx. Some one has said that if all the sisterhoods were taken out of our schools in the United States, we should soon have to close half our churches. Religious, then, are carrying on vast and important works for the benefit of the Church and society. Many other services which they render might be mentioned, such as preaching and hearing confessions, the publication of books and periodicals, the cultivation of the arts, science, literature and theology. But enough has been said to show that they are leading a strenuous life, and that boy or maid, who is emulous of heart-stirring deeds, could scarcely find a more propitious field of action than in the religious state. CHAPTER IX MUST I ACCEPT THE INVITATION?