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humor. Self-wise or purse-proud, they think the Church should come out to them, strain her dogmas and discipline to suit their advanced ideas and lofty station, invoke her God for them in polished phrases, and remove their moral leprosies by some means more dramatic than the humble confessional and the prosy devotions of the vulgar herd. Are not the rivers of Syria better than all the waters of Israel? Are not, say they, the cultivation of the arts and sciences and of letters and a high standard of culture more conducive to morality than the Church's tedious rites and ceremonies? Thus they would fain accept the essentials of religion without its accessories, and dictate to the Church and to the Lord which shall be and which shall not be the channels of His grace. They err, being wise in their own conceits, for says Samuel: " The Lord came, and a great wind rent the mountains before Him, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake, a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire, a still small voice and the Voice was the Lord." Just such a voice came to Naaman, now grown calm, when one of his officers approaching said: " Master, had the prophet asked something great of thee, all thy treasure, or some great achievement, thou hadst complied; why not do the little he asks?" It was the expression of his own better afterthought, and immediately turning he rode to the Jordan, where having washed seven times, his flesh was cleansed and restored as the flesh of a little child. So, too, sanctity