Signs of Spiritual Decline.
WHEN you are averse to religious conversation or the company of pure-minded Christians; when from preference, and without necessity, you absent yourself from religious services; when you are more concerned about pacifying conscience than honoring Christ in obedience; when you are more afraid of being counted over-strict than of dishonoring Christ; when you trifle with temptation or think lightly of sin; when the faults of others are more a matter of censorious conversation than of secret grief and prayer; when you are impatient and unforgiving toward the faults of others; when you confess, but do not forsake sin; when you acknowledge, but still neglect duty; when your cheerfulness has more of a levity of the unregenerate than the holy joy of the children of God; when you shrink from self-examination; when the sorrows and cares of the world follow you further into the Sabbath than the savor and sanctity of the Sabbath follow you into the week; when you are easily prevailed upon to let your duty as a Christian yield to your worldly interest, or the opinions of others.—Sel.