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Isaiah 28:10

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Feb 4, 1875

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 45, No. 6.

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Isaiah 28:10.

By Jos. Clarke

“For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little.”
Here is the true secret of educating the human mind in all that is good; it is by constant effort, and continued labor. Evil in the heart, like weeds in the garden, needs no special aid; but all that is good, and useful, and holy, needs the skillful, industrious, persevering effort of the careful trainer.
The carnal heart is very retentive of evil and corruption; but memory does not perform her office so well when good is the lesson to be retained. It is truly wonderful how soon good and holy impressions and lessons are eradicated from the mind. To-day the human heart stands in the light of Heaven, and in the attitude of confidence and praise; but to-morrow, perhaps, the tables will be turned, and God be forgotten, like Saul, to-day a prophet among the prophets, and to-morrow a worldling in the race of self-gratification and worldly honor and gain.
The appetite and the carnal heart may seem to-day to be in complete subjection, and calm and holy feelings may rule the hour; but before to-morrow passes, there may be fierce struggles for the mastery, a victory or a defeat. But the Master saw it would be so, and he has instituted a system of education for men which meets all his wants. The fickle, changeable mind is firmly and surely drawn along by the hand of God, in a straight and narrow path, and is made firm and stable. For line is given upon line, and precept upon precept.
Sabbath after Sabbath offers its high and holy pleasures. Good books and periodicals are laid before us, fresh like the banquet of a king; and seasons of daily devotion, social and private, with meditation and prayer, and self-examination; all these are the varied means our Heavenly Father uses to draw our souls heavenward, and cause our thoughts to travel in high and holy paths among the bright and shining landscapes where angels dwell.
The Bible, the testimonies of the inspired writers, above all else, when sweetly attended by the Spirit of God, are the most powerful, and are the basis of all that is good in training the deluded mind of man in the channel of truth and purity, and freeing it from the webs of error, and the dust and smoke of tradition, and the filth of carnality.
Line upon line; great is the patience of the great Teacher. Well laid and skillful are his plans to deliver man from the arch foe. Let the weakest be of good courage.
Jos. Clarke.