Means and Ends Inseparably Connected
MEANS and ends are inseparably connected. If we neglect the means, we cannot reasonably expect to attain the end. The student who neglects his studies need not hope to become a scholar. The husbandman who refuses to till the soil cannot expect to gather a harvest. The man who lives in sin has no reason to believe he will receive the reward of obedience. Effects naturally and necessarily follow their causes. There can be no effect without a cause; and every effect must necessarily partake of the nature of the cause that produces it. “Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” Men are sowing now, and they will reap the fruit of their sowing hereafter. If they will but examine the seed they are sowing, they need not be in doubt as to the harvest they will reap. The means and the end, the cause and the effect, are inseparably linked together. It is acts that make history; it is acts, with the feelings and motives that prompt them, that determine destiny. We are now moulding characters for eternity. There is nothing so important to us as the impress we are giving them. What kind of a character are you forming?—Methodist Recorder.